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Analysis: Panis Reaches the End of the F1 Road

Olivier Panis, the oldest driver and only Frenchman on the Formula One starting grid, says farewell to Grand Prix racing in Japan this weekend.

Olivier Panis, the oldest driver and only Frenchman on the Formula One starting grid, says farewell to Grand Prix racing in Japan this weekend.

The 38-year-old Panis will start his 158th race at Suzuka and then step out of his Toyota for a new career as a test driver with the Japanese team.

The decision for Panis to stand aside before the season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix was made when Italian Jarno Trulli, already signed up for next season, became available after parting from Renault last month.

Trulli will race in Japan instead of Brazilian Ricardo Zonta, who then returns for his home race in place of Panis. If the easy-going Frenchman feels disappointed about the decision, he is certainly not showing it.

A loyal team member and always polite and positive, at least in public, the man from Grenoble said he was looking forward to one last race at a favourite circuit where last year he qualified fourth.

"Although I will miss the excitement of racing, I will have the chance to give a big input in (Toyota's) future in my new role as a third driver," he said. "All I am hoping for this weekend is to finish my racing career with some points."

Only three current drivers - Ferrari duo Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello and McLaren's David Coulthard - have started more races than the Frenchman, who made his debut in 1994, before Coulthard.

Like them, he is a member of the winners' circle even if he has just one victory to his credit from a decade of competition.

Monaco Win

Two incidents, one an extraordinary high and the other a definite low, stand out in the career of a man who has shunned the high-living, jet-set world embraced wholeheartedly by some other drivers.

The first is his upset Monaco Grand Prix win in the wet for Ligier in 1996 when the race was stopped early and only three cars were still running at the finish.

Panis had started 14th on the grid, avoiding the crashes that put paid to almost everyone else, to become the first Frenchman to win in a French car in the Mediterranean principality since 1930.

His win remains the last by a French driver and the race set a record for the lowest number of cars to finish in Formula One history.

"I don't think I'll ever forget the sound of the yacht sirens in the harbour and the fireworks being let off during my lap of honour," he said.

While the result may look like a freak on paper, an outsider driving for a team that had been almost written off earlier in the season, Panis deserved to win the best known and most prestigious race of all.

Panis had been fastest in the morning warm-up and drove the race of his life, inch-perfect on the unforgiving street circuit. The front-page headline in France's L'Equipe newspaper the following day summed it up: "Panis? Incredible!".

The Frenchman's two best results before that race, also with Ligier, were his second places in Germany and Australia in 1994 and 1995 respectively - in both cases after almost all the frontrunners had been knocked out.

He had also stood out in his debut season by finishing all but one of the 16 races, more than any other driver and an impressive feat for a rookie likely to make mistakes.

Canada Crash

The low point came in Canada in 1997 when he speared into a tyre barrier and broke both legs in a crash that could have ended his career. At the time he had been riding high, third in the standings after compatriot and former champion Alain Prost had bought ailing Ligier and renamed it after himself.

Doctors put knee-to-ankle plates in Panis's legs and he was out for three months, replaced by Trulli for seven races. When he returned to the racetrack, it was in the knowledge that another crash could spell retirement.

Panis, who had entered Formula One after beating Coulthard to the junior Formula 3000 title in 1993, failed to score a point in a poorly-handling Prost in 1998 and had clearly fallen out with his team boss by mid-1999.

For 2000, he moved to McLaren as test driver in a decision that revived a career that had looked like stalling. Praised for his feedback and clearly quick, the Frenchman was signed up by BAR to partner Jacques Villeneuve.

He then joined Toyota for the 2003 season.

The race at Suzuka, the same circuit that witnessed compatriot Jean Alesi's last Grand Prix in 2001, will also mark Toyota's 50th start.

"I hope that we can celebrate a good result with both cars in front of our home crowd," said team boss Tsutomu Tomita. "I cannot think of a more suitable way for Olivier to end his final F1 race and for Jarno to make his debut as a Toyota driver."

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