RFM Front Page News

Photos courtesy Jamie Longmuir
MONTREAL, Canada (September 9, 2005) -- This year Bjorn Wirdheim joined Bruno Junqueira, Justin Wilson and Sebastien Bourdais as an International F3000 Champion racing in the Champcar World Series. After a difficult start to the season, Wirdheim and the HVM team feel they are on the right track to finish the season on a high note.

Though the International F3000 series has been replaced with the new GP2 formula, the fact that all of the champions back to 1997 are currently racing in either Champcar or Formula 1 speaks to the former series strengths in developing drivers. Bjorn comments that "it was a difficult championship and it usually takes a year of experience in order to be competitive and to be able to challenge for the championship. …The best thing about it was you go and race on all of the European Formula 1 circuits."

As with other upper-level development series, the learning curve in Formula 3000 was very steep, and drivers were only given a short period of time to prove themselves as one of the best. Fortunately for Bjorn, he had the experience of a top team in Arden Motorsport behind him to provide the equipment and support needed for a championship run.

"I spent two years with Arden - the first year was a learning year, but I had a good group of people working with me, and the second year we were able to make use of everything we learned in the previous year."

With the list of former champions reading like a who’s who of Formula One and Champcar, winning the 2003 title put Bjorn in some very good company. The significance of it was not lost on lost on him.

"It was my biggest career achievement I would say... It's important to do well, and you don't really get maybe 2 or 3 years if you want to get into Formula 1. There are drivers that have been there for 4 seasons, but I don’t think they have the same opportunity to progress."

With Formula 3000 mirroring the Formula 1 circuit, drivers who impressed naturally received a lot of attention from the Formula One paddock. As the 2003 Champion, Bjorn was no exception.

"I tested with Jordan, BAR and Jaguar. Jaguar offered me the best deal for the following season, which was to become their test and reserve driver, which was what I was looking for. My aim was to get into Formula 1, and I thought to spend a year as a reserve driver - getting to drive every Friday; learning all of the tracks and how to drive the car would be a really good step on the way to becoming a Formula 1 driver."

Though he would have a good season, and impress the Jaguar team, his path to Formula 1 would go off course when the Ford Motor Company decided to sell the Jaguar team to the Red Bull Energy Drink Company.

"I went with Jaguar and I had a good year - I learned a lot, but then unfortunately, Jaguar decided to sell the team and Red Bull bought it. Red Bull had their own driver program and that meant that there was no space for me."

With the door to a competitive ride in Formula 1 seemingly closed, Bjorn would look across the Atlantic to the North American Champcar World Series for a competitive ride.

"At the end of last year I realised that I wasn't going to be able to stay with Jaguar and that I wasn't going to be able to stay in Formula 1 unless I had sponsorship. So, I decided to focus on getting a competitive drive in Champcar. I think it was a better alternative than to go and race with Minardi, pay a ridiculous amount of money and be a backmarker. So, we started getting in touch with different teams - I tested with PKV, Dale Coyne, and eventually it turned out that we were able to do a deal with HVM, which I was really pleased about as they were one of the top 4 teams last year."

Unfortunately, over the off-season, HVM would lose their primary sponsor and go from being a front running team competing for race wins, to a mid-field team. For a rookie driver such as Bjorn, this just added to the challenges he would face in coming to a new series.

"It's been really difficult for me, because every circuit I come to is new to me apart from Montreal. There is a lot to learn - it's a completely different car. Originally, I thought it was very similar to Formula 3000 car, but it's actually very different. It's also simple things, like understanding how to use the new tires in qualifying has taken me a long time to understand, so I've had to learn it at the race track, and that's hindered our progress a lot this year. But, I feel that I'm starting to come to grips with it now, so hopefully we'll have a good finish to the season."

One of the keys to being competitive on any given race weekend is finding the correct car setup for both the driver and the track. One of the keys to this is having a solid driver-engineer relationship. With limited pre-season testing, Bjorn and his engineer's relationship would have to gel at the racetrack.

"We have to set the car up, build a relationship with my engineer. It's not until really half-way through the season that we started to get the working relationship going really well - started understanding each other."

After a tough start to the season, Bjorn and HVM feel they are on the right track to better results.

"At the start, the only test we really did was Milwaukee, and we were running 6th there until I brushed the wall and had to retire. After that, I think it's pretty obvious to me and the team that we're making progress every race..."

Heading into the final stretch of the season, Bjorn and the team are looking to finish on a high note, and gain momentum into next season when the team hopes to be more competitive.

"I just want to finish the season on a high, because it's always important to show - not only to everyone else, but to yourself that you're making progress and that you're getting better the further the season goes. So, if we can finish on a high, and test over the winter I think we could be in a position where we could challenge for the championship next year."

If the current trends in Champcar continue, the primary competitors for next year’s championship should be Bruno Junqueira, Justin Wilson and Sebastien Bourdais – the 2000, 2001 and 2002 Formula 3000 Champions respectively. For Bjorn Wirdheim, this would be good company indeed.

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