Ford only have themselves to blame.

I noticed that there is not a ford badge to be seen on this seasons 888 cars, even on the grille.

Sad to see.

Looks like Ben Fitz may have to change brands.
Funny stuff.
Ford only started winning when they started buying Holden drivers.

Cat 55 - would like to know what you base that statement on

I think you'll find he's based it on the truth mate. Good to see that the prodigal son has returned.

So when was Marcos Ambrose a Holden driver??

Have you ever asked yourself why the "prodigal son" left - some of those truths will be interesting if you care to remember them

Don't assume anything

PS Craig Lowndes will never win a championship again, he had his chance and blew it

Good thing we'll be getting Whincup too then ;)

Who said Ambrose was ?
I'm glad he never was because he's a knob.
Ford DID only start winning races once they signed a few Holden drivers.
It took Ambrose a few seasons to win a couple of championships and not without help from AVESCO making the Holdens run Ford front suspension, and redesigned engines and aero packages.
The last two Ford Championship winners are both former Holden drivers.
I'm sorry if the truth offends you.

So just to clarify you said Ford only started winning when they bought Holden drivers. Yet Ford actually started winning with Marcos Ambrose who was never a Holden driver, it had nothing to do with them signing Holden drivers.

Let me list some of the Holden drivers signed by Ford and the reasons they were signed or bought so you claim (I'll stick with higher profile ones).

Craig Lowndes - was getting treated like shit by Holden, he wanted to do more marketing for them, they laughed at him, they went testing with out him. So he looked to find another drive - Holden Motorsport wouldn't let him go to another team so he went to Ford. They saw his marketing potential and paid him (probably over paid him looking at his results in hindsight)

Jamie Whincup - a number 2 driver in a bottom 50% team being treated like a number 2 with dodgy equipment - wanted better opportunities but Holden Motorsport didn't want him because he hadn't performed. 888 took a gamble and it paid off - he wants big $$$ ford don't want to give it to him so he and Roland instigated the Holden talks.

Russell Ingall - Perkins couldn't afford to pay him, and none of the Holden teams wanted him because he comes across as a bit of a fruit cake. Stones offered him a decent contract as their number 2, he was lucky to have Ambrose developing the cars for him and was lucky to win a championship because Holden couldn't keep their cars on the track.

Marcos Ambrose took 2 seasons in an AU before he won a championship - if you think that is bad you are hard to impress.

Actually the Ford suspension was a tonne better than the Holden suspension and the Holden teams wanted the Ford suspension. Redesigned aero was for parity and the redesigned engine was actually a Chev decision to no longer make the old engine components and therefore was going to be too expensive to make the components here.

Ambrose being a knob is personal opinion - but then I think Skaife, Tander, R Kelly, Murphy and Bargs are all knobs.

Lowndes 1st ever car was .....a FORD, and he still has it.

I have met Ambrose on a number of occasions and I must say I was not impressed.

I have met Skaife on a number of occasions and was equally unimpressed.

You will be hard pressed to find anyone with a bad word to say about Lowndes.

Ford has made a huge mistake in letting go of the dynamic duo as there just aint anyone left driving a Ford with personality that comes close to Lowndes.

The debates prompted around the web on this are all making me laugh :-) Some Ford fans are near suicide! its truely amazing!

Ford brought this on themselves.. a team has to survive somehow.

I know how the fordies feel in losing a good driver.. it was like this when Craig swapped teams. This is however, slightly different though.. the team is swapping manufacturers. The T8 team treats the drivers well and Holden are terating both an T8 team and the drivers well. Ford pulled their funding from the T8 team and gave the drivers less fringe opportunities (amazing considering how much Jamie Whincup has done for Ford's image).

We will no doubt find that Holden v Ford team numbers will even back-out somewhat.. I mean Holden will have to pull some funding from some other teams in order to give T8 what they need. Unfortunately this may see some smaller teams go completely rather than swap manufacturers. In the end, Holden will want to promote drivers who have more skill and give more wins in return (And there are not many as skillful as Whincup right now).

holden will dominate next season but i dont like the move because of holden really out numbering ford. 888 will still create customer cars for ford teams and PMM. there will b alot of riverly between tom and roland. i say kick out tom

According to Crenno at the time Lowndes was asking things of HSV/HRT that would make Schumacher blush.
He was/is the highest paid driver in the series and was even told by a magistrate when he tried taking Heaphy to court over aledged unpaid monies that he was greedy. Despite winning three Bathurst's his time at Ford hasn't really been as succesful IMO as his time at HRT, and like Crenno said at the time he'll feel like a bit of a dick if things don't work out at Ford.
Bet Lowndes is feeling a bit silly for doing his best to burn his Holden bridges.