Max Mosley's attack on JYS and Damon's response

In response to requests from some of you, here is the complete story of Max Mosley's attack on Sir Jackie Stewart and the response to what he said by Damon Hill. As far as I know, Max has not apologised, although his office has been contacted by journalists since Hill's letter was published(on Thursday). I understand that, in the meantime, JYS has been consulting his lawyers.

Here is the full text of the story written by my colleague Jonathan McEvoy published in The Daily Mail on September 25th.

Max Mosley has hit back at Sir Jackie Stewart's criticism over his handling of the Formula One spying scandal, labelling the former triple world champion a "certified halfwit".

Stewart led the protests against FIA president Mosley, who chaired the World Motor Sport Council which fined McLaren $100million (about £50m) for using Ferrari technical secrets, claiming the sanction was "unjustifiable".

But Mosley said: "There's one particular ex-driver who because he never stops talking, never has the chance to listen — so he doesn't know what's going on.

"He said the FIA's decision would not have worked in a civil court. He has no qualification to say that.

"Then he starts saying this is personal between me and Ron Dennis, at great length, because everything he does is at extreme length.

"It's annoying that some of the sponsors listen to him because he's won a few championships. But nobody else in Formula One does — not the teams, not the drivers. He's a figure of fun among drivers."

Mosley, presumably alluding to the tartan trousers and cap Stewart wears to races, added: "He goes round dressed up as a 1930s music hall man. He's a certified halfwit."

Mosley has been condemned not only by Stewart but by several loyal supporters of McLaren boss Ron Dennis, who believe he is the victim of an FIA-inspired witch-hunt.

They allege Mosley cooked up a storm for McLaren at last month's Italian Grand Prix, where police arrived with legal documents informing the team they were part of a criminal investigation in Italy.

Nothing to do with me — or Ferrari — was the gist of Mosley's response, during lunch at a five-star hotel in Pall Mall.

"I don't hate Ron," he insisted again and again. "It's very simple. He has opposed all my moves to save costs. With all his sponsors compared to other teams, it suited him to keep costs high. We have disagreed, but that doesn't mean there is personal animus."

But is the disagreement not along social and academic lines? There is Mosley, second son of fascist leader Sir Oswald, former secretary of the Oxford Union, a physicist and lawyer. Then there is Dennis, who started out in Formula One as a 19-year-old mechanic on Jochen Rindt's Cooper-Maserati.

Mosley said: "I know that theory. I think what Ron has done is amazing. A lot of people are mechanics but he's the one with probably the best organised F1 team. It's something to be immensely proud of.

"But, apparently, he gets super p***** off, with the picture of him as an engineer on Jack Brabham's car. He's much grander than I am. He's a Commander of the British Empire. I'm not even a Member. The sport needs characters like him rather than some faceless manager."

Mosley has made no secret of the fact he favoured disqualifying Lewis Hamilton and McLaren team-mate Fernando Alonso. The majority of his WMSC colleagues disagreed and the drivers were saved.

But he scoffs at the idea that he is in cahoots with Ferrari, saying: "If Ferrari's chief designer had 780 pages of McLaren secrets and I didn't act then there might be a point to the argument."

Mosley, who says he will retire no later than when his term of office expires in 2009, is not ready to go quietly yet. Just this week he issued a letter telling teams to stop wasting money on obscure, pointless technology which serves only to titillate the engineers involved. Cue more of Dennis's wrath.

There is also the question of whether McLaren's 2008 car had benefited from the Ferrari secrets, with a decision over allowing them to compete next season due at the WMSC meeting in December.

For good measure, Mosley turned up the pressure on Downing Street over Silverstone's future. "The Government lost its virginity over subsidising sport when it supported the Olympics," he said.

"Arguably the British Grand Prix is more important and a greater tradition to the UK than the Olympics."

And here is Damon Hill's letter to Autosport magazine which was published this week.

"Last week I was amazed and appalled to read Max Mosley's comments about Sir Jackie Stewart. In the last few months the administration of Formula One has come in for a great deal of attention, not least because its decisions could have a significant bearing on the outcome of the drivers' championship. Without becoming diverted from my point in writing, by becoming embroiled in my own personal views on the folly of that whole episode, it is quite clear that Sir Jackie Stewart is owed a public apology by Max.

