Max Mosley

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Max Mosley in his active racing career (1969)

Max Rufus Mosley (born April 13, 1940 in London ; † May 23, 2021 there ) was a British lawyer , motorsport manager and sports official . Mosley was President of the FIA, the World Automobile Federation, from 1993 to 2009 .

Life

Youth and education

Max Mosley was the second son of the British politician Oswald Mosley and his second wife Diana Mitford . He had an older brother and five older half-siblings. His father Oswald Mosley was a member of the House of Commons in the 1920s, first for the Conservatives , then as an independent and finally for the Labor Party , for which he also held a brief cabinet post before he founded the British Union of Fascists in 1932 and became the most prominent representative of fascism in Britain became.

During the first three years of his life, Max Mosley was separated from his parents, who were interned in Holloway Prison until 1943 because of their sympathy for National Socialism as a threat to national security . Afterwards the family lived in different places, first in England and from 1950 alternately in Ireland and France . From 1953 to 1955 Max attended Schule Schloss Stein , a boarding school in Bavaria, where he learned to speak fluent German, and then went to the private boarding school Millfield in Somerset for a year . After another two years attending school in London , he studied physics at Christ Church College of Oxford University , who turned but after the first exam in 1961 jurisprudence to. After his legal studies at the London Bar of Gray's Inn , he was in 1964 as a barrister admitted and later specialized in patent - and trademark law .

While studying at Oxford, Mosley was secretary of the Oxford Union , a famous debating club . From 1961 to 1964 he served in the Territorial Army , where he was trained as a parachutist .

The Northumbria University in Newcastle upon Tyne awarded him in 2005 the honorary doctorate in civil law .

Racing

Mosley began his racing career as an automobile racer. After a few victories in British racing series in the mid-1960s, he drove individual races in the Formula 2 European Championship in 1968 and 1969 , but was not particularly successful there. Then he gave up active car racing and tried his hand at becoming a team boss. In 1969 he and a few friends founded the March racing team , the name of which was made up of the first letters of the team founders. The M stood for Mosley. The March team took third place in the constructors ' championship in its first season in the automobile world championship and was able to repeat this success at the automobile world championship in 1971 . Mosley resigned as team principal in 1977.

In the same year he began his career as a functionary and legal counsel for the constructors' association FOCA , the opponent of FISA . After concluding the Concorde Agreement , he left FOCA in 1982 and then worked for the Conservative Party . In 1986 he returned to motorsport as a FISA official and became its president in 1991. After FISA was dissolved in 1993, Mosley stood for the election of the FIA ​​President, which he won. Until October 2009 he was uninterrupted president of the world's highest automobile association.

Mosley announced in July 2004 that he would no longer seek re-election, but then ran for office in October 2005 and was re-elected without a candidate. His thoughts of resignation were mainly triggered by the dispute with the teams of the Formula 1 World Championship , who not only demanded a higher share of the advertising income, but were also dissatisfied with the regulatory reforms in recent years. The manufacturers threatened to set up their own racing series from 2008 onwards; after Fiat's withdrawal from the GPWC, this was only demanded by Mercedes-Benz , BMW , Renault , Honda and Toyota .

In June 2009, Mosley announced that after his term expired the following October, he would not stand for election. This was preceded by a fierce dispute over a budget ceiling desired by Mosley in the Formula 1 World Championship of 45 million euros per team. Despite a large number of meetings, FIA and FOTA were unable to come to an agreement, whereupon on June 19 the racing teams Ferrari , McLaren-Mercedes , Renault , Toyota , BMW-Sauber , BrawnGP , Red Bull and Toro Rosso again threatened to close Formula 1 leave and start their own racing series. On July 15, 2009, Mosley announced to the FIA ​​board that he would definitely not run again in October and proposed Jean Todt as his successor .

BDSM scandal

In March 2008, the British tabloid News of the World reported the existence of a five-hour video showing Mosley "hosting a sex orgy with prostitutes in Nazi uniforms". The incident attracted considerable public attention and was picked up by the international press. In various public statements, Mosley did not deny the authenticity of the video, but emphasized that it was mere BDSM role-playing games without any political reference to National Socialism.

