The best of teams, the worst of times: A GPR advent calendar
December 21st – 25th
Dec 21: Toyota – Allan McNish
Allan McNish is a sportscar legend. To his name, he has three 24 Hours of Le Mans victories, three American Le Mans Series titles and four victories at the 12 Hours of Sebring. Before his endurance triumphs, the diminutive Scot had several flirtations with Formula 1 teams, but no amount of tests had landed him a drive…
…until 2001, when Toyota scrapped its current racing operations for a full tilt at F1. McNish, having raced Toyota’s GT-One in 1999, had prior knowledge of working with the Japanese marque and partnered Mika Salo in the team’s development year. Both secured contracts for Toyota’s entry onto the F1 grid in 2002, McNish making his debut at the relatively advanced age of 32.
Although Toyota’s first year was geared up for development with a conservatively-designed car and engine, Salo managed to grab a point in the Albert Park season opener as McNish was embroiled in a start-line crash that took out half of the field.
McNish was close to scoring a point in Malaysia, but a mistake by Toyota in the pitlane scuppered the Lowlander’s chances of breaking his duck and, to add insult to injury, Salo scored once more in the next round.
Although performing capably, McNish never looked like troubling the scorers from then. Toyota, unhappy with its driving lineup, replaced McNish and Salo with BAR’s Olivier Panis and CART champion Cristiano da Matta, leaving the duo out of drives for 2003.
Perhaps McNish’s most memorable moment, sadly, was his colossal shunt at the 130R corner in qualifying for the Japanese Grand Prix. Deemed not fit enough to start the race, McNish’s short F1 career was over, save for a test drive for Renault in the following season.
Honourable mentions: Although replacement Cristiano da Matta was hardly much better than McNish, he managed to score a few points despite Toyota’s frustrating inability to make the most of its large resources. Oh, and he led the British Grand Prix for 17 laps in 2003…
Jake Boxall-Legge
Dec 22: Tyrrell – Ricardo Rosset
1998 was a transitional year for Tyrrell under its new owners British American Tobacco. The venerable Ken Tyrrell was keen to retain Jos Verstappen alongside Japan’s new golden son Tora Takagi, but BAT had other ideas, signing Ricardo Rosset behind his back.
Rosset had hardly covered himself in glory during his previous F1 stints at Footwork and Mastercard Lola; instead, the Brazilian was signed simply for his wallet as BAT wished to minimise 1998’s overheads. Ken angrily cut ties with the team, making Rosset a persona non grata within the team before Melbourne.
Rosset failed to prequalify for more races than he actually finished, his failure to beat the 107% rule in Monaco being particularly spectacular. Footage at Mirabeau showed Rosset going straight on, and then nonchalantly reversing back onto the track and up the hill. A short while later, the cameras caught Rosset pointing the wrong way at the Swimming Pool. Attempting to turn around, Rosset beached the car between the kerb and a gap in the armco on the other side of the turn, ending his qualifying session.
In the ITV commentary box, Murray Walker openly questioned whether Rosset was Formula One material, allowing Martin Brundle to famously deadpan “it’s a fairly short debate Murray” in response. To vent their frustrations Rosset’s mechanics swapped the first and last letters of the Brazilian’s surname around on his paddock scooter after the session.
Rosset bounced back in Canada to record Tyrrell’s best result of the season with 8th. He could not build on this momentum, recording another pair of DNQs in Germany and Hungary. After two races on the sidelines, Rosset was keen to make an impact at Spa, which he duly did – quite literally – during the multi-car pile-up on the first lap, ploughing into the carnage ahead at top speed. Rosset capped his and Tyrrell’s time in F1 by suffering an injury riding the rollercoaster at Suzuka, before racking up a fifth DNQ, mercifully ending a painful season.
The heir to a Brazilian lingerie business, Rosset had proven to be pants.
Honourable mentions: Oh, there were plenty, so we’ll just list them all. Michel Leclère, Geoff Lees, Kevin Cogan, Ricardo Zunino, Slim Borgudd, Brian Henton, Julian Bailey and Olivier Grouillard. Any more?