It is well known that Sir Jackie is a dyslexic and has struggled(as many thousands do) to cope with the all too easily made judgement that they are less intelligent than 'ordinary folk'. This is in fact more often than not quite the opposite, and many dyslexic people are highly intelligent and extraordinarily gifted, as I believe is the case with Sir Jackie. To call him a 'certified half-wit' would be on the first level unkind, but on another level, indeed the level at which Mr Mosley would like us to understand he operates on, is nothing other than a wicked joke designed to visit the utmost humiliation on its victim.

Regardless of the whether or not he was alluding to his dyslexia, what he said was a gross insult to one of the sport's leading figures over the last four decades and a thrice world champion. Not only is it bad manners, it also brings into question the character and judgement of the man who represents motorsport throughout the world through the august institution of the FIA. It was conduct most unbecoming of an FIA president and, in my humble view, brought the sport into disrepute, a crime he recently seems so keen to eradicate. Perhaps Mr Mosley became carried away in the moment after the pressure of the McLaren case, a would like to retract his words without too much embarrassment all round? I would like to at least offer him the benefit of the doubt.

I would like to emphasise that my motive for writing is sheer indignation and rage at what I see is abuse."

Comments

[Jerry]

Damon Hill says it all really.

[TONY]

Thank for sharing this with us, Ed. Although I confess to personally disliking Mr Mosley as a man and as the President of what is, under him, an increasingly dysfunctional FIA, I was very surprised to see Mr Mosley described as Mad Max on other websites. Having read your blog I believe the label fits.
It is extraordinary that someone in MM's position can lose control over his emotions to such an extent in public.
Sir JS's judgement that the FIA's sanction was unjustifiable is entirely reasonable, particularly when one reads, as I have, the Stepney letter to MM that preceded the Mclaren hearing. Furthermore, MM is wrong to suggest that only Sir JS holds this view since it seems that many ex-F1 drivers and experienced insiders concur - see statements attributed to Lauda, Fittipaldi, Prost, Hill ...
Even more shocking are MM's undeserved and disgraceful personal attacks on Sir JS. I sincerely hope that Sir JS's lawyers prosecute MM.
Finally, I applaud DH's open letter which is a courageous, fair, measured and appropriate response. His call for MM to make a public apology is right and proper, but I would prefer to see this affair closed by MM being asked to step down before the end of the year and for him to be replaced by someone who understands the sport - Sir JS would be an excellent candidate!

[Allman]

Phatetic, but it just shows how arrogant und unpolite you Brits are.

[Ade]

I've never liked Sir Jackie Stewart - he's always struck me as being an arrogant "I know it all, much better than you" type, and (IMHO) this view is confirmed every time he (all too frequently) opens his mouth on TV. Indeed, when he's on, I often turn over for a minute or two...

Nevertheless, to call him a "certified half-wit" is absolutely unquestionably false. He may be arrogant, his whiney Scottish accent may grate harshly on my nerves, but he DID win 3 world championships, he DID revolutionise the safety of F1, and he DOES know how to drive cars, fast.

Max Mosley, on the other hand, I'm not sure what to think of. Until this year, he's been a bit of a pain, but mainly a nobody. This year, he seems to be gunning for the Dictator of the Year award (if there isn't one of those, there ought to be). Perhaps he's under some pressure from his FIA colleagues, and is flapping around like a fish out of water?

Still, this whole thing is a storm in a teacup. If SIR Jackie (as he insists on being called) decides to sue, good luck to him. If he drags Mosley down from his position as FIA president, then that's good enough for me.

[Bojan]

Sharing pretty much Ade's assesement of Mr.J.S., I absolutely cannot accept that a man presiding an important international federation uses such offensive words for any person. Damon Hill was much too diplomatic in his letter. I was shocked first, but after learning about JYS being dyslexic I am disgusted. It was no less than a vulgar outbreak from someone who was supposed to be by far too civilised for that sort of verbal attack - above all not FOR the public.

I strongly believe that it is down to FIA members to take the decision (and responsibility) of who presides them, and not me. They get what they vote for, and they deserve what they get. On the other hand, I'd like to see Mr.M.M. being brought to a civil court to defend his words about Mr.J.S.. It would be quite a change to see this man of justice suddenly becoming a defendant instead of prosecutor and/or judge which were his usual roles lately.

@ Allman: I never had a problem with Brits nor some of their particularities. If you really dig deep, you can find disturbing bits in every nation, each group of people or individual. Then it is up to each person to either accept, ignore or condemn them. I find the first two options much more interesting.

[Richard Lyons]

I hope that Max Moseley comes to regret his outburst against a past F1 World Champion.
I'm not a fan of JYS out of the cockpit but it was completely inappropriate for the FIA President to respond with a tirade of spiteful insults.
Thoughout his Presidency, Mosely has used vitriol against disenters, but has never been challenged before.
This time, I hope it does for him.

