BE ON THE EDGE! The Final Years of Jordan Grand Prix (2000-2004)

[Music] there are teams that have come and gone in Formula 1 that have had different what's the word statuses in the fandom if that makes any sense we sort of rate them high or low depending on how we feel about them because well this is social media and we need a tier list virtually everything don't we a tier s tier meme tier people have different levels of regard for some of these teams some have been held in very high regard and have a cult following like manard some battled Against All Odds and operating on a minimal budget for so long like Tyrell and for that reason people respect them and some have gone down as just footnotes even on dedicated sites like the now defunct F1 reject site for how bad they were teams like token for instance it's something in the region of about 48 teams that have gone bust over the time that Formula 1 has been running 75 years or so as it so happens and one of the teams that met its sad demise in sort of the mid 2000s that was one of my personal favorites growing up was Jordan now I've covered a few elements of Jordan's history on the channel over the years I've looked at their first car the 1 191 I've covered the Michael schumacker debut which was in a Jordan that Spar in 1991 I've covered their crowning Glory a one two at the absolutely unhinged Belgian Grand Prix of 1998 Damon Hills final year in 1999 where he decided he had enough and how Jordan had been using a form of legal trash control that helped birth the second traction control era between 1999 and 2008 the Plucky underdogs based in silverston did quite a bit didn't they but sticking with 1999 that's about as good as it got for Eddie Jordan's band of rock and roll underdogs because once 1999 had been completed a season where Hein how fren got very close to winning the World Championship and Jordan might have done even better still in the constructors if Damon Hill had been on the ball it sort of fell off in dramatic fashion the 1999 season was a close call Hein Howard friendome one of the few shining lights on that cesspit that his Twitter could have won the championship if he'd won that hectic European Grand Prix assuming results panned out the way they did for the rest of the season he would have gone on to the Malaysian Grand Prix the first of which happened in 1999 just three points behind hackin and in the standings it's an absolutely Mad Season that could have gone differently still if the Michael hadn't been sidelined with a broken leg so then the 2000 season should have been full of promises Damon was gone but Jordan had hired Yano truley the Italian showing a lot of Promise in the Years he'd been in the sport he showed great qualifying Pace but had yet to show himself in a car that was half decent and the Jordan that was tining up to the grid should have been an improvement on the lessons learned through 1999 their best Return of the Season should have been in Monaco where truy might have won the race as he was ahead of race winner kard until his gearbox went pop and fren was running in second until he clattered the wall at Sand devart fron would however scored two podiums over the course of the season one in Brazil and one at Indianapolis but that was as good as it got truley would get a fourth in Brazil with a smattering of six places in other races but it was a case of being just on the bubble for Jordan that year there's a few occasions where they were just outside of the points as well as a lot of reliability issues to deal with Jordan would slipped down to six in the constructors as a result but they also lost Mike gascoin which didn't help things either but there was one other thing happening in the background and that concerns the team that was literally owned by tobacco company instead of just being sponsored by one British American Racing had a deal for their engines which clashed with Jordan Jordan through 98 99 and 2000 had been running mugan Hondas which aren't Factory Honda engines Honda as a factory engine supplier was back in 2000 after a spell away teaming up with bar the Mad zip Livery that had the 555 branding on one side and Lucky Strike branding on the other was Gone with Lucky Strike being the brand on display because well it's White and the logo that's on that white looks like a Japanese flag clever Honda was supplying full up Factory support for B while Jordan had engines that weren't getting the same level of backing as a result in 2000 B finished ahead of Jordan which must have left Eddie feeling a bit short changed although Eddie would get proper Honda engines for 2001 it's one of those weird things mugan which is the Japanese for infinite apparently took Honda v10s and ran them as a separate company I guess guess similar to what ABT to Audi Cosworth to Ford illmore to Mercedes Callaway with Corvettes and so on mugan was set up by Honda Sand's son mugan power roughly translates as unlimited power but they had Financial limits something that Honda once they came back wouldn't have to deal with and actually that's something else that messed Jordan about as they approached 2001 by 2001 the manufacturers were