Ecclestone denies exposing Max Mosley sex scandal

Bernie Ecclestone has taken the unprecedented step of issuing a denial that he or anyone associated with him was involved in the exposure of Max Mosley’s predilection for sado-masochistic sex with prostitutes.

In an interview with The Times, Ecclestone, the billionaire Formula One commercial rights holder, said he had no interest in “destroying" the embattled FIA president. The men have been close friends and business associates for more than 40 years, but their friendship is under severe strain after Mosley’s refusal to resign as result of the scandal.

“It is nothing in the world to do with me in any shape or form," Ecclestone said at his London office. “Secondly, this sort of thing is not my style – not the sort of way I would operate. Thirdly, there is no way in the world that I would want to destroy Max. To suggest I would want to do that is such a lot of b****cks, quite frankly – it’s not true."

Ecclestone said that the revelations about Mosley that appeared in the News of the World in late March, which included details of a five-hour bondage session with five prostitutes on video, may have been the work of “someone or somebody or ten bodies". But Ecclestone denied any involvement and said that he had no idea who was behind it. “It’s nothing to do with me at all," he said. “You must be joking."

Ecclestone’s comments come after speculation in some sections of the media at the French Grand Prix in Magny-Cours at the weekend that he may have authorized an operation to discredit Mosley. The aim would have been to remove Mosley in advance of the battle now raging between the Mosley-led FIA and Ecclestone’s company for control of Formula One’s multimillion-pound revenues.

Rumors of this kind have swirled around the Formula One paddock from the start of the scandal and were fuelled when Mosley wrote to FIA club presidents two days after the revelations in the News of World, claiming that he was the victim of a “covert investigation" of his private life by a “group specializing in such things, for reasons and clients as yet unknown". In recent weeks, sources close to Mosley have made no effort to discourage speculation that Ecclestone may have been involved in some way, although they have stopped short of naming him. More at London Times