Jordan Grand Prix last night confirmed rumours that have been stalking the Formula One paddock for several months by announcing they have re-signed Giancarlo Fisichella to race in 2002, the first year of a three-year deal with the Italian.
The Irish squad added that, as predicted, Jordan's current Italian driver Jarno Trulli will swap places with Fisichella at Benetton, which next year will be rechristened Renault.
"Planning for the long-term future is vital and stability and continuity are key to success," said Eddie Jordan last night of his second driver deal in a fortnight. "I am overjoyed that Giancarlo has signed a three-year contract with us, as this gives Jordan and Honda a strong platform to build on."
Both Fisichella and Trulli are contracted to Benetton-Renault boss Flavio Briatore, who as far back as last year made plain his wish to see Trulli behind the wheel of a Renault in 2002. Given Briatore's insistence of bringing Trulli to Renault, a Jordan spokeswoman last night said that future stability within the Irish team was major influence on the team's decision to sign Fisichella.
"Jarno wanted to stay," she said. "And though we love him and did want him to stay, it's likely the same thing (a move to Renault) would happen at the end of next season. With that in mind we felt Giancarlo was the right choice."
Fisichella first raced for Jordan in 1997. The then 24-year-old was snapped up by Jordan after impressing in eight races with lowly Minardi in 1996 and made his Jordan debut at the '97 Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne as team-mate to another Jordan discovery, Ralf Schumacher.
The Italian, who had come from a solid background in karting and Italian F3, where he was champion in 1994, shone for Jordan, scoring two podium finishes in the Peugeot-powered Jordan 197. First, a third place at Montreal's Circuit Gilles Villenueve, which has since given him further podiums for Benetton, and then at Spa, where he finished second behind Michael Schumacher.
A solid season also saw him qualify on the front row in Germany and he was on course to deliver Jordan its first grand prix win until sidelined by a puncture late in the race. Fisichella just shaded a volatile war with team-mate Schumacher, out-qualifying the now highly-rated German 9-8 over the course of the season.
Following his single year with Jordan, Fisichella moved to Benetton, where his declining fortunes have mirrored the slow disintegration of the team that gave Michael Schumacher back-to-back world championship titles in 1994 and 1995.
Since joining Benetton in 1998, Fisichella has twice finished in ninth place in the championship and last year took sixth as his team's major rivals suffered a difficult year. This year, Fisichella himself has suffered, toughing out a miserable year as Renault rebuilds Benetton in its image. The Italian did take fourth in Germany as most of his rivals lost out against Hockenheim's notorious rate of attrition, but that aside, 2001 has been a long tale of tail-end woe for the Italian once regarded as one of the sport's potential superstars.
Fisichella's trials at Benetton have, however, masked a talent worthy of resurrection. In 1998 he out-qualified current McLaren tester Alexander Wurz 10-6 and repeated the performance over the next two years, beating out the Austrian 13-3 each season. He has done the same this year. Pitted against the superstar of 2000, rookie Jenson Button, Fisichella has outpaced the much-hyped Briton 11-2 so far.
Eddie Jordan will surely be banking on repeating with Fisichella the makeover he effected on Heinz-Harald Frentzen's career. When Frentzen joined Jordan at the beginning of the 1999 season, coming off the back of two unsuccessful and traumatic years at Williams, he was widely regarded as finished in Formula One. By the end of the season he had brought Jordan to third in the constructors title race, their highest ever championship finish, and had secured third place for himself in the drivers' championship.
The refreshing of Formula One's notoriously short memories as to Fisichella's talents will likely be Eddie Jordan's next major project.
While Fisichella moves to Jordan, Trulli will now get his chance at a Renault hoping to emerge from the ugly chrysalis of Benetton as a fully fledged F1 butterfly. The confirmation of his move quashes last weekend's rumours that the Italian was in line to replace Mika Hakkinen at McLaren.
Over the course of the Hungarian GP weekend, it was suggested the two-time world champion was about to announce his retirement from the sport and many cited the possibility of a seat at McLaren as the reason for Trulli not putting pen to paper for Jordan as the team had expected him to last Thursday night.
Hakkinen's manager, former F1 champion Keke Rosberg, however, denied yesterday that Hakkinen would leave F1 at the end of this season and instead insisted his future was secure at McLaren.
"I would not be on a holiday at this moment if there was something unclear in Mika's agreement with McLaren," Rosberg told Finnish newspaper Italehti. "The fact that McLaren has not published its continuation agreement with Mika has nothing to do with Mika."
McLaren is expect to make an announcement regarding its driver line-up within the next few weeks, with Hakkinen and David Coulthard now likely to remain in partnership for a record seventh season.
