At the beginning of the 2000 season, all hopes were for a close and competitive championship but by the halfway stage, Guido Cappellini looked to be on line to successfully retain his title. This proved to be presumptuous due to his actions in Bulgaria, resulting in a two-race ban, and Scott Gillman´s frequent visits to the podium. This meant that the championship went to the last race of the season with Gillman proving to be the eventual and deserving winner.

After an absence of some twelve years, multi-brand racing arrived back in the Formula One pits. Three teams had opted to use the 3.1 litre 0MG engine. These included former world champion, Jonathan Jones, who partnered Philippe Dessertenne in the Fuchs Eurobet Team, Sami Selio driving for Team Finland and Carlos Maidana, with various team-mates in the Texaco-backed team. The others opted for Mercury engines, either 2.5 or 2-litre versions. These were headed by Guido Cappellini and Fabio Comparato in the Laserline Castrol team, Scott Gillman with Awad Al Qubaisi in Emirates, Massimo Roggiero and Paul Gaiser in Petrobras, Francesco Cantando with Duarte Benavente in the Singha Beer Team, Franco Leidi and Rudolf Mihaldinecz in the Waircom Team and Laith Pharaon and Cipriano Lambri in BiBi Racing. They were joined by Salem Al Khattal and Rupert Temper in MM Racing, Victor Kunitch and Stanislav Kourtsenovski in the Kalciems Racing Team and finally, Fabrizio Bocca from the Rainbow Team.

The first turn of the first race in 2000 was at Portimao and the strengh of Cappellini, Gillman and Cantando set the scene for the battles of the season ahead. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

The opening race was hosted by the tiny fishing town of Portimao in Portugal. Cappellini dominated the race even though Gillman had qualified in pole position. However, achieving this grid position proved very costly for Gillman in the form of three broken 2.5 litre engines, which insisted that he use the less powerful 2-litre engine. The only serious challenge to Cappellini´s lead came from Cantando, who was followed by the more experienced Bocca, while just missing out on a podium finish was local hero, Benavente. The city of Antwerp in Belgium played host to the second round and Cappellini followed up his previous race win with another victory, joined on the podium by Gillman and Cantando. This would become the pattern of the season with these three becoming the main contenders for the title.

Portugal's young hot shot, Duarte Benavente, made a successful transition from the lower orders to take his rightfull place in the Formula 1 hierarchy, driving for the Waircom/Siemens/Castrol Team. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

Cappellini continued his run of victories in Dunaujvaros, Hungary though this time he was followed home by his team-mate Comparato and Roggiero, who was still using a Mercury 2-litre, making it an all Italian affair, after engine problems had halted the progress of Gillman and Cantando and both failed to finish. Maidana though, provided the highlight of the race, nearly causing an upset by challenging Cappellini for the lead, but a clash of boats down the back straight proved his undoing, as the Texaco driver barrel-rolled at the next turn,after his hull had filled with water. The teams then headed north for the fourth round at Riga, the capital of Latvia. The race was well supported with over 75,000 spectators packing the banks of the Daugava River and for the first ten laps, Jones was the surprise leader, but gear case failure soon halted his progress, handing the lead to Gillman. Meanwhile Cappellini had crashed out of the race, his first accident since the 1998 Italian Grand Prix. This left Comparato trailing Gillman to the finish followed initially by the local Latvian hero Kunitch. However, the third place was eventually awarded to Al Qubaisi as Kunitch was disqualified for using an illegal exhaust system.

Francesco Cantando was a threat to the established order all season in his Singha Beer/Mercury cat, failing to score points only twice and placing third overall. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

Cappellini returned to his winning ways in Chalon, France, the Italians´ fifth French title in the last six years. Joining him on the podium were Gillman and Comparato. Early on it was Gillman who led the field, but Cappellini overtook him after a restart and Cantando´s weekend ended when he barrel-rolled at the pits turn. Making his Fl debut was Class One offshore driver, Pharaon, who put in a good performance, finishing sixth. Cagliari, Sardinia, saw Gillman powering his way back to victory and he led every lap of the Mediterranean Grand Prix to finish twelve seconds ahead of Cantando and Roggiero, who had finally obtained a 2.5-litre engine. Cappellini had earlier suffered a seized motor, which put paid to his challenge. There were smiles all around in the 0MG camp as Jones scored his first points of  the season, with a fourth place. Tremendous battles had been going on throughout the field including a three-boat tussle between Benavente, Comparato and Bocca, for fifth place. Bocca´s experience paid off as he followed Jones home.

