The UK Border Agency has admitted that it will be keeping a closer eye on F1 after discovering a quantity of drugs on a transporter belonging to the Kawasaki Superbike team.

The Daily Telegraph reveals that on searching the two Kawasaki Racing Team trucks last month on their return from Italy, a substantial quantity of drugs and a handgun was discovered.

Four members of the Paul Bird Motorsport - the company which runs the Kawasaki team - were subsequently arrested on suspicion of firearms offences and importing controlled drugs, said to include 18lbs of cocaine and more than 220lbs of cannabis.

As a result of the discovery, the UK Border Agency has admitted that in future it will be paying closer scrutiny to all motorsport vehicles including F1 transporters.

"Our intelligence analysts will be looking much more closely at motorsport vehicles from now on, including Superbikes and even Formula One," a UKBA source told the Telegraph. "They have been pulled over very rarely and that will now change."

Way back in 2002, Mike Lawrence pointed out that drugs and motorsport, including F1 are hardly strangers.

Furthermore, while many scoffed when Nigel Mansell claimed that he had been recruited by the Intelligence Services in order to keep an eye on the F1 paddock since there was a strong suspicion that a team was funding its operation by importing hard drugs in its race transporters, the fact is that he was telling the truth. Said team and its then boss are no longer in F1.