By Roger Horton, England
Atlas F1 Senior Writer

Jacques Villeneuve had every reason to believe he is destined to become one of Formula One's biggest stars ever: he had the talents, he had the pedigree, and he had a plan. Four lackluster seasons since he just barely won the 1997 World Championship, people are starting to wonder whether the French-Canadian made the right choice in sticking with British American Racing, and whether Villeneuve will ever really live up to his destination. Roger Horton looks back at Villeneuve's career and the accumulation of it all by the end of the 2001 season

It was race morning for the United States Grand Prix. Several journalists gathered on the ninth floor of the giant Pagoda-like building, that towers over the 'Yard of Bricks' at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Looking down, we watched Jacques Villeneuve as he toured the track with the other drivers for their parade lap. "That," observed a colleague wryly, "is the fastest lap Jacques Villeneuve has managed around here all weekend."

A cheap shot at a great driver? Perhaps. A bad joke at the expense of a driver just having a bad day? Again, maybe.

But more questions were raised by Villeneuve's totally unfocused performance at Indianapolis than at any other time in his entire career. His supporters have always portrayed Villeneuve as a charger, the ultimate racer's racer. But at Indy he was off the pace all weekend, and even Villeneuve was later moved to describe his performance as the worst of his career.

Such was the barrage of criticism following the US Grand Prix event that Villeneuve and team boss Craig Pollock were sat down for a PR interview with BAR's press officer Tracy Novak, to allow the pair to put their side of the story, and answer the questions that the media-shy Villeneuve knew needed to be answered. But in the end you have to say that just as the questions were all the same as have been asked all year, so too were the answers.

In some ways, it was doubly embarrassing for Villeneuve, a former CART and Indy 500 winner, that he chose that venue to put in such an undistinguished performance. At Indianapolis, Villeneuve is still something of a legend. His record there in his CART days was one win and one second in two outings, and that's impressive. The shy young driver turned up at the Brickyard in '94, an almost unknown except for his surname, did everything his team asked him to do and was only beaten by a Penske with a specially built Mercedes-Benz engine that had such a power advantage, it effectively made it a race for third place amongst all the other runners.

Along with his home race in Canada, only at Indy could Villeneuve be said to be available to the press in any meaningful way. That is, of course, very much part of the Villeneuve style. He wants to be able to dictate entirely just what he will and will not do over the season. Sponsor chores and media relations come so far down the list of his priorities that he is just about unemployable to any of the current front-running outfits.

That is, of course, his choice. But such is Villeneuve's almost obsessive determination to 'be his own man' and not conform to the demands that even the likes of Michael Schumacher and Mika Hakkinen have agreed to over the years, that he seems intent on permanently consigning himself to race anonymously in the mid-field.

So why has Villeneuve seemingly backed himself so far up this blind alley at BAR? Surely there has to be more to it than meets the eye? To find at least part of the answer you need to take a look back at his career and see just what influences have been at work on him that have made him the racer he currently is. After all, he has now been a professional racing driver for thirteen full seasons, and each phase of his career has had its distinctly differing element.

In the beginning there was Formula Three - some three years in the Italian series and one in Japan. He never really can be said to have set the world alight in this category and only in Japan did he score his first win, in his fourth year in the series. He finished second in his last attempt to win an F3 title in 1992.

It was in '92 that he finally convinced his former teacher Craig Pollock to become his manager. Pollock, who had his own promotional business at the time, agreed to manage his former pupil and the move was to change the course of his life. It certainly changed Villeneuve's life. By the end of his year in Japan he was little more than a long-haired 21 year old driver who had been beaten to the championship by Briton Anthony Reid, whose name was not exactly on every talent scout's lips.

Japan, though, marked the end of the first phase of Villeneuve's career. It had been a struggle; his father's famous name had put him under pressure and his results were mixed. Despite his outward show of independence, he needed help. He knew he needed Pollock, and Pollock knew he needed his own team.

So Pollock went to work in the country where the Villeneuve name meant most - Canada. The tobacco giant Player's agreed to bankroll Jacques's racing career in a three-year deal, the first in Atlantics, and the next two in Indycars.

The combination of the Villeneuve name and Pollock's shrewdness meant that Team Green was essentially built around the young French-Canadian from the start. They hired Tony Cicale, one of the sport's most respected race engineers, to give his undivided attention to the still raw Villeneuve. Indeed, so undivided was his attention on Villeneuve that there was friction from the team's other driver Claude Bourbonnais, who felt neglected. Despite this perceived handicap, Bourbonnais outscored Villeneuve in the championship, finishing second in the standings to Villeneuve's third at the end of the year.

