Cautious optimism from Jaguar

Jaguar designer Gary Anderson believes that his team should be a match for its main rivals in Australia despite a troubled test programme

Mar 4, 2000, 2:57 PM

The Jaguar R1 suffered badly from poor oil system reliability, and although drivers Eddie Irvine and Johnny Herbert were fastest in the final pre-season test at Jerez, neither was happy with the amount of time they had to work on set-ups.

Anderson played down the difficulties.

'We've had problems in testing, but nothing insurmountable and no more than anyone else,' he said. 'I don't think we've got any dramatic problems.'

He also predicted that Ferrari could be the team to beat at the start of the season for once, and that McLaren could disappoint.

'From what we hear I think Ferrari will be strong. McLaren don't seem to have gone forward very far, unless they're sandbagging a bit, but they're still strong.

'Then it's Jordan and us, then the rest. I wouldn't be surprised to Mika Salo and Sauber doing a good job.

'It's difficult to say, but we've been as good as most people on our runs with similar amounts of fuel.'