Monte Carlo, 4 June
The BAR 02 was not good in this high downforce track, the team unable to load it with enough downforce.
This was Ricardo's first-ever experience of the tricky Monaco circuit and he tried to take advantage of the available practice time as much as possible and soon settled in even if he missed the chicane a few times.
Friday combined practice: 17th, 1:23.976, 48 laps
Both BAR Honda drivers suffered much from the lack of downforce. Ricardo was early out making a lap in 1:25.736. He was able to better that time to 1:22.324 but that was only good for 20th position, three positions behind his team mate.
"I had fun driving here today. For me, it was actually quite a good qualifying session because my times were close to Jacques' throughout. The only problem is that we don't have enough downforce on the car and that cost us. I drove on the limit of the car every time I was on the track, so I enjoyed myself today despite the result."
Saturday practice: 19th, 1:23.088, 40 laps
Qualifying: 20th, 1:22.324, 12 laps
The start of Monaco GP was quite confusing. The first attempt had to be abandoned as Wurz' Benetton suffered an engine failure. When the race finally started Ricardo made an excellent start and as the cars went up the hill he had passed several cars, among them his team mate. However at the start line the red flag was already up for dubious reasons and everything was ready for one of the worst F1 scandals ever. Luckily for the organizers moments later de la Rosa spun his Arrows at Loews creating a multi-car collision and blocking the track totally. Organizers later blamed the red flag on the timing computer software.
Ricardo among several others had to abandon his car and run all the way back to the pits where BAR had two spare cars ready for their drivers. With four cars missing in front of him Ricardo had a clear track at the start. Unfortunately he was unable to take advantage of the situation as he this time got trapped behind his team mate in 16th position. Using a single, late-race pit stop strategy Ricardo was able to keep Villeneuve's pace and climbed slowly but steadily through the field to 9th before making his stop on lap 45. During the race the braking area to St Devote became slippery and Wurz, Mazzacane (Minardi) and Diniz (Sauber) all crashed. Coulthard (McLaren) also almost lost it there and soon after his incident Ralf Schumacher crashed his Williams hard into the barrier wounding his leg. On lap 48 it was Ricardo's turn to run wide in St Devote and retire against the barrier and later also Frentzen (Jordan) had to retire at the same place.
"It was a lottery for the race because I didn't know if the car would be good or not. We aimed to make it as good as we could for the middle section of the race and that meant working with a lot of different variables. I was fast in the race, but couldn't overtake. After my pit stop, I was pushing hard when I was forced to take a different line through St Devote and the car hit a bump so hard that I lost control under braking and hit the barrier. Despite the lack of a result, this was a good race for me because I learned a lot during the weekend."
Warmup: 20th, 1:25.397, 16 laps
Race: DNF 48 laps accident
FL: 1:23.514 on lap 48 (+1.943, 13th)
Winner: David Coulthard (McLaren-Mercedes)