Ecclestone Stands Down

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Just thinking about this, is Bernie not on trial for bribing someone, when the recipient was already found guilty of accepting a bribe - and jailed?

I really don't see how Bernie can escape that, but I'm sure he will!
 
Just thinking about this, is Bernie not on trial for bribing someone, when the recipient was already found guilty of accepting a bribe - and jailed?

I really don't see how Bernie can escape that, but I'm sure he will!

oh it's simple, he's very very rich.

on a side note, I'm glad to see he's admitted what the most cynical of us (or, the most realistic of us, depending on your view) already knew. Nothing has changed.
 
oh it's simple, he's very very rich.

on a side note, I'm glad to see he's admitted what the most cynical of us (or, the most realistic of us, depending on your view) already knew. Nothing has changed.


Miggins, there is an advantage in being a billionaire, not that I would know, sadly !!
 
snipped from the BBC
BERNIE ECCLESTONE VERDICT The judge who rejected an £85m damages claim against Formula 1 boss Bernie Ecclestone said he did pay a bribe over a sale of F1 shares.
Mr Justice Newey, in the High Court in London, said there had been a "corrupt" deal with a German banker to facilitate the sale to a preferred buyer, but he said there had been no financial loss to German media group Constantin Medien, which plans to appeal.

... So he is guilty of bribing? Oh no no lets turn a blind eye on this!
 
snipped from the BBC


... So he is guilty of bribing? Oh no no lets turn a blind eye on this!

it's a civil case rather than a criminal one (that comes later in Germany), and I guess the plaintiff didn't prove they lost out, although considering how awash with money the controllers of F1 are, I'm surprised.
 
On the subject of Ecclestone and whether he is the right person to lead F1, apart from all the financial shenanigans and revenue sapping greed of course, there is another angle, another reason he should go. There's an interesting article on Autosport about how the way people want to watch F1 is changing. The trouble is that Bernie has got where he is by knowing how to market F1 on TV, and how to make a lot of money as a result. But this is the 21st century and TV is simply not the only medium anymore. This is the world of video streaming, YouTube etc. There are any number of devices people can use to watch sport. And Bernie is simply too out of touch to realise this, he only understands TV coverage, and treats all these other avenues as the enemy. It's not unlike the reaction of the music industry to online downloads, when they spent all their energy and money trying to shut down sites like Napster when instead they should have realised the potential and got involved in online technology. Unless F1 embraces it, falling TV audiences and revenues will kill them.

http://plus.autosport.com/premium/feature/5885/time-for-f1-to-embrace-alternative-media/
 
it's a civil case rather than a criminal one (that comes later in Germany), and I guess the plaintiff didn't prove they lost out, although considering how awash with money the controllers of F1 are, I'm surprised.

ahh yeah I forgot about the other case. So the judge for this case has pretty much wrote the footnote for that case.
 
Bernie (or rather his lawyers) will have their work cut out in the German court then, seeing as he's effectively already been found guilty.

No doubt he'll squirm his way out somehow though. No idea why the teams are so loyal to him, any good he's done was well over five years ago now, if not more depending on how you argue it.
 
He shouldn't be able to squirm he was out, what with the German being convicted of accepting a bribe and the English judge saying that he paid a bribe etc. But he has too much money so he will walk.
As for the teams, well he has info on all of them. I bet he knows every rule each of them has and are currently braking. It would be so easy for him to 'anonymously' tip off the FIA.
Teams have way too much to lose!
Judging by Christian Horners statements Red Bull seems to have most to lose!
 
He shouldn't be able to squirm he was out, what with the German being convicted of accepting a bribe and the English judge saying that he paid a bribe etc. But he has too much money so he will walk.
As for the teams, well he has info on all of them. I bet he knows every rule each of them has and are currently braking. It would be so easy for him to 'anonymously' tip off the FIA.
Teams have way too much to lose!
Judging by Christian Horners statements Red Bull seems to have most to lose!