At an extraordinary general meeting of the FIA ​​in Paris on June 3, 2008, Mosley expressed his confidence after a secret ballot with an almost two-thirds majority, above all because of his services to safety in motorsport. He was therefore able to remain President of the FIA ​​until the end of his regular term of office at the end of 2009, but announced that he would withdraw more from public relations and delegate tasks. Various national automobile associations, including the ADAC, criticized the decision made in Paris.

On July 24, 2008, a British court ruled that the News of the World had unlawfully tampered with Mosley's private life with its coverage and ordered her to pay £ 60,000 in damages  . Mosley donated the money to the FIA ​​Foundation.

In Germany, Mosley sued, among other things, against the Axel-Springer-Verlag for 1.5 million euros in damages for violation of personal rights through the reporting of Bild und Bild online. In an out-of-court settlement, the publisher and Mosley agreed that the publisher had to make donations for charitable organizations totaling 200,000 euros, at Mosley's request half each to a foundation of the Formula 1 organization and half to a children's clinic at the German Heart Center Berlin . Mosley was also given the opportunity to present his own position on the "Nazi allegations" in one of the largest interviews ever printed in the Bild newspaper , with a big announcement on the front page.

Mosley also took legal action against website operators who had unlawfully published pictures of the Mosley Party, as well as against the search engine operator Google . After he had reached the first instance before the Hamburg Regional Court that Google had to filter and block infringing images from the results of its search engine, and Google had challenged this decision, an out-of-court settlement was reached in May 2015, the details of which were not disclosed.

Private

Mosley married Jean Taylor in 1960. Their son Alexander was born in 1970 and their son Patrick was born in 1972. On May 5, 2009, Alexander Mosley was found dead in his Notting Hill apartment at the age of 39 . He had died of a heroin overdose .

Max Mosley died on May 23, 2021 at the age of 81 in London of complications from cancer.

Web links

Commons : Max Mosley  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Lothar Gorris and Detlef Hacke: Formula 1: "She thought it was a joke" , Spiegel Online - Interview of March 2, 2009.
  2. ↑ See Spiegel Online: Formula 1 - Future budget limit is 45 million euros , April 30, 2009.
  3. ↑ See pirate series is off the table ( memento from June 26, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) at sport.ard.de, June 24, 2009
  4. ↑ mm_letter_150709 - PDF at www.fia.com ( Memento from November 23, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
  5. ↑ FIA boss causes scandal ( Memento from March 31, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
  6. ↑ Mosley wins in court
  7. ↑ Mosley: "Needed this judgment" ( Memento of July 27, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
  8. ^ A b Hans-Jürgen Jakobs: Mosley lawyer Irion - largest press law case in recent years , August 11, 2009, on sueddeutsche.de
  9. ↑ Klaus Boldt: Advertisement - Mosley sued the Springer board , July 24, 2008, on manager-magazin.de
  10. ↑ Hans-Jürgen Jakobs: Max Mosley and the "Bild" party with consequences , August 7, 2009, on sueddeutsche.de ( Memento from August 13, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  11. ↑ The Formula 1 boss in the big BILD interview - Was it Nazi sex, Mr. Mosley? , August 8, 2009, on bild.de.
  12. ↑ Isabell Hülsen : Mosley and Google end their legal dispute , May 15, 2015, on spiegel.de
  13. ↑ Björn Greif: Ex-FIA boss Max Mosley and Google settle legal dispute with settlement , May 15, 2015, on zdnet.de
  14. ↑ cf. ews in brief - Schumacher, RoC, Alonso, Mosley and Lauda ( Memento from June 12, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  15. ↑ see Mosley's son died of drug abuse - bbc.co.uk
  16. ↑ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1177954/Max-Mosleys-son-Alexander-died-desk-heroin-overdose.html
  17. ↑ British media report ex-Formula 1 boss Max Mosley dies at the age of 81. In: focus.de. May 24, 2021, accessed May 24, 2021 .
  18. ↑ Ex-FIA President Max Mosley died at the age of 81. In: oe24.at. May 24, 2021, accessed May 24, 2021 .


personal data
SURNAME Mosley, Max
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mosley, Max Rufus (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British lawyer, motorsport manager and sports official; President of the FIA
DATE OF BIRTH April 13, 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH May 23, 2021
PLACE OF DEATH London