Bjorn Wirdheim is a fresh addition to the Formula One paddock. Intelligent, humble and hard working, the F3000 Champion made his debut in Melbourne as Jaguar's third driver - a stop on his way to a fulltime F1 racing career. In an exclusive column for Atlas F1, Bjorn will share his experience over the 2004 season and tell us in his own words about the technical and personal challenges he faces throughout the year.

This Week: Bjorn recalls his past racing at the Hockenheimring as well as winning the F3000 championship one year ago, and he talks about Jaguar's recent successful testing in Jerez

My first race at Hockenheim was in Formula 3, on the old circuit with the long layout; I can't remember where I finished but I know that I helped my teammate Alex Muller to get pole position for that race. The straights were so long that we were giving each other tows in qualifying. So every other lap I'd be in front giving him a tow – and even though he was a long way behind he could get a tow and would overtake at the end, or even in the middle of the straight, and he would be traveling at such a higher speed you could never catch on for a tow yourself.

So on the last lap of a really wet qualifying session it started drying out, and it was my turn to get a tow so I was sure I was going to get pole position because we were the only teammates helping each other out and the circuit was going to be almost completely dry the next lap. But just before the last two corners he backed off and wanted me to go in front - I slowed down too because it was clearly my turn, but he wanted me to give him a tow and we nearly stopped together on the circuit!

In the end I gave up and overtook him, and I tried to put as much of a gap between us as I could so that I wouldn't give him a tow at all. Of course on the last straight he caught up and got a really good tow from me, so he was able to overtake me easily and take pole position, and I think I took fifth. We weren't very good teammates after that!

The race was wet, and it was really dangerous because there were about thirty of us - it was raining quite hard, and I remember on the long straight towards the first chicane I slowed because I thought I was getting close to it - I couldn't see anything because of all of the spray: I couldn't see the car in front of me, I couldn't see the side of the track or anything - and after I backed off I realised that I still had about 500m to go before the chicane!

I remember that you never really wanted to have the lead on the last lap on the old track because it usually meant you would lose it going into the stadium on the last long straight, but I really like the new layout. The first time we came here with the new layout was my first year in Formula 3000, and the result was my second podium of the year – I finished second behind Giorgio Pantano after qualifying third.

Of course my best moment at Hockenheim was last year - I qualified third again, and it was a really important race to me because I knew I could win the championship with two races to go if I was first or second and ahead of Pantano. It was a difficult race because it was very warm and difficult conditions, but I got second position at the start – Liuzzi actually managed to get by half way through the race but he ran wide at the same moment and I got back past him - and after that I finished second behind Sperafico and I won the championship.

It was definitely one of my best days ever, but also one of the toughest - I didn't have anything to drink during the race because we were trying to keep the weight down - we had been over the weight limit all season. It was a really warm race that lasted over an hour so I was completely dehydrated afterwards – it was really difficult to even go up on the podium – and then I had to go up to the Formula One paddock to do a seat fitting at Jordan for my upcoming test at Monza, immediately after the finish.

I was so hungry and so dehydrated, and I had to sit completely still in the seat while they poured these two chemicals in behind me to make this expanding foam – the chemical reaction makes it really, really warm, and I was sitting there sweating and thought I was going to faint several times! It was a bit disappointing because I won the championship and I wanted to celebrate but I was too tired - the team had left that evening, and when I got back to the hotel it was 11 o'clock and I just wanted to go to bed – my father wanted to celebrate so he went to get an ice cream, and I went to bed!

So all of that meant I felt really comfortable at the track from the first outing this weekend, and I was on the pace immediately. We were trying the new aerodynamic package that I had tested in Jerez – the test went really well because I had driven there last year with BAR, and we just got straight down to work evaluating the new front wing over almost 90 laps - the results correlated with the results we got in the windtunnel, so we were really happy with the test.

Unfortunately the team wasn't able to produce enough sets of the new aerodynamic package for the race weekend so I was only using the new front wing and some new brake stuffers, which were not made from carbon but rather a different material, and it didn't last – they broke, so we had to stop early and we missed the last outing in the first session, which was disappointing.

But in the second session we just continued our programme, and I was working on strategies and tyres to see how they performed over longer stints. This worked out well, and the results were shown in the race - I also managed to set a good laptime in the end of the session and ended up quickest of the Jaguar drivers, so I was very pleased with that.

As usual I was running with the previous race's engines - Mark's engine in the first session, Christian's in the second – just to see if we could put an extra hundred kilometres or so on them. We almost always do this – I think I've only run with a fresh engine once – and you can see how well this has been working when you consider that the only engine problem we've had this year was in Indy, when Mark was running the new spec engine.

After the session the weekend was a bit quiet – I was invited to a dinner with some of the WilliamsF1-guests because I am sponsored by the official Oris dealer to Sweden, and he was over with a few of his clients because they sponsor the team, but other than that it was just a case of waiting for the race, which turned out really well for us with Mark finishing in the points again – we are just one point behind Toyota now, and we are really motivated to get ahead of them in Hungary.

But before that we actually get a little break, which after the hectic schedule so far will be great – I am going back to Sweden with my girlfriend for a week to relax and catch up with everyone. After that it's back to England and the factory as usual to catch up on things before we head off to the next race in Hungary.

På återhörande,             Bjorn Wirdheim's column is written exclusively for Atlas F1 by Bjorn himself, with the assistance of David Cameron. Click here for Bjorn's official website.