It's impossible not to feel a little sad today, as Formula One prepares to say farewell to a couple of teams and characters.

Over the off-season BAR will quietly morph into Honda, giving Japan its second Formula One team. From the outset the BAR story seemed cursed, from the ludicrous 'tradition of excellence' slogan, through to claims that having won its first race in every series entered, Reynard would continue the 'tradition' in F1 with the Brackley team.

From the outset there has been controversy, from the dual livery through to the fuel tank saga, not to mention the bi-annual Button contract nonsense. With tobacco sponsorship being phased out, British American Tobacco's involvement in F1 could no longer continue, and it was clearly only a matter of time before Honda took control.

When Honda re-entered F1 in 2000, with BAR, it made no secret of the reason why it had returned; "we love racing," said F1 project leader, Takefumi Hosaka, and deep down we all know that it is true. Hopefully the Japanese ethic will kick in and the days of controversy will be left behind.

Jordan will be back in 2006, but will be known as Midland F1. However, rather than being unimaginatively named after a bus company, the Silverstone-based team will represent the combined businesses of Canadian-Russian Alex Shnaider.

Thankfully the yellow will be ditched - along with the Jordan name - and the millions of fans that revered Eddie Jordan's Irish outfit can end the period of mourning. The moment Eddie took the cheque and headed off to do whatever it is that multi-millionaires do, the team effectively ceased to be. Hopefully, with a new name, new livery - which will mean new sponsors - and the 'baggage' ditched, Midland F1 can move on. Though many in the F1 business remain pessimistic as to whether Shnaider will go the distance.

The loss of Minardi will come as a blow to all true F1 fans, for the little team from Faenza represented what many people still love about the sport, passion. In recent years Paul Stoddart has attracted much of the wrong type of publicity to the team, but in all honesty, if he hadn't stepped in a couple of years ago the Minardi dream would have ended even sooner.

We all have time for the underdog, and in F1 that underdog was always Minardi. The renaming of the team as Squadra Toro Rosso seems slightly patronising, but in many ways its good that the Minardi name has been laid to rest and the 'new' outfit can start from scratch. Dietrich Mateschitz has talked of keeping Gian Carlo Minardi on board, and the team will continue to operate out of Faenza, but this is the time to be saying farewell to Minardi, as we know it, a team that, if nothing else, brought so many talented drivers into F1. Looking up and down the pitlane, one wonders where young hopefuls will get their big break now.

Finally, it's goodbye to Sauber, which will become BMW, while team founder, Peter Sauber, heads off to the mountains to enjoy his fine wines and cigars. Like Minardi, Sauber has introduced many talented racers to F1, indeed motorsport, often completely bucking the trend.

Typically Swiss, the team got on with things quietly, never wanting a fuss. When Peter Sauber voted against Jean Todt last year, he was filled with remorse, and publicly apologized. One also remembers Peter's public grief back in 1994 when Karl Wendlinger was injured in Monaco, just two weeks after the deaths of Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger. At this point, who else remembers Norbert Haug, tears in his eyes?