Brazilian Grand Prix 2000
Interlagos, 24th-26th March

TV Screenshots

Race

Jaguar press release, 26th March: Despite a promising start to the Brazilian Grand Prix, Eddie Irvine’s race ended with an accident on lap 21. He was running strongly in sixth place when he retired. He had been as high as fifth soon after the start. Team-mate Johnny Herbert, starting from 17th position, was running in 10th place when he retired with a gearbox problem on lap 50.

Johnny's comments:

"The handling of the car was very difficult which is hard to understand and obviously being that far back was not easy, but I covered a lot of laps which was encouraging. The engine issue seems to be less of a problem now which is good, so we're moving the right way but we still need to finish. We’re still learning about the new car and Eddie has shown that it can be competitive so we can look at that and say 'we have a good, solid base, we can make it better'."

Eddie's comments:

"Thinking I was a lot quicker than I actually was, I was pushing harder than I should have been and just lost the back end. I didn’t really have a clear picture of just how competitive we are in a race situation before today, but I have to say lam impressed because I feel that we can mix it at the top end. I feel sorry for the guys who have worked hard since Melbourne that it ended like it did, but performance-wise, the future looks bright after today."

Paul Stewart's comments:

"Despite the two retirements, we have definitely made progress since Melbourne. Eddie proved that he can run on the pace and, given our fuel strategy, would have been poised for a podium place had he finished. It was pleasing for Johnny to have some solid running in the car. He drove well and it was a pity he didn’t make it to the end. I'd like to thank everyone from Jaguar Racing and Cosworth Racing for all their efforts over the weekend - we went through a lot of toil to ensure that we were in good shape for today’s race."

Jaguar-Racing, 26th March: There was disappointment in the Jaguar camp as both drivers again failed to finish the race. Eddie Irvine had started brilliantly, taking Fisichella for fifth at the first corner, and held the position until he was overtaken by Jordan’s Jarno Trulli on lap 16. But the car always looked nervous under braking and Irvine spun out of the race at Bico de Pato six laps later.

Team-mate Johnny Herbert lasted longer and fought his way up to ninth position before pulling into his pit garage on lap 54. Nevertheless, the team leaves Sao Paulo confident that it is making progress.

Race results:
 

Qualifying

Luck played a part as Eddie got his quick lap in before the rain came and made the last quarter of the session a washout. The field was tightly bunched, and less than 0.1s separated Eddie from the four cars immediately behind him.

Johnny Herbert had the opposite kind of luck, and was one of many drivers who did not get a decent run in before the track was soaked. Johnny had to settle for 17th place, 0.825s down on his team-mate. Herbert lost some track time in the morning practice session with a fuel pump problem, but otherwise the two cars had a trouble-free day.

"I'm disappointed because this morning it didn't look so bad," said Johnny. "I was expecting to gain a lot more time in the mid-section, which I never seemed to do. Just comparing myself with Eddie it seems I lost a bit of time under braking in a couple of places, which at the moment seems to be my major problem." 

After the session Eddie admitted that he was lucky to have stayed ahead of the midfield pack. 

"It's close isn't it! I could be a tenth slower and looking a complete idiot. To be honest we probably have a little bit of an edge on the others, which is why we're ahead of them. But it is very close. The car has still got the same problems; there's a lot of grip I can't use because of the balance. There's too much difference between the entry and exit of the corners - that's the problem."

Eddie is not worried about the team's relative lack of knowledge of race conditions, following the early retirements in Australia. 

"It doesn't matter - we'll see tomorrow. Hopefully I can beat Fisichella. Maybe the Jordans can be quicker, but there's not much in it to be honest. We've been so close to them in testing." 

Jackie Stewart agreed that fortune had favoured Eddie. 

"I think it would have been tough to hold that place, but we could have done it. It's all very close in that little window of time - there are five or six cars that could have all been in that slot. But I said that we had a good chance of being in the top six if we got everything running. We've had some problems here, but not on the same scale as Melbourne."

Qualifying times:

1. Mika Hakkinen, McLaren-Mercedes - 1:14.111
2. David Coulthard, McLaren-Mercedes - 1:14.285 (+0.174)
3. Mika  Schumacher, Ferrari - 1:14.508 (+0.397)
4. Rubens Barrichello, Ferrari - 1:14.636 (+0.525)
5. Giancarlo Fisichella, Benetton-Playlife - 1:15.375 (+1.264)
6. Eddie Irvine, Jaguar - 1:15.425 (+1.314)
7. Heinz-Harald Frentzen, Jordan-Mugen Honda - 1:15.455 (+1.344)
8. Ricardo Zonta, BAR-Honda - 1:15.484 (+1.373)
9. Jenson Button, Williams-BMW - 1:15.490 (+1.379)
10. Jacques Villeneuve, BAR-Honda - 1:15.515 (+1.404)
11. Ralf Schumacher, Williams-BMW - 1:15.561 (+1.450)
12. Jarno Trulli, Jordan-Mugen Honda - 1:15.627 (+1.516)
13. Alexander Wurz, Benetton-Playlife - 1:15.664 (+1.553)
14. Jos Verstappen, Arrows-Supertec - 1:15.704 (+1.593)
15. Jean Alesi, Prost-Peugeot - 1:15.715 (+1.604)
16. Pedro de la Rosa, Arrows-Supertec - 1:16.002 (+1.891)
17. Johnny Herbert, Jaguar - 1:16.250 (+2.139)
18. Marc Gene, Minardi-Fondmetal - 1:16.380 (+2.269)
19. Nick Heidfeld, Prost-Peugeot - 1:17.112 (+3.001)
20. Pedro Diniz, Sauber-Petronas - 1:17.178 (+3.067)
21. Gaston Mazzacane, Minardi-Fondmetal - 1:17.512 (+3.401)
22. Mika Salo, Sauber-Petronas - 1:18.703 (+4.592)

Friday practice

Johnny's afternoon session was curtailed by a drive problem, which cost him half an hour. However, he was happy with the laps he completed.

