Friday May 24th, 2002
Jordan Party
Eddie Jordan threw a bash for members of the Grand Prix paddock at the 'Stars and Bars' nightclub on the harbour front in Monaco on Thursday night, to take advantage of the Friday rest day lie-in. The entertaining team boss joined his band, V10, for an evening of rock and roll that continued late on into the night. Jordan, on drums, blasted his way through numerous classics as a heaving crowd rocked to the tunes.
The event aimed to raise money for the CLIC (Cancer and Leukaemia in Childhood) charity, supported by Jordan and his wife Marie, and is sure to have netted a healthy profit. Driver Takuma Sato also made an appearance as he took to the stage to be interviewed by British television star Cat Deeley. Jordan, later, invited another special guest, Caroline Corr, of the Corrs, onto stage to play a couple of songs with him and his band.
Harbour Positions
There were plenty of bobbing boats in the Monaco harbour belonging to team bosses and drivers, all hosting special parties for the affluent friends and guests on board. The harbour provides a perfect get-away from the confined streets, but none of the owners chose to go for a ride on the Friday rest day, preferring instead to stay moored up and switch between land and sea.
Jenson Button put his 'Little Missy' boat in a less prominent position than last year, when he was criticised for displaying his rapidly earned wealth but failing to perform on the track. Fellow Brit Eddie Irvine moored his yacht a little further down the harbour, with his former team boss Eddie Jordan's massive Dublin-registered yacht towering from the jetty alongside the paddock, its blue hull and pristine white and wood-clad deck shimmering in the sunshine.
Tyre Time
German Ralf Schumacher, his Willams-BMW team boss Frank Williams and his technical director Patrick Head paid a visit to the Michelin tyre headquarters at Clermont-Ferrand as they headed through France on the way to this weekend's Monaco Grand Prix. It was Schumacher's first visit to the factory, and he said: "I was very amazed to see these tyres being made for the first time and I was particularly surprised to see how many people are working on the project and how much was done by hand." Williams has now visited three times and stopped off at the same time last year with his other driver, Juan Pablo Montoya.
Honda Power
British American Racing offered members of the paddock a wild ride on Friday and Saturday when they showed off their Honda H10 powerboat. The boats race in a special one-make series, in which 18 of them rocket around specially made courses throughout the world. This time, journalists, photographers, and even BAR boss David Richards, were taken on a gentle tour of the Monaco harbour before heading out into the open sea, where the throttles were opened and the action began.
The small but perfectly appointed boat, little more than a leather-clad tub, can reach speeds up to 50 mph and flew over waves to provide a back-pummelling and sometimes breathtaking experience. Later, a group of photographers were shown the full performance of the boat as passengers were soaked to impress a film crew. Unfortunately one expensive camera was lost as the boat careered around the shimmering Mediterranean waters to end the day.
Published at 16:19:52 GMT
(03-11-2005): 
