The Jordan-Peugeot team have confirmed that they had a talk with Nigel Mansell to possibly give him another chance at the highest level of motor sports. The team also stated however that there were no talks going on at this time.

The spokeswoman of Jordan said: "Eddie did telephone Nigel to make inquiries when Damon went to TWR because Nigel had indicated he would consider a drive, but it was just a chat. There has been no direct dialogue or any on-going discussions since then.

However Jordan may well be signing a driver like Jos Verstappen because the spokeswoman added:"Eddie is going to investigate every avenue when it comes to our second driver. It is not as if we have got to make a decision by the end of November or something. "Ralf was always going to do the bulk of winter testing to get used to the car and the team. We are looking for the best driver available."

With Mansell they could be taking a risk. Mansell resigned from the McLaren team when he thought the car was un-driveble in 1995, although Mika Hakkinen seemed to do OK.

Jacques Villeneuve clocked a 1m 19.87s. Frentzen showed he could be the man to watch next year when he was just one hundredth of a second slower than his Williams-Renault teammate. Eddie Irvine was third with a 1m 20.46s. Ferrari is testing for Goodyear and TWR F1 is testing for Bridgestone. TWR F1 is still using the Hart V8 of 1996.