"Honestly, we are still making our plans for next year," said Takefumi Hosaka. "As you know, Honda has announced that we will be supplying two engines to two teams from next year. One team is BAR, where of course our chassis collaboration will be continued, we will also supply the same engines to Jordan for next year. If I say we intend to use the same engines which we used this year, performance-wise we had some problems. This was due to the newly designed small, lightweight engine, although we have cleared some of the problems. Using this engine as a basis, we are going to add some new power devices."

Mr Hosaka is confident of improved performance compared to the other engine giants. "Performance-wise we would like to push ahead of the other teams. Chassis-wise we will be continuing the collaboration with BAR. This year, unfortunately, we were not able to put our ideas forward, next year we hope to be putting in as many of our own new ideas, structures, materials, etc, in as we can."

There has been some concern that the chassis development agreement with BAR would lead to preferential treatment over Jordan, but when questioned, Mr Hosaka says there will be no problem supplying two teams equally.
"This is a simple question to answer," he commented. "We already have some experience from to Honda's 'second generation' entry in F1 (from 1983 to 1992), because our predecessors at Honda were then supplying two and sometimes even three teams. This year, we are also supplying several teams in CART racing, and taking care of them all on an individual basis. Based on that sort of knowledge, we do not expect any problems in supplying both teams."

Although his contract with Jordan doesn’t run out until July 2001 Eddie has now decided to release him early.
“He's been sitting in his garden,” Jordan commented. “He has also got a new boat - everyone in F1 seems to have a new boat - and he has been sailing that. Flavio has been asking me to release him, though, and I thought that Mike was in an inhumane situation because it was quite clear that he felt handcuffed at Jordan. I felt he would be much happier in a new home with Flav.

A rumour had been circulating that Eddie was waiting for Briatore to buy Mike out of the contract, but Eddie now says that was never likely to happen.
“I don't know where this story has come from. Everybody thinks Flavio is generous, but in fact he is SO tight. I tried to get a few pounds from him, in my usual style, but in this case I thought the greater need was Mike's. So I have released him.”

“Flavio and I have been in court together so many times, with money always changing hands there. This time it happened that we tried to do it without exchanging money, so we didn't go to court. The great thing about being in court against Flavio is that when you lose against him, you get the money. So I don't know what would happen if we had won.”

Briatore is delighted with the result and will be keen to get Mike working as soon as possible.
“I don't have anything bad with Eddie,” said Flav. “It's the same situation we had when Ross Brawn wanted to leave us to join Ferrari. You need people to concentrate 100 per cent on the job, and sometimes the people want to change. I don't know when Mike will start with us, it hasn't been decided yet. But Mike is part of the new structure of the team, which Renault has always said will only be ready in 2002. We will have had two years - 2000 and 2001 - to get the right people and to put the team together. We will continue this process until we feel the team has been set up and is ready to be competitive."

On where exactly Gascoyne will fit in with the team's current technical director, Pat Symonds, Flav added, "What you need in a team is good people, and whatever your job description might say about your position is not important. I believe everybody is working in the same direction, and it makes no difference to me what it says on your business card".

Zonta has tested for Jordan before, doing developement work on the J198 at the end of 1997, but he is a much more complete driver now. The decision will be seen as a major plus for the Irish team, allowing them to have three experienced Formula One drivers to get the best out of next year’s challenger. Ricardo will also bring valuable experience of working with Honda following his 2000 season.

The 24-year-old current BAR-Honda driver, who is losing his seat to Olivier Panis next season decided to stay in Formula One with Jordan rather than race in the American CART series. Panis himself has taken a year of testing as a way to get back into racing after spending the 2000 season with the McLaren team.
"There are no available places as a driver in any of the top teams so Ricardo decided to go to Jordan as a test driver," said Zonta's manager Geraldo Rodriguez.

Commenting on his latest signing, Eddie Jordan said, "I am delighted to have Ricardo back with our team. He was an exciting talent before, and now he has added experience to go with it, which will be hugely important to Jordan as the team doubles its testing efforts in order to mount a championship challenge. Ricardo will be very busy next year!"

Zonta has collected three points this season thanks to three sixth place finishes. He was happy to be back at Jordan, "Returning to Jordan and staying involved with Honda is the ideal situation for me to build my experience. Of course I would like to race, but I am happy to be a part of building Jordan-Honda into a winning team."

2000 has been far from what Jordan had hoped and Eddie has admitted that they have not delivered the results they should have, despite much improved competition. When the year began back in March, their plan had been to challenge both Ferrari and McLaren, but instead they find themselves fighting with BAR and Benetton for fourth, fifth and sixth places, over 120 points behind the leading two teams. EJ believes that the motivation within the team is still at a high level and things look good for the future.

