JANUARY 19, 2001

Major reshuffle at Maranello

THERE has been a major reshuffle of the staff of Ferrari with Britain's Nigel Stepney moving into a new role as racing manager.

THERE has been a major reshuffle of the staff of Ferrari with Britain's Nigel Stepney moving into a new role as racing manager. Stepney has spent the last seven years as team coordinator, leading the mechanics and ensuring that the cars run reliably. The highly-rated Englishman was on the verge of being poached to a new role as Director of Racing at Jaguar and so Ferrari decided to offer him a similar role. The move means that the current team manager at Ferrari Stefano Domenicali will be moved sideways into the role of logistics manager while the team's senior operations engineer Ignazio Lunetta is moving to a new role in the team, rumored to be as head of research and development.

The team has yet to sort out the future of sporting director Jean Todt, technical director Ross Brawn and chief designer Rory Byrne. All three men have contracts which run out in the next six months and Ferrari boss Luca di Montezemolo will be very keen to keep together the winning team of the 2000 season. The team has been held together in recent years by Michael Schumacher and his contract runs until the end of next year.