Swedish lady codriver Tina Thorner has been cited as the reason why Saudi Arabia's planned Middle East championship rally (to run 7-9 April) has been dropped from the FIA's regional series. Saudi Arabia's long established ban on lady drivers meant the organisers could not accept the entry by reigning champion Nasser Al Attiyah, who told the organisers that Tina was contracted to be his codriver for the year and he had to be compensated if Tina was banned from taking part. Already plans to run the Ha'il cross country event as an FIA series event were dropped because two women codrivers could not take part. The Saudi Arabian federation reluctantly applied for the event to be withdrawn from the MERC series and allowed to run instead as a non-championship event. The Sharqia Rally in Saudi Arabia has been plagued with problems, highlighted in 2008 when the leading car was sabotaged in the overnight parc ferme.

Ironically, Al Attiyah does not know at this time the future of his rally programme, on account of unknown consequences of the decision by Mitsubishi Motor Corporation to withdraw forthwith from all Dakar and cross-country events. Mitsubishi have won 12 Dakar Rallies, including seven consecutive victories between 2001-2007.

On Wednesday, Mitsubishi reported a quarterly loss and said its annual result will plunge into the red for the first time in three years. Japan's fourth-largest carmaker said its group net loss will amount to 60bn yen in the fiscal year through March 2009. Honda, which has forecast huge losses, withdrew from Formula One to reduce costs amid a slump in global car sales. Their departure from F1 was quickly followed by the withdrawal of rival carmakers Subaru and Suzuki from the world rally championship. Japanese motorcycle maker Kawasaki also followed suit last month by pulling out of motorcycling's MotoGP championship.

3mmm