MOTORSPORT/Formula One: Eddie Jordan has denied his team's new Formula One challenger, the EJ12, will struggle against its competitors in next week's season-opening Australian Grand Prix. Justin Hynes reports

Launching the EJ12 at the Brussels headquarters of new title sponsor, DHL, Jordan insisted the pre-season testing that has seen Jordan lag behind behind not only Ferrari-powered Sauber but also lowly Arrows is irrelevant.

"Last year's quickest testing times were set by Prost and the year before that it was Arrows," said the Jordan chief executive. "And we all know where they went during those seasons. It's impossible to gauge what programmes other teams are running during testing. We had our own programmes to follow, as did our rivals, and reading anything into the times is a waste of time."

The fact remains, however, that Jordan have been resoundingly outpaced by all their major rivals in the run-up to Melbourne, including being eclipsed by Sauber's Nick Heidfeld in a group test in Valencia two weeks ago by three-and-half seconds.

Front-of-grid rivals McLaren, Williams and Ferrari have all proved significantly quicker than the EJ12. Jordan, though remains confident that Melbourne will tell a different story.

"I wouldn't go so far as to say Sauber are in the same situation as Prost last year or Arrows the year before," Jordan added. "They're not. They are a really strong team for the future and will be hard to beat. But it is our job to beat the pants off them and that's what I intend to do."

Jordan also aimed a broadside at the Swiss outfit, claiming that they would never win a grand prix as long as they are powered by Ferrari customer engines.

"If I was Peter Sauber the thing I would have real difficulty with would be going to a race knowing that you're not allowed to win. I'm not sure I could race under those constraints. I'm sure they'll deny it, but there's no way a Ferrari car is going to finish behind a Sauber car. I don't want to make this into a contentious issue, but it seems quite clear to me.

"I, on the other hand, can finish in front of BAR and they can finish in front of me. Honda don't have any constraints on us."

Jordan did admit that the task this year would be difficult. "I can say I want to be in the top three, but then that would maybe be looking too far, or in some people's eyes maybe not far enough, because people always want to talk about winning races, winning championships," he said.

"We need to be realistic. There is huge competition. You can see all the manufacturers that have come in. Renault have just come in, Toyota have come in and for a privateer team like ours it's tough."

He was encouraged, however, by last week's Silverstone test at which Jordan received an uprated Melbourne-spec engine from Honda. "I'm more optimistic simply because the car was quicker and seems to be easier to drive," he said. "The car we've designed is very radical and it's a very different concept, and we had to spend some time learning to get the best out of that.

"It's not always easy - things broke, new ideas came in, Giancarlo had an accident (in Valencia), and those things set us back a bit - but in the last two weeks we've come a long way, particularly in the test at Barcelona and last week at Silverstone, where we had the new engine from Honda. It's much better and easier car, all around now."

Concern over Jordan's lack of pace in testing has mainly centred on Honda's new RA002E engine, a radical departure from last year's powerplant. Early last year the Japanese company declared they had pursued development of the R001E unit as far as possible and were going back to the drawing board to pursue a wider-angled "vee" engine.

Yesterday, Honda's head of research and development, Toru Ogawa, insisted he was pleased with progress on the new unit and that he expected Jordan to be fighting at the front of the grid.

"We expect Jordan and BAR to be fighting for the top three positions on the grid," he said. "I believe that is realistic. It would not surprise me if we managed to win a race this year - it is what we expect." He also echoed Eddie Jordan's insistence that pre-season testing is no indication of a team's true position on the grid.

Yesterday's launch also saw the unveiling of the team's new livery, with previous title sponsors Benson & Hedges being replaced by DHL, the company part-owned by Deutsche Post. The German company is to stay on as a sponsor, but yesterday they gave the team's major new sponsor a chance to flex its marketing muscle, unveiling the car in a complicated ceremony which involved freighting the car from England in one of the company's Airbus A300 planes, which was piloted into the company's hangar where it off-loaded the new EJ12.