BLOOMINGTON, Minn. — As Team Williams continues to celebrate its upcoming 30th year in Formula One, its cars carried the fifth of the six anniversary pre-season liveries at last week’s Barcelona test. The two cars had handwritten messages from each of the seven drivers who have won a World Championship with Williams.
“I was the first,” wrote Alan Jones, while Nigel Mansell said: “Fabulous 28 wins, Red Five.”
Keke Rosberg commented: “Thanks for 4 great years,” and Alain Prost wrote, “Many thanks to all the team — I was proud to win my last World Championship with you.” Damon Hill said simply: “Thanks Frank” and Jacques Villeneuve said, “Thanks for 3 amazing years and the Championship.”
The cars also carried the names of the rest of the 31 drivers who have raced for Williams including Ayrton Senna, Mario Andretti, Juan Pablo Montoya, David Coulthard and Jenson Button.

• Lewis Hamilton won a prestigious Laureus Award, the only global sports award honoring the greatest sportsmen and women across all sports each year. He won the World Breakthrough of the Year category.

• Aguri Suzuki flew to Japan last week to hold talks with Honda and possible sponsors as his Super Aguri team desperately needs a major influx of investment. Having already canceled the launch of its new car on Feb. 19, the team then canceled a scheduled press conference and withdrew from last week’s test in Barcelona.

• Josh Hill, the 17-year-old son of 1996 World Champion Damon Hill, will make his car-racing debut in England in the Ginetta Junior sports car series. He will be the third generation Hill to race. Graham Hill won the world crown in 1962 and 1968.

• Fernando Alonso believes that the racist attacks against Lewis Hamilton at a Barcelona test were one-off incidents and do not reflect the true character of Spain’s F-1 fans.
“I don’t think this is a racist country, and the fans aren’t either,” he said in an interview with the AS newspaper in Spain. “Anyone who says that there is racism in Spain is talking about isolated cases. If the FIA or anyone are saying that the Spanish fans are racist, it’s laughable.”

• Having followed Fernando Alonso from Renault to McLaren, Spanish insurance company Mutua Madrilena has followed him back to Renault with a new two-year sponsorship deal.

• Nigel Stepney continues to say he is innocent in the Ferrari/McLaren spy saga. The former Ferrari engineer met with an Italian magistrate Feb. 18.
“When questioned, my client rejected the accusation of having given [McLaren’s Mike] Coughlan the 780-page dossier with Ferrari projects to give to McLaren,” Stepney’s lawyer, Sonia Bartolini, told the Gazzetta dello Sport. “Maybe all that material got stolen, but that has nothing to do with Stepney. This is why he’s disappointed with Coughlan and his contradicting statements.”

• With far better reliability than the car had a year ago, Red Bull has much improved momentum and confidence as it heads into the 2008 season.
“We’ve started a bit fresher: It hasn’t been a grueling winter,” Mark Webber said. “We haven’t been getting knocked down every time we get up and try to run.”

• After 11 seasons in F-1 during which he won six times in 180 starts, Ralf Schumacher will compete in the German DTM touring car series this year driving for Mercedes-Benz.

• The Fuji circuit plans to make a number of upgrades to its facility to create a much better atmosphere than that the spectators endured last year. The shuttle bus service for fans will also be improved.

• Kimi Raikkonen has an exit plan. “I definitely don’t want to become the oldest driver in F-1; I’ll stop before that,” he said in an interview with Italian TV. “I’ll do this while it’s a good experience that I enjoy. The day I stop enjoying it, I quit.”

• “I think wins this year will be fortuitous!” Honda team principal Ross Brawn said at a press conference in Tokyo. “I think we have to be realistic and say our objective this year is to score some points, to get the team respectable again, to consolidate the team and get everything functioning in the team properly again. So if we win this year it will be very lucky.”
Brawn and the team have installed plans for 2009 and 2010 that will improve the overall competiveness of the team.
Jenson Button said he is happy with the way things are going.
“We’re making improvements at every test in many, many areas,” he said. “I’m happy also because the car is very drivable. It’s a car we can really build on.”

• Most of the teams are in Barcelona this week for the last major preseason test session. Next, after a brief shakedown, the cars will be shipped to Australia for the Grand Prix on March 16.

• Michael Schumacher was scheduled to test the 2008 Ferrari for three days alongside Kimi Raikkonen at Barcelona this week.