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Long interview with Jacques Villeneuve with autosport-atlas.com Time was when JV walked on water, winning as he pleased. But recently he's been in danger of sinking into the quicksands of the midfield. As ever, though, he talks a good story. He's as quick as ever, says he, and the uncaring F1 media simply don't get it... (By Matt Bishop )Only very rarely in the history of sport has an athlete enjoyed such phenomenal early success as did Jacques Villeneuve. Thrust into the F1 limelight by Bernie Ecclestone - who well understood the enduring global appeal of that surname and moved heaven and earth to put it into a Williams-Renault for 1996 - 24-year-old Jacques delivered on his promise by becoming only the third man, after Mario Andretti and Carlos Reutemann, to bag pole in his very first grand prix.But for a slow oil leak which prompted the emergence of the 'Slow' sign five laps from the end of that race, the 1996 Australian Grand Prix, he would have become only the second F1 driver, after Giancarlo Baghetti, to win on his debut. Instead he finished second, behind team-mate Damon Hill. But he would score four victories that year - and seven the next, to win the drivers' championship. Impressive.Watching him now, balding and bespectacled, often melancholic of countenance, strolling unmolested by the media through pit lanes and paddocks in the grotesquely over-sized overalls that once marked him out as an exciting maverick but now make him look more like a Dyno-Rod fitter in search of a smelly drain, it takes a bit of effort to remember just what a megastar he was in his glory years. A winner with Williams, he was being courted by Benetton, McLaren and Ferrari.But Jacques said no to Benetton, no to McLaren and no to Ferrari. Instead, in late 1998, he and his friend and manager, Craig Pollock, co-founded British American Racing. It made them both wealthy - but, in the five seasons he spent at B.A.R, Jacques never won again. Among world champions, only the decline of Emerson Fittipaldi - who, having won 14 grands prix and two drivers' titles with Lotus and McLaren between 1970 and 1975, spent the next five seasons going nowhere not very fast in his own Copersucar-Fittipaldi machines - is as abject as that of Gilles's once happy-go-lucky but latterly unhappy-go-unlucky boy.At the end of 2003, Jacques's F1 career appeared to be all washed up. No one in F1 wanted him, and he appeared to want no one in F1.We never expected to see him again. Then, last year, following Jarno Trulli's expulsion from Renault, Jacques was back, in a quick car, for the last three races of the season. But it was an inglorious return, and, again, we thought we'd seen the last of him. We were wrong. Peter Sauber signed JV to a two-year deal - and a troubled relationship. Earlier this year, Sauber was prepared to admit, even on the record, that his driver was "too slow". Indeed, 13 races into 2005, Jacques's team-mate, Felipe Massa, had out-qualified him nine to four; and in the eight races they both completed, JV finished ahead in only two. Even so, he now looks set to be part of BMW's first-ever full-works assault on F1. Or so he says.How did it happen? And why? Jacques has always been a smart talker. So, let's ask him... Why not sit down and go through it all, painstakingly, over an hour or more? Why not do it in Hungary, where it's quiet, and the sponsors are on holiday? Why not get it all from the horse's mouth?A question of paceA comeback, but only to the backMatt Bishop: Your comeback - three races with Renault last year, and the first three races this year with Sauber - didn't go well. Why was that? How much of a disadvantage was missing most of 2003, and in what ways?Jacques Villeneuve: "It was a big disadvantage because the cars picked up a lot of speed in that year. And, this year, it took a few races for the [Sauber] team to understand that you don't just sit in a car and drive it. Drivers aren't robots, and there are a few things you need to change to make a car respond to a new driver's way of driving. But now it's going well."MB: That's a Sauber issue, and we'll come to Sauber later. But the three races you did for Renault last year weren't that strong, either, were they? Maybe you didn't drive as well as you would have done if you'd been driving throughout 2003?He stares you out, does Jacques - but, much as he feigns to dislike the press, in fact I fancy he rather enjoys jousting with those who wield the poison pen (as he sees it). And there's no doubt that he regards F1 Racing as very far from being on-side. There's impatience in his eyes (remote and distorted behind his spookily thick-lensed glasses), and if he were Eddie Irvine he'd already be telling me to **** off. But he isn't. He's too shy for that.He smiles a forced smile, and begins to speak. His diction is hyper-precise in the way of all bilingual French-Canadians - he enunciates every consonant and rarely pauses. He thinks quickly, and instinctively. He doesn't appear to puzzle things out or plan his replies. Nonetheless, they're intelligent and logical, if always subtly feisty and tinged