Pitstop: Jackie Stewart in toughest Formula One battle of his life

LONDON - Jackie Stewart has seen friends killed at race tracks and received death threats for his campaigning efforts to improve Formula One safety.

He left school at 15, considered stupid because of undiagnosed dyslexia.

Yet in all his remarkable life, the three-time world champion said he had never had to face a situation quite like the one which comes to a head at Silverstone circuit tomorrow.

An extraordinary general meeting of the British Racing Drivers' Club has been called for a vote that could oust the 65-year-old Scot as president and board member.

On the face of it the dispute might appear little more than a parochial dispute, a clash of egos among the tie-and-blazer brigade.

Stewart, who became president in 2000 after being asked by his dying Formula One mentor Ken Tyrrell to take the job, disagrees.

"There was a campaign started which has been totally aimed at, as I see it, my credibility and my integrity," he said.

"A very vicious campaign that started off with only two or three people but was networked on to a level which has grown to be extraordinary ... the misinformation and disinformation has been colossal.

"My motor racing fight for safety was a tough one, tough because organisers and track owners didn't want to spend money and the racetracks were a disaster," he said.

"They were death traps, we were losing people every month. To move that around was big, I was very unpopular on that. And that was vicious.

"I had death threats, I had everything on that.

"[But] this is as severe as I've ever had in my professional life as a sportsman or a businessman," he added.

Tomorrow's meeting marks the closing stages of a dispute that flared up last year during on-off negotiations with Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone to secure the future of the British grand prix at Silverstone, which is owned by the drivers' club.

Stewart, who has clashed with Ecclestone over the years, wanted a three-year deal while then drivers' club chairman Ray Bellm concluded a five-year one.

Shortly afterwards, despite Bellm being lauded for having saved a race whose future looked doomed at one point, the chairman was dismissed.

That triggered what the entrepreneur sees as a revolt among the club's rank and file for Stewart to be removed from the decision-making part of the business.

Bellm is not seeking reinstatement but believes Stewart should leave the board and become more of an ambassadorial president - something Stewart says he will not do.

Bellm said the drivers' club, which boasts of being the world's most prestigious motor racing association, was run "too much like a secret society" rather than a modern business.

Ambrose faces scrutiny

Defending V8 champion Marcos Ambrose faces a minimum A$10,000 ($10,700) fine for bringing the sport into disrepute after his comments following Sunday's V8 Supercar Championship were referred for investigation.

The Ford driver lashed out at race stewards at Perth's Barbagallo Raceway saying his docking of 25 championship points on top of a stop-go penalty, after a collision with Mark Skaife, was a "square-up" for a similar incident that went unpunished in Pukekohe in New Zealand last round.

Ambrose accepted the initial race penalty for the first-turn collision during the second race of the day, but told a post-race media conference the points deduction amounted to him being hung twice for the same crime.

Ambrose recovered to finish fifth in race two and third overall for the weekend, behind Steven Richards and Russell Ingall, while Skaife had car damage and faded to seventh for the weekend after winning race one on Saturday.

Ambrose's remarks were referred to independent investigating and prosecuting officer Peter Wollerman, who is reviewing all footage and audio to determine if charges will be laid.

A spokesman for Avesco, the company which runs the V8 event, said Ambrose and his Stone Brothers racing team will then have the choice to either accept the charge and penalty or opt to argue it before a Confederation of Australian Motor Sport judiciary.

Targa entries pour in

Over 130 entries have been received for next month's two-day "Targa Bambina" in Tauranga. Cars entered for the rally, to be run on June 11-12, range from a 1960 Triumph TR3A to a brace of the latest GT3 Porsches.

The Super GT category is expected to be keenly contested, said rally organiser Mike John.

Aucklanders Mike Delmont and Grant Clegg had entered a "very rapid BMW 2002 with a very big turbo".

The Super GT class had also attracted several Mazda RX7s, one of them that of expatriate New Zealander Gavin Riches, a Lancia Delta Integrale (Ross Hill/Mark Roberts, Auckland), an Almac Sabre V8 locally built sports car (John Bennocj/Lance Bell, Auckland) and a supercharged Nissan 350Z (Lionel Rogers/Roly Rogers, Auckland).

Champ's quick recovery

National rally championship leader Mark Tapper will start this weekend's Rally of Otago despite nursing a recently broken right leg.

Medical specialists originally thought the injury would leave him unable to drive for up to three weeks after the event.

Tapper fell off a roof a couple of weeks after winning the prize for first New Zealander in the Rally of New Zealand.

He admits his first thought was that with the Otago Rally just three weeks away, his national championship hopes had taken a crash-landing too.

"At first, the doctors were talking about six weeks off, then it came down to three, and now I have been given medical clearance to compete," said Tapper.

"I have been driving for a few days already. I'm back on the exercycle, and I'm just starting to walk again."

The Auckland-based driver will start the event with a 15cm plate running along the outside of his femur and into the hip.

- AGENCIES