"We have not delivered in the way we should have and we have not delivered as much as we should have, that's very disturbing," said Jordan. "We had hoped to challenge McLaren and Ferrari this year, but it has not happened. Formula One has become more competitive this season, but I think the signs are good for the future. There are no problems with motivation in the team, it's very healthy."

Japanese F3 driver, Takuma Sato, will have his first chance to drive a Formula 1 car in December at the Jerez circuit.

Sato won four races in this year’s F3 championship and indications are that a successful session with the Jordan team might see him signed by the team for the 2001 season to conduct testing duties alongside Ricardo Zonta. Sato currently drives for the Mugen-Honda powered Carlin Motorsport team.

Honda are very keen to have a Japanese national as a test driver and only gave in to the Zonta selection because the hold the Brazilian in such high regard. Nevertheless, they would welcome the Sato signing if it were to happen.

Another important point is that with there being no Japanese drivers in F1 at the moment there is obviously a huge amount of Yen to be had for the team that signs a man from Japan. The beauty about Sato is that, at this stage of his career, it looks like the man is very fast.

But he knows that obviously he need points to achieve this. "Suzuka was a disappointing race for us. BAR has passed us in the championship - we need to get that back - and of course we'd like to pass Benetton also. These things happen. It's one of these very disappointing occasions but sometimes good comes out of it. Let's hope something like that kind of miracle happens again. It makes you realise we were so concentrated on next year's car and our first season with the works Honda engine, sometimes you lose focus on what's happening at the end of this season and you pay the penalty."

Heinz-Harald also has not given up but feels the Sepang circuit is similar in design to the Suzuka one so it will be difficult to find a big improvement in performance. "I hope we find something to improve it for the final race in Malaysia. Unfortunately, it's a similar sort of track as far as the chassis is concerned and I fear it is not going to be a lot better than Suzuka. It would be nice to finish the season on a high note. “Even get another couple of points to put our Jordan team ahead of BAR for the constructors' championship, for Villeneuve's point in Suzuka put them ahead again by one point. Jenson Button's two points for Williams also put me back a spot to ninth in the driver's table. Another third place finish like Indy would put me up another couple of places in the final standings.”

He added that he will now forget Japan to be in the best frame of mind for Malaysia. "After a visit to Honda early next week, I am taking a week's R&R with my wife Tanja in Lankawe before the Malaysian GP. That should help heal the wounds of Japan and get me ready for what's in store in Malaysia. Something better I hope!"

Falvio Briatore, the Benetton boss, has stated that he intends to reclaim Jarno Trulli at the end of the 2001 season.
Benetton have a long term option on the Italian when his current two year contract with Jordan expires and it looks likely that Briatore will be taking it up. “Next year Giancarlo Fisichella and Jenson Button will be our two drivers,” Briatore has said, “but in 2002 Trulli will take the place of Fisichella."

It isn't just Trulli that Briatore has his eye on. Having secured the services of Jenson Button for the next two years he now has his sights firmly set on another ex-Jordan driver, Ralf Schumacher. "In 2002 our option runs out on Button," he said. "After that, there are a number of drivers I'd like to see alongside Trulli, like Ralf Schumacher for example..."

Jarno might have the opportunity to stay, if he wants. It has been rumoured that there is a clause in Trulli contract with Benetton that he doesn’t have to go back if the team he is driving for is higher in the constructor’s championship than the Anglo/Italian outfit. It’s not clear at what stage this clause comes into effect, so Jordan will be hoping for a strong start to next year.

"McLaren will be tough, as will Ferrari. Renault will be back, we're back as a works Honda team, BAR is getting better and don't rule out Williams-BMW," he said. "So from that point of view, its probably going to be even harder to score points next year. Its going to be incredibly tough and its going to need some seriously clever people to make the best car and to get it going right."

Of the 884 constructor and driver points on offer for next year's championship it is pretty likely that, as with recent years, the lion's share will go to McLaren and Ferrari. 608 of those points have already been taken this year by the top two teams and more likely at Sepang. This leaves pretty slim pickings for the remaining 9 teams to fight over.

"Three days in Tokyo, one week relaxing on a beach in Malaysia - this was what I was doing in between the Japanese and the Malaysian Grand Prix," he said. "I am sure I will profit form this leisure time as Sepang will host the most demanding race of the year. It will be extremely hot and the track is very demanding, too, so by and large, the Malaysian Grand Prix is even tougher than the race in Hungary."

