General
Support for Ecclestone from unexpected angle
- GPblog.com
Bernie Ecclestone was in the news extensively last week because of his statements and his position in the BLM debate. The former F1-boss got the hang of it with six-time world champion Lewis Hamilton. Ecclestone explained the situation earlier, but now also gets support from Willie T Ribbs.
In 1986 Ecclestone was still the owner of the Brabham F1 team. The team boss invited the African-American Willie T. Ribbs for a test in Portugal. It would be an open audition for the driver who could become the first black F1 driver.
Ribbs talks to CNN for Ecclestone. Ribbs: "I don't know if Formula 1 would have existed at all if it wasn't for Bernie Ecclestone. He wanted me in the car at the time, he wanted me to make it to F1. At the time, however, he had Italian sponsors and they wanted an Italian driver. I respect him and have never had a problem with it".
"Ecclestone brought first black driver to the sport"
Ecclestone spoke about the prevailing black lives matter debate, saying that 'black people are often more racist than white people'. In turn, Lewis Hamilton fell over these words and called them 'uneducated and ignorant statements'.
Ribbs seems to take it up for the old F1 boss and concludes: "My goal was to reach F1 and Bernie made a statement. Because he was determined to get the first coloured driver, a black man, into an F1 car".