heavily present in the sport Ferrari is obviously Ferrari Williams had BMW on board Mercedes had shares in McLaren jagy was the Ford factory team bennetton had now been bought out by Renault B was backed by Honda and like already mentioned was owned by a tobacco company Toyota was 12 months away Saba was basically Ferrari's B team and pross went bust at the end of 2001 so now it was just Jordan menardi and arrows that were The Independents the season was slightly better for Jordan in 2001 they were fifth in the constructors ahead of B but they went the whole season without a Podium however after the 11th round of the Season fren left the team after reportedly having a Fallout with EJ but Eddie later admitted that the reason for dumping fren was to appease Honda and bring in tum masato as would be a recurring theme for some of these privateers it's often just business if you remember the video on the 1998 Belgian gu Prix there's a segment in that race that even today has got people saying this that the other there's that radio transmission where Damon says to the Jordan pit wall look if we race we could end up with nothing so it's down to Eddie as to what happens so Eddie got on the phone to Sam Michael and Sam told Ral not to overtake Damon they got the one two now this has people claiming that Damon was saying if he races me I'm having us both off or was to that effect but Eddie had to see the bigger picture here he had mugan on his back for lack of results and he had Benson and hedges also demanding a return because they were basically paying for Damon to be there and they hadn't seen the 1996 champion anything of note yet Ralph's brother had already been involved in an accident with kard half the field had been wiped out at the start of the race and it was a case of well if Ralph tries to overtake Damon and overcooks the breaking or if Damon defends and blinds Ralph with the spray we lose a one to so we'll preserve it I need results and I need money I don't give a about feelings right now so that's what Eddie did on this occasion he got rid of frenson brought in SATO engine suppliers were kept happy it's probably not what Eddie wanted to do but that's just the business of Formula 1 Eddie still had Benson and hedge's sponsorship but the net was closing in on Tobacco Company branding since more and more countries were now enacting bands on showing logos Jordan would display B on edge when these bands were in place and there was a drop in sponsor money too and there was another sponsor thing going on which is something that you see everywhere for some reason 2002 was the year that DHL was on board with Jordan as a title sponsor now you see this thing on the internet all the time about how DHL rebranded to yellow and red because of Eddie Jordan and his team but it runs a little bit more complicated than that it's more a happy coincidence really doche post had recently bought the San Francisco based parcel company with Deutsche Post having a yellow and black corporate scheme since the 1930s when they bought out DHL they rebranded the company to red and yellow and since Jordans were yellow because of Benson and hedges Deutsche Post stuck their newly acquired asset on the side pods the bit that everybody parrots on the Internet is that originally the Jordan was supposed to be red and white dhl's older color scheme until Eddie said no it needs to be yellow because of benon and hedges can you change the logo the Jordan cars certainly were great advertising for DHL since now they're well everywhere but changing your entire brand image for one Formula 1 team I can't see it and I only say this because nowhere does DHL actually say anything about Formula 1 in fact dhl's own website says the DHL takeover by Deutsche Post resulted in the red DHL font being given a yellow background the developers of the logo Associated the yellow color with a feeling of speed which suits a logistics company also due to the italic font the figurative Mark represents a stronger sense of movement like I said happy coincidence DHL is bought by Deutsche Post which is yellow Deutsche Post is sponsoring a team that has a yellow car because of another sponsor and wants to advertise its new purchase so it says to Eddie hey you've got a yellow car we've got a yellow company we've got this new acquisition that we need to plug you've already got a yellow car you don't have to do anything to it everybody's happy you know how back in 1991 Eddie wanted the sort of green car to represent Ireland and he chased sponsorship from companies that had green well corporate color schemes it's kind of like that really and there's a few videos on yoube YouTube saying how a Formula 1 team changed this company's color scheme and all that other stuff and you read through the comments and some of them are going no I didn't know this but the vast majority of them are saying clickbait clickbait clickbait clickbait fake news fake news fake news this is stupid this is wrong this is a myth blah blah blah blah blah blah but DHL doesn't mention Jordan at all DHL mentions Deutsche Post so well that's what I'm going to go with Eddie probably does claim that and I really do