Formula One News — December 2000

TAKUMA SATO became the youngest Japanese driver to test a Formula One car on Thursday when he was given a chance in a Jordan during testing at Jerez, Spain.

MICHELIN's latest assault on F1 honors looks extremely promising, if the first two days of testing at Jerez are anything to go by.

DaimlerChrysler boss and McLaren F1 supporter Jurgen Schrempp has been under pressure of late because of the company's poor performance and as a result of legal actions from former Chrysler shareholders, is clearly not too worried about life.

Alex Zanardi is planning to rebuild his racing career in the United States of America next year at the wheel of a Mo Nunn Racing Honda-Reynard.

WHILE the Brazilian Congress debates the future of tobacco advertising in the country and there are warnings from motorsport people in Brazil that the Grand Prix could be threatened if the new law is voted through, which seems to be the most likely outcome at the moment.

OUR spies in the United States of America are reporting that a deal is very close for the Minardi team to be sold to an American investment bank. If that happens we believe that both Gabriele Rumi and Giancarlo Minardi will be out of the sport and that an entirely new team will be put together using Minardi's signature of the Concorde Agreement as the foundation for a team which would be based in Britain.

DAVID COULTHARD has backed the decision to hold the British Grand Prix at Silverstone for the immediate future and promised to make it a hat-trick of victories in his home event next year.

LUCA BADOER continued Ferrari's preparations for the 2001 Formula One World Championship at Fiorano on Wednesday as he worked on new components and electronics.

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA underlined his competitiveness on Wednesday after the talented Colombian set the second fastest time of the day at a rain-soaked Jerez circuit.

WE hear whispers from Italy that Ferrari is about to recruit one of the top engineers from Tom Walkinshaw's Arrows team to help out with the engineering of Michael Schumacher's car next year.

JAGUAR RACING boss Bobby Rahal's bold prediction that Juan Montoya could take F1 by storm as the best driver of his generation was given added credibility yesterday when the 24-year old Colombian stunned the entire pit lane at Jerez Wednesday by posting the second fastest time of the day, 0.2sec behind Rubens Barrichello's Ferrari and ahead of David Coulthard's McLaren-Mercedes, on the second day of the first winter test session.

FERRARI - and its two customer teams Sauber and Prost - are poised to torpedo the proposal to reintroduce traction control to Grand Prix racing at Thursday's F1 Commission meeting in Monaco.

BRITISH AMERICAN RACING's new recruit Olivier Panis set a flying lap early on Thursday to clock the fastest time in testing at a rain-drenched Jerez.

YOUNG Finn Kimi Raikkonen was given his Formula One super licence by the Federation Internationale l'Automobile on Thursday and was immediately confirmed as a Sauber driver for the 2001 Formula One season.

REGULATORS of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange say that they have begun looking at whether to launch a formal investigation into share trading surrounding EM.TV.

YOUNG Finn Kimi Raikkonen has said he will not let the Federation Internationale l'Automobile's decision over his superlicence application affect his test with Sauber at Jerez.

WEDNESDAY morning brought no respite for EM.TV on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange as the company's shares dropped another 22% in the course of the morning trading, dipping under 7 Euros ($5.90) in value for the first time as investors continuing to push for a change of management at the company.

AS investors begin to take stock of the situation after the collapse of EM.TV's value, the investors in the Deutsche European Partners fund, which is run by Morgan Grenfell Private Equity, are trying to discover how much money the fund has lost as a result of its F1 involvement in the deal.

RUBENS BARRICHELLO has admitted he is not looking forward to the prospect of traction control in 2001 -- but admitted that the new rules will be fair to all.

JENSON BUTTON completed his first day in a Benetton at the Spanish circuit of Jerez on Tuesday and insisted his desire to succeed next year is even higher than in his debut season with BMW-Williams.

DAVID COULTHARD ended an impressive day of testing in Jerez, Spain on Tuesday as he took advantage of an empty track to set the fastest time in his McLaren.

The Frankfurt Stock Exchange has continued to punish Formula One shareholder EM.TV in the course of Tuesday after an enormous 40% drop in value on Monday.

According to sources in Germany Leo Kirch agreed to pay Thomas Haffa $550m for almost all of his 50% shareholding in Bernie Ecclestone's Formula One group of companies.

British American Racing has successfully scooped all the attention in F1 circles this week when it comes to the question of encouraging young drivers.

THOMAS HAFFA's EM.TV - or at the least the remains of it - is being threatened with legal action by some of its smaller investors who have lost large sums of money because of the company's collapsing share price in recent weeks.