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Tony Jardine

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Tony Jardine
Tony Jardine at the 2018 NEC Classic Car Show
Born
Anthony Thomas Jardine

(1952-03-05) 5 March 1952 (age 72)
Liverpool, Merseyside, England
NationalityEnglish
Occupation(s)Motorsport journalist, commentator
Public relations
Employers

Anthony Thomas Jardine (born 5 March 1952) is an English rally driver, motorsport pundit and former Formula One (F1) assistant team manager. He has done broadcasting work as an F1 pit lane reporter for the BBC and as a pundit for ITV in its television coverage of the sport from 1997 to 2005. Jardine has worked with the Brabham, McLaren and Team Lotus teams and run his own sports public relations company. He has competed in rallies on both an amateur and a semi-professional basis.

Early life

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Jardine was born on 5 March 1952,[1] at Oxford Street Maternity Hospital in Liverpool.[2] He is the son of the Royal Navy pilot Eric Percy Jardine.[3][4] His family moved to South Africa when he was an infant before returning to Wirral, Merseyside when she was nine.[2] Jardine and his family returned to England in 1962 upon the death of his father.[3]

Motorsport career

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Following his leaving the University of Warwick where he studied psychology and sociology,[3][5] Jardine began his career as a art teacher for a year at Woodchurch High School in Bebington,[6][7] and for one year,[8] he was head of the art department at the New English School in Kuwait.[3][9] He later became a cartoonist for the Kuwait Times.[7] His motorsport career started in single seater racing cars, raising the money to go racing by working on holidays and on both building sites and in bars. He was competing in a Palliser Formula Ford car in 1973.[10] Whilst in Kuwait he took up rally driving for the local Datsun importers in his spare time after an accident in which he crashed his own Formula Ford car meant he was unable to pay for it to be repaired. He was comparatively successful, finishing eighth on the Kuwait International Rally in 1975.[8][11]

Outside his later Formula One (F1) management career, Jardine has continued to race in rallying on an amateur and semi-professional basis, mainly in the United Kingdom but also overseas. Jardine has competed in four Arctic Rallies and 27 Wales Rally GBs, finishing second in class in 2001. He was a three-time recipient of the journalists' award.[9][11] Jardine also tested a Tyrrell 026 at Donington Park in 1998.[12] He competed in the 2013 Wales Rally GB and the 2016 Wales Rally GB with co-driver Amy Williams, the Winter Olympic gold medallist.[13][14]

Formula One career

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Jardine then moved into F1, getting a job working for Goodyear's Grand Prix Team, driving trucks and fitting tyres at races across Europe in 1977.[3][8][9] His next role was with the Brabham F1 team as its race co-coordinator from October 1977 after an approach from the Brabham family.[8] Jardine worked with racing driver Niki Lauda and designer Gordon Murray.[12] After Brabham he moved to McLaren in 1980,[9] Jardine became an Assistant Team Manager when the team drivers were Alain Prost and John Watson.[12][15] Jardine then left F1 to work for an American promotions company, but within eighteen months he was back in F1 working for Lotus; colleagues here included racing drivers Nigel Mansell, Elio de Angelis and Ayrton Senna. In 1985 he formed his own sports public relations company, Jardine Communications Ltd, in which future ITV co-presenter Louise Goodman worked.[12] In 2012, Jardine International was taken over by the HPS Group, becoming HPS Jardine.[16] Jardine became the director of communications of the classic rally company HERO/ERA in 2019.[17]

Media career

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In 1982, Jardine began working in broadcasting when the commercial radio service Independent Radio News (IRN) were unable to locate their reporter to cover the drivers' strike at the 1982 South African Grand Prix, so Jardine took up those duties.[9] This led to him working for IRN more often and he eventually became its F1 correspondent.[18] Jardine started working for the BBC in the 1980s, including standing in for Murray Walker, as main commentator, at the 1985 German Grand Prix when Walker had a clash between the 1985 British motorcycle Grand Prix and the German Grand Prix and was asked by the BBC to cover the motorcycle event.[18][19] He was also a race commentator for the South African Broadcasting Corporation.[18]