with paranoia.JV: "Actually, the lap times themselves I wasn't disappointed with. I was disappointed with the end results. I did three races, and out of those six qualifying sessions I was ahead of Fernando [Alonso, his Renault team-mate] three times. So that wasn't too bad. Also, I hardly tested the car. And, because it was the end of the season, it didn't really matter what they did with me, so they were just open and happy to try anything."When we got to Suzuka, for example, we had a bunch of new stuff on the car and it rained all the time and we only found out what it was like in the dry in the race. And by then it was too late to adjust anything. So the race didn't work. And also I got tired. Physically, I wasn't expecting so much heat and humidity. I was using a very old type of race suit, and I just over-heated."By the time we got to Brazil, though, things were great. The second half of the race was good - my lap times were a tenth or so quicker than Fernando's but I'd lost a lot in the opening half when it was a little humid. So actually I wasn't as disappointed as people think. And the engineering side of the team had a lot of positive comments to make about me. But, of course, if you take what the marketing side said as the truth, then maybe it was a different story. But then, maybe, there were marketing advantages to saying I hadn't done a good job, and that's why they said it."As a microcosm of JV-speak, this fluent peroration has it all. A hint of selective data presentation, of equivocation even, runs through it - and it ends on a gratuitously sour note. Did Renault's marketing people slag him off last year? If so, I don't remember it. But perhaps one of them did, once, or someone told Jacques that one of them had, and he doesn't want to leave that person unbollocked. I'll encounter his vengeful side again later on...MB: Why would criticising you have been advantageous to Renault's marketing people?JV: "I don't know - don't ask me. I don't really care about those comments anyway. What I care about are the comments that came from the engineering side. That, and the fact that they'd noticed I wasn't difficult to work with."MB: Which was your reputation, wasn't it? Where did that reputation come from?JV: "I think it came from Williams, and from Patrick [Head, Williams's director of engineering] in particular, because I had my own ideas and I stuck to them. That's different from just being difficult for the sake of it. If it's something I believe in, then I'll fight for it. But that doesn't mean you just complain and be a cry-baby. I've never been that. I only fought for things I believed in. And if you look at my Williams years, we [he means himself and his race engineer, Jock Clear, who now looks after Takuma Sato at B.A.R] made the team go forward - in spite of Patrick, basically. And I think that annoyed him a lot and that's why he made those negative comments."I'll return to the subject of Patrick later...MB: Moving on to this year - and I'll ask you about Imola in a little while, because I think that was your first good race this year - what was the problem in Australia, Malaysia and Bahrain?JV: "I wasn't happy with the first three races. Well, we [again, he means himself and his race engineer, Giampaolo Dall'Ara] looked okay during the race in Australia. In Malaysia I kept locking the rear wheels. It was annoying to spin but we fixed the electronics after that, which was a good thing. And then in Bahrain we were within a tenth of Felipe [Massa]. But as far as the accident with David [Coulthard] was concerned, I couldn't control it. He hit me while I was already in the corner, and I didn't see it coming. So, that was a little disappointing because that would have been our first point of the season."MB: And then at Imola, where you always seem to go well...I catch him snatching a glance at my notebook. I have it open at the page on which I've jotted down his qualifying and race performances relative to Massa's - and, going by the way he takes the conversation over the next five minutes, he's successfully deciphered my upside-down scrawl and has decided to give me his own whistle-stop tour of 2005.JV: "Yes, Imola was good. Next was Barcelona, where we'd had a really bad test maybe a month before. As a result, we didn't get a set-up. I just couldn't drive it. In the race it was okay, but qualifying was dreadful. That's a function of the way I use tyres. I'm not as hard on tyres as Felipe, which means I'm okay in the race, but, if I'm qualifying on hard tyres, I can't get enough heat into them for the one-lap format. At Imola the tyres were on the softish side, and that worked out in the race - because, when everyone started slowing down because of tyre wear, we were actually going faster and faster."Next was Monaco, where we were really fast all weekend in comparison to Felipe. And the strategies were in our favour, too. We knew his tyres would be destroyed before the end of the race - and, with 30-odd laps to go, sure enough the team were telling him to slow down to save his tyres. At the same time they were telling me to push and try to overtake the guys in front of