[Weasel]

Clearly Max Mosley is in denial: "I am not even a member". But dear Max, the exact opposite is true - you are indeed a member - a prize prick!

[MGribbroek]

Perhaps the "chickens have come home to roost" as we say in the States. Speaking as someone who has no particular bias for or against McClaren, I would have to say that, having read read all the transcripts and available evidence, McClaren has been treated rather badly. The team took quite a hit for the wrong doing of one employee, and this without any concrete evidence that it had even been used by the team. Apparently, if it had been up to Mr. Mosely, the penalty would have been even more draconian than it was, penalizing the drivers as well and even excluding McClaren from F1 altogether next season. Given the evidence, it is hard to accept the argument that McClaren and Ron Dennis were not the target of some sort of vendetta.

And now these foolish and insulting remarks about Stewart. Perhaps what we're finding out is that the real problem in F1 is not "spying" but the FIA as lead by Max Mosely.

I suspect McClaren will survive this whole mess better than Mosely.

[Bruce]

Wow, Mosley is behaving more and more like a jumped up little fascist dictator. I wonder where he gets that trait from?
Why are all major sports being ruined by corrupt and self-serving egomaniacs. How do they get in such a position and then remain there? Mosley is already trying to shoe-horn his preferred sucessor, Jean-Todt into the job, just to keep the bandwagon rolling. Maybe a two-term limit and a more representative electorate is required. These bozos should simply be administrators and if they were doing their jobs properly we should rarely hear from them or even be aware of their existence.

[Michael Bowen]

Jackie Stewart as a race car driver was the main reason I got interested in F1. I enjoyed his interviews, enjoyed commentary he offered about racing and races after he retired, cheered considerably when he formed Stewart-Ford, and felt great delight when his team had a podium finish. He is one of the central figures that generated interest in F1 in his racing generation...to denigrate him publicly such as Mosley did is beyond the pale. [Note: I am a North American, so perhaps my diet of Jackie Stewart has been moderated to a tolerable level by the distance from the British Isles...unlike others who must see/hear him more often. Irrespective of this, Mosley is out of line.]

It's ironic that it is his critic, Max Mosley, that's the person most responsible for my waning interest in F1 over the years.

[Juan Fandango]

Ooooh Max - you're such a bitch.......

[Carolina]

Who cares about JYS?

There is a reason why he failed as a team leader in F1 and why he is no longer involved in F1 today.

Great driver, yes, but that was a looooooong time ago!

[Philip Burton]

I am sure you have had a flood of emails and messages about the matter of Mosley insulting Sir Jackie Stewart. But I have just heard about the disgraceful comments Mosley made about an icon and champion of the sport I have loved for over 35 years, and I am so sick and tired of Mosley, I felt compelled to say something.

Thank god for up standing people like Damon Hill. He said perfectly what needed to be said and now it is up to Mosley to respond in kind and apologise. Nothing else.

It is not only Jackie Stewart who Mosley has offended but all people who have a special need i.e. dyslexia. This includes my sister and a close friend who I can assure you are not "certified half wits!"

This has gone beyond a point of being tolerable any more and it needs to stop. If Mosley cannot or will not shut up and do his job in a professional manner, then he needs to quit. I for one, will not tolerate his abusive ways and if I ever had the chance to meet with him, I would put him straight on a few things and that includes what it is to be a decent human being and what it is to be a man.

Right now, I have my doubts about the integrity that Mosley has and I believe that there are many people who share this view. If he does not see that he is wrong in this matter, then it will show how bad his judgement is and has been on a number of issues particularly this year.

At best his behaviour shows the ignorance of a pig. Please get rid of him for all our sakes.

Thanks,

Philip.

[Marc]

Carolina,

Who cares about Jackie Stewart?

Pretty much most people who race cars today and thank him for the safety initiatives he introduced to motorsport, with which a great many of us who race probably owe our lives to. Oh, and maybe a few million real racing fans.

Secondly, he never led Paul Stewart Racing FI, it was his son Paul.

As the Irish say, every group of friends has an eejit. If the your group of friends doesn't have an eejit, guess what? Your the eejit!

p.s. One day, you will be older too. I hope you are given more respect than you give a man with three WDC titles to his credit, gained at a time when you were as likely to survive a career in motor racing as you were to be killed.

Please engage Brain before selecting Mouth.

[Andy G]

Who cares about Carolina?

