New firm
Not once did he blink as the snappers captured digital image after digital image, not once did he stutter or his language halt as he delightfully expressed his ambitions for the forthcoming season. Afterwards Eddie Jordan asked one of his associates, “he did alright, didn’t he?”. How you handle the press, the pose you adopt for photographers, these things are important this world. These are the things that sell.
There was no need for Jordan to worry. Ralph Firman did fine. In fact, if Firman handles his car with the same steady hand he controlled his first press gig as a Jordan driver, he may succeed in convincing his new boss that the past two seasons, where disappointment has been followed by turmoil followed by disappointment, was nothing more than a blip in Jordan’s dream to become a force inside Bernie Eccelestone’s televisual bubble.
The initial signs are good. While there were those who said Jordan was taking a gamble on Firman, testing under a persistent cloud in Barcelona last week saw Firman lap almost as quick as his old Formula 3 sparring partner Juan Pablo Montoya.
Six years away from the pressurised tracks of Europe doesn’t seem to have blunted his competitive edge.
The identity of Jordan’s second drive dominated news about the Irish team for much of the winter. Although Firman got to test for BAR last Autumn, a prize for winning Formula Nippon last year, he wasn’t considered to be in the running. Young Brazilian Felipe Massa was among the favourites, as he may have brought Red Bull on board. Of course, many in Jordan, especially those with filthy lucre in mind, would have preferred Eddie Irvine to ensure the commercial viability of the car.
Firman wasn’t in the shake-up, until by chance, he wandered into a sunglasses shop during a Caribbean Christmas holiday. As he searched through the RayBans and Oakleys, he bumped into Jordan. It is the kind of story you expect to be repeated ad nauseam should Firman live up to Jordan’s expectations. “It was just by chance,” recalls Firman, who at 27 was wondering if he would ever get his chance in Formula 1. “I was on holiday with some friends, and we just ran into each other in a sunglasses shop on the promenade. It was quite a surprise, I didn’t even know he was there, but we ended up having dinner and things just sort of continued from there.”
By that stage, Jordan was fretting. With the new season only three months away, he had yet to secure a deal for Takumo Sato’s replacement.
The idea was mooted over dinner, but it was until they were both back in the UK that serious negotiations began. And from a chance meeting in a sunglasses store, Ralph Firman’s Formula 1 career begins.
Already, it has the makings of a good story. The man once thought of as the hottest prospect in motor racing, ignored by Formula 1 and forced to make a living in Japan, given his chance by an old family friend. Firman’s father, also Ralph, created the Van Diemen Racing Services 30 years ago, and the charismatic Jordan was a frequent house guest.
“I can’t remember much of him, I was very young, but I remember him in the house with my parents.” Jordan wasn’t the only visitor to the Firman family home. Ralph also recalls Ayrton Senna being around for dinner, afternoons and evenings that he still draws inspiration from.
“Yeah, it was when Ayrton was with Lotus, he stayed with us for a while, a few months. It was great to have him around, and as much as the great opportunities my parents gave me, I think having a presence like Ayrton’s around from an earlier age, that made me determined to be a driver, to be a success. Every driver says it, but Ayrton Senna is the driver everyone in this sport wants to emulate.”
His father’s obsession became his obsession at an early age. By the time he was 10, he was karting. With his parent’s fully supportive, Firman harnessed early promise into a British Junior Karting Championship in 1990, winning the seniors two years later at 17. After that, he turned his attention to cars, building up an impressive list of achievements that culminated in winning the British Formula 3 championship in 96, beating Montoya. A few months later, he won the Macau Grand Prix.
And then obscurity. While those he beat with regularity in Formula 3, the likes of Montoya, Jarno Trulli and Nick Heidfield, all went on to Formula 1, Firman had to take the scenic route. Although the six years in Japan eventually ended in success last year, at the start, it was a struggle.
“It was just the way things worked out. I didn’t have the money to race in Europe, but I thought the Japanese championship would give me a better grounding anyway. It’s very competitive over there, although I wasn’t as competitive in my first few years.
“My car wasn’t the best, and that was a tough period. I would say frustrating more than difficult, because I wasn’t winning or even scoring points, I wasn’t getting recognised back home. The only way to be noticed in Nippon is to be winning.”
Despite the frustrations in Asia, he always kept focused on his dream. “I didn’t ever think that I wouldn’t make it to Formula 1. No. I always knew that if I continued to work hard, and started winning in Japan, which is what happened once I got a competitive drive, that I would make it back to Europe. Honestly, it would have been nicer to be involved in Formula 1 at an earlier age, but I have this opportunity now and I am not going to waste it. The experience in Japan will hold me in good stead.”
Eddie Jordan has never been shy of flattering his drivers publicly and he started as early as the morning he unveiled him to the press with Firman, saying, “the most important thing Ralph has is that he knows how to lose, how to battle to get where he is. A lot of these young drivers coming into Formula 1 have been winning all the way through. As well as that, I prefer drivers who come from Nippon, it is more rigorous than Formula 3000.”
Firman agrees with his new boss. “The Nippon championship is excellent for developing a driver. There are more physical demands placed on you than in European F3000. And for me, I was on my own, so I had a lot of growing up to do in a short space of time. My first year was really hard, because I settled in an area where there were no foreigners and I couldn’t speak Japanese. After my first season, I moved to an area where all the other foreign drivers were. But, it is a good way to mature quickly, being out on your own.”
Although the team are keeping tight-lipped about Firman’s financial package, it is not thought to be big. Since Deutsche Post pulled the plug on their £15 million annual investment, Jordan has had to scale back. He is going into this season without 45 of his staff at Silverstone, including some key members of the engineering department.
In fairness, the Irish team is not alone in this regard. The sport has been affected by Micheal Schumacher’s dominance and a recessionary pull on the global economy. Sponsors’ money is no longer as free-flowing, and there was a time, before FIA intervened, when the future of independent private teams were in serious doubt.
But the head honchos have intervened. There are more regulations now, the one-lap qualifying, the modifications, two increased point-scoring places. Jordan should have a more fruitful season, particularly if Firman can stand up to the hype of his manager. “The main target this year, certainly for the first few races while I get used to the car, will be to finish them and not make any silly mistakes,” he says.
“It would be great to score points in every race, that is what you set yourself at the start of each race. If I go out, determined in that thinking, I think I have a great chance of a podium finish.”
And he is excited by the prospect of Giancarlo Fisichella as team-mate.
“I am looking forward to having Giancarlo as a team-mate. He is widely regarded as one of the quickest drivers around and I am looking forward to what I can learn from him. Of course, that doesn’t mean I won’t be pushing him as far as I can and trying to out-qualify him. That is my initial target, it is something I must be able to do before I aim to win races.”
IF you notice a shamrock on one side of his helmet at Albert Park in Melbourne on Sunday, this is no sop to his new team. Firman’s mother, Angela, is from Newbridge and Firman remembers childhood summers spent in the Kildare town and in Galway.
Even when he raced in Japan, away from any watching Irish eyes, he wore a shamrock on his helmet. This is a plastic paddy proud of his roots. “Yeah, I am very proud of my Irish connections. My mother has always made me be,” he laughs.
So, Irish drivers haven’t fallen by the wayside just because there’ll be no Eddie Irvine this year. There is the one who bumped into Eddie Jordan in the sunglasses hut and ended up replacing Takumo Sato in the Jordan team.
The story begins, for real, on Sunday.
