Newsgroup: it.sport.formula1.moderato
Titolo: [Pit-Radio]Motor racing-BAR men hope to raise spirits in the East (Un pò lunghetto)

Motor racing-BAR men hope to raise spirits in the East
By Alan Baldwin
LONDON, Oct 13 (Reuters) - One team has more to prove than others at the Malaysian Grand Prix on
Sunday.
Not championship leaders McLaren, certainly not Ferrari despite the embarrassment of their famous
three-wheel pitstop at Nuerburgring last month, and not even
Minardi.
BAR, the British American Racing newcomers who have more cash to flash than most and who threatened
to make an instant impact in Formula One before the
season started, arrive at Sepang as the only team yet to score a point.
After 14 races, they are last in the F1 rankings.
Arrows, regular tail enders, did it in the opening race in Australia while fellow back markers
Minardi finished sixth -- ahead of either Ferrari -- at Nuerburgring.
BAR, with an annual budget estimated to be in excess of $80 million, have just two races left in
Malaysia and in Japan on October 31 to get in the points.
Otherwise, they will start their new partnership with Japanese carmakers Honda next season at the
very furthest end of the pit lane and paddock.
Despite having the vast resources of British American Tobacco (BAT) behind them and Canada's former
world champion Jacques Villeneuve at the wheel, the BAR
story has not followed the expected script so far in 1999.
``We were overly brash,'' team boss Craig Pollock, formerly Villeneuve's school teacher and manager,
was quoted in Britain's Sunday Mirror newspaper as saying
recently.
``(McLaren boss) Ron Dennis said we should have come in quietly instead of with a fanfare and I
don't disagree with him. It's been worse than I thought from A to Z.
``We had a dream and it became more of a nightmare.''
BIG SPENDERS, POOR FINISHERS
BAR took over the Tyrrell team and launched at their glistening new premises with pounding music and
bright lights -- and straight into a controversy over the livery on
their cars that was subsequently ruled to be illegal.
The cars, with barely any carry-over parts from Tyrrell, took their place on the grid in Melbourne
in March amid talk of a debut win -- however implausible that now
sounds -- and some fast-looking pre-season lap times.
The hype was fuelled by technical director Adrian Reynard, who had won his debut race in every class
of motor racing he had entered and rashly suggested BAR
might do the same.
It was not to be: Villenueve crashed out after 13 laps and Brazilian Ricardo Zonta retired after 48
when his engine over-heated.
Things got worse in Brazil, where Zonta crashed in qualifying and was out for the next three races
with Finland's Mika Salo standing in. Salo's seventh place at Imola
remains the team's best result so far.
By June, relations between the team's star driver and technical supremo were sounding strained.
WEAK LINK
Villeneuve publicly accused Reynard at the French Grand Prix of being the team's ``weak link,'' said
he had hardly seen him at the race track all year and added that
BAR missed his input.
Reynard retaliated at Silverstone in July, saying that he was ``surprised at being slagged off by
him like that'' but adding they had made up their differences.
The Canadian stalled on the grid at the first start of the race, before Michael Schumacher had his
big crash, and re-started in the spare car. He lasted 30 laps.
``Our increased reliability has turned out to be a fallacy and we now need to work hard on improving
it for the next race,'' said Pollock afterwards.
That next race was Austria and Villeneuve lasted slightly longer -- 34 laps to be precise.
He crashed out of the German Grand Prix in a first lap shunt, his 10th successive failure to finish,
and did not get to the final straight in Hungary either.
Matters improved in Belgium in August but only after both BAR drivers had close escapes from
dramatic crashes.
BAR had to rush new chassis to Spa-Francorchamps after both drivers crashed heavily after rolling at
high-speed in qualifying for that race.
But Villeneuve finally made it to the finish, albeit in 15th place, after 11 retirements in a row.
At Nuerburgring, Villeneuve was in fifth place until he retired with four laps to go. The
frustration was calmed by a feeling that a breakthrough could be imminent.
``The positive thing now is that the car is competitive and we just have to go for it in the last
two races,'' said Villeneuve, who is committed to next season with BAR.
Sepang has not hosted a Formula One race before. Maybe BAR could yet provide the shock of the new in
Malaysia.

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