Tag Heuer Pulls Out as F1's Timekeeper

TAG Heuer, the official Formula One timekeeper for the last 12 years, has decided to pull out of the sport. A new timekeeper has yet to be announced.

Earlier this month TAG Heuer announced a new long-term deal with the IRL championship as the official timekeeper, and the company told Atlas F1 today that "to succeed in this new challenge and ensure total focus of its engineers and resources, TAG Heuer has decided to relinquish its FIA Formula One Timekeeping activity after 12 years of participation."

The company said its decision to pull out of Formula One did not affect the sponsorship agreement with the McLaren team.

With 15 days to go before the first round of the 2004 season, it remains unclear who will replace Tag Heuer as the official timekeeper. However, the sport's governing body, the FIA, said the announcement would not affect the Australian Grand Prix, which takes places on March 7th.

"Timekeeping arrangements are in place for Melbourne as usual, and an announcement will be made in due course," an FIA spokesperson told Atlas F1.

TAG Heuer was criticised after last year's Brazilian Grand Prix, when the race was stopped on what appeared to be the 55th lap, when Spaniard Fernando Alonso crashed into wreckage left by Australian Mark Webber's Jaguar and destroyed his Renault.

Italian driver Giancarlo Fisichella was leading at that stage in his Jordan and celebrated the win, before McLaren's Kimi Raikkonen was declared the winner because he had been in front two laps before the race was halted.

The results were revised a few days after the race, when an internal FIA investigation discovered the timekeeper had erroneously rolled back the results by one lap, and Fisichella was confirmed as the winner.