Laine Tisdall
Dec 23: Vanwall – Colin Chapman
It seems strange looking back, but Colin Chapman was himself a racing driver before Lotus entered the F1 frame. He was certainly a product of a past era, the time of the “driver-engineer”, when one could race at a rather high level without surrendering other vocations. With his own self-built Lotuses (Loti?), Chapman was a pretty decent driver in his own right, and in 1956 he even reached Formula One.
Chapman was involved in the design of the Vanwall VW 2 and he was called up to drive a third car at Reims. One notable thing he achieved on his only F1 weekend was out-qualifying his future world champion teammate Mike Hawthorn…and even that wasn’t of his own doing. Harry Schell, Chapman’s other teammate for the weekend, actually set the fifth place-worthy lap time in Chapman’s car, and the organisers mistakenly credited Chapman with the lap time. In any case, Colin would not make the start due to an incident with Hawthorn.
Mike was coming to the end of a lap in practice but, when he entered the Thillois hairpin, he suddenly lost control as something hit the back of his car – it was Chapman, who had locked his brakes and thumped the Surrey garage owner, ruining both cars. Chapman came out of the crash none the worse for wear, if a bit apprehensive about heading back to the pits to explain the whole ordeal to Tony Vandervell.
The boss took it rather well, though, and simply said “that’s motor racing”. But, with only enough time to repair one car, Chapman was forced to sit out the race, as the team gave priority to Hawthorn.
Back to the drawing board, then.
Honourable mentions: We waived our “no one-offs” rule for Chapman, since his time behind the wheel was so…distinctive. Maurice Trintignant, Harry Schell and Ken Wharton were also looked at.
Anthony Byrne
Dec 24: Williams – Antonio Pizzonia
Suffering from a concussion and two fractured vertebra in his monster shunt in the 2004 US Grand Prix, Williams’ ever-grumpy Ralf Schumacher spent six long rounds on the sidelines.
Former Minardi racer Marc Gené took over the car for the first two races, before handing it over to Williams’ new test driver Antonio Pizzonia for the next four. Pizzonia had come off the back of a poor partial season with Jaguar in 2003, and was perhaps fortunate to get his chance in the Williams.
He wasn’t dreadful, by any stretch – managing a trio of seventh places – but was comprehensively outclassed by Juan Pablo Montoya. Pizzonia had been accident-prone at Jaguar, but was wisely more circumspect in his 2004 outings before Schumacher returned from the physio’s table.
After Williams decided to ring the changes with its line-up, letting go of Montoya and Schumacher for the team’s last year with BMW power, the incoming Mark Webber needed a partner on-track. Pizzonia competed in a shootout with Nick Heidfeld, who had rekindled his F1 career by dragging an abysmal Jordan to the points on numerous occasions. Heidfeld got the nod, despite Pizzonia’s bigger commercial influence as sponsor Petrobras was lobbying for the Brazilian to get the drive.
Nonetheless, Pizzonia “earned” a second call-up to the Williams race team, which went more as expected. Heidfeld sustained a heavy crash in practice at Monza, before a motorbike accident left the German on the sidelines for the rest of the season. Naturally, Pizzonia got the drive, bagging another seventh in Italy.
Nicknamed “Jungle Boy” having been born in the Amazon-surrounded city of Manaus, Pizzonia proved increasingly wild as the season continued. Waving the second-placed Montoya through to lap him near the end of the Belgian Grand Prix, Pizzonia then unceremoniously careened into the back of the McLaren and earned a £4,000 fine (and Montoya’s unavoidable fury) for his efforts.
Pizzonia’s home race at Interlagos was next up, but his race lasted mere seconds. Attempting to squeeze a fast-starting Coulthard, Pizzonia made contact with the Red Bull and ended up hitting the back of team-mate Webber, before finding the wall. In the following round at Suzuka, Pizzonia beached his car in the gravel, before his career ended on a flat note at China with a puncture.
