And then there were ten...

After half a year of uncertainty, Super Aguri have finally announced their withdrawal from the 2008 season. Aguri Suzuki said, after a meeting with the Honda board in Japan, "In order to realize my dream to become an owner of a Formula One Team, I applied for a grid position in the FIA Formula One World Championship in November 2005. Since then, I have participated in the championship for 2 years and 4 months with the Super Aguri F1 team, but regretfully I must inform you that the team will be ceasing its racing activities as of today." The team, which was originally set up by Honda to give Takuma Sato a drive, has struggled from the start by only just making the final cut into their first season in 2006. The team managed to overcome their original financial struggles and by 2007 secured a permanent second driver, Anthony Davidson, and things stated to look up for the Japanese squad with an improvement in their results. The 2007 Canadian Grand Prix was their strongest outing with Takuma finishing in 6th with his British team-mate heading for a 5th place before colliding with a groundhog. At the end of the championship they managed a 9th place constructors position beating the short-lived Spyker team and only just behind a severely under performing Honda (and helped by the exclusion of McLaren). Whilst preparing for their next season, however, their major 2007 sponsor, SS United, breached their contract and failed to payout any of the agreed deal plunging the team into the financial struggles seen at the beginning of the season. But what does this mean for the sport? With the races back down to only 20 drivers and teams with small budgets finding it harder and harder to start up a team with less people interested every month, it seems the FIA have to be more extreme with their cost-cutting plans. All hope for the two drivers may not be over however, with the team going into administration we might yet see a return by some of the core of the Japanese squad in 2009.