F1 team from 1992. We chose this team because they really were the ultimate F1 wannabes - to the point of tragedy. So there we have that in common.
The team was started in 1992 from the remnants of the old Coloni team that was disbanded at the end of 1991 after a pretty ordinary tilt at F1.
A guy called Andrea Sassetti started the team and named it after his fashion brand ‘Andrea Moda’. The first drivers were Alex Caffi, relatively decent, and Enrico Bertaggia who had tried to compete with Coloni in 1991.
Having arrived in South Africa for the first race the team was declared a “new team” but hadn’t paid their fees so were prevented from attempting to qualify. Sassetti had decided anyway that the car was a shitbox and had a new car, designed by Nick Wirth, built in a very short time for the Mexican GP. The cars, which had Judd engines, were withdrawn though from the Mexican race due to freight issues and when the drivers complained about all this Sassetti fired them!
New drivers were employed for Brazil, the very decent Roberto Moreno and Perry McCarthy (a.k.a. the Black Stig).
In those days there were so many entries there was a pre-qualifying system. I think 30 cars were allowed into qualifying, so any new teams beyond that had to meet a required cut-off point. Those teams had their own session on the Thursday to try to pre-qualify. The top four were then allowed into qualifying.
For the next race, in Brazil, only one car was readied in time but it was all to no avail as Moreno was 15 seconds off the pre-qualifying time. In Spain Moreno’s engine broke after 1 lap of pre-qual and McCarthy got 18 yards before his donk also died. They got one car going again but alas Moreno was 10 seconds off pre-qualifying. In San Marino McCarthy did 8 laps before his diff broke and neither driver pre-qualified.
Then came Monaco and Andrea Moda’s crowning moment. Moreno got into the race and was running 19th and last when after 11 strenuous laps the engine expired. Such was their season.
In attempting to compete in their season of 12 races there were lots of DNPQ and DNQ, and then also the exclusions and withdrawals, and when they did start the one race with one car, a DNF.
The ultimate shame came though halfway through the Belgian GP weekend when team owner Sassetti was arrested for fraud and that was it for the team – game over.
So there you have it. Andrea Moda, a team worthy of remembering for ‘having a go’ and that’s about the best you could say. And like them, those of us competing in the F1 tipping championship are also having a go (although um, not actually racing…..).
Further reading - http://www.f1rejects.com/main.html
No comments:
Post a Comment