Bernie Ecclestone: Former F1 superstar sells car collection worth ‘hundreds of millions’

CNN
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Former Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone has announced he will sell his entire car collection, estimated to be worth “hundreds of millions” of dollars.

The collection, which consists of 69 cars, includes world championship-winning Ferraris driven by the likes of Michael Schumacher and Niki Lauda.

Also included are Alberto Ascari’s 375 F1, which won the Italian GP, ​​and the controversial Brabham BT46B ‘fan car’, which won its first and only race before being withdrawn from competition and banned the following season.

The news comes after Ecclestone pleaded guilty to fraud last year after failing to declare more than 400 million pounds (about $509 million) in assets held in a trust in Singapore. The former Formula 1 boss agreed to pay back almost 653 million pounds (about $830 million) to HM Revenue and Customs and was sentenced to 17 months in prison and two years probation.

“I love all my cars, but it’s time for me to think about what will happen to them when I’m no longer here, and that’s why I’ve decided to sell them,” the 94-year-old said in a statement .

“After collecting and owning them for so long, I would like to know where they have gone and not leave them to my wife to take care of in case I am not there.”

Instead of selling the collection at auction, Ecclestone will sell the collection through sports and racing car dealer Tom Hartley Jr., who called it “the history of Formula One.”

“A collection like this has never been offered for sale again and probably never will be again,” Hartley said. “It consists of the greatest cars of their time, many of which have not been seen for decades and are completely unique.”

“There are many cars in the collection worth eight figures and the total value of the collection is well into the hundreds of millions,” he said, according to the BBC.

Ecclestone dabbled in racing in the 1950s before becoming driver manager to Stuart Lewis-Evans and Jochen Rindt, both of whom tragically died while competing.

The Englishman bought the Brabham F1 team in 1971 and employed the likes of Lauda and Nelson Piquet before leading the sport into the modern age when he became CEO of the Formula One Group in 1987 and founded a new company – what later became the Formula One Promoters Association as Formula One. 1-Management – ​​to manage the commercial rights of the sport.

Ecclestone left Formula 1 in 2017 when Liberty Media took over the sport.