People

Heinz Paschen

From the southern German town of Mengen, near the Swiss border, Paschen studied engineering at the Fachhochschule Ravensburg-Weingarten and after graduating in 1982 he became a freelance engineering consultant for the next few years while he raced Ultralight 80cc motorcycles in the European Championship, notably with the Portuguese-built Casal bikes. In 1993 he joined Toyota as an engine designer and in 1998 went to the United States to work with Toyota Racing Developments in Costa Mesa, California, working on the company's CART engine programme. Paschen's RV8E engine became the first Toyota to win races, powering Juan-Pablo Montoya to three victories in 2000 with Target Chip Ganassi Racing and going on to more success and a championship victory in 2002 with Cristiano da Matta with a development version of Paschen's engine.

At the start of 2000 however Paschen left Toyota to take up the post of chief designer at BMW Motorsport in Formula 1 and he was the designer behind the P80 engine in 2001 which took Ralf Schumacher and Montoya to four wins. The 2002 season was more difficult with BMW Williams scoring just one victory but in 2003 Paschen's engines were very strong again and both Schumacher and Montoya were in the running for the World Championship.

By then Paschen had been promoted to be technical director of BMW Motorsport, replacing Dr Werner Laurenz when he moved to Mercedes at the end of 2002.