How BMW took Williams to the brink of F1 glory and back
In the fifth part of our history of the Williams team, DAMIEN SMITH recalls 2000-2005, when a new partnership with BMW promised to return Williams to championship glory - but that hope remained unfulfilled as tensions mounted behind the scenes...
Formula 1 erupted in a collective surge of jubilation when Juan Pablo Montoya dived down the inside of Michael Schumacher's Ferrari at Turn 1, Interlagos in 2001. In that moment, an audacious late-braking pass by an F1 rookie in only his third grand prix felt seminal, as a bright new contender stepped up to challenge the threatened dominance that Schumacher and Ferrari were coming to represent.
Mika Hakkinen had been just as fast as Michael, if not a shade quicker over one lap, but increasingly he seemed a spent force. Instead, here was Montoya: fresh, cocksure, charismatic, funny - and on the face of it, a true Williams driver in the mould of an Alan Jones, Keke Rosberg or Nigel Mansell. This was going to be good.
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