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Formula One: Ferrari, McLaren eye each other at Melbourne opener

10 March 2000

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel

MELBOURNE, Australia- Who will come out on top down under?

The Australian Grand Prix on March 12 is the season opener in the 17-race 2000 Formula One World Championship that will include the inaugural United States Grand Prix at Indianapolis on Sept. 24.

So whose name will be on top of the winners list after the Grand Prix "down under" in Australia? And which teams will be the ones to beat this season?

"Ferrari will probably be our main rivals," said reigning World Champion Mika Hakkinen, who returns to the West McLaren-Mercedes team for the eighth consecutive season, "but we will see after this weekend what happens. We are in a more confident and comfortable situation than we were last year."

Ferraris Michael Schumacher, one of Hakkinens main rivals for the title, sees Sundays race and the entire season as a Ferrari/McLaren-Mercedes battle.

"McLaren certainly are our main rival," Schumacher said. "If you look at the championship in recent years, you would have to say its up to McLaren and Ferrari. And in that I include all four drivers."

Schumachers teammate is Rubens Barrichello, who joins Ferrari this season and becomes the first Brazilian ever to drive for the factory Ferrari F1 team. David Coulthard is Hakkinens teammate for the fifth consecutive season.

"I am at the start of my time with the team," Barrichello said, "but I can say that I am already aware of the great progress made with the new car when compared to the 1999 car. The level of technology and of performance we have seen to date make me genuinely optimistic for the start of the season in Melbourne."

After winning two consecutive championships, Hakkinen is taking a relaxed approach to title number three.

"Im much more relaxed than in 1998 and 1999," Hakkinen said. "Im starting with a calm approach this year and just taking things as they come. Im not sitting here worrying about qualifying and the race. Its not that I feel less hungry to win - I want to be stronger and to win in a different way from the past."

Schumacher, too, is relaxed and ready to go.

"I am looking forward to the Grand Prix in Melbourne," he said. "The holidays during the winter time have really been long enough, and also because the new car makes me feel very optimistic. So Im eager to start the first race and hopefully win it."

This will be the first Grand Prix for F1s three rookies this season: Jenson Button in the Williams-BMW, Gaston Mazzacane in the Telefonica Minardi-Fondmetal and Nick Heidfeld in the Gauloises Prost Peugeot.

"Like most of the F1 circuits, I have never driven around the Albert Park circuit before," Button said. "There is little I can do in these situations apart from going out there and giving it my best shot. I have been studying on-board TV footage from last year and looking at telemetry in an effort to understand the track."

Four years ago another F1 rookie, also driving for Williams, made his debut at Melbournes Albert Park circuit. He qualified on the pole and was heading for victory in the race until he had to slow down because of an oil leak and finished second.

That particular rookie in 1996 was Canadas Jacques Villeneuve. But while he was a rookie in F1, he was hardly inexperienced. Villeneuve won the Indianapolis 500 and the CART championship in 1995. Villeneuve went on to win the World Championship in 1997 and joined the new British American Racing team in 1999. Last year he failed to score a single point. This year, his BAR has a new Honda V10 and improved reliability.

"In previous years, it seems as though if I have gone well in Australia, the rest of the season has gone well," Villeneuve said, "so I am really hoping for a good result in Melbourne. As for this season, I have said before, and I will say again, that I didnt get into racing not to fight and win, and nor did I get into this team not to fight and win, so that has to be the goal. I think there is every chance that we will have a good season and maybe surprise a few people."

Text provided by IMS

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