me. And then the Safety Car came out, and I lost 20 seconds as a result, and Felipe came out of the pits right in front of me. And so we just got very unlucky. It was too bad because that was one race where we were extremely fast but it didn't pay off. Was the Nurburgring after that?"MB: Yes.JV: "Qualifying was acceptable but our race pace wasn't very good. We got stuck with the Jordans - not a very good place to be. Not as bad as at Barcelona, but not a good race. What was after that?"MB: Canada.JV: "In Canada our pace was really good."MB: You qualified eighth.JV: "Yes, we qualified eighth and our pace was quite a lot faster than Felipe's. Our race pace was good, too, but I ran into Takuma on the first lap. That was a little stupid. Too bad. Shit happens. I would prefer that to have happened at Barcelona or the Nurburgring, because those were races where we weren't fast, but at Montreal we were fast yet we finished only ninth."Also, at Montreal, in the pit stop when we changed the nose, the camera cable got stuck and we lost another 15 seconds, which then meant I had to let the leaders lap me - and that lost me another 15 seconds on top of the first 15 seconds I'd already lost. And that probably cost us eighth - so that was annoying."MB: A point lost...JV: "Yes, another point lost. At Indy our pace was okay in qualifying. Nothing special and not as good as in Montreal, but not bad. The race would have been okay, too. In France our pace was very good. We had more fuel on than Felipe, and yet we qualified at around the same pace. And the race went well, so no complaints there."Silverstone? Qualifying went very well, and then the race was hell. I cocked up in the pit stop and then after that it just went from bad to worse. And Germany was very disappointing because our pace was very good. I did the same lap times [as Massa] and had quite a bit more fuel on, but it was just a mess after that."On track spills......and no thrills from the mediaMB: You've had a number of mishaps this year, and you've mentioned a few of them. But you glossed over the Monaco one [in which Villeneuve drove into Massa, ruining both their races]. And, like it or not, whenever a driver has an accident with his team-mate, the F1 world is very unforgiving. I know you've said the team had asked you to push, but...JV: [Interrupting] "Look, when I went to overtake Felipe, at that point I was a lot quicker than him and the team were telling me to push and telling him to slow down. I wasn't expecting to have to fight hard for the position. And when I made my move, I saw him move just a little to the right. And then I thought, 'Shit, he's going to close the door. He isn't going to let me by.'"And so I released the brakes and tried to cut the corner to give him room. But I went over a bit of kerb, got airborne, and hit him. Had it been another driver, I'd have stayed on my line and pushed the guy off the track instead. I should have ignored the fact that it was my team-mate and shoved him into the wall and continued on my way."It's sound-bites like this last sentence that make Jacques so fabulously quotable. On the other hand, he's never brash. His body language and attire - he shambles rather than struts, while his flip-flops, untrendy shorts and nerdy glasses look like they were bought by his mother - belie his genuinely impressive fearlessness.MB: It sounds like you're blaming Felipe - or, at least, saying maybe he should have made it a bit easier for you to pass him?JV: "Well, it was a strange situation because even before the start of the race the team knew his tyres would be destroyed 20 laps from the end and mine wouldn't. So, yes, at the end of the day we had an unnecessary and embarrassing moment."A shrug, then silence, followed by a forced grin.MB: And the other unnecessary and embarrassing moment you slightly glossed over was Silverstone, where you more than cocked up a pit stop - you ran over one of your mechanics.JV: "Hey, Michael's done it. Everyone's done it."MB: So it was another 'shit happens' situation?JV: "The thing is, if you lose half a second in a pit stop, you really get screamed at. So you have to go for it. So my gaze was riveted on the lollipop, and I was poised to take off as soon as I saw movement, and out of the corner of my eye I saw movement in the Red Bull garage [next door] and I instinctively dropped the [hand] clutch. And then, almost immediately, I saw that the lollipop was still down, so I grabbed the clutch again and pressed the brake. But I'd touched the mechanic."But, yes, that was a stupid mistake and, yes, it was a cock-up on my part. It's happened to everyone and, yes, criticism for it is normal - but it's amazing how extreme it gets. It's something that everyone has done and everyone will keep on doing."MB: Talking of criticism, even extreme criticism, especially in the press, I'm told you were mighty pissed-off about F1 Racing's 'Half-term Report' (August issue) in which you were judged by an independent panel of F1 celebrities to be only the 21st-best driver out of the 24 who have started a grand prix so far this year...JV: "I can take criticism. If you write that I was really