Eddie Jordan has admitted that he wouldn’t run a Formula 1 team in the current era, as he believes that the sport has changed significantly since he was in charge of Jordan. The former team boss first entered F1 with his namesake outfit back in 1991, and the yellow cars remained a staple on the grid until the squad was sold to the Midland Group in 2005. Jordan went on to become a television pundit as well as pursuing business ventures, and does not appear to have any interest in fielding a team again. “I don’t want to be blunt, but I wouldn’t [run a team in the modern day],” Jordan told The Race. “It’s so different. Not better, not worse, just different. I think it’s becoming hugely corporate, institutionalised. “It just needs a very highly qualified, very understanding type of person. You really don’t see the style of Ron Dennis or Frank Williams or myself, whether it be Ken Tyrrell or Jackie Stewart or all of these people, including Tom Walkinshaw. “These were, as Bernie [Ecclestone] used to call them ‘owner drivers’, so in other words you went in there, it was your money that was at risk. If Bernie paid you had enough money to keep going and if he didn’t pay you, basically you’d struggle.” Despite this, Jordan believes that his experiences as a Formula 1 team boss made him a “better person” and does not seem to have any regrets about the way he ran his team. “I love, love, love Formula 1, but I would not see myself in there because I don’t know who would employ me other than somebody to just front up something,” the Irishman said. “At Jordan it was a full-on involvement, I had my finger on the pulse I will say, most of the time. I don’t want to blame money because we did have some money, but I think we did perform particularly well. “I enjoyed the fact that I didn’t have or didn’t want to have somebody telling me what to do. And that’s just very old fashioned, isn’t it really? Very old fashioned. But I have to believe that it was the right way for me.”
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