Are F1's court appearances damaging the sport?

I don’t know about you, but I am a little tired of reading about Formula 1 people being in court. Bernie Ecclestone seems to be keeping various legal firms in business with all his adventures of late.

And in recent weeks we have seen sometime F1 manager Anthony Hamilton’s lawyers slugging it out with legal representatives of his former client Paul di Resta.

It is all rather too messy for the sport and some might argue that it gives the impression that Formula 1 folk are always in and out of court. The problem with this is two fold: firstly, it creates the wrong impression, which tends to worry potential sponsors.

There was a time when the F1 teams were smaller and operating out of telephone boxes, but it is definitely not the case these days if one goes around and looks at the size of the factories and the corporate nature of most of these impressive organisations.

The second point that one needs to take into account is that high court judges are a pretty select group. There are only 108 in the whole country and they are not doddering old fellows as popular culture likes to suggest.

These days they retire at 70 and there are more than a few of them now under the age of 50. And like all professions, they tend to mingle a little and chat about what they are up to. “You’ll never guess who I had in my courtroom this week…” That sort of thing.

If they get the same kind of people over and over they are bound to form an impression about an industry sector, and F1 is in danger of ending up being seen as a world in which people cut corners in order to get things done and so get into trouble more often.

F1 is not a not dodgy business these days, and while the media may be a little sad that we do not have the pirates and buccaneers of yesteryear, the more corporate modern generation are a lot better for the sport.