The New venue of Poznan in Poland saw a first ever F1 win for Francesco Cantando, who out-performed the opposition all weekend and showed Gillman the way home. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

Poznan, Poland, another new venue, saw the first ever Formula One victory for Cantando, who had been out-driving his main rival, Gillman, all weekend to clinch the victory. During "Free Practice" Cappellini had crashed out at 215km/h and spent the rest of the weekend in hospital. Third place went to Jones who put in a credible performance to increase his points total. Plovdiv, Bulgaria ended up being declared null and void after a drivers´ protest forced the promoter to rule that the event would become an exhibition race due to safety fears about the course - the width of the water was feared to be too narrow. As an exhibition event, the results scored no points towards the championship, but Dessertenne was delighted when he won the 35-lap event. Just one week later and with thousands of race fans lining both the European and Asian sides of the Bosphorus in Istanbul, the drivers battled it out in the rough water for the ninth round of the championship. The second lap proved eventful for Maidana who barrel-rolled his RVS hull and had to be hospitalised. After 39 laps Cappellini had done enough to hold off Cantando and Gillman to take his fifth win of the season. The beautiful venue of Lake Como in Italy provided the drivers with a new course designed by Renato Molinari. It proved to be the most difficult and technical course of the season resulting in several drivers crashing out - Al Qubaisi, Roggiero and Kunitch were among its victims - and this left the usual front runners Cappellini, Gillman and Cantando together with Comparato to fight it out to the finish. The eventual race results were almost as hotly contested as the actual race. Cappellini took the victory with Gillman and Cantando taking second and third places.

Riga, the Latvian capital, hosted the fourth round of the championship and 75,000 spectators packed the banks of the Daguva river to see Gillman take the laurels. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

Vienna, Austria, the next venue, was voted by the drivers as the best-organised race of the year. The start became high drama when Gaiser hooked his DAC off the pontoon, catapulting Bocca´s DAC on top of Maidana´s RVS hull, before finally crashing into Leidi´s DAC. Consequently, before one lap had been completed four drivers were eliminated. At the restart, Mihaldinecz barrel-rolled at the first turn bringing the field to a halt yet again and after a short delay, the race resumed with Pertti Leppala, deputising for the suspended Cappellini, suspended for two races after damaging the timing equipment in Bulgaria, leading Gillman and Cantando. Within three laps Leppala had opened up a lead of half a lap. He eventually crossed the finish line 25 seconds ahead of Gillman and Cantando, an incredible result, as Leppala had not sat in a boat for over nine months.

Local UAE driver, Salem Al Khattal, placed third in the Sharjah Grand Prix behind Cantando and Gillman and is tipped as a driver to watch in the 2001 series. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

Sharjah, in the UAE became the fifth new venue of the year and proved successful for Cantando who scored his second win. Gillman had led, but trim problems had allowed the young Italian to pass and local hero, Al Khattal, driving in only his second race of the year, stunned the establishment by taking third place.

American driver, Scott Gillman, took the 2000 World Championship driving for the Emirates team with two first and five second places in his 143 points tally, beating Cantando by only two points in a season dogged by controversy. Photo: Formula Photographic/Davies

The race had been delayed due to an accident between new driver, Jan Honkala and Comparato resulting in the Laserline driver being admitted to hospital and out for the remaining race. One week later, the drivers arrived in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the UAE, with Cappellini back after his suspension. The Championship was up for grabs. Cappellini needed to win if he was to retain his title. All Gillman needed to do was to finish in the top three. The outsider for the title was Cantando, but he needed to win the race with both the other drivers not finishing. Cantando did his bit by winning the race with the best drive of his Formula One career holding off Cappellini by two seconds. Gillman though did enough as he followed the pair home to wrap up the first F1 Drivers Championship of the new millennium.