FEBRUARY 21, 2005

Kimball in British F3

American racer Charlie Kimball has signed to race for Carlin Motorsport in the British F3 Championship. Kimball had a successful debut year in Formula Ford in Britain in 2004 and hopes to make a big impression with Carlin.

Kimball is being carefully guided by a man who knows a great deal about the ins and outs of making the grade in motor racing. His father Gordon worked with John Barnard on the design of the ground breaking Chaparral 2K Indycar in 1978. He later became chief engineer with Patrick Racing and won the Indianapolis in 1981 and 1982 with the team. Gordon went back to F1 to work with Barnard in 1984 and four years later went with John from McLaren to Ferrari. In 1990 he went back to McLaren and engineered Ayrton Senna to the World Championship. He was then appointed technical director of Benetton Formula but got a knife in the back within a matter of days when it was decided that the job should be given to Ross Brawn. Kimball left F1 and went back to the United States and set up his own design consultancy business, doing work for a variety of different clients, including making the Eagle-Toyota competitive in the late 1990s.

In recent years Gordon has been overseeing his son's career.