The half-truths and deal-making behind Schumacher’s first F1 racer
The Jordan 191 - Michael Schumacher’s neat, efficient, beautifully effective launchpad - nearly didn’t get off the drawing board. In fact, there nearly wasn’t a drawing board in the first place. STUART CODLING revisits the chaos of Formula 1 in the early 1990s
The early 1990s could and should have been a golden age for new teams as Formula 1 bid adieu to the increasingly powerful, temperamental and costly turbocharged engines which had come to dominate the previous decade. Convinced that ‘new’ F1 was but a small step above Formula 3000, ambitious young teams jumped in feet first.
Only one survived as the booming global economy of the 1980s slumped into a bust and, on the recession’s coat tails, the ‘haves’ of the F1 ecosystem marshalled advanced aerodynamic and electronic innovations which took them far beyond the reach of the have-nots.
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