Throughout the season, Verstappen proved to be very much the faster Footwork driver, but his reliability record was poor, only finishing a single race in the first half of the season (at Buenos Aires, where he finished sixth). He suffered numerous mechanical failures, including a sticking throttle which caused a huge accident at Spa which left him with permanent neck injuries. He also caused a major scare at Imola when he left a pit stop early and ripped the fuel hose from its tank, covering the garage with flammable fuel. By contrast, Rosset was surprisingly steady for a rookie driver, finishing half the races, but was noticeably slower than his teammate. Ultimately, neither driver was retained for 1997; World Champion Damon Hill made the surprising decision to join the team after being dumped by Williams, and Pedro Diniz with his sponsorship money was chosen to be his number two.