ASWC11 is right.
Then McLaren went to Melbourne and Coulthard won! West had a great introduction to the firm and the losing streak was broken. It rubbed it in to Marlboro quite a bit.
Getting back to the Schumacher link. Five yoears ago McLaren had won two championships with a man who Ron treated like a son. There was no way they would have taken MS on in the same terms he had at Ferrari. Ron and the team had to make a decision on turning the team into MS Racing or keep the team they had. They had just won two WDC's on the trot (1998, 1999) so why take MS on. Coulthard was still quick enough to win races and back up Mika, and there were a few good and much cheaper drivers for the future.
When Ron looks at all this in retrospect he takes it all into account. Had MS joined McLaren it would be a much different team than the one it is now and maybe Ron and his fellow directors prefer it that way.
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