Ferrari were ready to leave F1 - 9th February 19:29pm GMT

Bernie Ecclestone’s offer of a $100 million (about £54 million) sweetener saved Ferrari from walking out of Formula One. It would have been the unthinkable for millions of fans around the world, but Ferrari were on the brink of quitting the sport they helped to create more than 50 years ago, staggering under the weight of the soaring costs of winning.

The price of the long-term deal, binding Ferrari to Ecclestone’s Formula One until 2012, has been a bombardment of criticism and claims of a “sell-out” because it dumped Grand Prix World Championship (GPWC), the rebel manufacturers’ group aiming to found a rival series from 2008.

But Jean Todt, now promoted to managing director in charge of Ferrari’s Formula One team and the road car operations, told The Times that there was no question of betrayal. Instead, he warned the GPWC last year that Ferrari were simply facing harsh financial realities before the other nine teams and told them that their bargaining power with Ecclestone would lead to improved financial deals for the rest — if they follow. He believes that they will, with the poorer teams unable to wait until the GPWC’s promised motor racing nirvana in 2008, happy to take the cash now and ask questions later.

“Sooner or later, the reality and the logic will take over,” Todt said in his office at the heart of the Ferrari factory here. “I understand that, for some, it doesn’t make sense, but it will. We needed to agree the future for the sake of security. We couldn’t just go off blind in a new direction and it was up to us to secure the future of Ferrari inside Formula One.”

That assessment will do little to bridge the deep cavern between Ferrari and Formula One’s other nine teams. They remain convinced that the Scuderia are driven by the arrogance of success and the selfishness of a deal that will undoubtedly outstrip anything else on offer, even to the leading teams such as McLaren-Mercedes and BMW-Williams.

But Todt disclosed to The Times that a quarter of the Formula One team’s estimated £250 million budget comes from Ferrari’s road car company and hard questions were being asked as to whether the cost of success in Formula One was worth putting at risk the rest of the business. Although Todt denied that cash was the imperative in the deal, there seems little doubt that Ferrari needed to generate income now rather than wait for a theoretical payout from the GPWC.

“We are a small company and we have to cover the costs of Formula One,” he said. “We discussed very often leaving Formula One because it was costing too much money. Ferrari could have been in a position to stop being in Formula One. Yes, that is sure. The trend of the evolution of rising costs without extra revenues put the question on the agenda. At the end of the day, we have to act in the interests of Ferrari.”

It might have been a case of business before the pleasure of Formula One, but a new season starts in a month and Ferrari will turn up in Melbourne for the Australian Grand Prix more isolated from their peers than almost any team in sporting history.

Todt refuses to accept that the team is guilty of insularity, citing its willingness to discuss regulation changes and measures to cut costs across the board. But the chances are that it will be a long time before differences are settled. Todt will not say it, but he almost certainly allows himself the sneaking thought that jealousy of his team’s success has unnerved the rest.

“We did not win a championship for 21 years, but we did not complain,” he said. “We live in a world where there is too much pride, too much ego and too many personal fortunes and the sport is paying the price for it. I don’t care that nine other teams don’t agree with us because I know we are doing a good job. We should try to find more agreement and be more sensible . . .”

But with that, his sentence trailed away and Todt crossed his arms, seemingly resigned to a Formula One season that will be played out against a theme of them and us.