23/02/2006
NEWS STORY
A press release issued by GP2 team, David Price Racing (DPR) has once again stirred up talk of a possible McLaren B-team.
In the release, issued on Wednesday evening, DPR announced a partnership between the British-based team and the Japanese Direxiv company, this announcement coming only days after separate statements revealing that McLaren Mercedes and Direxiv are establishing the 'Direxiv Dynamic Wellbeing Programme', and that former F1 driver, Jean Alesi has joined Direxiv as the company's Senior Executive Director.
For the last two years, McLaren has been linked with a possible B-team, with Alesi's name figuring strongly as potential team manager.
Price has strong connections with both McLaren and Mercedes, having been involved in the McLaren F1 GT racing programme and also having served as team manager with the Mercedes-Benz Sports Car team.
According to the release: "Direxiv's motorsport involvement will be substantially increased this year to include commitments in a number of international racing series from Formula 1 through to Formula Nippon. The first step of this partnership is the re-naming of the DPR team as DPR Direxiv for the GP2 series.
"We are a relatively young company, but with big ambitions in motorsport," said Direxiv's President and CEO, Misato Haga. "We recognised that DPR is not only mutually ambitious, but also has a depth of experience that will be very beneficial to us all."