need to read his book at some point just finding the time but DHL saying it's to do with Deutsche Post so that's what I'm rolling with for 2002 fella was back at the team and he was partnered with Sato the team scored a handful of points and did manage to beat b for the second time in a row but as was the case with a couple of other teams that I've covered in these videos keeping hold of decent engines was going to be hard because B was going to be getting an exclusive Supply from Honda for 2003 onwards arrows like Prost had also gone bust meaning that it was now Jordan and menardi propping up the end of the Grid on shoestring budgets although there was the added safety net of Toyota and jaguar not doing much with their massive budgets it meant that EJ was going to have to get something from somewhere he ended up with a supply of forward engines for 2003 and the sponsorship money was starting to Teeter off Benson and hedges were still with the team but the Deutsche Post money was gone the car looked a bit bare versus previous Seasons with a Chinese TV station being a logo on the car but through sheer luck Jordan would score one final Victory it's a video I've covered before so I won't keep you all day and actually alamy has withdrawn the rights to the one picture that I had for this particular race basically fyell was in the right place at the right time when Alonzo crashed at the Brazilian Grand Prix Weber crashed moments later and brought out a red flag as fella was leading the race on countback the race was declared although renham was initially declared the winner with f Kella collecting his Winner's trophy just before the SU Mara Grand Prix it also means only one of Jordan's wins came in the dry the 1999 Italian Grand Prix the point system changed that year which was designed to help teams like Jordan and minardi under the 2002 system Fella's win would have been the only points they got all year but he and Ralph Furman managed to get a combined three points over the rest of the season despite the win in Brazil the only team they finished above was manard felo moved on to Saba for 2004 but in the June of 2003 Eddie was in court because he was suing a major corporation Eddie had made a claim with the high court in London saying that the mobile phone service provider Voda phone had made a verbal agreement with him only to pull out of that deal and then go and sponsor Ferrari Instead This was dragged through the courts for around 6 weeks with the trial ending on the 29th of July 2003 Jordan claimed that over 100 million in sponsorship rested on four words you've got the deal which he claimed was said to him on the phone by vodafone's brand director but vone said they were just in negotiations negotiations that they also had with other teams as part of a global branding strategy a global branding strategy that had already resulted in the sponsorship of the England cricket team and Manchester United Football Club as the BBC reported at that time just as Mr Justice Langley was about to hand down his Judgment of the case EJ did a u-turn and said he'd withdraw the claims and pay all of Von's costs Eddie was then blasted by the judge for blatant inaccuracies and when challenged on these was reduced to embarrass silence needless to say Eddie had to pay out a lot to cover the costs for Vodafone something that the team never recovered from also in 2003 minardi requested access to Bernie's fighting fund a part of cash that teams could get access to should they find themselves in the mud either to get to the end of a season or otherwise keep them afloat while they search for a takeover or some other form of financial rescue or to cover losses from a major sponsor pulling out you know that's sort of thing this was all set up by Bernie to try and help the struggling privateers Prost had gone at the end of 2001 arrows was done Midway through 2002 which left 10 teams on the grid for 2003 that is if manard went that's 18 cars on the grid if Jordan went two that's 16 if Saber went as well if Ferrari decided they didn't want to keep supplying them with parts and engines that's 14 cars and Formula 1 would look a bit silly Eddie at this point was nosing around trying to get Mercedes engines some of the most powerful engines available at that particular time because Mercedes had a share in McLaren BMW had a share in Williams and other teams had manufacturer teams straight up like Toyota or Renault or Jaguar basically they wanted to continue spraying money up the wall and manard being around was stopping them from doing that because they were bringing in rules to try and protect manard so if they could get rid of manard then it meant they could keep spraying money up the walls so all the teams including Eddie and Jordan voted no Eddie never got those MK engines by the way Jordan and manard were on life support by all accounts but it's believed that despite this Jordan had a workable budget but that's it it kept them there not much for development and certainly not enough to get them a car good enough to climb up the grid for 2004 quick Nick hield was showing promise but the car hadn't got the pace needed to get him over the