The was the fifty-second
FIA Formula One World Championship season. It commenced on
March 4 ,
2001 , and ended on
October 14 after seventeen races.
The following
Teams and
Drivers competed in the
2001 FIA Formula One World Championship .
The 2001 season featured several driver lineup changes prior to the season, and more changes during the season proper.
Before the season opener in Australia, the following lineup changed had occurred:
- Olivier Panis left his test position with McLaren to take up a full time drive with BAR.
- Ricardo Zonta lost his BAR drive to Panis, and took up the position of test driver with Jordan.
- Although still on contract to Williams, Jenson Button was "loaned" to Benetton for the 2001 season.
- Button displaced the under-performing Alexander Wurz at Benetton. Wurz moved on to become test driver at McLaren.
- Button's place in the Williams was taken over by Juan Pablo Montoya. (Montoya had been in a relationship with Williams since 1998, and had been "farmed out" to the CART series in 2000 which he won in his only attempt, including victory in the Indianapolis 500 .)
- Bruno Junquiera left the Williams test driver position to take up a drive in the Champ Car series in the US. As Of 2005 he has not returned to F1.
- Marc Gené lost his seat at Minardi due to sponsorship problems. ( Telefonica had been backing Gené financially and therefore helped fund the struggling Minardi team.) Gené signed a contract to become test driver at Williams where he remained until the end of 2004 .
- Gaston Mazzacane also moved away from Minardi for 2001, and started the season with the Prost team where he took over for the Sauber-bound Nick Heidfeld.
- Minardi's first signing of the new season was Fernando Alonso, who took over from Marc Gené.
- Tarso Marques returned to Minardi to fill the second seat there after several seasons racing in America. (Marques had driven for Minardi in 1996 and 1997.)
- Nick Heidfeld left Prost to join the Sauber team for 2001. He replaced Mika Salo who signed up with the Toyota team to perform development work.
- Pedro Diniz did not return as a driver for Sauber, but instead purchased 40% of the Prost team and served in a management role there in 2001. (Diniz and Alain Prost had a major falling out during the season. Diniz then sold his share of Prost and returned to South America where he became a motorsport promoter.)
- Kimi Räikkönen was signed to Sauber for a full drive from near obscurity. He had performed some testing for Sauber in late 2000 after dominating the British Formula Renault series, and so impressed Peter Sauber that he was given the full time drive next to Nick Heidfeld. (There were concerns that Räikkönen was too inexperienced for F1, and his superlicence granting was somewhat controversial during the off season.)
- Johnny Herbert decided to leave the Jaguar team in an attempt to secure a drive in American Champ Cars. The deal did not work out, and he was forced to sign on with Arrows as a test driver for 2001.
- Luciano Burti stepped up from test driver to fill Herbert's slot at Jaguar.
- Pedro de la Rosa lost his drive at Arrows to Enrique Bernoldi and signed on as a reserve drive with Prost.
During the season even more changes occurred:
- Management at Prost quickly reached the conclusion that Gaston Mazzacane was not right for their team and he was released.
- Luciano Burti left Jaguar to take over Mazzacane's seat at Prost.
- Pedro de la Rosa then left his reserve seat at Prost for a full drive at Jaguar.
- Prost management later decided to also release Jean Alesi from his drive. This left Prost with none of their starting drivers from the season opener.
- Heinz-Harald Frentzen suffered injuries after a crash and was replaced for the Canadian GP by reserve driver Ricardo Zonta.
- After returning from his injuries, Frentzen's contract was terminated by Jordan after the French GP. The split was not a happy one, and the matter ended in court before the season's end. Zonta took over Frentzen's drive for the German GP.
- Frentzen was then signed to Prost to take over from Alesi.
- Alesi was also signed by Jordan to take over from Frentzen. This meant the Prost and Jordan had simply swapped drivers mid-season.
- Alex Yoong was granted his FIA super-licence during the 2001 season, and replaced Tarso Marques in the Minardi starting lineup. Marques moved into a reserve/test role for the rest of the season.
- Luciano Burti suffered serious injuries during a crash in the Belgian GP. He was forced to sit out the rest of the 2001 season and was replaced by Czech driver Tomas Enge for the remaining races. This left Prost in the incredible position of having ''five'' starting drivers during 2001.
- Tomas Scheckter was sensationally fired from his testing position at Jaguar after being convicted on charges of " Kerb Crawling " {Link without Title} . This left Jaguar with no test drivers for 2001 after Burti's earlier departure.
There were no team changes from 2000.