In the second and third year with Team Green, Villeneuve blossomed. Indycars racing suited his style and success followed success, including, of course, the CART and Indy 500 titles. F1 Ringmaster Bernie Ecclestone was quick to see the enormous marketing opportunities of returning the Villeneuve name to Formula One and arranged a three-day test for the young star at Silverstone with Williams.

He was impressively quick and a three-year deal commencing in 1996 was soon concluded. Pollock's initial three-year plan had been a huge success, and no detail in Jacques's package had been overlooked. Before he turned a wheel in an F1 race, he covered a huge mileage in an extensive pre-season testing programme with the team to prepare him as much as possible for the tracks he would race on. This was a repeat of his first year with Team Green, who had purchased an Indycar chassis for him to test with whilst Jacques was still racing Atlantics. This eased the transition to the more powerful Indycars he would race the following season.

So phase two of his career finished and Jacques Villeneuve was on a roll. He had fulfilled his childhood ambitions by reaching Formula One, and without having to learn the ropes by driving for a mid-field outfit where the odd podium result was a bonus. If you were a half decent driver in a Williams-Renault in 1996 and 1997, then anything worse than a top three finish was a failure. On a lot of occasions, even a second place finish was questionable.

Yet even after he clinched the title at his second attempt there were doubters. Some said that he made heavy weather of beating Schumacher's Ferrari given the performance advantage he enjoyed. The unimpressed contended that had he suffered from a mechanical failure at that final race shoot out with Schumacher at Jerez, and the German had clinched the title cleanly, then Villeneuve would have been heavily criticised for not winning the title when he had the best car.

There is some support for this view from a man in a good position to know. After his team's Canadian win this year, Patrick Head admitted that he hadn't enjoyed a race so much for a long time, feeling that the whole team had performed to their maximum, which is the real key to the technical boss getting satisfaction from a race win.

Looking back to Villeneuve's era with the team, Head reminisced: "I didn't feel very happy about our performance in '97 because I knew we had quite a much better car than the Ferrari, and I really didn't feel in the way the car was being set for the races that we were taking full advantage of the performance advantage we had. I think that there were one or two races in '96 when I came away from it thinking that we had done a good job in getting a good set up on the car and worked very meticulously, logically and hard to get the result. I don't think I felt that way often, if at all, in '97."

Despite his world title and eleven race wins whilst at Williams, there were always tensions between the strong-willed French-Canadian, who was determined to go his own way in everything from setting up his car the way he wanted it, to wandering around the paddock in his oversized clothes and dyed hair. His clashes with the team's conservatively minded technical director Patrick Head added spice to many race weekends and it became increasingly clear that Villeneuve was chaffing at the restrictions placed upon him by an equally determined senior management team.

Some might also say that Head's rather jaundiced view of the '97 season was coloured by his sometime rocky relationship with Villeneuve. Whatever the truth, by midway through the '98 season the reigning World Champion had decided to leave one of the most established outfits in the pitlane and head off to start his risky and so far unsuccessful adventure with BAR. It was the end of phase three of his career and a return to the formula that had worked so well at Team Green, where his close friend and confidant Craig Pollock would be in charge, and he - Villeneuve - would have unfettered control once more over his racing life.

Pollock's motivation in wanting Villeneuve at BAR was obvious. Once again it was the name that excited the sponsors. To have a World Champion on the driving strength gave the whole project enormous and instant credibility. The attraction for Villeneuve has always been harder to fathom. Friendship? Loyalty? Money? A challenge?

To date, the BAR 'dream' - or the fourth phase - has been a disastrous failure if you judge his success by race results alone. And, when you look back on a driver's complete career, is there any other way to pass judgement? Villeneuve chose to walk away from Williams and throw in his lot with Pollock's team. Now, three years into the relationship, it is hard to find concrete signs that the BAR team is ever going to regularly supply Villeneuve with a winning car.

Some three decades ago, Emerson Fittipaldi, a double World Champion, turned his back on McLaren to join his elder brother Wilson's start-up Fittipaldi Automotive outfit that attempted to take on the established teams with a car that they built themselves and ran under the Copersucar banner. It never won a race and it effectively ended Fittipaldi's serious F1 career.

It would indeed be sadly ironic, if Craig Pollock's success in persuading his young charge to join his fledgling team for the 1999 season, results in Jacques Villeneuve effectively ending his F1 career in the same manner as Fittipaldi did all those years ago. The headstrong yet talented Villeneuve is effectively still mired in the Pollock inspired but increasingly questionable career plan.

One thing, however, is becoming increasingly clear: Villeneuve can't afford any more weekends like Indianapolis. Even legends have a sell-by date, and there are few sadder sights in sports than one that has outstayed his welcome.