MAY 15, 2003

Dernie doing some work for Williams

Frank Dernie, a longtime F1 engineer who in recent years has been working at Lola, is back at Williams working on special projects for Patrick Head. Dernie was at Williams back in 1978 when he did aerodynamic work for the team which helped to launch the operation on its way to success. In 1989 he moved to Lotus where he was technical director but after two years which were not a success he moved on to Ligier where he spent a couple of years before returning to Britain to work with Ross Brawn (another Williams old hand) at Benetton. He was then sent back to Ligier (which was owned by Flavio Briatore at the time) and he stayed there when Tom Walkinshaw took over the team. That led to a switch to Arrows in 1996, but after that he dropped from the F1 scene and in recent times worked at Lola, designing the F1 lookalike Formula 3000 car and running other technical operations for the Huntingdon manufacturer. He left Lola last year.