HRT: Lowndes led astray by "difficult third party"
4/11/2000 4:12 (V8 Wire - Jason Whittaker) - Still reeling from the shock news their biggest star has walked out on them, the Holden Racing Team has spoken about their frustration and disappointment over the way in which the Craig Lowndes saga was played-out leading to yesterday’s surprise announcement.
Lowndes has turned his back on HRT, and they're not happy...
Pic: Michael Shaw
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In a right-of-reply statement released late yesterday, the Factory Holden outfit spoke of its dismay in the way in which Lowndes provided false hope to a team keen on retaining his services, and slammed his defection conspirators for making the negotiation process far more difficult than it needed to be.
Craig Lowndes ended a six-year relationship with the Factory-owned franchise by announcing his resignation yesterday. HRT first heard of his decision after receiving a statement from Lowndes’ lawyers.
“In the past three weeks during a number of meetings, we were given every indication that Craig wished to stay with the team, and he also conveyed those thoughts in recent press articles,” the HRT statement explained.
“Naturally HRT is very disappointed at this news, particularly if – as it has been alleged by many calls to our office today – that he will drive for a Ford team in 2001.”
The timing of the announcement – a fortnight before the team will attempt to win a Championship crown for Mark Skaife at the FAI 1000 – and the manner in which it was made, disappointed team management. HRT purport they were more than accommodating during the negotiation process.
But the biggest frustration from the team’s perspective was working with Lowndes’ “difficult” negotiation team, who had undue influence over the process according to HRT – unreasonable at the negotiation table and ignorant to the conditions of any deal.
“The most awkward part of the entire process over the past five months for HRT's management is that Craig left everything to his lawyer and we cannot begin to tell you how frustrating that has been – dealing through difficult third parties, who have no understanding of our sport,” the statement said.
“At one stage we even began to wonder whether Craig's lawyer was going to turn up at race meetings to drive his car for him!”
Media reports suggest Lowndes’ legal team were demanding a significant salary hike – upwards of $400,000 – to remain with the team, and a greater slice of the marketing and merchandising pie.
While Lowndes continued to state publicly he wanted to drive for HRT next year, it is believed he was being advised he could take greater advantage of his popularity elsewhere.
Lowndes described it in his solicitor-prepared statement as taking, “more control of our (his and his wife’s) destiny."
“Our hope now is that he and those close to him, start to realise his single most important focus is racing cars, and not all the peripheral and secondary money, management and merchandising issues that have taken up all his time, energy and attention over the past twelve months,” HRT’s statement said.
With Lowndes out of the picture, the team will seek the services of a new co-pilot for Mark Skaife as soon as possible.
“During all these negotiations, HRT has been very single-minded on ‘not playing the field,’ deciding instead to concentrate on trying to get Craig to continue with the team. Following Bathurst, we shall devote our energies into a replacement driver,” their statement said.
Meanwhile, Lowndes has stated while he’d rather not sever his ties with General Motors, a switch to the rival Ford camp is not out of the question.
“We would love to stay with Holden because they have supported me from day dot, but we have shut one door now and we will see how many will open,” Lowndes said.
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