Wednesday February 16th, 2000

British American Racing, the only Formula One team to fail to score a point last year, completed a 10-day test on Wednesday confident of their prospects this season.

"The engine has been extremely reliable in the warm weather," said Takefumi Hosaka, Honda's Formula One project leader after the team put in 500 laps at Kyalami.

Team manager Robert Synge said BAR had now completed 5,000 miles of testing so far over the winter, a distance equivalent to about 16 grands prix.

"To have achieved nearly an entire season's race distance by mid-February is a remarkable achievement," he said. The new season starts in Australia on March 12.

Last year marked an embarrassing debut for BAR, who arrived with vast resources and high expectations. They have linked up with Honda for 2000 and are determined to be serious contenders for the points.

Former champion Jacques Villeneuve said the new car was running strongly and the team was improving all the time while Brazilian Ricardo Zonta also sounded more confident.

"Last year I never had enough time to set up the car properly for myself so I was going into race weekends with Jacques' settings," Zonta said.

"It has been great to get a long stretch of running this week. It has helped me to develop the car to my liking and that makes me more confident on the track."