Formula One News — July 2002

Alain Prost is planning to try his hand at sports car racing.

Speculation is building in F1 circles that Renault Sport will this weekend announce that Fernando Alonso will be joining Jarno Trulli next year.

The Austrian racing driver Fritz Glatz was killed last weekend at the wheel of an old Arrows chassis while racing in the European historic Formula 1 championship.

Nordic Racing has signed Sweden's Thed Bjork to replace Australia's Ryan Briscoe in Formula 3000.

Eddie Jordan is relaunching the Jordan brand name, according to the latest reports in Marketing magazine in London.

Jenson Button made a very quiet visit earlier this week to the Sauber factory in Hinwil.

The Arrows team arrived at Magny-Cours at midday on Wednesday and began setting up the pits and hospitality areas in preparation for the French GP this weekend.

The CART series has received another setback with the news that the receivers of the Lausitzring have cancelled the event scheduled for September 21.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released the draft of a treaty text for the planned Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

Juan Pablo Montoya is the latest F1 star to join forces with Sports Telecom to develop branded mobile services and products.

It is worth noting that Saudi Arabian Prince Al-Waleed, a major global investor, could be quietly supporting the idea of a Grand Prix in Beirut.

Tom Walkinshaw has sent the Arrows team trucks off to France but there are still no guarantees that the team will be able to compete.

The Credit Suisse company has revealed that it is currently spending $17m a year on its sponsorship with Sauber.

There continue to be rumors that Toyota Motorsport is considering running CART driver Cristiano da Matta in F1 next year.

Gonzalo Rodriguez was killed in the autumn of 1999 while trying to build a career for himself in the CART series in the United States of America.

In 1999 RJR Nabisco agreed to sell its non-American tobacco businesses to Japan Tobacco for $8bn.

Although Malaysia's Proton has said that it intends to build its own engines for production cars, the company's oil company Petronas is continuing to push ahead with its own car engines.

The Formula 1 transporters normally set off for European races on the Monday before each race but on Tuesday afternoon it seems that the Arrows trucks are still at Leafield and have yet to set off for Magny-Cours.

Felipe Massa says that he has no contract with Ferrari.

Any hope that their might have been of a Turkish Grand Prix seem to be failing as the current government stumbles towards what looks like being an early demise.

The legal action between Deutsche Bank and Tom Walkinshaw's Arrows may have more to do with Deutsche Bank's financial situation than with any real interest in F1.

Tom Walkinshaw is rumored to be close to completing a deal with Morgan Grenfell, which will allow him to sell the Arrows F1 team to Red Bull GmbH and Red Bull Inc.

Red Bull is a company which has money to spend and the motor racing world fits in nicely with the company's advertising philosophy of supporting participants in dangerous and extreme sports.

Anthony Davidson is to be have a run in a Jaguar later this summer as the team looks at possible signings for next season.

There are rumors in F1 circles that Toyota Motorsport has offered Willi Rampf twice his current salary to move to Cologne to work for the team.