crap at Barcelona and the Nurburgring, well, yes, I can't argue. I was really crap at those races. I have no problem with criticism as long as it's intelligent and fair. But if that criticism becomes personal - when I read that I'm a tugger - well, that's just insulting. That's not a word a professional journalist would use. That's not proper criticism."I've looked for the word 'tugger' in our 'Half-term Report', and I can't find it used about Jacques. Maybe I haven't looked hard enough, or maybe F1 Racing has used it about him in another article. Answers on a postcard, please...MB: And the ranking? What do you say about being ranked only 21st?JV: "I don't care about the ranking. That doesn't really matter. But there's no need to be insulting."MB: A lot of drivers say, 'I don't care what the media write.' But usually, when they say that, it's because they do care...JV: "Okay, that's true. Whenever anyone says that, it's always a bit of a lie. Because drivers only ever say that about negative comments. And the only reason you say that is because it has already affected you."MB: Exactly, because it's a coping strategy, isn't it?JV: "Yes, I guess so. But it's not important. It's only important to know what's being written about you so that you'll know how to cope with the fall-out. It's useful to know who thinks what and why, because the fans will react to it, the teams will react to it and then you'll be asked questions about it. So you need to know what's going on in the media."MB: Over the years, but especially when you were winning races, F1 Racing has sometimes praised you very highly. If you're unhappy with negative or, as you describe it, insulting copy now, how did you react to positive copy then?JV: "I guess the criticism has been extreme because the praise has been extreme in the past, and one comes with the other."MB: Exactly. And, actually, F1 Racing's 'Half-term Report' is an annual thing, and it's always the result of an independent poll of F1 experts - it isn't just the opinions of F1 Racing's journalists. Last year Sato came fifth, which seems absurd now, and this year he was 17th. And that shows, I think, that even experts within the sport can be very fickle, and that...JV: [Interrupting, and clearly getting angry with what he probably construes as my faux-urbane responses, but without raising his voice at all] "Some journalists are great. They're fair and they do a professional job. But some are just biased. They have their friends, and they praise their friends, and they don't really care if it destroys drivers who aren't their friends. These journalists have a god complex, really. There are a few of them in the paddock, and they're dangerous."MB: Are you thinking of any specific journalists?JV: "Yes. Guys in their mid-50s with a very high opinion of themselves."I'm 42, so he can't be referring to me, can he? On the other hand, I'm considerably balder than Jacques is, even, so maybe he thinks I'm in my mid-50s. Does he mean F1 Racing's grand prix editor, Peter Windsor, perhaps? Or our two editors at large, Alan Henry and Maurice Hamilton? Or others, not connected with this magazine? Switzerland's top F1 hack, Roger Benoit, perhaps? He ain't saying...Trouble with SauberWill Pete and Jacques ever be mates?MB: Now, Sauber are a conservative, traditional, very Swiss team - and they don't usually get into the headlines. But with you, earlier this year, they found themselves in the middle of a media feeding frenzy - and I don't think they particularly enjoyed it.JV: "Yes, I think that's true. And that created a few problems, because suddenly there was Peter in the gunsights of the media. And when he said, 'We're very disappointed with Jacques...' and so on, which I think was just a heated reaction to a stressful situation, it got blown up into a big thing."MB: The British press were pushing the '[Anthony] Davidson to replace Villeneuve at Sauber' story - it was started by Autosport, incidentally, not F1 Racing - and I guess that added to the fuss, too.Aaaagh! I shouldn't have said that. It's set him off on his old media-slagging theme again...JV: "Well, for the British media, F1 is British. So, you guys always say, 'Get rid of everyone who isn't British.' And I was the easiest one to criticise at the time, so why not? Peter was saying things against me, and it just made it easier for the British media to... well... you know, if it hadn't been me, they'd have just picked on someone else. They just needed to pick on someone, that's all. Then you can sell your magazines."And there was a lot more to that particular bollocking than that, too - much more than we have space to print, in fact.MB: It's fair to say that you're more than somewhat cynical about the media - especially the British media...JV: "Yes, definitely. But that doesn't mean I won't deal with the British media professionally. And if the person in front of me is intelligent, and asks me proper questions, I'll always give proper answers."And that's absolutely true. It's clear that Jacques mistrusts F1 Racing, and therefore me - probably because, although F1 Racing is, in fact, a truly international magazine (it's