There is a reason why s/he failed as a blog commenter, mostly the stupidity of the comments, the irreverence and irrelevance of the person making them and frankly the inability to sustain anything other than mild contempt for the views expressed.

Loud mouth, yes, but who's interested in what it has to say?

[John Sharp]

Definitely a blatant stupid idiot!

[Douglas]

Max Mosley does have a point when he observes (effectively) that the more people speak themselves, the less chance they get to hear and learn about things that would make them interesting and informed when they do speak - an exercise that becomes ever more counterproductive.

Try as I have, myself, over several decades, to make myself warm to Jackie Stewart, ever since I first met him in 1964, I have never succeeded: his verbosity becomes very wearying.

But what Stewart says, although infuriatingly long-winded, is invariably correct and I have always had tremendous respect for what he has achieved, both inside a racing car and outside of it.

Sitting in various motorhomes over the years and listening to him talk, at considerable length, I learned a very great deal.

This is a man who won three world championships as a driver in the late Sixties and early Seventies and who did so in a manner that it was impossible not to respect. Nor did I ever see him do anything that was unsportsmanlike however much pressure he was under.

At the same time, he launched, almost single-handedly and despite much boorish derision, the campaign for safety in motor racing that is saving lives today. Dyslexic he may be but he converted the rest of the world to his enlightened view.

Two decades later, he started a new Formula One team from scratch, built a car that could (and did) win a Grand Prix bearing his own name, ran it with an impeccable integrity that is rare in Formula One and then sold it to Ford for £100m when his son Paul was diagnosed with cancer. In its third and final year, Stewart Racing finished fourth in the Constructors Championship, ahead of both Williams and Benetton. WIthout him, Ford (which changed the name of the team to Jaguar) went into ignominious and hugely expensive decline.

To suggest that a man who can do all that is short of wisdom, knowledge, insight, experience or understanding of Formula One motor racing - however irritating he may be - is ridiculous.

Stewart’s judgement is unerringly sound and he has an extremely healthy contempt for both Ecclestone and Mosley, seeing both of them for what they are.

Mosley, beneath a thin veneer of expensively educated charm - useful for schmoozing journalists in expensive hotels - is a deeply unpleasant man.

He was raised on the knee of a disgraced aristocrat who founded the British Union of Fascists and who was an admirer and supporter of Adolf Hitler and all that Hitler stood for. Mosley’s parents were married in the home of Joseph Goebbels and his aunt was a personal friend of the tyrant himself. Hitler even attended their Berlin wedding in 1938.

After the war (during which his father - along with his mother - was interned for his pro-Nazi sympathies) Mosley assisted his rightly ostracised father to establish a new polital party in England. He was even, for a while, a prospective Parliamentary candidate for it.

A failed physicist and an unimpressive barrister, Mosley then turned his attention to motor racing where, after a brief and equally undistinguished career as a driver he has transformed the FIA into a magnet of contempt by his running of it.

Mosley is a man who was brought up to raise his right arm to rabble-rousing despots who exploited the basest of human prejudices: Stewart is a man who raised his right arm to acknowledge crowds acclaiming his achievements as a racing driver, as a Formula One constructor and as a winner at both.

Of these two men, I know which one I would prefer to see running motor racing.

So far as I am concerned, the voluble Sir Jackie Stewart can wear as much tartan as he likes and in whatever manner he wishes: it’s a great deal healthier than wearing a Black Shirt and it doesn’t undermine my respect for his views on the subject of motor racing by one iota.

The one good thing that Mosley’s snide, offensive and patronising remarks about Stewart have done is to demonstrate to a far wider audience his inherent and total unfitness to be running the sport we all love and to polarise long-overdue contempt for him personally.

The fact that Mosley sees no reason to apologise publicly to Sir Jackie for saying any of them simply underscores further his own arrogant inadequacy.

Like Stewart I may not: but as a man he is worth ten of Mosley.

[Andy G]

Freeze the thread there. I've not managed to fathom who you might be Douglas, though I've a funny feeling I've read your words before, but this perfectly constructed prose does what should have been done sometime back: drop the odious Mosley right in it.

[Russ]

Sir John's talent, achievement and sportsmanship have never been equaled in motorsport. I just hope there's a ground swell big enough to drum out Maxi Pad and his organ grinder monkey sidekick.

[Si]

What no ranting Spaniards?

Ed...you need to have a word with Mosley and get him to insult Alonso...he's a pretty easy target at the momment.

While he's at it...get him to offer a few words in support of Franco's fascist rule in Spain. Thats something he might be qualified to comment on.