Q. Is Chad Hurley still on board, because there are stories that he doesn't speak to you, that he has left – then we hear he is still there. We also hear rumors that Peter Windsor has left, and then that he is back again?
KA: The situation is that nobody has left anybody. Everybody is still on board. We were exploring different options – we weren't calling the press to say, 'Hey, we are going to talk to Campos.' We tried to keep it under wraps a little bit.
We chat to Chad every day, and he has been great. Chad did everything he said he was going to do. He put the money in. He got us to where we could go racing. He never agreed to sponsor the team – and as you can imagine that is a pretty significant number in itself. As of January 15, we were right on course for where we said we were going to be. But then when the stuff did not show up, then the warning bells started sounding. I scrambled to keep it together, but I just couldn't do it quick enough.
Peter has now gone back to England, but he lives there. He has stayed in a hotel here for the last three months. We are well and truly on hold until we hear from the FIA, because there really is nothing we can do. There is no point spending a lot of money finishing the car if they say no, and if they say yes then we can have everybody back by the end of the week.
Q. You say Peter has gone back to England. Is he still part of US F1? Is he still a director of the company?
KA: Yes. Nothing has changed. We explored all options to fulfill our obligation to be in Bahrain, and those options were obviously partnering up with Campos, because they had Dallara cars and our car was going to be a little late. But it didn't work out. We both have Cosworth engine contracts, we both have entries, so there was nothing we had that they needed that bad. So it didn't happen.
We talked to Stefan GP, but that didn't come to anything. We explored everything so that we could not be accused of not trying, but at the end of the day you have to do what makes business sense.
The most sensible thing right now is not to be running around like a bunch of headless chickens trying to make the fifth race, or something like that – and then not being able to test and look even worse. So we need to regroup, get it right and come out stronger in 2011.
Q. As part of your bid to stay on the grid, I understand you went to Toyota to look at their cars?
KA: Toyota heavily invested in that car, and didn't want to stop doing that [work]. But they didn't really know, if Toyota was laying off a bunch of people, where next year's car was going to come from. So that would not be anything other than a short-term solution. Plus, we had a deal with Cosworth – and there wasn't an option to break that deal. So there was really nothing we could do with the Toyota deal at the time.
Q. You spoke to former Toyota F1 boss John Howett two weeks ago. What was that about?
KA: We were just exploring all the options of being in Bahrain, and it just didn't seem feasible. It was a lot of money and we didn't have that kind of money to really throw around. And I'm not sure what deal Zoran Stefanovic had with them.
Q. What do you say to Bernie Ecclestone's comments as saying that US F1 is finished? Have you heard from him recently?
KA: I haven't. We got to him when we were trying to put something together with Campos. Bernie has always been great, he has been very supportive, very gracious and has always tried to help. I read the same things in the press as everybody does, but I don't know. Bernie is Bernie!
Q. What do you think your chances are of getting the concession from the FIA that you are after? Can you put a percentage on it?
KA: I've never really thought of it in a percentage way. I would say more from a practicality standpoint – we did everything we said we would do in regard to our application to the FIA, to the point of something outside of our hands caused us not to be able to bring it home.
We said we would build a certain facility, design and build the car in-house, and we are a proper F1 team. The schedule was so tight, and we overcame a couple of speed bumps on the way, but the last couple were just insurmountable for this year. We can easily do it for next year. We have come this far and we are fully capable of designing and building a car. What we would do now is make changes for the 2011 car, as there is no point in building the 2010 car. We would start on the 2011 car now, and I know what most of the changes would be anyway.
If they don't allow us to come in 2011 and they shut us down, then I assume they will open the selection process again. And I don't know who else out there has what we have already done.
So I've never thought about it in terms of percentage. I would think 90 percent! I think America is a big market, and we have shown that by investing in the building, the people and the equipment, that we have the staying power. We are not just having another company make a car for us. I think that has always been our plan, even before a cost cap or a resource restriction agreement came to light.