"The track is extremely challenging from a driver’s point of view and can only be compared to Suzuka. The kerbs are pretty nice, you can easily cut them. The only critical aspect is that you can only overtake if the car in front of you will make an error. Even the long pit straight doesn’t offer an opportunity to overtake without problems.

"I only hope that we at Jordan will be in a situation to overtake other cars," said Frentzen who has endured a tough season with reliability. "This event is really crucial for us. We can still beat both Benetton and BAR in the manufacturers championship. Let’s wait and see what we can do."

This season has been a marked reversal of fortune following the many highs of 1999 including 3rd place in both championships and two race wins. Despite having a good chance of claiming fourth place, the team was not able to score any points in either of the last two races, running well off the pace, so had to settle for a dismal 6th. Eddie, as always, though manages to put a positive spin on things. “2000 has been an incredibly tough season, especially coming on the back of the successes of last year.
“Arguably, though, we have learnt more this year than last, and the disappointments have made us more determined than ever to be back winning races. Our new partnership with Honda will play a key part in achieving this goal.”

Jordan paid tribute to his two drivers, Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Jarno Trulli, saying neither deserved any of the blame for the team’s disappointing year and no one could have done more. “Heinz and Jarno have done a good job under difficult circumstances and I know they are really looking forward to the 2001 season.”

There is absolutely no track work allowed for the rest of October or November, but the whole team will be extremely busy designing the 2001 contender. Many hours will be spent in the wind tunnel and at the test benches, trying out all the new components. During December and January we can expect to see hybrid versions of the 2000/2001 car on the test tracks.

Already one of the fittest of the drivers, he is now going to step up his training in perperation for the New York marathon.
Whilst the rest of the F1 paddock heards off to assorted exotic beaches around the world, Jarno is getting ready to take part in the 26 mile race around the Big Apple.
Although he says he is looking forward to the marathon, which takes place on the 5th of November, he has admitted that he is not as fit as he should be. However, without an EJ10 to break down, he hopes he can be fairly competitive !

"We suffered a lot of pain this year and that is why we have already begun for next year with an interim car out in December.
"Honda has a huge reputation, a great name. But the first part of the year is to get to understand and work with each other.
"The target stays, despite the 'familiarisation' period - the top three. We have to start winning races again, pole positions - if we don't develop the car for 2002, we would have failed."

The Irishman said this year has been a huge disappointment after last year's highs of winning two Grand Prix races, but he had to take a few risks to try to improve. "In order for us to compete against McLaren and Ferrari, we had to make radical changes this year," he said.

Eddie will be now aware that the radical approach isn’t always the best. He said early in the season that the team had had to sacrifice reliability for speed and undoubtedly for most of the season the car was fast – Trulli qualified twice on the front row of the grid. But as Williams and Benneton showed, consistency is much more important than out-and-out speed and the faster Jordan was left in their albeit small wake.

We can now hope that the Honda works engine will allow the car designer team to work on the reliability problem and let the excellent power plant take care of the speed problem.

The Italian came to Jordan at the beginning of this year believing that he was being given a package capable of winning races. Despite many excellent qualifications, highlighted by two front rows at Monaco and Belgium, he has been dogged by bad luck, an unreliable car, or both.

Understandably, when comparing his pre-season hopes to his actual results, he has said that his 2000 season with Jordan has been the "worst of his career" and admitted that he is concerned for the team's chances next year.
“I came to Jordan to score a lot of points, to have a chance of victory, but the opposite has happened," he said. "It's been really bad this season. In fact, I think the worst of my whole career. We've had a very unreliable car and a lot of bad luck, but basically we weren't strong enough."

The Jordan driver also confessed that the incredible run of back luck that dogged his season did get to him at times particularly after the Belgian Grand Prix. At Spa, after qualifying on the front row behind Mika Hakkinen, he was shunted out of the race on lap four by an over-zealous Jenson Button.
"I carried my frustration through to the United States race," he admitted of an event in which he was again taken out by Button and publicly railed against the young Englishman and his driving skills after the Indianapolis race. "But then I said, okay, it's not my year."
"I don't really get angry or in a bad mood. It's not my fault. I've had so much bad luck this year that one day I must be paid back - but it hasn't happened this year."

Nevertheless, Trulli will continue the fight in 2001. Although, at this stage he doesn’t know how much of an improvement the Honda works engine will bring.
"It does look promising," he said, "but I can't say for sure that we will be strong. We have to work hard because we are finishing this year with a gap to the other teams. As for me, I've proved many times that when I have a good car I can do my job. I have been on the front row twice this year. But my ambitions for next year ? It all depends on the car."