Michael Schumacher’s debut at the 1991 Belgian Grand Prix is written into F1 folklore, having caught the attention of the motorsport world for the first time.
Schumacher blew everyone away when he qualified in seventh place in the uncompetitive Jordan 191, beating his experienced teammate Andrea de Cesaris by a significant margin.
He would go on to carry this momentum into the race, climbing up to fifth in the opening corners before his clutch exploded and brought his debut to an abrupt end.
It was one of the most scintillating half laps in Grand Prix history, but team owner Eddie Jordan almost didn’t sign the German star due to the troubles he was facing with the team behind closed doors.
Eddie Jordan nearly missed out on signing Michael Schumacher in 1991
The 1991 season was financially draining for Jordan, mainly due to the mounting costs and the lack of funding for the team from sponsorship.
Schumacher came at the right time when Mercedes offered £150,000 to Jordan in exchange for some seat time for the sports car star to replace regular Jordan driver Bertrand Gachot.
“There was a great legend of a man called Gert Kramer. And he had been pushing me ‘Eddie, Eddie, Eddie, you might have a seat. You’ve got to look at this guy, Michael Schumacher. He’s the business,'” said Jordan when speaking to the Beyond the Grid podcast.
“And I’m kind of bored with this altogether. I said ‘Look, Gert, go away. Tell me what budget he has, and then I’ll think about it. But please don’t keep telling me how good he is. Tell me how much he’s got.’
“I mean, that’s how brutal it is. So we did that, and the rest is history. Michael became a big star.”
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Why Michael Schumacher did not drive for Jordan again in F1
Schumacher had already garnered enough fanfare by this point that driving in F1 was almost a certainty, but he didn’t have a contract for the rest of the season.
Despite offering Jordan his services, it would be Bernie Ecclestone that would intervene to give him a better chance after seeing the impact of his first drive.
“He [Ecclestone] wanted Michael Schumacher because he came to Spa. Suddenly, he looks at the receipts from Spa, and he has 20,000 people extra on the gate at Spa because Carpen, where he lived, was just across the border,” said Jordan.
“And suddenly, a German interest in Formula 1, Bernie just then realised ‘Hey, I’ve missed a trick here. I need a German driver. Now I’ve got to find him a seat.’ So he rang up Flavio and he told Flavio to put him in the car.”
Coupled with the fact that Schumacher’s long-time manager, Willi Weber, had amended his contract with Jordan to state that he would provide “a driving service” rather than “the driving service” to the team for subsequent seasons (via Autosport), he managed to negotiate out of the deal with Jordan.
Schumacher went on to race for Benetton from the 1991 Italian Grand Prix, before finding championship success with them in 1994 after a controversial crash with title rival Damon Hill.