People
Mark Gallagher
From Belfast in Northern Ireland, Gallagher moved to Britain when he left school and joined the sales staff of Haymarket Publishing - which owns most of the big car magazines in Britain - in 1983. He first job was to sell advertising space but after two years he decided he wanted to break into journalism and became a freelance reporter in Formula 3000. It was not easy to make a living but the arrival of Ireland's Eddie Jordan Racing at the start of 1988 certainly helped him out. For the next two seasons Gallagher wrote about the exploits of Jordan drivers such as Martin Donnelly, Jean Alesi and Heinz-Harald Frentzen and when Eddie Jordan began putting together his F1 team in 1990 he asked Gallagher if he would do the new team's public relations work. In 1991 he became the Jordan team's first press officer in its first year of Formula 1. It was a dramatic year with the team producing some impressive performances with Andrea de Cesaris and Bertrand Gachot. It was complicated by Gachot being sent to jail in Britain which was followed by the arrival and then sudden departure of Michael Schumacher, and by the end of the year Gallagher needed a break. He left Jordan and became a freelance PR man, working with David Richards's Prodrive Subaru rally team and with Pacific Racing in Formula 3000. This was followed by a period as an account manager with the PR firm Avenue Communications in London, helping to look after the Mobil account. In 1995 Mark was asked to help Keith Wiggins's Pacific Grand Prix and returned to F1 as the Commercial Manager. Unfortunately the team was already in dire financial trouble and at the end of the year was forced to pull out of Grand Prix racing. Gallagher had revived his interest in F1 and when an opening as Sponsorship Manager came up at Jordan he jumped at the chance to get back into his old team. In 1999 he became the team's Marketing Manager.