"We made progress, but we stopped half an hour before the end of the last session. It’s not engine related. But every time we were going out we were making big, big jumps, so stopping doesn't help too much, especially when the track is going quicker. We'll see how we fare tomorrow; we've got to have a trouble-free day. But we haven't had any of the problems we had last time."

In the morning session Eddie had completed just four laps and had not set a proper time when an electronic problem ended his session. Despite losing almost an hour, he was able to catch up in the afternoon, when he ran 26 laps with a best time of 1m19.971s. He was only half a second off sixth place, emphasising how close the field is this year. During the session he also tried out a new front wing.

"In the morning I was changing gear then it started cutting out," said Eddie. "But the first few races are going to be difficult for us; we knew that. In the afternoon session we had a programme to do, and we did it. We had a lot of fuel on board, so we're probably alright, and we didn't use new tyres. There's still room for improvement in handling - there's half a second there straight away. I didn't change springs and bars the whole session, because we had the wing to try, and had to do it properly."

The team’s chief operating officer, Paul Stewart, expects to see an improvement on Saturday. 

"Thirteenth position for Eddie may not look that impressive, but considering how tight things are I expect we can make a considerable move up the order tomorrow. Johnny didn't get enough running in towards the end to set a significant time, but he feels he has plenty in hand."

Johnny Herbert completed 11 laps and finished in 18th place with a time of 1m20.512s. But it was Irvine who suffered the worst luck of the two Jaguar drivers. He appeared early in the session but was hampered by a misfire. In the end, he completed only four tours of the circuit and not one was a full flying lap.

"We didn't do as much running as we wanted to," said the team's chief operating officer Paul Stewart. "But there were no dramas really and we stopped Johnny Herbert five minutes before the end of the session because there was something on the car we wanted to sort out."

Practice times from AtlasF1:

1. Hakkinen McLaren Mercedes 1:15.896 
2. M.Schumacher Ferrari 1:16.375 + 0:00.479 
3. Coulthard McLaren Mercedes 1:16.606 + 0:00.710 
4. Barrichello Ferrari 1:16.613 + 0:00.717 
5. de la Rosa Arrows Supertec 1:17.217 + 0:01.321 
6. Alesi Prost Peugeot 1:17.468 + 0:01.572 
7. Verstappen Arrows Supertec 1:17.641 + 0:01.745 
8. Trulli Jordan Mugen-Honda 1:17.642 + 0:01.746 
9. Villeneuve BAR Honda 1:17.654 + 0:01.758 
10. Fisichella Benetton Supertec 1:17.831 + 0:01.935 
11. Frentzen Jordan Mugen-Honda 1:17.920 + 0:02.024 
12. Salo Sauber Petronas 1:17.933 + 0:02.037 
13. Irvine Jaguar Ford 1:17.971 + 0:02.075 
14. R.Schumacher Williams BMW 1:18.024 + 0:02.128 
15. Gene Minardi Fondmetal 1:18.248 + 0:02.352 
16. Mazzacane Minardi Fondmetal 1:18.280 + 0:02.384 
17. Zonta BAR Honda 1:18.789 + 0:02.893 
18. Diniz Sauber Petronas 1:19.081 + 0:03.185 
19. Wurz Benetton Supertec 1:19.129 + 0:03.233 
20. Button Williams BMW 1:19.303 + 0:03.407 
21. Herbert Jaguar Ford 1:19.575 + 0:03.679 
22. Heidfeld Prost Peugeot 1:20.364 + 0:04.468

Race preview

"We’ll be taking two specifications of dry tyres to Interlagos: medium and soft," says Yoshihiko Ichikawa, Bridgestone Motorsports Technical Manager. "They are the same specification as those used in Australia, even though the track surfaces at these two circuits are completely different. At Interlagos, the softer dry tyre is prone to increased degradation of grip. If the teams choose the soft specification they also have to consider the increased tyre wear, and this factor will figure strongly in the race strategies. I anticipate the teams running two stops. 

"The track has undergone some resurfacing work since last year. We haven't yet experienced the new track conditions, but if it makes the surface smoother and less bumpy, setting up the cars should become easier. If the resurfacing work has made the track slippery then the teams may have to choose a softer tyre to increase grip.

Like Barcelona and Silverstone, Interlagos is one of the few circuits that cause significant degradation in the tyres. In Melbourne, the teams were using scrubbed or old tyres during both qualifying. But Ichihiko says that new tyres will work best at Interlagos because scrubbed tyres would already be too degraded. The very bumpy nature of the track can also destabilise the cars, which can be counteracted with the use of softer tyres to provide extra grip. 

There’s also the chance of rain – although normally hot and dry at this time of year the semi-tropical climate has been known to spring surprises – and the drivers will have to deal with the fact that Interlagos runs anti-clockwise and is mostly made up of left-hand corners. Neck strain and physical exhaustion can be a serious problem, particularly for the rookies

.Jaguar Press Release, 17th March: After a tough season opener in Melbourne, the Formula One circus now the other side of the world to South America for the Brazilian Grand Prix. at the Interlagos track In the city of São Paolo, the home town of two famous champions — Emerson Fittipaldi and Ayrton Senna.

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 Jaguar-Racing material used by kind permission
Preview pictures (and kids) by Dave Schembri
Last updated 26th March 2000