available in 23 languages, in 28 editions and in 110 countries), its senior journalists are British - and yet it's equally undeniable that, despite that, he's giving me a very fair interview.Even so, although selling magazines is undoubtedly a major part of any editor's ambition, and supporting your local sheriff has a part to play in that, it's palpable nonsense to suggest that F1 Racing has ever promoted a 'get rid of everyone who isn't British' editorial line.MB: Going back to Sauber, what are your impressions of them as a team?JV: "I'm happy now. But it took a while - and, at first, I wasn't happy. At first I was told, 'Well, that's the way Felipe drives. Just shut up and get in the car.' That wasn't necessarily my race engineer, by the way, but the team as a whole were a little like that at first."But, in the end, I got some things changed. But I really had to force the issue. It was a difficult way of working - but then, when they realised that what I'd insisted on worked better, the guys all became easier to work with. They opened up a bit. And some of the stuff I insisted on is now on Felipe's car, too."Aha! Here's an opportunity to get Villeneuve's view on Head's, and by association Williams's, failings...Willy they or won't they?And should things come to a Head?MB: Nonetheless, the way you set-up a car has always been distinctive - and that goes all the way back to something you mentioned 20 minutes ago about Patrick [to remind you, dear reader, he said, "And if you look at my Williams years, we made the team go forward - in spite of Patrick, basically"], who has often said that you made heavy weather of winning the 1997 world championship. Obviously, you had clashes with him on set-up. But, now, Williams seem to be in a hole. What's your view of the trouble they're in?JV: "Just look at what happened when Heinz-Harald [Frentzen] joined them [in 1997]. At that point Patrick noticed that we [yet again, he means himself and Clear, his race engineer] weren't listening to him, so he decided to put all his energy into Heinz's race effort instead. And, as a result, he totally destroyed Heinz. We ended up scoring twice as many points as Heinz [it was 81 to 42, so well remembered, Jacques]. And that was purely Patrick's doing."There's a flicker of a smile playing around Jacques's lips. I think he's enjoying this...MB: Are you saying that Patrick knocked the confidence out of Heinz, or...JV: [Interrupting, warming to his theme] "Yes, but also some of the stuff they [Frentzen and his engineers] were doing on the car at that time was just to make Patrick happy. You know, there was a time when Patrick wanted us [Villeneuve and Clear] to change the anti-roll bars we were using, but we didn't want to. So we changed the serial numbers on them instead, so that Patrick was happy, but kept the same actual anti-roll bars."MB: So you tricked him, in effect?JV: "Yes. It's a big shame if you have to do that in what's supposed to be a team, because it slows down your progress, but the people I was working with directly - the engineers, the designers - all had trust in what I was feeling and what I was doing."Don't get me wrong: Patrick sometimes had good ideas, too. The trouble was, sometimes he was right and sometimes he was wrong, but he was never open-minded about it. And at the end of the year he complained that I'd made the season difficult - just because we won in spite of him. And I guess that hurt his ego. But does he still complain about it now?"MB: He's been known to, yes. But that isn't a secret - it's on the record.JV: "He complains even now? Even though, eight years later, I'm still the last driver to have won the championship for Williams?"MB: Yes. But F1 is a small world, isn't it? And now you have a chance to drive for BMW next year, partly because Williams - and, by association, Patrick - mishandled BMW. It's ironic, isn't it?JV: "It's fantastic. So I want to say, 'Thank you, Williams - and thank you, Patrick - for bringing BMW to me.'"A bit vengeful again, that last remark, don't you think?A new (BMW) chapter for JVOr will Theissen hire new drivers?MB: BMW buying a majority share of Sauber is obviously a very exciting prospect. Now, it's not certain that you'll be driving for the team, of course...JV: "Of course it's certain."He's looking tetchy again, having been all sweetness and light while he was burying Head's reputation...MB: Why do you say that?JV: "Why is it not certain? I have a contract. Look at Jenson - he didn't want to stay at B.A.R last year, but his contract forced him to stay there. Contracts are quite powerful things."MB: So you can guarantee that you'll be driving for BMW next year? You're certain?JV: "Yes, certain. Besides, there's no indication that BMW are unhappy with the fact of my contract. So, there's no reason for me to be worried. And I'm already building good relationships with Mario [Theissen, BMW's motorsport director] and the other BMW guys. It's going to be fantastic."All that might well be true. On the other hand, undeniably (sorry, Jacques), such will be BMW's level of financial investment in their F1 team over the next five-or-so years, that