Failed F1 Teams

It was sad yesterday that Super Aguri had to call it a day.

They had some great moments during their short tenure - the greatest possibly being Takuma Sato overtaking Fernando Alonso in Canada last year - and will be missed by many F1 fans around the world.

Super Aguri may have only scored four points during their F1 career, but compared to this lot below, they were titanic heroes:

Connew Racing Team
A Surtees design engineer set this team up and built his own cars. They competed in two races, but failed to start the first or finish the second.

Amon
Driver Chris Amon decided to start a team and build his own ambitious car in 1974. It first appeared at the Spanish GP where it retired. It then failed to qualify for the next six races, after which the team closed down.

Gulf Rondini Racing
These guys managed to qualify last and finish 14th at the German GP in 1975. They took part in three more races - finishing 18th in Monza - and were never heard from again.

Andrea Moda Formula
Italian shoe maker Andrea Sassetti bought a team in 1991, which was immediately excluded from its first race for failing to stump up the new team deposit. Their second driver was there simply to make up the numbers - he rarely got chance to qualify - and Sassetti was later arrested in the Belgian paddock for allegedly forging invoices. The FIA eventually excluded the team for bringing the series into disrepute.

Derrington-Franci Racing Team
Stirling Moss's old mechanic Alf Francis started a team in 1964 in time for the Monza GP, lasting 25 laps. The one and only chassis was then destroyed in testing and the car disappeared (not literally).

Eifelland Wohnwagenbau
Team owner Gunther Henerici made a fortune selling caravans to Germans and entered F1 in 1972. The car appeared eight times before the caravan business was sold, and that was that.

Protos
The Protos team was actually a Formula 2 squad, but qualifies for this list as the 1967 German GP was run concurrently with that year's F2 race.

Spyker F1
The Dutch supercar manufacturer Spyker bought the ailing Midland F1 squad in 2006, but sold it again at the end of 2007 due to lack of funds. They were rubbish.

Token
A couple of businessmen bought a car from Ron Dennis's Rondel squad in 1974 that competed in four races. And that was that.

Apollon
The Jolly Club of Switzerland acquired a Williams FW03 in 1977 that was hopelessly off the pace at its one and only Grand Prix in Italy.

I've deliberately missed a bunch out, so be sure to send in your favourite rubbish teams using the handy comments form below...

source: Top Gear