He presented the 1988,[20] 1989,[21] and 1990 official F1 season review videos produced by the Formula One Constructors' Association.[22] Following the death of James Hunt in 1993, Jonathan Palmer moved to become co-commentator alongside Walker and Jardine became the BBC's full time pit lane reporter.[3] He was the presenter of Opposite Lock on Sky Sports in the 1990s.[12] When the F1 coverage switched to ITV in 1997, he became one of their main pundits, appearing on-screen before and after races.[19] Jardine fulfilled the role until he was dropped by ITV after the 2005 season.[23] He covered A1 Grand Prix and has also done broadcasting for the pay-TV broadcaster Sky TV, Sky Sports News previewing each F1 Grand Prix in the Sky studio, Talksport, TalkTV and BeIN Sports, analysing F1 races for Africa and the Middle East.[9][18]

Personal life

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He also does a considerable amount of after-dinner speaking for clients including Toyota, Heineken and Toshiba. In 2007, Jardine's wife Jeanette was badly injured in a car crash, in which she was an innocent bystander. She had to have her right arm amputated.[24] The couple have been married since October 1978.[8]

References

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  1. ^ "Tony Jardine". British Racing Drivers' Club. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  2. ^ a b "Posh Scouse". Liverpool Echo. 6 June 1998. p. 15. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. ^ a b c d e f "Tony Jardine". GrandPrix.com. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  4. ^ "Eric Percy Jardine". Arctic Convoy Museum. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  5. ^ "Tony loves life in the fast lane". Wirral Globe. 30 October 1997. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  6. ^ Wilkinson, Jane (23 November 1996). "Grand Prix voice in RAC rally hot seat". Liverpool Daily Post. p. 8. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. ^ a b Huntley, Walter (2 July 1986). "Scouser Tony in at the depe end". Liverpool Echo. p. 7. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via Newspapers.com.
  8. ^ a b c d e Mansell, Jim (23 September 1978). "'Teach' Tony enjoys life with kings of the track". Liverpool Echo. p. 7. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. ^ a b c d e f Keilloh, Graham (17 October 2024). "Tony Jardine: The Man You Can't Keep Away From Motorsport". Motorsport News (MJ3456): 20–25. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via PressReader.
  10. ^ "How I Spend It: Tony Jardine". Paddock Magazine. 21 October 2015. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  11. ^ a b "Bob Searles / Tony Jardine". Heritage Grand Touring Car Challenge. Archived from the original on 21 November 2008. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  12. ^ a b c d e "Tony Jardine". ITV-F1. Archived from the original on 16 March 2006. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  13. ^ "Tony Jardine praises Amy Williams as pair finish Wales Rally GB". Sky Sports. 19 November 2013. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  14. ^ Jackson, Connor (1 November 2016). "Tony Jardine and Amy Williams MBE Complete Rally GB in Style". The Checkered Flag. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  15. ^ Lawrence, Paul (November 2016). "Historic racing news". Motor Sport. 92 (11): 44. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  16. ^ "A big HPS welcome to Jardine International | HPS Group". Archived from the original on 20 March 2013. Retrieved 7 August 2013.
  17. ^ "Jardine joins HERO". Octane (189): 34. March 2019. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via PressReader.
  18. ^ a b c d Nelson, David (18 June 2019). "In conversation with Tony Jardine". Motorsport Broadcasting. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  19. ^ a b "Tony Jardine". ESPN. Archived from the original on 9 March 2016. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  20. ^ Collantine, Keith (1 January 2005). ""Honda… all fired up!" – 1988 F1 season review video". RaceFans. Retrieved 23 January 2025.
  21. ^ "FIA Formula 1 World Championship Review". Motor Sport (2). February 1990. Retrieved 23 January 2025.
  22. ^ Wood, Steveh (2 February 2020). "F1 Season Reviews Reviewed: 1990". Medium. Retrieved 23 January 2025.
  23. ^ "Jardine: I'm going to miss it". Crash. 31 March 2022. Retrieved 22 January 2025.
  24. ^ Eason, Kevin (30 November 2007). "Jardine's selfless wife insists show must stay on road". The Times. No. 69182. p. 103. Retrieved 22 January 2025 – via The Times Digital Archive.
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