Wednesday March 15th, 2000

Ferrari technical director Ross Brawn answered back to McLaren chief, Ron Dennis yesterday, rebutting Dennis' claims that Ferrari "sacrificed" Rubens Barrichello's race by chaning his pitstop strategy to two stops, in order to allow Michael Schumacher to win. Speaking yesterday, Brawn said: "I don't see how he works that out. It was worth a gamble; if we hadn't done anything, Rubens would have stayed behind Heinz-Harald Frentzen anyway."

Frentzen's Jordan was visibly slowing down Rubens Barrichello, who was not able to pass the German. According to Brawn, he decided to bring Barrichello into the pits early in order to get him out in front of Frentzen. Consequently, he was forced to make another stop near the end of the race.

Barrichello himself supported Brawn's decision, saying: "With the other guys going away, I was working on fresh tactics with Ross. He has been described as the maestro and now I can say he really is the best. Ross and the whole team did a great job."