line in a good spot georgo Pantano was a pay driver brought in to help balance the books but his sponsorship failed to materialize on a couple of occasions and he missed the race in Montreal because of it the only reason they scored points that year beyond the seventh place at Monaco was because the Toyotas and the Williams cars had been disqualified for break irregularities although the seventh place in Monaco would have been enough to keep them above manard in the championship then in the latter part of 2004 it started to fall apart again Ford was putting Cosworth up for sale meaning that Jordan was going to be without engines for 2005 Toyota had agreed to supply engines to the team the same as the ones in the factory cars as a bailout but at a constructor's meeting at heo airport Bernie introduced Eddie to a Canadian businessman called Alex Schneider 6 weeks later in the January of 2005 Eddie sold the team it carried on as Jordan through 2005 scoring its final Podium at the fical US Grand Prix where it became Midland for 2006 it's funny to think then that Jordan was bought out by a Canadian billionaire and it goes through different hands and yada yada yada and then it's bought out by another Canadian billionaire okay it's not strictly the same team because of racing Point losing all of their points in 2019 was it or something like that but it's still run out of that factory opposite silverston so where did it all go wrong for Jordan then well similar to the videos I did on Lotus and Bram some of it is to do with engines McLaren in 1994 ran perso engines and they kept blowing up when those engines found their way into Jordans they started getting the job done with them until Pros came along and Persia was going to be the French supplier at the French team so Jordan is left with Pro old mugan that were a bit iffy to start with and then started getting things on track with them as they win that Belgian Grand Prix and get close to winning a championship the following year only for B to arrive with Honda and Jordan Beats b 2 years running Honda Works exclusively with B leaving Jordan with cies that just can't cut it and with sponsorship levels decreasing while the manufacturers with unlimited money could just spray money all over the place there was no way of keeping up in someone who was an old school Privateer like EJ had no chance of making it to the front by what 2003 which explains the way the team dropped off the way it did around that time the vone Fiasco probably didn't help either Eddie had taken on Porsche and got a free car out of it he'd got something out of Mercedes and beniton when schuma left the team he took Ralph for a few million he'd done all this stuff so when it came to taking on Vodafone maybe he'd bitten off more than he could chew and it slapped him in the face but I don't think Eddie's ever spoken about it as far as I can tell maybe it'll crop up on that podcast he does with David kard Eddie did say he took his eye off the ball around 2000 but what remains is that he gave us a rock and roll image with bright yellow cars glamour models everywhere and also a team that gave many drivers their break Irvine barell schumacker Zanardi Sato Andrea dearis had his career rescued by Jordan because he was able to show that he was more than just a professional Crasher then you've got trolley fella and heidfeld who use the team to Showcase their ability ities I mean Formula 1 is a bit worse off without people like Eddie Jordan isn't it there's no Wheeler Dealers anymore you know Eddie Jordan seems to be that sort of guy that goes into a pub and tells everybody about how his dad was involved in the Great Train Robbery you know these Tall Tales the way I like to describe Eddie Jordan is that he's a car salesman that ended up in Formula 1 can you see where I'm coming fromont with that I hope you do so then a look at the demise of one of the cult classic for for one teams in Jordan if this has been interesting for you then do like the video so I know a good job was done for more stuff from this channel like subscribe and get that Bell on as we're now about 600 away from the magical 100,000 massive thanks as ever to the madlads at patreon that continue to support at a more personal level and if you want to help contribute to the image buying fund and other bits and Bobs then a link to patreon is in the description along links to Discord socials and other stuff or the super thanks and the membership stuff if you just want to do things that way so until next time I've been Aid Mard have a great day wherever you are and [Music] goodbye

Channel: Aidan Millward

Views: 37,551

Keywords: eddie jordan, jordan, damon hill, heinz harald frentzen, hhf, frentzen, 1999 formula one season, jordan grand prix, bring back v10s, the race, autosport, motorsport, dhl, ireland, formula one, aiden millward, f1, adien millward, story time, storytime, podcast, talking head, analysis, insight, history, motorsport history, peter brook, josh revell, p1 podcast, matt gallagher, racing, motor racing, tommo, matt and tommy

Id: zEoLuhMIZDs

Length: 19min 24sec (1164 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 10 2024