5 Quotes from Formula 1 Supremo Bernie Ecclestone
Bernie Ecclestone has been a part of the Formula One landscape for almost 60 years. After stints as a driver (two failed attempts to qualify in 1958), manager and team owner, the Suffolk, England, native finally found his calling controlling the commercial rights of the world's most glamorous motorsport.
His reign has seen the sport grow from a mainly European affair to a truly worldwide spectacle. Largely a story of success, it hasn't been without controversy.
Often, stemming from what comes out of Ecclestone's mouth.
Seven years ago today, February 2, he came out with a beauty. Read on for that and three of Bernie's controversial quotes, capping it all off with a wedding quote.
On Ron Dennis' Truthfulness
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McLaren were kicked out of the 2007 constructors' championship and fined a massive £50 million after reportedly receiving confidential Ferrari data from the Scuderia's employee, Nigel Stepney, as detailed by Wired.
It took several months of investigation to get to the bottom of who knew about it, and there's every chance we still don't know for sure. Then-team principal Ron Dennis always denied personal knowledge.
Ecclestone, it seems, thinks he knew all along. Speaking at an address to business leaders in February 2008, he said:
"If McLaren had come clean and owned up none of it would have happened the way it did. He is a good friend of mine but Ron was six months pregnant and said he was a virgin. He knows he got off cheap."
He certainly has a way with words...
On Vladimir Putin
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The 2014 Russian Grand Prix caused some controversy in the western world. The ongoing conflict in Ukraine, widespread corruption as reported by Transparency International and concerns over gay and other civil rights left many thinking the country wasn't suitable for F1 to visit.
Russian president Vladimir Putin was seen as a large part of the problem, with former rally driver and FIA presidential candidate Ari Vatanen calling for the race to be cancelled.
Ecclestone, of course, had a different view. He was quoted in Vedomosti (via the Daily Mail), saying of Putin:
"He's a first-class person. I always supported him. He could control Europe or America; he is able to deal with it. But I think he is very busy. Let him finish what he's doing and then we'll see."
The United States Grand Prix was three weeks later. Had Bernie made such comments 60 years earlier, he may have been in a spot of bother when he arrived at the airport.
On the 'New Teams' at the End of 2010
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Ecclestone was never a fan of the "new teams" that arrived for the start of the 2010 season. That year they were known as HRT, Lotus and Virgin; the first departed at the end of 2012, while the other two, as Caterham and Marussia, went into administration late in 2014.
The F1 boss is unlikely to have cared—indeed, he wanted them out less than a year after their first race and was typically tactless in his choice of words.
Speaking of them toward the end of of the 2010 championship, he told Christian Sylt of the Financial Times, "We need to get rid of a few of those cripples."
A combination of rising costs and lopsided commercial deals eventually did just that. It's a credit to Marussia and Caterham they lasted as long as they did.
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On Adolf Hitler
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Many of us have a speck of quiet admiration for people whom it's not fashionable or socially acceptable to admire. It might be a controversial politician, uncool musician, player for a rival team...whomever it may be, we usually keep it quiet.
Ecclestone tends to speak his mind. Discussing dictators with The Times in 2009 (h/t Jewish Chronicle), he decided to talk about the most infamous, loathed dictator in history—and even attempted to find a positive.
"In a lot of ways, terrible to say this I suppose, but apart from the fact that Hitler got taken away and persuaded to do things that I have no idea whether he wanted to do or not, he was in the way that he could command a lot of people, able to get things done.
In the end he got lost, so he wasn't a very good dictator because either he had all these things and knew what was going on and insisted, or he just went along with it...so either way he wasn't a dictator.
"
Trying to find a positive in Hitler's actions was never going to go down well. Ecclestone apologised, but Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, called for him to resign.
Bernie responded in an interview with The Associated Press (via ESPN.com):
"If the WJC is influential, he said, 'it's a pity they didn't sort the banks out.' Asked to elaborate, Ecclestone said, 'They have a lot of influence everywhere.'"
Ecclestone isn't antisemitic but could perhaps do with having his brain-to-mouth filter serviced every once in a while.
On His Daughter's Wedding
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No man would continue working into his 80s unless he needed to. Ecclestone has no direct financial need to carry on, but other needs exist.
Speaking after daughter Tamara's four-day wedding celebration, Ecclestone told The Times (h/t the Express):
"I don't celebrate. I don't see the point. I went to my daughter's wedding last week and walked her down the aisle. But I didn't go to the celebrations the next day. I went home. I was there to do a job [give her away] and was happy to do that. I didn't want to hang around. The whole thing was a huge affair, too much really.
"
Ecclestone's own wedding was a quick, register office ceremony with no photographer; afterwards, per his biographer Tom Bower writing in the Daily Mail, he went back to work and left his new wife to get a taxi home.
To anyone else, these two occasions would have been the happiest of their lives. But though he dearly loved both, neither story suggests he got a lot of joy from the ceremonies.
To some degree, F1 needs Ecclestone. But he also seems to live for his work—so maybe the need is greater the other way round.
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