A $300,000 diamond last seen on the nose of a Jaguar Formula 1 car at the 2004 Monaco Grand Prix has still not been found, 22 years later, BBC Sport reported. The 1.4-carat stone was attached as a publicity stunt and disappeared after a first-lap crash. Whether someone picked it up, it was swept away with debris, it went down a drain, or — as some rumours have it — it was never real, remains an open question. The reason it was there was straightforward: publicity. Jaguar's results had been mediocre, and by 2004 Ford had decided to pull the team out of the sport.
"My job flipped from primarily running the team to primarily selling the team and finding a new owner or they would shut it down," former team principal Tony Purnell told BBC Sport. Communications director Nav Sidhu wanted a promotional hit like the team's earlier Terminator 3 weekend at Silverstone. He learned that Ocean's Twelve was shooting in Monte Carlo and struck a deal involving George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, and producer Jerry Weintraub. Sidhu then negotiated with diamond company Steinmetz to mount gems — which would today be worth about $1 million in total — on the two Jaguar cars. The diamonds were encased in steel and fixed to the nose cones of Mark Webber's car and rookie Christian Klien's. They were expected to bring the stones back.
On lap one, Klien made contact with a Jordan car exiting Mirabeau, damaged the front of his car, and had a slow collision with the barriers at the Loews hairpin. He climbed out unhurt, but the nose was crumpled. Steinmetz was soon on the phone asking if it would get its diamond back. "I can't remember what I answered, but it certainly wasn't 'yes,'" Sidhu said. He could not reach the car until the remaining 76 laps were over. By then the diamond was gone. Sidhu denies rumours that it was fake, saying a diamond company would not risk being caught with a substitute in public, and that a fake would have embarrassed Jaguar and Formula 1. Purnell recalled that managing director David Pitchforth scratched a window with the stone to test it. "Hearing that from Dave, I'm in no doubt it was the real thing," Purnell said.
Theories remain. Purnell thinks someone may have pocketed it, or that it shattered at speed, or was swept into a sewer. Sidhu is "pretty certain" someone picked it up, perhaps without knowing it came off a car. He also dismissed the idea that Klien crashed on purpose. The damage to the car, reports at the time that the diamond was uninsured, and the value of points and sponsors made a staged crash irrational, he said. "For us, bringing two cars home, ideally in the points, had far bigger commercial benefits." The verified facts are a documented stunt, a first-lap crash, and a missing stone. The rest is still a Monaco mystery.