JANUARY 27, 2003

The Senna trial goes on...

The Italian Supreme Court has ruled that the appeal process of the Senna Trial must be done again because of legal errors in the original appeal. This will drag the trial up to close to the 10th anniversary of the death of Ayrton Senna at Imola in 1994. It is anticipated that the latest decision will result in a reaction from the Formula 1 teams who are tired of having to worry about Italy's arcane judicial system.

The Italian F1 races are already at risk because of the recent European Union ruling that tobacco will be banned in 2005 rather than 2006 and with his announcement about Austria Bernie Ecclestone has shown that the time for bluffing is over. The additional legal problems with the Italians can only be bad news for the San Marino GP, which has been living on borrowed time for some years because of the organizers' failure to implement changes requested by the governing body.