Jordan Grand Prix helped to breed some quality Formula 1 drivers through the years, and Michael Schumacher stands out as the top dog.
However, the backend of their time in the sport is remembered for struggles and trying to make it to the next race. Team boss Eddie Jordan managed things very well.
Jordan Grand Prix’s last official victory came at the 2003 Brazilian Grand Prix, but was handed to them weeks later after a timing error.
A crash involving Fernando Alonso forced the race to be red-flagged, and it wouldn’t be restarted, handing one driver their first career victory.
The year prior, Renault withdrew Alonso from Formula 1 in favour of integrating him into the sport gradually.
Alonso is still displaying the same ‘exceptional’ talent in 2025, at the age of 44, and shows no signs of slowing down soon.
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Photo by Clive Rose/Getty ImagesGiancarlo Fisichella was the last F1 driver to win for Jordan but was lambasted for being slower than Fernando Alonso
When Alonso started winning drivers’ championships for Renault in 2005 and 2006, his closest rival was Ferrari’s Michael Schumacher.
His teammate for those campaigns was Giancarlo Fisichella. That’s the same man whom Alonso helped to earn a maiden victory in Brazil in 2003.
The Italian made 229 Formula 1 starts and raced between 1996 and 2009 before deciding to give up on single-seater racing.
He raced for seven different teams with varying levels of success, and even got to live out a dream by completing his final few races with Ferrari, after Felipe Massa’s horror accident at the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix.
In 2006, while at Renault, current Visa Cash App Racing Bulls boss and Fisichella’s then-engineer Alan Permane shouted some entertaining words of encouragement down the radio, after comparing the Italian’s pace to Alonso’s.
“Giancarlo, you are two seconds a lap slower than Fernando! This cannot be possible,” he said at the Australian Grand Prix.
Understandably, his team were frustrated as he had shown pace in qualifying the day before by putting himself second, ahead of reigning champion Alonso.
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What happened to Giancarlo Fisichella after being told off for going slower than Fernando Alonso?
After a tricky season in 2006, Renault stuck with Fisichella for 2007 alongside rookie Heikki Kovalainen. The defending champions were subsequently dethroned in both titles.
For 2008, Fisichella moved to Force India, where he would fail to score a single points finish in 18 months, before suddenly claiming pole position at the 2009 Belgian Grand Prix.
He raced to second place on Sunday in what was very much a backmarker car, and found himself in the car that won at Spa for the following race at Monza.
An Italian driving a Ferrari at Monza was a dream come true, but he ended up ninth and struggled to get much pace out of what was another tricky car.
Nowadays, he competes in GT cars every now and then for Ferrari, but he called time on his World Endurance Championship career back in 2022. At the age of 52, he’s finally taking a slight rest.