Motorsport: Aussie ace hopes he's heading for F1 greatness

So lean that a master butcher would have trouble detecting an ounce of fat, Mark Webber exemplifies all that makes the British male envious of his Australian counterpart as he strides through his solid, square, red-brick pile in a village outside Aylesbury.

You wouldn't want to find yourself competing with this ultra-fit 28-year-old at a speed-dating event.

The suspicion is that the elite of Formula One won't relish taking him on at their own speed game, either.

Not now that the driver, who carries the epithet of "the next Michael Schumacher" as an inspiration rather than a burden to bear, at last has the No 1 seat in a car - a BMW-Williams - that appears likely to match his abilities.

It is not so much what Webber has achieved so far in an F1 career which began 50 races and three years ago with a fifth position in the Australian Grand Prix - still his best placing - that encourages that belief. It is more what he has promised in races when many experienced judges noted that he had taken his Jaguar to finishing positions which, in technical terms, it simply did not merit.

His new team chief, Frank Williams, talks of Webber's "tenacity, determination and motivation" as well as his talent as the explanation for the outlay of the reported 36 million ($95 million) it required to inveigle the driver from Jaguar. If that sounds like big money, it's not in F1.

Times are hard, or relatively so, for Williams, who has sold his private jet and whose team could not continue to afford Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo Montoya - at least according to Patrick Head, the team's co-owner and technical director.

Some sceptics will regard Webber and his German team-mate, Nick Heidfeld, as simply the cheap option.

Williams would prefer to regard Webber's signing as the tapping of a well which may just prove to be a gusher in years to come.

Either way, the Aussie appreciates that he has progressed to a point where, from next Sunday's season-opening Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, anything much less than a podium finish will be perceived as failure.

"I'm at the base camp of Everest and I've got a long way to climb," Webber concurs.

"I've got a lot to prove, not least to myself, and I can't bloody wait to get out there and put my neck on the line. I feel I've got a good six- or seven-year career, hopefully, ahead of me and, if I'm good enough, I'd like to one day be world champion - but that's a long way away yet."

He adds: "I put a massive amount of pressure on myself. I know I need to keep driving and delivering as I have done in the last few seasons, even though, in the bigger picture, the results weren't that spectacular.

"But I believe that, with what I had, I did a pretty reasonable job. Now, with Williams, podiums are what we have to be aiming for, week in, week out.

"I've had a few years in F1 and still haven't achieved anything. Now I've secured a Williams drive, which is amazing considering their history in the sport.

"Some of their drivers are real heroes of mine: Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, guys like that. It's incredible. But it's nothing until you go there and deliver. Now the stakes are much higher and there's plenty of people ready to shoot you down."

Geography has historically limited Australian domination of this one sphere of sporting endeavour at least. The last Aussie to secure a world championship was Alan Jones in 1980. Before that it was the three-times winner Jack Brabham.

"You can have the odd victory here and there," Webber says, "but you're just another name, aren't you? Forty or 50 people have done that. But I'd love to be able to achieve what Alan and Jack did. If you really do achieve that, it's something that's meaningful."

The English formality of North Bucks, accentuated by the mournful calls of the peacocks he owns, is a far cry from the New South Wales bush town of Queanbeyan, where the F1 driver was raised with the scent of engine fuel permanently teasing his nostrils.

His father, Alan, ran a motorcycle dealership for 20 years. His parents still run the local petrol station started by his grandfather.

Fitness is a religion to him: cycling, running, swimming, gym work, anything to release those endorphins. "I love it. I train every day, and I get frustrated if I don't. Ann [his long-time partner] will tell you that there are times I'll bite her head off. When I do, she'll say, 'Go and have a bloody workout'. When I come back, I'm a different person."

To the public gaze, however, he is rarely anything less than articulate, personable and well-rounded - characteristics not always associated with elite sportsmen - and a man, you sense, who could have enjoyed an enriching career, even if F1 hadn't provided the magnetic force it has.

"There's a lot of things about F1 I don't enjoy, in terms of the groupies and the people you get around you because it represents fame and fortune," he says.

"I suppose women are attracted by the danger side of the sport. Ann and I have a bit of a laugh about it. I know how shallow it is. But I don't need a stunning young lady to tell me how awesome I am. That kind of stuff does my head in. What I get off on is driving the fastest cars in the world. I love taking myself to the edge."

On the day we speak, he has just flown in from Munich. "I read on the way over that Mourinho's been mouthing off again," says Webber of the Chelsea manager's latest sermon to his disciples. No myopic Aussie then?

"I'm a massive sports fan," he says. "Recently, I went cycling with Lance Armstrong. To hang out in Texas with him for a few days and to get to know him, albeit briefly, as an individual was a great experience." Last week, in Valencia, he completed a 154-lap practice session. In doing so, he produced some of the best lap times.

Maybe, just maybe, we are witnessing yet another wizard of Oz, this one capable of usurping Schumacher's territory. Next Sunday will provide the first vital clues.

- INDEPENDENT