Losing “his” Williams seat to Nico Rosberg, Pizzonia was out of F1 for good after that. He’d displayed plenty of talent during his junior formula days but, in Formula 1, “Jungle Boy” was left on the ropes.
Honourable mentions: We focused on the current iteration of Williams, since the old “Frank Williams Racing Cars” team signed its fair share of slowcoaches. Kazuki Nakajima was noteworthy for scoring no points in 2009 with a good car, Alex Zanardi did the same ten years prior, and Bruno Senna completely wasted the race-winning Williams FW34.
Jake Boxall-Legge
Dec 25: Wolf – James Hunt
James Hunt, 1976 World Champion. In a decent car, the wild Briton could be one of the fastest drivers of his day. By 1978, though, he was struggling with McLaren, its M26 proving to be extremely uncompetitive. Seeking a new challenge in a competitive car, he was amazingly offered a drive by Ferrari. Hunt, aware of the politicking within the Fiorano outfit, turned it down. With Ferrari instead poaching Wolf’s main driver Jody Scheckter, Hunt filled in the South African’s spot, rejoining his old friend from Hesketh, Harvey Postlethwaite.
He had hoped Wolf, race-winners in their debut season in 1977, could be the platform for an assault to the World Championship in 1979. What happened was anything but.
The mood at Wolf was more serious and race-focused than the light and carefree attitude at Hesketh. As a result, Hunt and Postlethwaite often came to blows, especially when the WR7 chassis that year was uncompetitive and ill-handling. That, coupled with the death of good friend Ronnie Peterson at Monza the year before, sucked the motivation out of Hunt.
At the first race in Argentina, his front wing snapped off and struck his helmet, ruining his fast lap in qualifying before retiring from the race with electrical problems. At Kyalami, his brakes almost gave way during practice on the fastest point on the track. James, previously daring and fearless, was left frightened and physically shaken. Funnily enough, that race would be the only one Hunt would finish, a lacklustre effort towards an 8th place.
The frustration of uncompetitive machinery led to a reprisal of the old “Hunt the Shunt” moniker. He almost reverted his fortunes in Zolder, qualifying in ninth and managed to make his way all the way up to fourth, but crashed heavily and needlessly.
After a driveshaft failure at Monaco just five laps in, James Hunt called it quits on Wolf and on his Formula One career, a shadow of the World Champion he was just three years earlier.
Honourable mentions: CART legend Bobby Rahal was named, but his stint doesn’t quite compare to Hunt’s fall from grace.
Luke Levy
Dec 25: Minardi – Giovanni Lavaggi
We hope you’re still awake, and are able to stifle a turkey-induced burp for a short while to peruse the final (bonus!) installment of our advent calendar.
During its 20-year F1 tenure, Minardi had welcomed drivers good and terrible in equal measure. For every Fernando Alonso, there was an Alex Yoong; for every Giancarlo Fisichella, a Gaston Mazzacane. Yet, Mazzacane and Yoong somehow manage to look okay compared to one driver in Minardi’s former employ. Giovanni Lavaggi – or Johnny Carwash, as he is lovingly remembered – was arguably the worst of the lot.
After throwing the ailing Pacific team some cash in the latter half of 1995 in exchange for a race drive, Lavaggi quickly became synonymous with the wave of super-pay-drivers in the early-to-mid-‘90s. Slow, ungainly and clearly not up to the task of handling F1 machinery, Lavaggi somehow found his way into the Minardi team the year after – replacing Fisichella for the final six rounds.
Up against Pedro Lamy, Lavaggi looked exceptionally slow. The 38-year-old failed to qualify for three races, and was 1.35s slower on average than Lamy over the time they spent together. Thereafter, Lavaggi returned to his spiritual home of sportscars and tin-tops, never to return to F1 again.
Honourable mentions: Plenty we could mention in passing. In addition to Mazzacane and Yoong, Tarso Marques was equally as hopeless in his three spells with the team. Adrian Campos, “Pasta Man” Paolo Barilla and Nicolas Kiesa were also considered.
Jake Boxall-Legge
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