Early Melbourne start for McNish.

Toyota grand prix rookie Allan McNish has already made his 'debut' in Melbourne, courtesy of a radio appearance in the Australian city.

McNish was interviewed on station Talk 1116 by evening show host Gavin Wood and motoring journalist Jan Murcott, who met the Scotsman in Japan during the Tokyo Motor Show earlier in the week, and also as Toyota tested its developmental F1 car at Suzuka.

McNish, winner of the American Le Mans event in Adelaide last New Year's Eve, will partner Finnish veteran Mika Salo in the Japanese motor giant's team in next season's F1 world championship-opening event at Melbourne's Albert Park on 3 March. The circuit is within a kilometre of the Talk 1116 studio.

"F1 is the pinnacle of motor sport and so, from any driver's point of view, to achieve a seat [in it] is fantastic," McNish said, "For Toyota, it's their first ever time in GP racing, and so it's a big thing for them.

"We've been testing the first car. We've been doing a lot of development with the engine. We've been doing a lot of development with the electronics and also the chassis. We're pretty happy with the way it's going. So we're really looking forward to getting to Melbourne now. It's really hard to say right now [how the team will perform at its debut GP at Albert Park]. We haven't driven our new car [being built for the 2002 season], but, as well as being testing this year, we've been developing a new car in the background, and we haven't driven that yet.

"We also don't know what the competition is going to do. The one thing we do know is that, by the time we get there in March, we're going to be really up and we're going to be doing the best we can.

"It's a good place for us to come for our first GP. We've got a lot of people behind us that have got a lot of experience in motorsport, and it is a big opportunity with us in F1. Toyota know what it takes to succeed in motorsport. You've known that by the stuff that has happened in Australia [in various forms of motorsport], by the Le Mans programme, by the World Rally Championship programmes that have been very successful.

"F1 is no exception. We want to succeed in that, but we also know that it is going to take time. We're in for the long term on this one."

At the end of the interview, Murcott confirmed that the Toyota team principal, Ove Andersson, had said during the week that 20-year-old Australian Ryan Briscoe will be tested by the team in the next couple of weeks. Briscoe, from Drummoyne in Sydney, recently won the Italian Formula Renault Championship.