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Some say Eddie Jordan wasn’t just a man of motorsport, he was motorsport. From driver to team boss to media maverick, the charismatic Irishman left his mark at every turn.
His passing at 76, after a short battle with bladder and prostate cancer, sent shockwaves through the F1 world, even though he’d revealed in December that the disease had become ‘aggressive’ and spread to his spine.
Beyond the track, he leaves behind his wife of 46 years, Marie, and their four children, who say goodbye not just to a motorsport legend but to the man who meant the world to them.
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Jordan wasn’t one for comfort zones. He thrived on risk, and more often than not, it paid off. His career could have taken a wildly different path; at 15, he flirted with the idea of becoming a priest. Instead, he dabbled in banking after an accountancy course, landing a job at the Bank of Ireland. But fate had other ideas. A work trip introduced him to karting, and that was it. He bought a kart, practiced relentlessly, and by 1971, he was Irish Karting Champion.
He clawed his way up through Formula Ford to Formula 3, even landing a stint as a McLaren reserve driver. But elite racing wasn’t in the cards, and by 1979, he’d swapped the driver’s seat for the pit wall, launching Jordan Racing. His eye for talent was as sharp as his business acumen – he hired future F1 stars Johnny Herbert and Martin Brundle (now more famous for grid walks than driving).
By 1991, Jordan Grand Prix had arrived in F1. It was Jordan who gave Michael Schumacher his debut at Spa. Under his leadership, the team secured four wins, including an unforgettable one-two at the Belgian Grand Prix, with Damon Hill taking the checkered flag ahead of Ralf Schumacher. But after 14 years, he cashed out, selling the team to the Midland Group in 2005.
Selling Jordan Grand Prix was just one of the savvy moves that padded his reported £463 million fortune. The 2005 deal alone brought in around $50 million (£40m), but that was just a fraction of his vast business empire.
Jordan had a thing for the ocean. A teenage dinghy racer in Ireland, he later indulged in superyachts. He bought his first Sunseeker in 1986, but his pièce de résistance came in 2014: Blush, a £32m, 155-foot floating palace with a nightclub, hot tubs, and enough room to store jet skis. By 2017, though, he’d sold it, trading excess for adventure with a Perini Navi sailing yacht—also called Blush—which he kept until December 2024.
“The sea is where I came from,” Jordan once said. “When I left motor racing, I wanted to sail around the world.”
There was not a chance he was going to walk away from F1, though. Post-team ownership, Jordan became the most unapologetically blunt pundit in the business, working with BBC and Channel 4 before joining Top Gear in 2016. In 2023, he and longtime sparring partner David Coulthard launched Formula For Success, an F1-centric podcast. Fittingly, their final episode dropped less than 24 hours before his death was announced.
The thing is, he wasn’t just talking about the sports; he was also shaping it. Jordan acted as an agent for Red Bull’s Adrian Newey, brokering his massive £20m move to Aston Martin. He even led a consortium to buy London Irish Rugby Club and dabbled in everything from real estate in Bulgaria to energy drinks and vodka brands.
On the F1 sidelines, he was a drummer at heart, leading V10 (later Eddie & The Robbers), a band that rocked F1 circuits worldwide. He played gigs everywhere from Monaco to Singapore, jammed with the likes of Bryan Adams and Roger Taylor, and even released a charity single in 2009 for children’s cancer research. Oh, and he once played alongside Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill.
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For all the high-speed chaos, Jordan’s family remained his anchor. He married Marie, a former Irish basketball international, in 1983, and together they raised four kids; Zoe (a fashion designer), Miki (sports event manager), Zak (a snowboarder and instructor), and Kyle (a sustainability entrepreneur). Despite his fame, Jordan fiercely guarded his private life, knowing that family was what truly mattered.
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They split their time between three homes – London, Monaco, and Cape Town – living the high life but always making time for each other. In his own words, “My family keeps me sane.”
Jordan’s family summed it up best in their statement: “EJ brought an abundance of charisma, energy, and Irish charm everywhere he went. We all have a huge hole missing without his presence. He will be missed by so many people, but he leaves us with tonnes of great memories to keep us smiling through our sorrow.”
Eddie Jordan never did things by halves. He lived life at full throttle, and he leaves behind a legacy as big, bold, and unforgettable as the man himself.
[Source: DailyMail]