dispensing with a driver's services, even if it means having to pay him not to race, would amount to a drop in the ocean, a mere bagatelle, a nothing. Bluntly, Theissen will run the drivers he wants to run. That might include Villeneuve; on the other hand, it might not.MB: And your team-mate is likely to be Nick [Heidfeld]?JV: "Maybe, yes, but I don't know. All I know is that there will be a bigger budget under BMW than there is under Sauber - which is important. I mean: we have the best wind tunnel in F1, at Hinwil, but it isn't being used all the time because of lack of budget. And that's just one example. So a bigger budget will help in many ways."MB: You've driven for Williams and B.A.R, and you've been around long enough to have a pretty good idea about how most teams do things. And now you've driven for Sauber. BMW have spent six years with Williams, who had won championships with Renault and Honda before, and they didn't win a championship. A lot of people are saying - quite understandably, I think - that it's going to take a long time to bring BMW-Sauber, or whatever it'll be called, up to the McLaren/Renault level.JV: "I disagree. It can happen overnight. Just look at 1998, when McLaren won the championship, having been behind Williams, Ferrari and even Benetton the previous year. Out of the blue, it can happen."MB: Yes, but McLaren were already a top team. They'd won many championships before.JV: "Okay, but they were more than a second a lap slower than Williams in 1997."MB: Okay, so are you about to make a prediction?JV: "No, I won't make a prediction."MB: Okay, no prediction. That's cool. But you're saying you don't buy my argument that it may take many years for BMW to win a championship because Sauber are a small team and...JV: "I don't see it happening next year. It should take at least a year, because we haven't started working together yet. That won't start until Christmas. So the beginning of next season will be tricky - but, after that, things will get better very fast."If you're thinking what I'm thinking, you'll now be reeling from shock caused by Jacques's indomitable optimism - no, make that naivety - in the face of the enormous mountain that BMW still have to climb.But, then, don't forget that this is the same Jacques Villeneuve who joined B.A.R in 1999, and who was happy to have his photograph taken underneath the lunatic legend 'A tradition of excellence' before failing to score even a single championship point in the ensuing grand prix season. Granted, BMW will do better than that - quite a lot better. But I, for one, am not about to predict that they'll win the championship in 2007. Well, are you?A question of focusBecause his specs are very, very thickMB: I'm going to change the subject, Jacques. Now, a thing people often say behind your back but don't often ask you directly about - because people often don't have the courage to do that - is that your eyesight is poor. Some people say, 'He's having a difficult time because he can't see the apex.'JV: "Well, I was very quick at Monaco this year, where you're driving between guardrails and precision is all-important. So if my eyesight was bad, then, definitely, I'd have hit a guardrail or I'd have been slow."MB: So, when you're wearing contact lenses, which you do to drive the car, you have 20:20 vision? Correct?JV: "Yes."MB: Because a lot of people say you're handicapped by poor eyesight. They may not say it to you - why would they? - but they say it behind your back. Even people in teams say it.JV: "Listen, when I started racing, there were a few people who told me, 'You shouldn't even bother trying, mate. A driver with glasses will never win a grand prix, let alone a championship.' And those people were wrong. I'm not the only one [in F1] wearing contact lenses. There's a few, but they hide the fact."MB: Rubens Barrichello, Ralf Schumacher...JV: "Yes, but there are quite a few more. Like me, they wear contact lenses to drive. Unlike me, they keep them on between sessions. The difference is that I walk around the paddock wearing glasses because I'm not trying to hide. But I'm not the only one."MB: How many would you say there are?JV: [A sigh] "I don't know."It's interesting that Jacques says, of Monaco, "If my eyesight was bad, then, definitely, I'd have hit a guardrail." Especially interesting when you consider that that's exactly what fellow contact lens wearer Schumi Jnr did at Tabac...ODDs 'n' endsChances for JV to shoot his mouth offMB: You've said that contracts are "quite powerful things". It would appear that Jenson is attempting to wriggle his way out of his Williams contract. What do you think of what he's doing?JV: "Jenson is out to do what's best for Jenson, obviously. But why would another team want to sign a contract with him now, because obviously contracts mean very little to him?"Thank you, Jacques. Another very juicy sound-bite.MB: Do you regret joining B.A.R in 1999?JV: "No, because I was part of the founding of the team. Had I not joined in 1999, and had I not signed my initial two-year contract, B.A.R would never have existed. My mistake was to re-sign the second time around. That