Analysis: Panis Retirement a Bleak Day for France

The significance of Olivier Panis's impending retirement will not be lost on French Formula One fans.

The very birthplace of Grand Prix racing, whose language runs through the sport from chassis to parc ferme, now risks being without a Formula One driver for the first time since 1965.

Panis, 38, has been holding the fort since crowd-pleaser Jean Alesi retired at the end of 2001 but the oldest driver on the starting grid announced at the Italian Grand Prix on Thursday that his time had come.

The winner of a memorable 1996 Monaco Grand Prix, and veteran of 155 races to date, said he would hang up his helmet after next month's final Brazilian Grand Prix to move to a test and reserve role with his Toyota team.

It will be a poignant farewell, even if the Grenoble racer has not scored many points in recent seasons, and also a sobering one. The man who has for so long been one of the biggest optimists in the paddock could find few rays of hope for his compatriots on Thursday.

"If someone had told me 10 years ago that there would be no French drivers left, I would not have believed them to be honest," Panis told Reuters. "It's a shame. After the laws changed in France it became very difficult to find a way into Formula One and to find sponsors."

Since Panis made his race debut in 1994, France has introduced strict legislation banning sponsorship and advertising by the tobacco and drinks companies that had helped French drivers on the road to success.

Montagny Hope

"Now is a very bad time for French drivers," continued Panis. "We have Franck Montagny and maybe if Renault try to help him and support him, he could have a chance. At the moment, I think he is the only hope.

"It's very bad for the whole French nation. I think the Federation is working very hard to try and find a way for some French drivers to come back to Formula One in the future but I have no idea how long it will take."

Montagny, the Renault test driver this season, will not find a seat with the French carmaker next year but there have been suggestions that team boss Flavio Briatore could seek to place him with Minardi.

However money may prove too big an obstacle.

Apart from that, there are few openings with even established drivers such as McLaren's David Coulthard still unsure of what the future holds.

It is all a far cry from the not-so-distant past when four times World Champion Alain Prost was in his pomp and France could boast as many, if not more, drivers than any country.

Through the ages there have been Gallic challengers, from Jean Behra and Maurice Trintignant in the 1950s through to Guy Ligier in the 1960s followed by Jean-Pierre Beltoise, Francois Cevert and a string of racers in the 1970s and 80s.

When the first Formula One race was held at Silverstone's former World War Two airfield in 1950, two French drivers finished in the top five. France has held a Grand Prix in every year, bar one, since then.

Twenty years ago, there were seven Frenchmen in the Championship; Jacques Laffite, Prost, Philippe Alliot, Patrick Tambay, Philippe Streiff, Francois Hesnault and Rene Arnoux.

Lowest Point

"This is the lowest point," Laffite, now a commentator for French television, admitted on Thursday.

"Maybe Montagny or (Sebastien) Bourdais has a chance with Minardi or Jordan," added the winner of six races between 1974 and 1986. "But this is life. We had seven or eight drivers at every race in the 80s. After that it was the Italians who had big numbers and now there are not so many.

"To arrive in Formula One now is not like it was 20 or 30 years ago. I hope Renault will give us the chance to have some new drivers in Formula One, but they need money to start out and it is very difficult."