MOTOR SPORT/Spanish Grand Prix: Ralf Schumacher has told his Williams team-mate Juan Pablo Montoya to stop whinging, after the Colombian demanded clarification of the rules regarding overtaking following an incident with champion Michael Schumacher at the San Marino Grand Prix a fortnight ago, writes Justin Hynes in Barcelona.
"I'm going to go and speak to Charlie Whiting (the FIA's race director)," said Montoya of the incident in which he ended up on the grass in a battle for position with the world champion. "How can you have a one-move rule in Formula One and then have Michael Schumacher move left and then right and do nothing about it? That's two moves."
Schumacher's younger brother told the Colombian to stop complaining. "I think Montoya should stop whinging about it and focus on his driving. It's unrealistic to criticise Michael and then do what he did to me," he said of the follow-on from the incident in which the younger Schumacher reckons he was impeded by Montoya as the Colombian tried to regain position.
"I had to go to see the stewards after the race and they said to me that if he's alongside, then you've got to give him room. But how far alongside is alongside? I want clarification on that too. At the end of the day it's normal to try and defend a position," he added.
"Juan just seems to complain a lot about other people instead of looking after his own driving style."
Meanwhile, BAR, the team that has come from nowhere this year to become the major challengers to Michael Schumacher's dominance, yesterday confirmed it has extended its relationship with engine supplier Honda into next year, despite their contract coming to end this season.
It had been speculated Honda might be rethinking its involvement in Formula One after five less than fruitful seasons with BAR but the team's sudden move to the front of the grid has obviously caused a rethink.
Team principal David Richards confirmed the continuance yesterday in Barcelona, the scene of BAR's sudden rise to prominence earlier this year, when in pre-season testing lead driver Jenson Button shattered the circuit's lap record, becoming the first man to record a sub 1:15.00 lap around the Circuit de Catalunya.
About the future of the BAR-Honda partnership, Richards simply said: "I can assure you we will be with Honda for some years to come."
The partnership between BAR and Honda began in 2000 after the team entered Formula One in 1999 with an uncompetitive Supertec engine and failed to score a single point in its debut season. Results improved only marginally in the years following as both the team and Honda failed to come to grips with the complexities of modern Formula One and only a handful of podium positions were scored in the 2000-2004 seasons.
The man responsible for those finishes, Jacques Villeneuve, around whom the team was originally built, departed amid much acrimony at the end of last season but in the intervening months BAR (whose chassis design is aided by Honda engineers at the team's English base at Brackley) and Honda have found a secret recipe and Button has finished on the podium in three of this season's four races, with the English driver also scoring his first pole position at San Marino two weeks ago and finishing just behind race winner Michael Schumacher.
This weekend provides a major opportunity for Button as the 24-year-old could claim his first victory, though Button yesterday admitted it would be a tall order. "Looking at Imola, the gap between us and Ferrari was eight tenths of a second a lap," he said.
"We can't catch that up here even if we do expect to be closer. I know it's a different circuit but if Ferrari does a perfect race, as they have pretty much everywhere, it's going to be hard to beat them here too. Hopefully I'm going to win a race, but it's a question of when," he added.
