Motorsport: Suzuki's decision to quit the world rally championship (WRC) and Honda's recent shock pullout from Formula One will cause the entire motorsport industry concern, Subaru team boss David Richards said today.
"All forms of motorsport, and not just the world rally championship, have to be concerned about the manufacturer involvement currently," the former world rally supremo said.
"Whilst manufacturers are under such financial pressures in the normal marketplace, any discretionary spend is going to be avoided if at all possible."
Suzuki, who entered the full championship only this year after graduating from the junior series, said they were suspending their activities due to the global economic crisis.
Japan's second largest mini-car maker, whose Hungarian unit last month laid off 1,200 of its 5,523 workers due to a drastic drop in orders, said the shrinking market for vehicles was unlikely to be just a short-term phenomenon.
Rally Ireland is due to host the prestigious opening stage of the 12-race WRC series from January 28th-February 1st, 2009.
Earlier this month Honda announced that they were pulling out of Formula One, walking away in the face of slumping sales and shrinking share prices.
Rallying does not have anything like the budgets of Formula One, where a team like Honda can burn through €365million a year, and the sport also has a long-standing tradition of private entrants.
However Suzuki's exit leaves just world champions Citroen, Subaru and Ford chasing the manufacturers' title next year. Ford is one of the Detroit Big Three seeking a bailout from the US government while Citroen have announced job cuts in France.
"When I was competing there were two manufacturers," said Richards, who was a world championship-winning co-driver with Finland's Ari Vatanen in 1981. "It was Ford against Fiat in those days and it was still great competition.
"The rallies themselves are populated by numerous private competitors, we (his Prodrive company) ourselves support hundreds of private Subarus around the world and in fact participating in the world championship this year will be a number of them.
"So it's not purely about the manufacturers and it should never be considered as that," he added.
"It (Suzuki's departure) is disappointing for the short term for the championship whilst it restructures itself for 2010 onwards," said Richards.
Like Formula One, rallying is trying to slash costs with the championship reduced to 12 races from 15 next year and switching to a super 2000 specification from 2010 to make the sport more accessible.
Richards said Citroen, Ford and Subaru were all assessing their participation in the championship on an ongoing basis and nothing could be taken for granted in the current climate.
"It is beholden to motorsport to get its own house in order and make sure that motorsport programmes are cost effective and give good value for money so manufacturers see it as a positive way of investing their marketing spend," he said.
Rallying also has a problem that Formula One experienced not so long ago, that of one dominant driver and team making the outcome of races so predictable that spectator interest starts to wane.
Formula One had it with now-retired Michael Schumacher, who won five titles in a row with Ferrari between 2000 and 2004.
Rallying has Citroen's Frenchman Sebastien Loeb, who ended this year with his fifth successive championship and a record 11 wins from 15 starts.
"You can't complain about Sebastien," said Richards. "He's one of the best drivers that we have ever seen come along and he demonstrated that in the Race of Champions over the weekend (the event at London's Wembley stadium which Loeb also won).
"He's extraordinary but that's something else we have to face up to."