Then, as now, he was a man of trenchant opinions, and it was very much his team, in the sense that there was no ‘engine deal’ back then, no link with a manufacturer. There were, of course, commercial sponsors to consider, but essentially Frank was answerable only to himself and his company, which helps explain why he, like all his fellow team principals, was far more willing to speak ‘on record’ than now.
Twenty-five years ago, after all, F1 was still a relatively simple business. As Patrick Head put it: “These days making an F1 chassis, with all the moulding and so on, takes a number of months — quite apart from the design process. Back then, two days after having some sheets of aluminium against the wall you could have a monocoque ready to go! You bought an engine from Cosworth, a gearbox from Hewland, organised some tyres — and went off to fight for the world championship.”
On that Sunday morning at Williams’s house we began by talking about the driver situation. “I never thought Alan would change his mind about retiring,” said Frank, “but I kept hoping. Patrick’s more realistic than I am and a long time ago he said, ‘No, forget it. Jones is history, a statistic.’
“Alan’s indecisiveness has always amazed me. In a car he’s incredibly positive, but out of it just the opposite. I think that if he had come back he would have been as good as ever. As a man he is immensely competitive. If you can get him on a tennis court, for instance, he’ll try his very best — to the extent that he’ll do silly things like throwing his racquet on the ground in a fury. It’s bloody hard to get him on the court in the first place, but once he’s there it becomes a serious business.
“[It was the] same with racing. He might not want to leave Australia, come to Europe, live on aeroplanes and so on, but once he’s in the car he gives it everything he’s got.
“Therefore, I reckon that he weighed everything up, was well satisfied by what he’d achieved, had made a pile of money and decided to call it a day. Funnily enough, despite what a lot of people think, he’s not madly ambitious for money. I mean, I’m far more ambitious for money — or the things you can get with it — than he is. He’s got a farm, a few houses, various other business interests, and that’s all he needs, you see. Now I require a lot more than that to satisfy me. I mean, Alan doesn’t want a 2000-acre estate in England, which is what I would like! Now that’s four million quid straightaway…” Remember, this is a quarter of a century ago.