Eddie Jordan is the hot story of Formula One car racing. As the 1999 Grand Prix season draws to a close, his eponymous team has edged out established rivals on and off the race track. A maverick, he has changed the face of investment in motor racing and is now looking for challenges beyond the sport.

Eddie Jordan has been described as the king of the deal. Legend has it that he began his business career by trading conkers as a Dublin schoolboy. In his youth he progressed to part-time street trading, selling everything from carpet off-cuts to smoked salmon. Even working at the Bank of Ireland could not tame him. He used to sell secondhand cars after work, to customers who had been to see him earlier in the day.

By 1980 he had enough money to set up Eddie Jordan Racing and in 1991 he established Jordan Grand Prix and plunged into the cut-throat and expensive world of Formula One. This year, it cost Jordan GP around £50m to mount its 1999 campaign for the championship. Others spent a lot more.

Although costs were less when Jordan began, Formula One has never been a poor man's sport and in only its second season the team almost went under.

"We've been through some horrific times, but we came through," Jordan recalls. Seven years on, his team has secured third place, its highest ever position in the F1 world constructors' championship, coming out ahead of former champions Williams and Benetton.

Next year Jordan wants to get to the top. He admits that part of the success is down to the involvement of his new partner, investment group Warburg Pincus. Last year Jordan himself netted £40m by selling a minority shareholding to the US group, putting his total personal fortune near £90m. But the decision to sell part of his team was not an easy one for Jordan, who, until last November, only shared ownership of the team with his wife, Marie.

"It was hard, especially as I'd heard so many horror stories about investor relationships with teams. But in order to maximise Jordan's potential and make a real challenge for the World Championship, we had to change. I'd just turned 50 and I felt it was the right time," he says.

And as with so many of his business decisions his instincts have paid off handsomely. Jordan has nothing but praise for his new partners.

"Warburg Pincus have been an absolute dream," he enthuses. "They didn't know much about motor racing but they trust us and have allowed us to get on with running the company."

His deal with an investment group is a first for Formula One, where most teams look for partners within the motor industry. Jordan looked at the bigger picture. His eye for the main chance extends to the track too, where he is seen as the unofficial star spotter. It was he who gave Michael Schumacher his first drive in a Formula One car. And he puts his money where his mouth is. He staked £2,000 on a 14-1 bet on his own driver Heinz Harald Frentzen to beat World Champion Mika Hakkinen in last month's Italian Grand Prix. Mika crashed out, Frentzen took the chequered flag and Jordan pocketed £28,000.

But he is not a gambling man when it comes to the stock market. "It's not my style," he says - although he does keep track of market movements. In particular, he watches the progress of his sponsors and their rivals to ensure the security of current deals and searching for future possibilities.

"Sometimes, running a team, you get cocooned in the day-to-day details and the dream of winning. But in reality there are so many financial implications you have to keep watching to make sure you don't miss anything," he says.

The only cloud on Jordan's horizon is the controversy over his appointment as sporting ambassador for Ireland.
Health department officials there were outraged that the government paid him I£100,000 to take the post. They claimed the team's tobacco sponsorship (Benson and Hedges are the team's biggest sponsors) damaged their attempts to reduce smoking in Ireland. Jordan was staunchly defended by the Irish sports minister Jim McDaid. For a man who enjoys the razzmatazz and glamour of Formula One - his British Grand Prix parties are legendary - Jordan is remarkably conservative with his personal finances. He and his wife, Marie, and their four children still live in the large family home in Oxford which they bought more than 15 years ago. He keeps a flat in London, a holiday home near Malaga in southern Spain and a house in his native Dublin. His material tastes are conservative too - no costly collections of classic cars fill his garages. He uses a Honda NSX sportscar, a Honda Shuttle, a people carrier, and a Honda Legend saloon. All are loaned to him by Honda, manufacturers of the engines which power his Formula One cars.

And he makes good use of a sponsor's jet for flying to and from race meetings across the globe from Brazil to Japan.

"With all the pressures on my time it is so important to get home. Using the jet saves 10 or 20 days' travelling time throughout the year. To me that justifies its use."

His only extravagance is his luxury yacht, a Sunseeker Manhattan 80, moored near his Spanish home. "I love the fact that you can't control the sea. My retirement plan is to get into my boat and sail around the world - but I don't think I could persuade anyone to come with me."

Retirement could be some way off. Jordan has a host of plans still to be realised. There is the world championship to be won, not to mention changing the face of Formula One merchandising. "I want to enlarge Jordan as a brand and the deal with Warburg has allowed that to happen. Now we can get on with new ideas - maybe create another company and add value to the brand. There's a real opportunity for major growth into different markets.

"I don't want it to be like Ferrari. I want to take Jordan out of racing or at least not be restricted to it. Designer companies, clothing, eyewear - finding a new niche.

"The brand is very strong already. And at a couple of Grand Prix this year our merchandising has outsold Ferrari's," he says proudly.

"Jordan also has a very young following. I think young motor racing fans were looking for something different and Jordan fills that," he says.

The Jordan team continues to go from strength to strength. As it has just ended its best ever season, Eddie Jordan is still looking for the goal which has yet eluded him - the constructors' crown. But rumours persist that he might yet go back to selling cars - apparently Michael Schumacher wants to buy the Jordan car he had his first Formula One drive in. No doubt Eddie Jordan is rubbing his hands together in glee.


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