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**FotoCihasWewb** · 03-27-2012, 04:19 AM

Manufacturers can be absolutely astonishing in their incompetence when it comes to motorsport, can't they? In the old days, Ford certainly 'got' motorsport, as had BMC before that, but look at Ford's motorsport record in the last 30 years and it's pretty woeful. Is this the result of bean-counters taking over from motorsport people? Then there are the Japanese, whose efforts either seem to have been brilliant or laughable. My favourite example of all is Nissan with the Sunny GTiR rallying project. Team principal Dave Whittock recalled a few years ago how the Japanese engineers' preparation for the 1991 Safari, the team's first WRC event, largely involved putting cigarette packets in potholes to measure their depth. Then when Whittock told the Nissan bosses that a victory first time out on the Safari was unlikely, they seemed to lose interest in the whole programme.

I don't think you can lump together an entire nation in one grouping. Nissan's recent WRC attempts may have been poor but IIRC they had a Fairlady Z do well in the Safari back in the '70s didn't they? I don't think the Japanese are any better or worse than the Germans or Americans. BMW may not get motorsport but the VW group (when they can be bothered) have done very well with ALMS or F3 and Mercedes have not done badly either.

Frankly for BMW I think the issue comes down to not being very capable dealing closely with an outside party. Their incompetence in this respect is not limited to motorsport. Their takeover of Rover reads like a slapstick comedy while their motorbike division is suffering from appalling quality issues due to increasing reliance on their Chinese suppliers and failure to ensure quality in their partners. Then their choice to take over RR was interesting to say the least when historically Bentleys outsold the luxury marque 3:1.

03-27-2012, 04:19 AM	#12
FotoCihasWewb Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 374 Senior Member	Manufacturers can be absolutely astonishing in their incompetence when it comes to motorsport, can't they? In the old days, Ford certainly 'got' motorsport, as had BMC before that, but look at Ford's motorsport record in the last 30 years and it's pretty woeful. Is this the result of bean-counters taking over from motorsport people? Then there are the Japanese, whose efforts either seem to have been brilliant or laughable. My favourite example of all is Nissan with the Sunny GTiR rallying project. Team principal Dave Whittock recalled a few years ago how the Japanese engineers' preparation for the 1991 Safari, the team's first WRC event, largely involved putting cigarette packets in potholes to measure their depth. Then when Whittock told the Nissan bosses that a victory first time out on the Safari was unlikely, they seemed to lose interest in the whole programme. I don't think you can lump together an entire nation in one grouping. Nissan's recent WRC attempts may have been poor but IIRC they had a Fairlady Z do well in the Safari back in the '70s didn't they? I don't think the Japanese are any better or worse than the Germans or Americans. BMW may not get motorsport but the VW group (when they can be bothered) have done very well with ALMS or F3 and Mercedes have not done badly either. Frankly for BMW I think the issue comes down to not being very capable dealing closely with an outside party. Their incompetence in this respect is not limited to motorsport. Their takeover of Rover reads like a slapstick comedy while their motorbike division is suffering from appalling quality issues due to increasing reliance on their Chinese suppliers and failure to ensure quality in their partners. Then their choice to take over RR was interesting to say the least when historically Bentleys outsold the luxury marque 3:1.
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