Few F1 Teams just disappear into oblivion these days. usually they are bought out, cars repainted and it's business as usual. I decided to have a look at this seasons protagonists and to explore the Bloodlines of the modern F1 grid.
1: Scuderia Ferrari / Alfa Romeo - Enzo began his racing team to run cars for Alpha Romeo before WW2. Post War the agreement was not to be renewed and the rest as they say, is history!
2: McLaren - Although the cars bear the same name as the Orange cars first entered into a GP by Bruce McLaren in 1966 this is a very different team. Following the James Hunt title of 1976 McLaren stuggled to remain competitive. The tide was turning and the days of steel frame monocoques, off the shelf DFVs and Hewland gearboxes were coming to an end. Renault had spoilt the party with their Turbo and soon others would follow suit. Ron Dennis was a successful F2 boss backed by Marlboro and in 1980 his Project 4 group acquired McLaren and a new company called McLaren International was born. The reference to this take over can still be seen in the cars MP4 Prefix.
3: Renault / Benetton / Toleman - The little Toleman team arrived in F1 in 1980 and struggled to make the grid. their two cars could managed just one start each in an era of Qualifying & Pre-Qualifying. By the end of 1983 however things were looking better with Derek Warwick taking two 4th place finishes. It was the arrival of the young Ayrton Senna de Silva which would write the Toleman name in History. That 2nd place finish at Monaco in 1984 along with two more podiums at Silverstone & Estoril began the Senna legend and attracted new sponsors for the team. The Benetton family would eventually go beyond sponsorship and by 1986 owned the team outright. by 1990 they had placed Flavio Briatore at the helm and by the mid 90's 2 World Titles had been won. Eventually Flavio would be moved aside and the team fell into decline until Renaults take-over. Ironically Renaults success owes much to the reappointment of Flav!
4. Honda/ BAR / British American Racing / Tyrrell - The once mighty Tyrrell team's last stand came with Jean Alesi's storming Second Place finish at Monaco in 1991. As the gap between the "have's" and the "have nots" grew ever bigger during the 90's Tyrrell fell increasingly into the "have nots". For their Final GP in 1998 Ricardo Rosset could not even qualify! A sad end for the team of Cevert and Stewart. The team was sold to British American Tobacco as part of Craig Pollock's Masterplan for a "Team Villeneuve". Unfortunately the team was Pollocks and JV's "Big One" at Eau Rouge that year pretty much summed up the year. By the time of Ken Tyrrells death in 2001 Villeneuve had made the podium but it still wasn't good enough. Pollock was ousted from his own team and Dave Richards began turning things around. The Arrival of Jenson Button would show up Villeneuve and he would be replaced before the end of the 2003 season. As BAR gave way to Honda Jenson would score that first win. but 10 years after the Tyrrell team's demise, it's successor still cannot live up to it's own lofty ambitions.
5. BMW Sauber / Sauber - After huge successes in Sports Car racing running the Mercedes superteam of Schumacher, Frenzen & Wendlinger. Peter Sauber was viewed by Mercedes as the perfect platform upon which to return to Grand Prix Racing for the first time since 1955. At the 1994 Monaco GP Karl Wendlinger suffered horrific injurys which lead Sauber to pioneer the now standard cockpit head protection. Mercedes support ended suddenly with a switch to McLaren for 1995. and stints with Ford and Ferrari power would follow. In 2001 the team took a huge gamble by bringing in a vastly inexperianced Kimi Raikkonen despite huge protests. he would of course be a revelation. Eventually the works support first envisaged from Mercedes arrived in the form of rivals BMW and the team goes from strength to strength.
6. Toyota - A brand new team in a brand new factory... well just a Brand really!!
7. Red Bull Racing / Jaguar / Stewart - Stewart showed the world how to start a formula one team. Works support from Ford, title sponsorship from one of the worlds biggest banks, two highly rated drivers and a car built by one of the best designers in the business - oh and a new tartan. 1997 was the year Bridgestone returned to take on Goodyears tyre monopoly and Jackie was one of the first to sign up to the new Japanese rubber. It all came to fruition at the Nurburgring in 1999 when Jonny Herbert took a fantastic win. Ford took notice and upped their involvement. Stewart left with his tartan and in came British Racing Green and World Champsionship runner-up Eddie Irivine. A constant rotation of the management staff though probably helped the project stall and a slump in Fords worldwide sales lead to the plug being pulled on Motorsport
8. Williams - Although the Williams team as we know it today is a born from scratch by Frank Williams & Patrick Head, the teams roots go back even further. In the late 1960's Frank Williams set up Frank Willliams Racing cars using customer chassis for drivers such as Piers Courage. Later with backing from a fridge company and Marlboro Cigarettes he began to build cars under the ISO Marlboro banner with little success. When his sponsors pulled out Canadian Millionaire Walter Wolf acquired a stake in the team. Williams became increasingly unhappy and left in 1976 to form the Williams we know today. His Old team became Wolf Racing and would go on to win a Grand Prix with Jody Schecketer before being would up after the 1979 season. A year later Alan Jones would take Williams first title.
9. Scuderia Toro Rosso / European Minardi / Minardi Course. Gian Carlo Minardi's team didn't build bad cars, they just never had the budget to build amazing ones. Where as some would be tempted to go down the pay driver route for extra money, Minardi resisted. The result is that Minardi's list of Drivers includes names such as Alonso, Trulli, Fisichella, Zanardi, Fittipaldi & Nannini. Winners all! Stoddart eventually took the name to ChampCar and the Minardi name lives on. I live in hope that one day it will return to Formula One... perhaps if we all stop buying Red Bull?
10. Force India / Spyker / Midland / Jordan - ...and of course the busiest paint shop in Formula One. Major backing from B&H helped Eddies team move from midfield maestros to championship contenders. Unfortunately when the money stopped so did the success and Jordan slid back down the grid at an alarming rate. Eventually there was an offer from an investment firm which was too good to refuse. they got the return on that investment and a year later made a sizable profit by offloading to the Spyker car company. Unfortunately people weren't buying enough Spykers to justify having an F1 programme so they were sold again to a Beer company. Well everyone drinks beer!!
11. Super Aguri - Used Honda's backing to make 5 year old Arrows Chassis go better than they ever did new. Rumours of a takeover were in the air but we all secretly hoped for the suvival of everyones favourite little team
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