News From the Paddock - Spanish GP
Friday May 28th, 1999

  • British American Racing's team manager, Greg Field, has now left the team. No reason has been given for his departure although a statement described the separation as "amicable". Field was previously employed at Benetton.

  • King Juan Carlos of Spain could be one of the quickest monarchs on the planet, as there are plans for him to passenger the McLaren two seater F1 car this weekend, driven by ITV commentator and former McLaren driver Martin Brundle. Still on the subject of two seater Grand Prix cars, Jordan are apparently planning to follow McLaren down this route and build their own.

  • Rumours from America say that Toyota could call on Swift Engineering to build its F1 chassis, if and when it comes into F1. Toyota is said to have bought the California-based firm from its Japanese owner, Hiro Matsushita.

  • VIP guests at the Manchester United v Bayern Munich game included Mika Hakkinen, David Coulthard and Heinz-Harald Frentzen. Two Mercedes powered guys and one German were obviously supposed to be cheering for Bayern. At the 89th minute the trio were dragged off for interviews with a German TV station. They were merrily babbling on about what a great victory it had been for Bayern, when they heard huge English cheers from the crowd, followed of course a couple of moments later by even more jubilation. The interview had to be canned...

  • There appear to be conflicting stories about the British American Racing engine deal with Honda. While BAR boss Craig Pollock has stated the team are not paying for the Japanese engines, other sources in the F1 paddock claim he is forking out somewhere between 20 and 30 million pounds per season for the privilege. Honda's decision not to run its own team and simply supply engines apparently had little to do with the available budget as a Honda spokesman claimed they were spending more on their engine supply deal than if they were also building a chassis.

  • Ferrari's Eddie Irvine arrived later than planned in Barcelona on Thursday. Taking off from Nice in his private jet, the windshield blew out at 10,000 feet over the French town. An emergency landing was called for and the Irishman had to find a scheduled flight to Barcelona. "I was shitting myself," admitted Eddie.

    [  Previous  |  News Index  |  Next   ]