Australia. The team finished in ninth place in the constructors championship, and Andrea de Cesaris was placed fifteenth in the drivers championship. Rial expanded to two cars ahead of the 1989 season, and with de Cesaris moving to Dallara, German drivers Christian Danner and Volker Weidler were hired to drive the ARC2. Designed by new engineer Stefan Fober, the car was an updated version of the ARC1, with reworked aerodynamics by McLaren designer Bob Bell, and the improved Cosworth DFR engine being worked into the chassis. With turbo-charged engines banned for 1989, the entry list had increased to 39 cars from 20 teams; to accommodate the number of cars a pre-qualifying system was introduced, where the new cars and the teams ranked lowest in the previous season would compete for the 30 spaces available in qualifying, and then for the 26 starters in the race. Danner did not have to pre-qualify, while Weidler driving the new entry had to enter the session. Danner achieved a 14th place at the opening Brazilian round, before the improving cars of Rial's competitors forced Danner out of qualifying for the next two races, hampered by the older ARC2 chassis. The fifth race, the on the Phoenix street circuit, saw Danner finish in fourth place, in a similar attritional race to the year before, giving him the best result of his career. Weidler meanwhile had failed to pre-qualify for any race so far in the season, and following Danner's 8th-place finish in Canada in what was to be Rial's final race start, neither driver qualified for the following Grands Prix, despite both Rial cars being allowed to enter qualifying following the changing of pre-qualifying rankings after the . At the Hungarian race, where an illegal rear wing saw Weidler's qualifying times deleted, both Fober and Weidler left the team following the blame by Schmid for the imposed fine. Pierre-Henri Raphanel was his replacement, bringing with him new designer Christian van der Pleyn. However the new design team could not improve the ARC2 to qualify for a race, and Danner quit following the . Gregor Foitek was brought in for Spain, but a rear wing breakage during qualifying caused an accident destroying his car, and he immediately left the team. Bertrand Gachot took over for the final two races, but neither Raphanel nor Gachot managed to qualify to race, with the outdated car several seconds off