MAY 23, 2002

Gaillardot joins Jaguar Racing

VINCENT GAILLARDOT has joined Jaguar Racing. The chief engineer of Prost Grand Prix has been out of work since Prost folded at the start of the year but has now been called in by Jaguar to replace Mark Ellis, who has moved to British American Racing.

Gaillardot is unusual in that he is both an engine and a chassis engineer. He has been worked in F1 since joining Renault Sport as a track engineer in 1991 when he worked with the Williams test team. He then became the Renault liaison engineer with Ligier in 1994 before working on Michael Schumacher's engines in 1995. Gaillardot stayed with Renault Sport and Benetton in 1996, looking after Alesi's engines, but in 1997 moved to the TWR Arrows team to become a race engineer with Damon Hill (with whom he had worked at Williams). He was promoted to the role of chief engineer in 1998 but then moved back to France to take up a similar position with Prost in 1999.