BAR - HONDA
I never quite understood the hype around BAR for 2001. They were expected to beat Jordan quite easily, which I couldn't work out, and be at least 4th in the WCC. This sat wrong with me, though I did predict a definite improvement from a leaner, meaner BAR, with a possible win, and certainly a 3rd for Panis, and probably a 2nd for Jacques. I was excited to see how Panis would do; his stock had soared after a good season testing for McLaren. In fact, he did do well for the firt half of the season. Panis amazed me actually, leading me to overrate him a bit. I was really like "WOW" during 2001 for Olivier, though he did tail off when the McLaren drive became available and he realised he missed out on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be a McLaren race driver. The way he matched and beat JV caused me to re-evaluate opinions.




JAGUAR
Now I knew they weren't going to make a big leap and they would have to contend against other improving teams, but I still expected Jaguar to be more respectable and get more points. I had Irvine 10th in qualifying as I couldn't conceive a Jaguar being out of the 10 best qualifiers. So Jaguar to improve, but others improving more. Luciano Burti was never really going to be a long term bet, and I guess he beat Dario Franchitti to the drive as the team were worried he'd be another Zanardi.




SAUBER
I well remember how Heidfeld was maligned after 2000 where he struggled and little was expected. This was always so wrong to me. Yes he did qualify last twice I think, but this was down to struggling with a terrible car. Few seemed to notice after the first 6 or so races, that for the rest of the season he matched Alesi - I certainly did, and this was a truer barometer of his ability. People judged Nick far too harshly and made their minds up after the first half of the season. I though, thought he would quietly be more impressive and perform at a higher level generally than Alesi this year.

As for Raikkonen, I so clearly remember like it was last year how Kimi was a shock signing to RACE for Sauber after a single test. At the time, Red Bull were pushing for Enrique Bernoldi and I think Mateschitz (or maybe Dr Marko but I think the former) called Peter Sauber crazy for choosing Raikkonen. There had also been a rumour around Spa 2000 that Johnny Herbert could rejoin (since no-one better was available), but that was immediately rubbished by Martin Brundle.

So, great rejoicing at Sauber having signed an exciting mega-rookie. But what's this? Max Mosley and the FIA have immediately refused Raikkonen a superlicence saying he was too young and inexperienced, and potentially very dangerous. Even at the time I found this ridiculous and unjust. The way I see it, if a person can do the job, regardless of age, gender, anything else, then they can do the job - no argument! This row raged on for ages until Max finally got his way.

The really bad thing about this was that Raikkonen had turned down a good drive at either Manor Motorsport in British F3 or for Dr Marko's Red Bull Jr F3000 team for 2001, I can't quite remember which one. But by the time the FIA finally demanded no, the drive had been filled and it looked like Raikkonen would be out of a proper drive altogether.

The F1 seat was essentially confirmed for Luca Badoer, so much so that I ran him in my GP2 seasons, 19th and marginally ahead of Alonso.

Thankfully, weeks or even months later, Raikkonen was reinstated but given a stern probation for 4 races - one slip and you're out. So Kimi, with 23 British Formula Renault races behind him, went into his first F1 season with many burning eyes practically willing him to fail.

Those eyes were soon filled with tears as their doomsday prophecies turned out to be so much trash, as Raikkonen came 6th on debut. His season amazed me so much, I never imagined anything like it.

You have to remember I only really got into F1 in time for 1998, so I had never witnessed an amazing debut season. I only knew of Takagi, Tuero, de la Rosa, Zonta etc. So when Jenson Button came and had the season he had in 2000, I found this utterly amazing, to the point where at the time I thought he could go on to be the best driver ever, ahead of Moss, Fangio etc...

In 2001 I was even more shocked as Kimi, imo, had an even more impressive debut season. He didn't have the overall 3rd best car after all and only scored 3pts less than Jenson.