was a mistake. But, then again, if you look at what we [B.A.R] did the next year, compared with what was done by Benetton [who were anxious to sign Villeneuve at the time], we had a better year than they did - so maybe it wasn't such a bad thing."Jacques's logic, and his memory, are faultless; B.A.R scored seven more constructors' championship points in 2001 than Benetton did.MB: Things soon turned ugly at B.A.R, though, didn't they?JV: "Yes. But what really destroyed things was when [David] Richards arrived and had a private battle with Craig [Pollock, who was still Villeneuve's manager, and therefore a presence in the B.A.R motorhome even after he had been replaced as team principal by Richards in late 2001]. After that, Richards [Jacques always calls him "Richards", you notice; never David or DR] decided that I was part of the Craig situation and started hating me as well for no good reason. So Richards was on a mission to destroy everything I'd ever achieved, and I think that was damaging for the team as well as for myself. And so I was over the moon when he got fired at the end of last year. Sadly, I didn't have anything to do with it, but it still felt good. Vengeance is always sweet."Well, exactly. But, although you can to some extent empathise with Villeneuve's bitterness, Richards's excellent track record - B.A.R came second in the constructors' championship in 2004, for goodness' sake - potently gainsays Jacques's suggestion that his actions were unreservedly "damaging for the team".MB: Isn't the truth of the matter that you rejoined B.A.R for 2001 because you were offered $19 million a year?JV: "I'm not getting anything like that."MB: Not now. Then.JV: "Oh, well, it's supply and demand. If someone offers you that much, what do you say? Do you say, 'No, please give me less'? Is that what you'd do?"MB: No, but...JV: "Exactly. So, why should people complain about me? I was told, 'If you don't sign now, the team won't exist.' 'Okay,' I said, 'then I want, er, so much.' 'Okay,' they said. 'Thank you,' I said. And that was it. And, anyway, the same money was available to me at that time from another team, too."He must mean Benetton, which seems extraordinary to me. For, without being overly cynical, the negotiation Jacques has described, above, must have been conducted between his manager (Pollock) and his team principal (er, Pollock). As such, it can't have been a very hard bargain to strike...MB: But...It's no good trying to interrupt; he's in full flight...JV: "And it was a very close call. Finally, perhaps I chose B.A.R only because Craig was my friend. That was possibly the balancing factor at the end. Actually, it was the balancing factor. That, and Honda. The Honda guys went on bended knee to beg me to stay - then, within a year, they started hating me. But, had I known Craig was going to be replaced by Richards, I definitely would never have re-signed for 2001."You know, ultimately, it's the team bosses who make or break drivers - not the press or anyone else. Just look at David [Coulthard]. He's had quite a few bad years for McLaren, but he was always protected by Ron [Dennis, McLaren chairman]. So his image was always good, and that allowed him to get into Red Bull and he's had a good season and he's back to being great again, which is fantastic."And just look at Rubens. His image has always remained good, even though he's always been a long way behind Michael. Why? Because Jean [Todt, general manager, Ferrari] and the team always say he does a great job and he's a big help and so on. But then, of course, if you get the opposite thing - as I did earlier this year from Peter - then suddenly the media start writing extremely negatively about you when there's no reason to do so."MB: So you very much prefer the Todt/Dennis method of standing by your driver?JV: "Of course. That's the only way to go forward. You have to pull together. You win and lose together. But you work as a team. You don't destroy what you have, what you've worked for together. What's the point of that? You don't shit in your own garden. Is that the saying?"MB: Shit on your own doorstep.JV: "Yes, that's what I was trying to say. And that's why the years with Richards were so damaging."It's an angry speech - and, although I haven't read it elsewhere, and therefore don't think he's uttered it in the vicinity of a Dictaphone before, it sounds as though he's said it all before, perhaps to Pollock, many times. It prompts a question I hadn't planned to ask, but which seems as good a theme to end on as any...MB: Has F1 disappointed you, Jacques?JV: "I won the championship in 1997, and that will remain. So, you can write whatever you want in the end. Whenever something is big, like F1 is big, it attracts all the wankers. It attracts people who don't have a personality of their own, but need to wear one of the team shirts or something so that they can go back to the pub at night and tell their friends, 'Look, I'm very important and I do this and I do that and look at my business card.' Without F1, they'd be nothings. They'd be wankers. And, sadly, there are just too many of them.[A pause] "Does that sound bad?"
