35 Days Until the 2008 Australian GP
February 9th, 2008 | by Farzad |
In the five years between transforming from Ligier and folding at the end of the 2001 season, the Prost team scored 35 points. The majority of these points were scored in the team’s first year, 1997. Olivier Panis started the season very well with a fifth place in Australia and a third place in Brazil. In Monaco Panis finished fourth, while the Spanish Grand prix was the highlight of the season with a second place for the Frenchman.
At the following race in Canada, things went dramatically wrong. While in seventh place, Panis suddenly spun right into a wall, breaking both his legs and eliminating him for seven races. Teammate Shinji Nakano finished the race in sixth, but the team had lost its leader. Jarno Trulli took his place and finished fourth in Germany and Nakano sixth in Hungary, but those were the points finishes until Panis returned with a sixth place in the Luxembourg Grand Prix. This gave the team 21 points for the season and sixth place in the Championship.
In 1998 the team had to settle for just one point, scored by Jarno Trulli in Belgium. The following year showed a little progress, but the nine points weren’t near what the team hoped for, especially since six of those points came from a single race when Trulli finished second in the European Grand Prix. The 2000 season then became a drama for the team. They retired most of the time and didn’t score a single point. In the final year, reliability was up again, but the speed was still lacking. Two sixth places and a fifth for Jean Alesi meant a grand total of four points.
Tags: prost, team points
