By Huw Alban
April 27 2002

OrangeArrows have been very much in the media eye recently, with stories of problems with the new chassis, problems with the Cosworth engine, and the ongoing saga of who will partner Enrique Bernoldi. The site has asked the questions and can provide the definative answers (well sort of) ... First came the news that OrangeArrows were ready to shakedown the new A23 at the end of last week, and the chat room revelations from 'Huub' (unconfirmed I might add) that the shakedown had been delayed. The reasons given were that there was a problem with the rear of the car.
On the same evening rtlgrandprix.nl released an article telling us that there was a possible seating problem with the Cosworth engine into the engine bay of the new car, and that was the reason for the delay. In addition they revealed that Enrique Bernoldi was to be the only driver but that Jos Verstappen had been invited.

Next came the quote from F1Racing.net that indicated that there would be two drivers at this weeks Valencia test, and that it was 'likely' that this second driver would be announced as team mate to Enrique. Indeed today rtlgrandprix are claiming that the team has book booked two hotel rooms for drivers at the hotel accomodating the team for the duration of the Valencia test.

On the driver front, the official word from OrangeArrows is, "As far as the other driver is concerned there is still no news." I guess this can be read many ways, but for me it is neither a denial nor a confirmation of any of the driver related rumours, i.e. don't read too much into anything until the official press release comes. Reports on F1-live.com and Formula1.com suggest that the team is due to make an announcement tomorrow, however I find this odd. Teams don't normally announce when they are going to confirm drivers; car maybe, but that's for commercial reasons. Driver announcements tend to be 'out of the blue.' One other thing that has just occured to me, however, is that one of the OrangeArrows teams' senior press staff is in Valencia with the team. At a test session ? Isn't that a bit odd ?

As for the supposed problems with Cosworth, it would appear that all these reports are mere speculation and in retrospect were never supported by any factual information anyway. The line from the team is, "Our engines were delivered on time. There was never a problem." This suggests to me that there is no problem with the Cosworth deal or the engine being seated correctly, and that the teams shakedown schedule went ahead as planned, i.e. the team always intended to run the A23 chassis as has already been officially reported.