Formula One News — September 2002

The bid by a mysterious American multi-millionaire Carl Smith to buy the Arrows team must be completed by today or else the Arrows team will be going out of business - at least in its current form. Arrows is facing a compulsory winding-up order in the English courts on Tuesday.

The Silverstone bypass has finally been opened although for the moment there is still only going to be one lane operational in each direction. The new road has been planned for years and will help to alleviate congestion at the Silverstone racing circuit - a big problem for the British GP in recent years.

The Belgium Grand Prix paddock was relatively quiet this year - at least in terms of celebrities. Nigel Mansell and Thierry Boutsen were there but almost unnoticed there was also former F1 driver Erik Comas, who has been racing in recent years for Toyota in Japan. The Frenchman was at Spa in his role as the manager of Romain Dumas,

It is becoming increasingly obvious that CART is going to lose the Green, Ganassi and Mo Nunn teams next year, the three following Penske Racing into the rival Indy Racing League series. This is not because of any desire to be there but rather because there is pressure from sponsors.

The French weekly magazine Autohebdo is reporting that Jordan Grand Prix is looking at some kind of a deal with rising star Gary Paffett. Paffett is currently leading the German Formula 3 Championship.

Although it has yet to be officially announced we expect there to be a completely new name for British American Racing at the end of the current year. And it will not be Honda F1, nor will it feature the Prodrive name.

Cristiano da Matta has admitted that he thinks he going to be staying in CART next year. The Brazilian says that Toyota does not seem to be interested in him being anything more than a test driver next year - and that does not interest him at all.

Friday was the last day of testing at the Monza circuit before the Italian GP next weekend. The teams ran in the morning only, allowing the race officials to begin the preparations for the race in the afternoon.

As expected, American Townsend Bell will test for Minardi later this month. The ex-CART driver has F1 aspirations after being replaced at Patrick Racing in July because the team felt he was too reckless.

Minardi would love run Ferrari V10 engines - and a Ferrari rear end as Sauber does. Paul Stoddart would be only too pleased to put his team up into the top 10 at every Grand Prix. The only slight problem is that it costs a pile of money and Stoddart has yet to find it.

It is not a surprise that Bridgestone and Sauber have reached an agreement to continue their relationship until the end of 2004. Sauber has been with Bridgestone since 1999.

There have been stories in Germany that the creditor banks involved in the Kirch debacle have to get European Commission clearance before being allowed to appoint a new board of directors for SLEC, the company which controls the Formula One group of companies and which controls the commercial rights to Formula 1.

There is no secret in the fact that Jordan sponsor DHL, a subsidiary of Deutsche Post, was keen to have a German driver in Formula 1 next year. The company showed itself to be very keen on Heinz Harald Frentzen but that deal never happened.

Testing continued at Monza Thursday, where the teams saw their first full day of dry testing this week. Pedro De la Rosa topped the time sheets in the Jaguar R3, conducting tire testing for Michelin.

Bernie Ecclestone is reportedly in Spain today at the wedding of Ana Aznar, the daughter of the Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar and Alejandro Agag, a former rising star in European politics who is now working for a Portuguese bank.

BAR test driver Darren Manning will drive the Team St. George entry in the Rockingham 500 CART race on September 14th.

We hear that attempts are going on to try to put Felipe Massa into a drive at Toyota, despite the fact that all the signs at the moment are that the Toyota team is going to hire the soon-to-be-crowned CART champion Cristiano da Matta.

The initial fuss about Arrows needing to answer to the FIA for failing to race in Belgium is now over and everyone is waiting to see what the response will be. We are not expecting any response at all.

There have been vague signals in recent months that there may be changes in the Williams-BMW relationship in the future. The relationship was signed for five years and that means that the current arrangement ends next year...

Testing continued at Monza Wednesday, where all the F1 teams except Arrows tested in preparation for the Italian GP.

Gallaher, the owner of Jordan's sponsor Benson & Hedges is about to announce a major deal to break into the Chinese market. The company has signed a letter of intent with the China National Tobacco Corporation.

Marlboro has confirmed that it is to sponsor the Peugeot World Rally Championship for the next four years. The team will become known as Team Marlboro Peugeot Total and the drivers Richard Burns, Marcus Gronholm, Gilles Panizzi and Harri Rovanpera.

Retired world champion Mika Hakkinen will be working at the US Gran Prix, not behind the wheel of a McLaren but behind a microphone. The ex-McLaren driver will act as a commentator for Canal Digital, the digital channel that broadcasts F1 in his native Finland, analyzing the race and giving the drivers' point of view.

Allan McNish's Formula 1 career seems to have come to an end but the Scotsman looks like being employed next year in one of the big factory teams in sports car racing.