Full credit to Michael Schumacher, who always believed Raikkonen should have a chance. And shame on Mika Salo, who with his usual swearing negative style railed against Raikkonen, then had to sit and watch as Kimi put in a first season which imo was at least at the level, probably higher than any season Salo had had.



PROST
Like everyone else, I expected some improvement here with Ferrari engines. However, I was one of the few who never bought the testing times and the hype. Autosport tipped Alesi as an outsider for victory at Melbourne, as at the time, there were concerns about the reliability of both the McLaren and the Ferrari. I never accepted any of this, and instead tipped Prost for a season garnering about 5pts, with Alesi a little behind Heidfeld, not matching the lofty expectations, but nevertheless having a much more respectable season. I tipped Mazzacane to average 1sec off Alesi.

For a long time, the drive looked like going to Spanish CART driver Oriol Servia, who I rooted for, or Bernoldi, with Mazzacane in the mix too. For much of my GP2 seasons I had Servia in the 2nd Prost.



ARROWS
At the time I rated Peugeot fairly highly, believing their figure of 792bhp the year before. Therefore, this seemed like an increase over the Supertec, so I thought Arrows would make a slight improvement, though others would improve more. I didn't know that Asiatech would only achieve reliability by detuning the ex-Peugeot engine so it had only 750bhp iirc.

There was an uproar when Pedro de la Rosa was dumped for Bernoldi, who was placed by Red Bull. A real shame for Pedro but Enrique was unfairly maligned and didn't deserve that. I liked Enrique as his 2000 F3000 season impressed me. He was pretty much the best and most consistent qualifier of all, against more experienced and highly rated drivers, though he only scored 5pts through a mix of poor racing and terrible, terrible misfortune mechanically. He turned out closer to Verstappen than expected though I think Jos underperformed.

So a slightly weaker season than 2000, but still good I thought it would be.



MINARDI
Unknown and to me, surprisingly unheralded Spaniard Fernando Alonso was signed for Minardi in late 2000, having only recently turned 19. He would bring sponsorship that could save Minardi, who suddenly and inexplicably had gone from having a good year with one of THE best chassis in F1(!) and a Supertec deal in their pocket, to being about to close down.

Thanfully Stoddy saved the day. The Minardi seat was the final seat to be resolved. Enrique Bernoldi was such a shoe-in for a drive at one point, I had him in my GP2 season. Then since due to money, Alonso couldn't be confirmed, he was set to be announced alongside Mark Webber at Super Nova for a 2nd season of F3000.

At the time, strangely now, Giorgio Pantano was THE next big name, and McLaren and Ferrari (the dominant teams of 2000) engaged in a battle to secure him on a long-term contract, joined by Flavio Briatore at Benetton too! At one point, he was 99.99% for a race seat at Minardi (who I had given a blue/white/Telefonica lime green (and maybe an extra colour or two) livery) so Pantano and Bernoldi were my drivers in Grand Prix 2.

By late January though I think I'd realised the cars were going to be black(?) Now with Alonso confirmed, there was a new twist regarding 2nd seat, the last to be filled in F1. The seat would go to a mystery experienced driver who has driven in F1 before! Wooooooo who would it be? The 2 drivers in contention were eventually revealed to be Tarso Marques and Gianni Morbidelli!! I was begging for Morbidelli who was dreaming of a comeback, but was still happy to see Marques back! It really felt like a strange good dream somehow, a strange good feel about it.

Back then, Marques was highly rated, for driving his appaling Swift chassis in CART and for qualifying 14th ahead of Martin Brundle at Argentina '96. He was regarded as a driver with potential. I thought he could even match or beat Alonso after settling back in. He was one of the biggest unknowns to me in terms of potential. At the time, despite witnessing Alonso in F3000 I didn't realise how good he was. As it turned out, Marques "couldn't drive a nail into a piece of wood" (lol).



That's about that then. *Checks Post* Wow I got carried away. I just love living in the past.