The fall of Ron Dennis, one of the great beasts in the Formula One jungle, has been confirmed. The chairman and chief executive of the McLaren Group – but, more than that, the image and personality of one of the biggest and most successful of F1 teams – was told by his fellow shareholders he must give up his position.
To be red-flagged by his own team is a sad end for a man whose half-century in F1 has been dominated by his 36-year association with McLaren, whom he led to seven constructors’ championships and 10 drivers’ titles featuring some of the best known drivers of the sport, including Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost and Lewis Hamilton, the prodigy he built into a world champion in 2008. He has presided over 158 of the team’s 182 grand prix victories.
In recent times McLaren have struggled to recapture old glories and Dennis, 69, is no longer viewed as the man to revive their ailing spirit; in fact the style that made this ruthlessly single-minded and most driven of men so successful is now viewed as something of a handicap when it comes to development. He was always more autocratic than collegiate.
Dennis owns a 25% stake in McLaren, which he will retain, but it is a figure matched by the Saudi businessman Mansour Ojjeh, his one-time business partner. After a disagreement between the two men Ojjeh has become more closely aligned with Bahrain’s Mumtalakat investment fund, which owns the other 50% per cent of the shares.
McLaren were probably right to break with Mercedes as their engine suppliers at the end of 2014. They were always going to struggle to come out on top against Mercedes’ own works team. Honda, with whom they shared so many prizes in the 80s and early 90s, were ill-prepared for a reunion in 2015 and McLaren had their worst season, finishing ninth, ahead of only Manor. Things have improved this season but they are still a distant sixth and have not won a grand prix for four years. Dennis has also been unable to find a sponsor to replace Vodafone.
The McLaren Group, though, is about much more than Formula One. This is one of the world’s foremost technological companies and they are anxious to develop.
Dennis will always be essentially a Formula One figure and one who has arguably done more to develop the sport than anyone else, apart from its chief executive, Bernie Ecclestone, who said: “It’s a shame if we lose Ron. I just can’t understand why he has let this happen to him. It’s not like him.”
Dennis started F1 life as a mechanic for the Cooper team when he was 18. He joined McLaren in 1980 and by 1981 had taken control. He has amassed a fortune of about £400m but that will not diminish the hurt of being pushed out of the team he built to greatness. There is a chance he may be offered a less important role with the Surrey-based company, but his pride is likely to prevent him accepting such a compromise.
Zak Brown, the American businessman and a former racing driver, has been increasingly linked with McLaren in recent weeks.
At McLaren, Dennis is infamous for his obsessive behaviour. At the team’s Woking base every room – as at his £25m home in Virginia Water – is set at 21C. Not 22, or 20, but 21C, because that is what he considers to be the optimum temperature.
When it comes to shoes he wears only tasselled loafers from America, because he considers that to be the best, and he buys them in bulk each year. And when he had expensive gravel laid in his drive he had it washed beforehand.
He hates exposed cables and wires and screw-heads at McLaren’s Technology Centre must be vertical, not horizontal, so they don’t attract dust. There is also a man at the MTC, Phil the Light, whose only job is to wander around checking that there are no dud bulbs; Ron can’t stand a bulb that doesn’t work.
