Wednesday 17th January 2001

Jaguar was the first team to unveil its new car ahead of the F1 season and eight days later became the first to crash it when Eddie Irvine went off the circuit in Valencia at about 140mph, wrecking the front end on the tyre barrier after skating across the gravel trap. He was uninjured, the car was less fortunate. “Eddie was familiarising himself with the new car,” said a team spokesman. “It was nothing to do with driver error.”