I doubt Horner would want all that arse-licking to have been in vain. He has tied his colours very conspicuously to Bernie's mast; I can't help thinking that this was rather short-sighted unless he believes he really has a chance at taking over the reins from Ecclestone, as Bernie has suggested.
 
I doubt Horner would want all that arse-licking to have been in vain. He has tied his colours very conspicuously to Bernie's mast; I can't help thinking that this was rather short-sighted unless he believes he really has a chance at taking over the reins from Ecclestone, as Bernie has suggested.

I think that was Bernie just being facetious, rather than an earnest response! Would much rather we had a businessman take over (someone who won't show bias towards certain teams!), but someone who's prepared to realise his limited knowledge and employ some decent advisers. Ideally the businessmen would then maximise the revenue streams F1 generates, without diluting the product to achieve that. Ideally passing a healthy amount of said revenue onto the teams!
 
I think that was Bernie just being facetious, rather than an earnest response! Would much rather we had a businessman take over (someone who won't show bias towards certain teams!), but someone who's prepared to realise his limited knowledge and employ some decent advisers. Ideally the businessmen would then maximise the revenue streams F1 generates, without diluting the product to achieve that. Ideally passing a healthy amount of said revenue onto the teams!

I doubt he was being earnest! Facetious, dissembling or disingenuous, maybe, but I wondered whether Horner had perhaps been seduced by any of that because, otherwise, it strikes me as less than shrewd to ally oneself so intimately and publicly to Ecclestone when Bernie cannot possibly have much longer left in charge. I don't believe it would be out of sincere loyalty on Horner's part; wouldn't it have been politic to have kept his options more open?
 
Bernie could be out in days?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/26289470

CVC did say they would kick him out if found guilty of bribery. So will they stand to their word?

Also Bernie was going to buy the nurburgring in a way to sweeten the deal. He has now pulled of that deal? What do you reckon the significance of this is?
 
I'm surprised that CVC didn't stick to their word then. The judge at the civil case said the paid a bribe, and CVC said they'd kick him out if he was found to have paid a bribe. Then again, they're a big business, and big businesses like using false promises
 
Bernie Ecclestone said:
"I'm going to be 84 at the end of 2014 so I'm probably going to have to start to think 'do I want to go into the 85th year doing what I've been doing for goddamn how many years?'.

"It's something to which I'll have to give some very serious thought."

"The important thing is to know when you should hang up your gloves so you are not going to end up going into the ring and getting a good hiding."

It could happen...
 
Son of a bitch. This definitely sounds like the work of BE:
Bernie Ecclestone is up to something… The sport’s 83-year-old chief executive turned up on Friday in Sepang, and after cracking a joke about how he wishes “he could get it up”, he found the engine noise not as bad as he had feared, but he still wants more noise.
Away from the engine sound, which hopefully will drop off the agenda in the next few races, rumours were hanging in the hot, humid air that Ecclestone was planning an audacious bid to regain ownership of Formula One.
The theory goes that he has been talking down the sport in an attempt to make CVC Capital Partners keener to sell. He would then look for the help of Dietrich Mateschitz, Red Bull’s owner, Ferrari, and his vast array of business contacts to regain a controlling stake in Formula One. There are many possible complications, including where his trial for bribery sits in the scheme of things, but the rumours have been building with each passing day.
On Saturday night he dined with Christian Horner, Red Bull’s team principal and his nominated successor, and the publicity shy Donald Mackenzie, co-founder of CVC. Who knows what was discussed, but the following morning Ecclestone then had breakfast with Toto Wolff, Mercedes head of motorsport in a hotel near the circuit.
Mercedes are thought to be one potential obstacle, given their issues over compliance if Ecclestone is found guilty of bribery, so was this a case of the 83-year-old putting a proposition to them? Impossible to say at this stage. Then again, it’s not as if Ecclestone is ever short of potential dining companions…
 
So the trial started, his defence is he was blackmailed into bribing him. Although pretty much everyone knows he's guilty, how much is Paddy power offering for an acquittal, it must be odds on.