FEBRUARY 24, 1997
Tino Belli joins Arrows
TINO BELLI has been appointed head of research & development with Tom Walkinshaw's Arrows Grand Prix operation.
Belli then worked with the Forsythe Indycar team and last year raced engineered Raul Boesel with the Brahma-sponsored Team Green.
As head of R&D at Arrows he will be working with Japanese engineer Taku Takamura, an old accomplice from Fomet 1 days, with McLaren refugee Gary Savage and with ex-Lotus and Ligier engineer Steve Clark.
There are expected to be further changes in the technical staff at Arrows as the season progresses and rumors persist that the team is looking for a new technical director to replace Frank Dernie. We hear that top of the list for the job is GustavÊBrunner, who finishes a four-year contract with Ferrari at the end of July. Brunner has spent much of his career working in England but he is understood to have had an offer from Sauber to become technical director of the Swiss team.
With all the top F1 teams growing fast at the moment, there is much demand for experienced engineers. The teams are so desperate in fact that there has been a lot of pillaging of engineers from Formula 3000, sportscars and Indycars. More is expected in the months ahead.