McLaren officially presented their 1997 challenger in a spectacular show. The public had already been given a 'sneak preview' of the orange West-McLaren-Mercedes some weeks ago. Now the 'Silver Arrow' was unleashed on the press at the Alexandra Palace in London (England) with the drivers Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard.

The McLaren-Mercedes MP4-12: photo by McLaren International

The presentation was overshadowed yesterday by the possibility that the Williams, McLaren and Tyrrell team can loose 100 million pounds because they refused to sign the Concorde Agreement last year.

There has even been some talk about the teams setting up their own league but they will be rejoining the pack now.

Frank Williams says the issue might even be settled in court. He said: "It could be over in a week or it could take two years. If it goes to court, it will be very long and very expensive, but God forbid it goes that far. There is a great deal of money involved in the whole thing, especially when you multiply it by five years. But when we opted out, there was no deal on the table. Eight days after we opted out, a very lucrative offer was made to the other teams. They think it is Christmas now because they have got a lot more money. Nobody gets a mortgage without knowing the figures and the terms were not clear so we were not happy about signing originally. Subsequent to our withdrawal, a statement was outlined which made things much more satisfactory and it would be in everyone's interests if things were resolved."

Max Mosley commented: "I think they probably regret their actions and I am doing everything I can to bring them back into the fold."

Alain Prost will announce his Ligier take-over tomorrow (Friday) in Paris (France). The Ligier team will change name to Prost Grand Prix before the season starts in Melbourne on March 9.

Patrick Head is ready to fight as strongly as possible to clear his name in the oncoming Senna trial. He and other officials are facing man slaughter changes for the death of Ayrton Senna.

"It is a very serious matter, a criminal case, and we are therefore taking it very seriously. For myself as an engineer it is something I do not want to have on my record and I am prepared, if the case goes against us, to appeal and fight on for as long as necessary to clear my name," commented Head.

• TWR-Arrows

Damon Hill concluded the TWR-Arrows tests on the Barcelona (Spain) circuit today. He drove 35 laps with a best time of 1m 20.80s.

• Sauber

The Sauber team had a good test today on the Fiorano (Italy) track. Nicola Larini took over from Johnny Herbert and clocked a faster time: a 1m 01.73s (62 laps).