March 05 1996
All of the information in this section was obtained from a bloke down the pub, which means that while we believe all the following information to be true, we couldn't swear that it is.
What we will say however, is that usually, "there's no smoke without fire".....
Inoue Replaced For Melbourne
Villeneuve Determined To Succeed
Qualifying Sessions
Hill Ready To Win
Drivers Praise Melbourne Track
Jordan Announce New Sponsor
Protesters Step Up Action In Melbourne
Testing Effectively Over Now
Jordan Confident
Inoue Replaced For Melbourne
Taki Inoue will not race in Australia. He has some sponsorship problems and his place will be taken by 1994 Italian Formula 3 champion, and test driver Giancarlo Fisichella.
Fisichella had been linked to the second Ferrari seat before Irvine moved from Jordan.
Villeneuve Determined To Succeed
Jacques Villeneuve is determined not to follow the same path as other Indy champions that crossed into F1. Mario Andretti took 3 seasons before he won an F1 race and Michael Andretti well......... his team mate was Ayrton Senna who was not a current champion. Compare their results and see how hard it is to cross into F1 from Indy.
Jacques has looked impressive in testing, lets hope he can carry that form into the races. He will win races, no doubt about that, it's just a question of when.
This year qualifying for a Grand Prix is slightly different. There are no Friday qualifying sessions.
Teams will be allowed to have two free practice sessions of one hour, limited to 30 laps on Fridays (Thursday at Monaco).
On Saturdays the teams will have two 45 minute sessions. The Qualifying session is limited to twelve laps and there will be a cut off point of Pole position time plus 7% for qualifying. Though the FIA have given race stewards the right to waive this in exceptional circumstances.
We will just have to wait and see.
Damon Hill has said that he had a great winter and can't wait for the start of the season. Many people hold the opinion that this year is the best chance he will get of winning the title. Martin Brundle said that "Damon can only lose the title this year". In the final testing at Estoril Damon was the quickest driver on five out of the seven days that he tested. Coulthard has said that Damon "is the one to watch".
The Williams car is certainly one of the best, if not the best and has covered almost 9000 miles of testing.
Drivers Praise Melbourne Track
The Drivers have all praised the Melbourne track. Michael Schumacher commented that the track was "fast and exciting" and with the cars likely to reach over 300 KPH on some sections the race should be exciting.
Jacques Villeneuve added that there were "six potential overtaking places" on the track which should help get the season off to a lively start.
The Total Jordan Peugeot Team have annonced that they will be sponsored by Benson And Hedges. This is contrary to rumours that they would be sponsored by Camel.
The Jordan cars will be decked out in the distinctive Gold livery of the Benson and Hedges packaging.
The last Gold coloured GP car that springs to mind is the Arrows of the late 70's when Warsteiner were their sponsors.
Protesters Step Up Action In Melbourne
With only 9 days to go before the start of the Australian GP, the protests that have been occurring in Melbourne were stepped up. Protesters playing ball games in the pit straight were arrested. The teams have also been threatened, and many have received parcels containing nails accompanied by notes inferring that drivers lives would be at risk if the race proceeds. The race is not likely to be stopped though as the state premier Jeff Kennett was the man responsible for the race being allowed to take place. He described the threat of an injunction being sought on the grounds of noise pollution as "Un Australian".
Now that all the teams (except Ferrari) have completed their testing programmes and the cars are being readied for shipping to Australia, I thought that it might be worthwhile having a look at the testing times.
The outstanding times belong to Hakkinen, Salo, Villeneuve, Berger and Barrichello. All of these drivers have in one way or another posted remarkable times. Hakkinen for obvious reasons, Salo has shown that the new Tyrrell is a force to be reckoned with when he is driving it. Villeneuve has shown how well he has adapted to Formula1 cars, we just need to see him adapt as well in race mode. Gerhard Berger had a torrid time in early testing and has come through and shown that he is as quick as ever. Finally Rubens has shown that this year, he and Jordan are there for points.
Coulthard and Alesi did not get much testing done and so their times should not be viewed as representative. Damon Hill went home after Wednesday and like Schumacher, did not run in qualifying trim during his testing, so again these two have slower times than they are capable of.
A summary of the best test times
| 1 | Hakkinen | 1.19.65 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | Villeneuve | 1.19.85 | |
| 3 | Berger | 1.19.90 | |
| 4 | Barrichello | 1.19.93 | |
| 5 | Alesi | 1.20.26 | |
| 6 | Salo | 1.20.45 | |
| 7 | Hill | 1.20.95 | |
| 8 | Schumacher | 1.21.08 | |
| 9 | Brundle | 1.21.18 | |
| 10 | Panis | 1.21.74 | |
| 11 | Coulthard | 1.21.86 | |
| 12 | Verstappen | 1.21.93 | |
| 13 | Katayama | 1.23.06 | |
| 14 | Diniz | 1.23.42 | |
| 15 | Rosset | 1.24.49 |
Jordan and Peugeot have both said this week that they are expecting to finish in the top four of the constructors championship, and that they expect to win at least one race this year. Peugeot have been working very hard on an engine that will not blow up with three laps to go !!! and Jordan say that this years car has been designed for the Peugeot engine, unlike last year when they had a Hart/Ford/Peugeot engine swap at the last minute.
