F1 bosses continue to add fuel to the fire

Motor sport: Whether Fernando Alonso wins the Formula One world championship will be an issue of pride for Ron Dennis and Flavio Briatore - whose mutual indifference has sometimes bordered on simmering hostility.

The team principals of McLaren and Renault are driven men whose egos have been conspicuously massaged by the success their teams have achieved over the past two decades. Yet, for these ruthlessly ambitious multimillionaires, life in the grand prix jungle is all about little triumphs.

Both men pretend they do not care what numbers their cars might carry, but there is no doubt Dennis, a Formula One traditionalist, will find it hard to suppress his trademark wolfish grin if Alonso wins the world championship and brings the coveted race "No 1" to his Woking-based team.

Remarkably few drivers have carried their world champion's number one to a new team. In 1997, Nelson Piquet won the title with Williams and took it with him to Lotus. Alain Prost made a similar move to Ferrari from McLaren in 1990, and Michael Schumacher took number one from Benetton to Ferrari in 1995.

In 1993 the use of "No 1" lapsed for a season as the world champion Nigel Mansell quit Formula One in favour of the US Champ Car series.

Briatore and Dennis are very different individuals. The Italian is a wildly extrovert entrepreneur whose face is as likely to feature in society columns as motorsport magazines. Dennis, by contrast, is a more private and formal individual who weighs his words carefully and keeps his private emotions closely buttoned up.

Last week Dennis fired a salvo at Briatore after he criticised the $350 million McLaren technology centre in the latest issue of F1 Racing magazine. Stung by Briatore's observation that the lavish facility was "irrelevant", Dennis responded by saying that, of course, anybody is entitled to an opinion, but that Briatore was only a hired hand at Renault rather than a stakeholder.

"Flavio is only an employee," said Dennis. "People can say what they like, but his comments are not born out by the facts. I am a shareholder in McLaren, along with Mansour Ojjeh and Mercedes-Benz, so my objective is to be successful and deliver enhanced shareholder value."

He added: "Much is fed into the media by people who want it to be believed that McLaren is heavily in debt, but the fact is that we will be wholly debt free by the start of next year."

For his part, Briatore made it clear he believed McLaren waste enormous amounts of money, on things like motor homes and their new factory. "Why do these teams build such enormous and expensive motor homes?" he said. "I also don't understand Ron's new factory. What good did it do his team? Because the bigger the factory, the less efficient it is. You probably need a taxi to go from one department to another."

This sniping is proving an amusing sideshow for the rest of the Formula One community, but underscores the petty jealousies and frustrations that fuel the internecine rivalries at the sharp end of the starting grids.

Irony also abounds. While Dennis may well get race "No 1" on Alonso's McLaren next season, Briatore will be smiling too. As Alonso's manager he will take more than 20 per cent of the Spaniard's $22 million McLaren retainer.