Formula 1 has been around since the 1950s, and its format has remained almost the same. While other sports such as golf have seen some huge changes, F1 has been untouched. This is because Bernie Ecclestone has controlled the Formula 1 franchise for a long time, and he always supported the conventional format. And recently, Eddie Jordan has talked about how Ecclestone succeeded in saving the franchise from a makeover like golf several years ago.

At one point in time, Eddie Jordan was the owner of the F1 team Jordan Racing and Michael Schumacher had debuted. During that time, Ron Dennis was the Team Principal and owner of McLaren under whom Niki Lauda, Alain Prost, and Ayrton Senna had won Championships. On the other hand, Williams’s boss Frank Williams was also operational in the sports of Formula 1 in those days. According to Jordan, this was when F1 stood against the threat of being split into two different Championships. In a recent interview, Jordan had a conversation with ex-Red Bull racer David Coulthard about LIV golf.

When asked if he has ever seen this format of golf, Eddie Jordan said on Formula For Success, “I saw it in Sotogrande when I came there first. I was always apprehensive about it.” Jordan’s concern comes from the fact that golf has been divided into different tours such as the LIV Golf Championship and the PGA Tours. So, there is no single format where all the golfers contest, and this has broken golf into several bits and pieces.

Then, Jordan revealed F1 might have had such a fate as golf. He said, “I’m a little bit concerned because it’d be like splitting Formula 1 into two. I remember myself and a couple of others–we took on Ferrari’s Ron Dennis and Frank Williams. They wanted to split it [F1] up. We wanted to support Bernie, which we did. I just don’t see how a sport with the magnitude of Formula 1 and with the magnitude of golf can sustain two top-level situations.”

With this, Eddie Jordan revealed how he sided with Bernie and stood against legends like Ron Dennis and Frank Williams as they wanted to break F1 into two Championships. But what did the Briton say about another incident that he had with Bernie Ecclestone?

Eddie Jordan once said Ecclestone asked him to help Michael Schumacher

Michael Schumacher might be a big name in motorsports right now, but at one point, the German had found it hard to enter Formula 1. At that time, Mercedes was backing Schumi’s F1 debut, but they could not actually help him land a seat as they were not an official team. So, Michael Schumacher went to Eddie Jordan’s team for a driving role. In one of his talks, Eddie revealed how Bernie Ecclestone had played a part in convincing him to take up the German talent.

Eddie Jordan noted, “Bernie came to me. And Bernie said, listen Jordan, you’re going out of business. I can’t possibly how you’re going to survive. Take the money, go. Just take as much as you can off the table and I took the money off the table from Mercedes for Schumacher.“ Of course, who else would know better about making money and keeping businesses afloat than Ecclestone as the 93-year-old has a current net worth of $2.9 billion as per Forbes.

Thanks to Bernie’s shrewd tactics, F1 became known amongst the common people during his times. He played a part in reserving TV rights to telecast the Grands Prix and make Formula 1 the massive sport that it is today. But now that Liberty Media has taken over F1, will they be able to maintain the top class that Bernie had shown? Or will their ideas lead to the pinnacle of motorsports losing its initial popularity? What do you think? Let us know in the comments.