JULY 24, 2001

Decision time for Trulli

IT seems that Jarno Trulli may well be staying with Jordan for 2002 after all, completing his third season alongside Heinz-Harald Frentzen with the Silverstone-based team.

IT seems that Jarno Trulli may well be staying with Jordan for 2002 after all, completing his third season alongside Heinz-Harald Frentzen with the Silverstone-based team.

Trulli had long been anticipated to join his manager Flavio Briatore at Renault Sport next year, with Briatore himself saying: "In 2002 Trulli will take the place of Fisichella."

Fisichella has, however, earned himself something of a reprieve in Briatore's eyes after comprehensively outpacing Jenson Button in the opening 11 races of the season, and recent negotiation between Briatore and Eddie Jordan is believed to have been regarding the maintenance of status quo.

This might well cause Trulli to backtrack on his recent outbursts of frustration at the Jordan set-up, where he wondered aloud 'what Eddie Jordan does with his money.'

Said Trulli: "I did not expect to find myself at this point of the championship at this technical level. The secret of the top teams is to try new solutions and to develop... at Jordan we develop little and this penalizes us a lot."