F1 News, Reports and Race Results

Pertamina ends Manor sponsorship after Haryanto demotion

Pertamina - the state-owned Indonesian energy company - has opted to stop advertising on Manor's cars after Rio Haryanto lost his race seat.

Haryanto joined the team at the start of the season but has been replaced by Esteban Ocon for the rest of the year after his management was unable to pay the remaining instalment of funding to secure his seat. It is reported Haryanto still needed to pay in the region of €7.5million (£6.5m) to keep his drive,

Having had sponsorship on the Manor since the start of the year, Pertamina has now decided it no longer wants to be on the car with Haryanto now having been demoted to reserve driver.

“The Manor Racing team has offered to let us continue advertising on its cars," Pertamina spokeswoman Wianda Pusponegoro told The Jakarta Post. "However, we have decided to discontinue the advertising.”

The Indonesian government last week described the decision to drop Haryanto as "disappointing" after being told he was due to race for the entire season back in February.

Frenchman Ocon will make his F1 debut for Manor at the Belgian Grand Prix, which takes place from August 26-28.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.