Former F1 racer Bertrand Gachot has revealed how he and Eddie Jordan patched things up following his jailing for an assault on a London taxi driver.

Gachot was one of Jordan’s first drivers in Formula 1, but was unceremoniously dumped in favour of Michael Schumacher when he was jailed for assaulting a taxi driver in London.

Bertrand Gachot opens up on London taxi driver incident

Gachot had raced for the Subaru-powered Coloni team in 1990, a backmarker team with little hope of making points – so poor was the car’s performance, that Gachot never made the grid after failing to make it through qualifying and, often, pre-qualifying.

But that changed for 1991 as Jordan’s eponymous team stepped up into F1, and signed Gachot as a driver.

The Jordan 191 proved a potent machine, with Gachot saying he knew it was “something special” after testing. Such was the car’s performance relative to the Coloni, his neck gave up after two laps due to the increased G-forces, forcing Gachot to go through extra training before the season started.

Gachot, an adept negotiator and confident self-promoter, had been on his way to a business meeting with Pepsi, owners of the 7UP sponsorship on the 191, when he was involved in a road rage incident.

“It happened in December, actually, before the season,” Gachot told the Formula For Success podcast in 2024.

“Basically, I was meeting Eddie and we were meeting with the board of Pepsi to make the decision on the sponsorship, and I was just driving, and I had a fight with a taxi driver.

“I was sitting in my car, and the guy came out of his taxi and he wanted to fight, and I just used tear gas, and I defended myself.”

Jordan pointed out to Gachot that the fight had come about as a result of Gachot running into the back of the taxi.

“He kept brake-testing me!” Gachot said.

“So I pushed him a little bit. I pushed him, but nicely, you know, no damage! A little tap, a little tap to just say, ‘I’m here’ The guy came out of the taxi, and he said, ‘I’m gonna kill you’.

“He grabbed me by the tie, and I just didn’t even think. I just took the spray, and defended myself. Then the police came because I called the police like an idiot, because the guy didn’t want to get out of the car – he was in my car. He said, ‘I’m calling the police, I’m not moving for me until the police come’.

“So I called it, and then they came. I went to the police station and, half an hour later, I was gone and I joined the meeting.

“It was all done and dusted, and I had a day to appear in court, which I didn’t really understand, a few months later.”

Gachot’s court date at Southwark Crown Court was scheduled just before the 1991 Belgian Grand Prix, shortly after Gachot won the Le Mans 24 Hours with Mazda. When he headed to court, he expected a “slap on the wrist”. Instead, he received a jail sentence of two years – much to his shock.

“They kept asking me, ‘What are you in here for?’ and I said, ‘I used tear gas’,” Gachot explained about the reaction of fellow inmates.

“The guy said, ‘You’re joking, I used tear gas on a police officer, and I got a 150 pound fine! He said, ‘You must have used a knife!’”

Put to him that his profile as a Formula 1 driver may have counted against him, Gachot said, “100 percent, but I should have prepared for that. To be honest, I was naive.

“I really thought nothing of it, I thought I was going to get a slap on the wrist or a fine, I never thought about that. I had asked multiple lawyers about it, and they all said the same, but the judge wanted to make an example. He wanted to be the top man that day. Two years was tough.

“When I appealed, I got out the same day. What is amazing, and this is why I have no grudges on it, because, after that, the British ambassador to the EU called me and some journalists, and he just said, ‘Look, we don’t understand what happened. It was a travesty of justice’.

“He said I’m always welcome in England and I really appreciated that. When I was in jail, I got thousands of letters from people, and a lot of them were from English people saying, ‘What happened?’”

Bertrand Gachot reveals Eddie Jordan fall-out and Michael Schumacher meeting

With Gachot jailed before the race at Spa, Jordan needed a new driver, and turned towards Mercedes’ sportscar star Michael Schumacher. Schumacher raced at Spa, before moving over to Benetton, meaning Jordan had to scramble around again, having lost out to Flavio Briatore in his negotiations for Schumacher.

Alex Zanardi got the nod but, with Gachot successfully appealing his conviction and securing a release after just two months of his sentence, the Frenchman showed up in Japan to try getting his seat back.

“I have a lot of respect for Michael and what he did and also for him, as a man, you know, because when I came out of jail and I came to the Japanese Grand Prix, I went to see him, and he said he didn’t want to talk to me!” Gachot laughed.

“He said, ‘You were in jail. J-A-I-L, he said it like that!’ But he said ‘Bertrand, I am really sorry for what happened.’ I was really touched.”

But the relationship with Jordan had been badly damaged during the process of the court hearings and subsequent jailing and, despite Gachot being back available, Jordan didn’t fancy giving his driver back his seat.

There was an extra element of spice to the deteriorating relationship too – not only was Jordan Gachot’s then-team boss, but he was also his own driver manager! While jailed, Jordan had cut all contact with the Belgian-French racer and, despite him now being a free man again, he had no interest in putting Gachot back in the car.

In fact, the situation suited Jordan just fine, according to Gachot.

“Let me tell you… the thing is, he wanted me to be convicted! He didn’t want me to go to jail, that’s for sure, I don’t believe that,” he said.

“He wanted me to be convicted, because, in the contract, in the agreement, it stated that if I had a conviction, he could replace me. And because the car was so good, everybody was calling him. People from everywhere, from all over the world, they wanted that car and they were offering a lot of money.

“Stupidly, I had given the money that I could bring as sponsorship. I’d organised that the payment was done up front because he needed cash. I didn’t think that my manager, who was supposed to look after my interests, wanted the conviction to get me out of the contract and make money to survive!”

With Jordan having made a reported £150,000 from running Schumacher in Belgium, he addressed the tension in the room by saying, “You brought the team into disrepute!

“[Bertrand] told everyone in Belgium! If you remember the race we did at Spa, remember the whole track had been covered with, ‘We love Bertrand’ and ‘Fuck you, Eddie Jordan’, and all these nasty things.”

But while Gachot was open about the fact he and Jordan had gone through a period of intense dislike for each other, including a particularly tense meeting in a lift at Monza, time had healed their relationship.

“With all the hatred between me and Eddie, he’s an exceptional character,” he said.

“He’s a complete bastard, but you cannot dislike him. That’s the bottom line.

“Because he’s always funny. He turns it around, and it’s just difficult. And he was different.

“I have to say that I have a lot of respect for what he’s achieved, because what he did is absolutely amazing. So I always respected him as a professional.

“Now, what he did with some of his drivers I didn’t respect. From a human point of view, I couldn’t have done it because I’m not as hard as him. Thomas Danielson, Martin Donnelly… these people you were cruel with.

“I always respected what he achieved, because to go from where he was to becoming a winner in Formula 1 is absolutely remarkable. So I respected that, and, after that, I said, ‘Why should we keep fighting?’

“We had a little court case and everything. I won, obviously, and he had to pay me some money, which he hated!”

With Gachot’s daughter Grace showing an affinity for music, Gachot called upon Jordan for help with her career – help which was forthcoming, helping to further mend the rift and resulting in the two men visiting each other’s families at their homes.

“I thought, ‘Why the hatred?’ War is gone. And basically, we started to chat again. It was really fun,” Gachot said.

“He invited me to his beautiful family home in Soto Grande and it was great. I came with my kids, [for] his kids, and I thought it was really nice, you know. It’s a story that ends up much better than if we stayed both angry, you know.”

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