Motor Sport/Canadian Grand Prix: Scott Speed yesterday became the first American for 12 years to drive in Formula One when he contested the first free practice sessions for the Canadian Grand Prix at the wheel of the third Red Bull RB1.
The 23-year-old picked up the baton dropped in 1993 when Michael Andretti was sacked by McLaren. Like all the other number three drivers here, Speed's participation was confined to the two Friday sessions; he will watch the rest of the weekend's proceedings from the pit wall.
Speed has made a splash as a promising contender in the GP2 support races and is clearly hoping to be promoted to Formula One full-time in 2006 in line with the ambition of Red Bull's chief executive Dietrich Mateschitz to nurture American driving talent.
"For a marketing person, having a driver with a name like Scott Speed is like having Christmas and Easter coming at the same time," said the founder of the Austrian energy drinks company whose driver search programme highlighted Speed.
Accelerating out on to the dusty track surface at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, made even more slippery by the extensive resurfacing since last year's race, Speed performed with a measured caution to finish the first hour-long session 15th fastest, some 2.08 seconds slower than the pace-setter Pedro de la Rosa in the third McLaren but quicker than Christian Klien and David Coulthard in the other Red Bulls.
Toyota's test driver Ricardo Zonta set the second fastest time ahead of Kimi Raikkonen's McLaren, Michael Schumacher's Ferrari and Juan Pablo Montoya's McLaren.
Meanwhile Patrick Head, technical head of the Williams team, has added his weight to Frank Williams' recent criticism of their engine partner BMW, raising speculation a split is imminent. BMW has hinted at its wish to enter a partnership with the Sauber team for 2006, but the German car maker's continued criticism of Williams has infuriated the 59-year-old engineer.
"I haven't been impressed by this attitude, which is when a constructor pretends every problem comes from the car and not from the engine," said Head. "When the car always starts (races) badly, in my opinion it's more likely that it depends on the engine's control systems rather than the car's.
"Unfortunately our partner chose to tell people they are perfect while accusing us. This is honestly something which, besides being very unprofessional, shows very little character."
The Canadian race marks the start of the most gruelling - but, in title terms, decisive - phase of the Formula One schedule with six races coming in the next eight weeks.
Not only is this an extremely taxing period for the drivers and team personnel, it also stretches the logistical organisation of the teams to near breaking point. The cars and all their paraphernalia have been airlifted to Montreal in a couple of Boeing 747 freighters and tomorrow evening they will all be loaded on to a fleet of more than 30 articulated trucks for the 1,000-mile drive south to Indianapolis, where practice for the US Grand Prix begins next Friday.
Then, in a crammed calendar with a record 19 races this season, having completed their north American tour the cars will be flown back from Indianapolis to Europe where their regular transporters will take them to four races in just five weekends.
