Dodgy Business

Just imagine you are Max Mosley. You have before you the entries for the 2008 Formula One World Championship. Bernie Ecclestone says he wants 12 teams. The current 11 have all entered and one slot is left. There's an entry from Paul Stoddart under Minardi European F1 Team and there's one from a new outfit, Saddam Hussein's International Team (S.H.I.T for short). Which one to take?

There's a little rider that went along with the entry form. It provides that all entries are accepted at the sole discretion of the FIA. Which might just be a problem for Stoddart.

If you thought that Stoddy had sold Minardi to Dietrich Mateschitz, I'm sorry, so did I, but apparently he sold Red Bull the PS05s and the Faenza factory while retaining the naming rights to Minardi and the 2004-spec PS04Bs. In terms of continuing to own what you appear to have sold, Stoddy has obviously learned from the commercial rights holder!

When Stoddart walked out of the Shanghai paddock last October he did so with a heavy heart, he said. Would he be back? Never say never. The more cynically minded pointed out he had heavy pockets as well, stuffed full of Mateschitz's dough. Good business, they reckoned. And now he was off to concentrate on OzJet as it tried to carve a niche in the market with cut-price business flights between Sydney and Melbourne.

Stoddart is an interesting bloke who has had the nous to make money from his personal interests. He started as a car dealer and moved up a league when, through a contact, he got to buy up a job lot of BAC1-11s that were surplus to the requirements of the Australian Air Force. He figured on making a quick buck by flogging them on to charter operations but apparently had so many offers that he started looking into the business himself.

At the time Tasmania was the only state of Australia that permitted gambling and Stoddy started to make good money shunting punters back and forwards for a bit of R&R. He then branched out into VIP charter.

Paul Stoddart © LAT

OzJet's recent venture, though, was less successful and suspended its flights this month after just four months in the air. OzJet will continue with its charters, but as for the cut-price business deals, Stoddy has been left to swallow a loss.

"We've given it four months and we said we'd give it six," he told the Australian media. "But we can see that the forward-booking trend that traditionally comes after the Australia Day holiday when business gets back to work, just hasn't happened for us."

How much has he had to wipe his mouth for?

"It's an eight figure number," he admits. So, best case scenario, 10 million Oz dollars, a tad over $7 million USD. "We had unbelievable support before the launch, but it just did not translate into bums on seats."

Stoddart denies that it's the OzJet problems that have prompted him to turn his sights back to F1.

"Truth is," he told me from Melbourne, "I've always loved racing, and one of the biggest problems I've got is keeping the bloody phone switched off so that I can watch the races before someone tells me what happened.

"But would I like to get back into F1? Yes. Could I do it? Yes. I have the premises and I still have staff. Will I get the opportunity? Let's see how it goes."

Stoddart, of course, was hugely outspoken against the FIA president last year, egged on by team principals with major manufacturer affiliations who could not be seen to be saying what they wanted said. But that's not to say he was a puppet. Stoddart would only say something if he felt it. Still, he could end up paying for it. His fight with Mosley became personal and there weren't too many FIA blue shirts at his leaving barby...

It's ironic that Mosley's $100 million USD budget plans open the door to Stoddart's return. As an entrepreneur, Stoddart will not be slow to appreciate the potential of one of F1's 12 confirmed entries.

If it really is going to be so much cheaper to take part in the world's only global, fixed-event, 18 times a year sport/marketing opportunity (delete as applicable), then one of the 'franchises' as well as allowing him to go racing again, would also become a highly saleable commodity. Especially if F1 gets its house in order and improves itself for the good of all.

A respected paddock figure told me recently that he considers F1 is far too much like a gentleman's club. He thinks that new ideas and new blood are needed in many areas for it to realise its potential. But a gentleman's club, he reiterated, is what it still is. We don't need to get into the rights and wrongs of the FIA having rights of veto over F1's competitors, but I did wonder what Stoddart thought of his chances?

"It depends how it goes," he said. "There's obviously the relationship with Max to overcome..."

There is a suggestion that if any existing team was denied entry to the 2008 championship, they might seek legal recourse claiming restraint of trade. Which is one reason why all the teams have entered, sharpish, even if they are still negotiating on the commercial terms and the rules of the game.

David Richards © XPB/LAT

You could hardly claim such a thing if you hadn't entered in the first place. But Stoddart is not a current competitor and so you would assume that he could have no issue if he didn't get an entry. But, knowing him, it was worth asking. His response was level, measured and more acquiescent than expected.

"It really depends on how many boxes we tick," he said. "If the FIA allocates entries to people better positioned than us, I've got no problem. But we could be testing within a fortnight, we've got the credibility of having done it before, and if the budgets come down to the level that Max is talking about, then I'm damned sure we can be competitive."

I asked what he'd heard on the grapevine, about other potential entries, such as David Richards' Prodrive team.

"DR's more qualified than us, no argument there," Stoddart said, "But if a GP2 or a Euro F3000 team, one without any structure or street cred, got an entry ahead of us, then you might have to ask why."

After the Red Bull sale, Stoddart retained his Ledbury premises in the UK and has staff running his two-seater programme, which is much bigger than many appreciate. He had 10 of the things racing on the GP Masters programme at Kyalami last November and the first event of the 2006 programme, not unnaturally, was in Melbourne this week.

Mangalore Airport was the venue and no fewer than 65 passengers, a one-day record, were flung around a 2.65km-course by Zsolt Baumgartner as Stoddart continued his initiative of 'bringing F1 to the public'. Rides were often prizes in OzJet promotions and one well-heeled individual apparently donated more than £10,000 GBP for the privilege at a charity auction.

"I think I'd pay £10,000 GBP not to have to climb into an F1 car with Zsolt Baumgartner..." a mate of mine said, somewhat uncharitably, before asking whether I thought Stoddy would get an entry.

If someone opens a book on it, don't stake your house, I said. To Mosley, Stoddart was a man who went OTT and made a noise inversely proportional to his significance. You really do feel that Max would rather take an entry from Saddam himself.

But to many others Stoddart was accommodating, feisty and straight-talking. A character. And manna to a journalist, of course. One even described him as the most quotable figure to have walked the paddock since Mario Andretti. And that was good, even if it wasn't the best reflection on either the PC nature of the modern day driver or, indeed, the direction the sport has gone. But, hell, someone has to say something interesting!

Will Stoddy make it back, or won't he? I'll give you 2-1 against. But the ceiling is five quid. I'm not a rich man and this is a strange business...