Formula One News — May 1999

THE Formula 1 teams split up last week and went off to prepare for Monaco at a variety of different circuits around Europe. Ferrari and Minardi were in action at Fiorano; McLaren and Prost ran at Magny-Cours; Benetton tested at Barcelona, although the track was modified with some traffic cone chicanes; Jordan shared Lurcy-Levis with the Honda F1 operation and Williams, Stewart, BAR and Sauber went to the Circuit Paul Armagnac at Nogaro, in south-west France. Only the Arrows team did no testing at all, the cars running only at a shakedown test at the Santa Pod drag strip in England.

THE outgoing European Union Competition Commissioner Karel Van Miert says that he is coming to the end of his investigation into Formula 1 racing and that the Commission will be ruling on the matter shortly. Van Miert is due to leave office in September but intends to settle the battle with F1 before he goes.

FORMULA 1 engineers often dream about running their cars in full-scale windtunnels but such ideas are enormously expensive and to date only Ferrari has the capability to do that - although there is expected to be a 100% rolling road windtunnel at the new McLaren factory.

ALAIN PROST has asked the investment bank Credit Suisse First Boston to develop the team's international financial strategy. What this means is that Prost is looking at ways of raising money - either from an initial public offering or from the sale of a minority shareholding in the team to a financial institution or venture capitalist.

RENAULT's top management may be busy trying to sort out the problems of Nissan but there is no doubt that at Renault Sport in Viry-Chatillon there is a strong desire among the remaining staff to return to Grand Prix racing. The danger is that if Renault does nothing the entire F1 team of the early 1990s will be broken up. Already BMW and Toyota have picked up disgruntled members of the Renault Sport team and more are likely to follow in the months ahead.

IN the last few days we have heard increasing whispers of big changes coming at Benetton Formula. The Enstone team has won only one race in the last three years and is not looking likely to win this season. The young drivers - Giancarlo Fisichella and Alexander Wurz - are becoming frustrated and the team has lost a lot of personnel to British American Racing. In addition the team looks likely to be stuck without a factory engine until the end of the year 2000 - and maybe longer.

Finland's Mika Salo is expected to drive for BAR at Monaco as Ricardo Zonta is unlikely to be able to test for the team this week and so it is wiser that the F1 rookie waits another couple of weeks before making a proper comeback and leaves Salo to tackle Monaco with the team.

Arrows team boss Prince Malik promised "a big surprise" from the team at Imola with the countdown on the side of the car coming to an end, but the announcement sent few ripples of interest through the F1 paddock.

There have been some interesting rumors circulating in recent days which suggest that BAR shareholder Jerry Forsythe is casting around the F1 paddock looking to buy a shareholding in a second Grand Prix team.

A year ago Sauber came close to doing an engine deal with Supertec, with the intention of running the French engines badged as Sauber Petronas V10s. In the end the deal was not signed as Supertec agreed deals with Williams, Benetton and British American Racing.

BMW Motorsport has hired one of the top engine designers from Cosworth Racing's team at Northampton. Alan Cowell was one of the team working on the exciting Ford CR-1 V10 engine under chief designer Nick Hayes and while the men at Cosworth are keen to play down just how important Cowell was in the program, there is no doubt that he is a key figure.

The Ford Motor Company has announced that it will not be supplying engines to other teams next year, which means that Minardi is going to have to look elsewhere for an engine deal. "We are in racing to win, not just to compete," said Ford's Martin Whitaker, who also announced that Ford will be giving Cosworth more support next year to concentrate everything on Stewart Grand Prix.

British American Racing could pull off one of the biggest coups in Formula 1 in recent years if the board of directors at the Honda Motor Corporation in Japan gives its blessing to a proposed engine supply deal for the 2000, 2001 and 2002 seasons.