ART Grand Prix submitted 2011 F1 application

[Dr. Krogshöj]

I haven't seen this in any thread, but if I missed it, I'm sure the mods will take appropriate action. Anyway, according to AutoHebdo, ART Grand Prix, the most successful team in GP2 and the F3 EuroSeries submitted an application to the 2011 season. The team is co-owned by Frédéric Vasseur and Nicolas Todt. They're based in France.

My ideal solution would be ART getting the 13th grid slot and Epsilon Euskadi taking over the Hispania team. Epsilon is a respectable outfit and José Ramón Carabante would be better off backing them rather than the current HRT effort. My respect goes out to everyone who works for them, becuase it must be a hell of an effort, but Adrian Campos and co. screwed this operation up beyond repair in my opinion.

Original story: http://www.autohebdo.fr/f1/f1/article-25-25-3920/130510-art-grand-prix-vise-la-f1-en-2011

In English: http://f1.gpupdate.net/en/formula-1-news/234532/art-grand-prix-submits-2011-f1-application/

[I am evil Homer]

No you see that's the sort of calibre team that should be applying not chancers like Stefan GP and NTechnology. ART is a great team...however could Todt's involvement be a conflict of interest?

[jens]

It's actually a bit surprising that a team as successful as ART is going to take such gamble to join F1 after seeing all new teams struggling now. What I mean is that if such professional organization would ever take a gamble for F1, they should have a pretty good plan and idea, what to do, because for sure they don't aim to be hopeless backmarkers just to make up the numbers. However, if they are chosen - Bianchi for one of the seats in 2011 presumably? Oh, and somehow I guess they'd get Ferrari engines too.

[ioan]

This will be a difficult situation to handle for Jean Todt given his son's involvement with ART.
I think that he will have to give the slot to Epsilon Euskadi, who are also a highly deserving applicant.

[I am evil Homer]

Agreed...I think that Nicolas would need to leave ART for this to happen. As deserving as the may be conflict of interest suspicions will always arise.

Jens - possibly it is a massive step up from having a customer car and running that well to having your own team and everything that entails.

[Nikki Katz]

I don't see any real issue with Nicolas Todt being a team owner while his father is head of the FIA. Well, I mean I do, but I probably feel no worse about Jean than I did before. And whatever I say about him, he has to date been much better than Mad Max...