2001 Formula One World Championship (Alt)

This is a fictional account of an alternative version of the 2001 F1 season. For the real 2001 season, see the 2001 Formula One World Championship

The **2001 FIA Formula One World Championship** was the 55th season of FIA Formula One racing. It commenced on 4 March 2001 and ended on 14 October after seventeen races. Michael Schumacher won the Drivers' title and Ferrari won the Constructors' award. The season also marked the reintroduction of several electronic driver aid systems; including traction control, launch control, and fully-automatic transmissions, with the FIA permitting their use starting at the Spanish Grand Prix. Electronic driver aids had previously been banned since 1994.

Future world champions Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen made their Grand Prix debuts in Melbourne, for Minardi and Sauber respectively. Colombian former CART champion Juan Pablo Montoya also made his F1 debut, with Williams.

There were new beginnings for French companies Renault and Michelin. After four years out of the sport since 1997, Renault returned to supply engines to the Benetton team, while Michelin's comeback as a tyre supplier provided Bridgestone with competition for the first time since Goodyear left the sport at the end of the 1998 season. At the other end of the spectrum fellow French company Peugeot withdrew from the sport after seven years since 1994 following a disastrous season in 2000 as an engine supplier to Prost. The assets of Peugeot's Formula One programme were purchased by Asia Motor Technologies France and the 2000-spec powerplants were rebadged as Asiatechs and supplied to Arrows free of charge.

At the end of the season, triple world champion Mika Häkkinen announced his intention to take a one-year sabbatical in 2002. Also racing for the last time in 2001 was Jean Alesi, who passed the 200 race mark shortly before his final Grand Prix in Japan. Veteran British commentator Murray Walker gave his final commentary at the United States Grand Prix (which would also turn out to be Mika Häkkinen's last victory in the season).

The Prost and Benetton names disappeared from the sport at the end of 2001; Prost folded due to a lack of finances while Benetton was re-branded as Renault after the French manufacturer bought the team outright.

The Drivers' Championship was won with ease by Michael Schumacher, who finished ahead of David Coulthard in second place. With Michael Schumacher's teammate, Rubens Barrichello, tallying a decent number of podiums throughout the season, Ferrari also won the Constructors' Championship by a substantial margin. Coulthard's title challenge looked strong early on, winning two of the first six races and being neck and neck with Schumacher for the title lead. He also qualified on pole position in Monaco, only to stall on the grid. With Schumacher winning the race and Coulthard recovering only to fifth, it was a turning point of the season. Coulthard would not win again for the rest of the year and had dropped off massively by mid-season as Schumacher kept either winning or finishing second with few exceptions all season.

Williams drivers Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo Montoya both scored their maiden wins in the sport, at San Marino and Italy respectively. The younger Schumacher added victories in Canada and Germany, giving the team four wins in total, marking a return to success for the Oxfordshire team after three years without a victory since 1997. The Schumacher brothers also scored historic family 1–2 finishes in Canada and France.

McLaren secured four wins during the season. These were shared equally among their drivers: Häkkinen winning in Britain and the United States, Coulthard winning in Brazil and Austria.

## Teams and drivers

The following teams and drivers competed in the 2001 FIA Formula One World Championship.

**B** = Bridgestone, **M** = Michelin

† All engines were 3.0 litre, V10 configuration.

### Driver changes

**Olivier Panis: McLaren test driver -> BAR. Ricardo Zonta, BAR -> Jordan test driver.**

**Jenson Button: Williams -> Benetton.** Still on contract to Williams, Jenson Button was loaned to Benetton for the season. Button replaced Alexander Wurz at Benetton, as the Austrian had fallen out of favour with team boss Flavio Briatore and moved on to become a test driver at McLaren. **Juan Pablo Montoya -> Williams.** Button's place in the Williams was taken over by Juan Pablo Montoya, who had been tied to Williams since 1998 but had been loaned to the CART series in 1999, where he took the title in his first attempt as well as a victory in the Indianapolis 500.

**Fernando Alonso -> Minardi.** Marc Gené lost his seat at Minardi due to sponsorship problems. Gené signed a contract to become a test driver at Williams where he remained until the end of 2004, and was replaced with debutant Fernando Alonso. Gastón Mazzacane also moved away from Minardi for 2001, having been replaced by the returning Tarso Marques.

Mazzacane beat CART driver Oriol Servià for the Prost seat, replacing Nick Heidfeld – who subsequently left the team and moved to Sauber. Kimi Räikkönen was signed alongside Heidfeld for a full drive from near obscurity. The Finn had performed some testing for Sauber in late 2000 after dominating the British Formula Renault series, and so impressed Peter Sauber that he was given the full-time drive. Pedro Diniz did not return as a driver for Sauber, but instead purchased 40% of the Prost team and served in a management role there in 2001.

Johnny Herbert decided to leave the Jaguar team in an attempt to secure a drive in Champ Cars. The deal did not work out, and he was forced to sign on with Arrows as a test driver for 2001. Luciano Burti stepped up from test driver to fill Herbert's slot at Jaguar.

Pedro de la Rosa lost his drive at Arrows to Enrique Bernoldi and signed on as a reserve driver with Prost.

#### Mid-season changes

During the season, Jean Alesi quit his Prost drive and later joined the Jordan team.

* Gastón Mazzacane was fired by the Prost team after the San Marino Grand Prix. He was replaced with Jaguar's Luciano Burti, who was subsequently replaced with Prost reserve driver Pedro de la Rosa.
* Heinz-Harald Frentzen suffered injuries after a crash and was replaced for the Canadian GP by reserve driver Ricardo Zonta. After returning from his injuries, Frentzen's contract was terminated by Jordan after the British GP. The split was not a happy one, and the matter ended in court before the season's end. Zonta took over Frentzen's drive for the German GP.
* Jean Alesi quit his Prost drive after the German Grand Prix. Frentzen was then signed to Prost to take over from Alesi, before Jordan completed a straight swap by signing Alesi – with both drivers remaining in their new seats for the rest of the season.
* Alex Yoong was granted his FIA super-licence during the 2001 season and replaced Tarso Marques in the Minardi starting lineup at the Italian Grand Prix. Marques moved into a reserve/test role for the rest of the season.
* Luciano Burti suffered serious injuries during a crash in the Belgian GP. He was forced to sit out the rest of the 2001 season and was replaced by Czech driver Tomáš Enge for the remaining races.

## Changes

### Rule changes

* The eleven teams and members of Formula One's governing body, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) held a meeting on 30 August at Heathrow Airport to discuss rule changes for the 2001 season. It was agreed that drivers would be allowed to use an extra three sets of tyres during Friday's two practice sessions. Ten days later at Monza, team bosses accepted to ban in-season testing during the month of August and a three-week break would be implemented during that time period.

### Safety car

For this season, Mercedes-Benz provided a new safety car in the shape of the SL55 AMG, which also performed this duty during 2002 and replaced the previous CL55 AMG. It was first deployed during the German Grand Prix.

## Results and standings

### Scoring system

Points were awarded to the top six finishers in each race as follows: