Richard Coleman, Tech3 Team Principal: ‘The $4.9bn Bet: Can Liberty Replicate F1 Success with MotoGP?’ (Ep.89)

33:44That's certainly changing. How much does a rider get paid? I mean, it's a huge spread. It's an absolutely huge spread. So I mean, the top riders are on sort of like, you know, 15 million a year. So we're talking like people like Marquez, Cotararo, I mean, obviously I don't sit and look in their bank account, but that's kind of the numbers that are banded around. 15 a year? Yeah. Pre-sponsor ships or that's including everything? No, that's just their sort of rider contract. Wow. And then also the other thing I would say in MotoGP, which is a bit different to Formula One, is that, you know, obviously a lot of people are enthusiasts.

34:18You know, you've got to say Jerez, the first European round of the season, there will be 70 ,000 motorcycles in the car park. 70 ,000 people have decided to go on a motorbike to that race. And of course, all these people buy helmets, visors, gloves, gadgets to hold your phone on the bike, all these different kind of products. So there's a far more sort of technical element. So a lot of the top riders also get paid huge money for their leathers, their helmet brand, far more than they do in Formula One in a way. Because most Formula One fans don't go and buy a set of racing overalls on a Monday or buy a helmet to go to work in.

34:53whereas motorbikes is a very different market so they all earn really good from their endorsements of that and I would say probably the sort of riders that are very good professional riders they're probably on kind of like one and a half million a year something like that It's a big challenge when you have something that's hugely successful but hugely successful within a set of parameters a real focus and a core fan base there's a there's a huge challenge you have when you're enjoying that success but then also trying to build it out also trying to make it more commercialized more mass market go into new regions is there a danger that is this grows and develops that core fan base that has driven the sport for so long gets corrupted in any way they lose some of what's made it so valuable to them yeah i think it's always a danger um but i also i also think that a lot of this is kind of this almost like hyperbole that's driven by the media and if you like i said if you look at formula one the sentiment for the first four years of liberty's ownership was neutral to negative and now you'd be in formula one you'd find anybody really hard push to say that liberty and not have not been a good owner but of course the you know most journalists that are of the sport itself they are absolute dyed in the wool stalwarts of the sport they know everything they know every stat everything else and it's a bit you know have it in all sports you see in cricket you know i mean look at the success of the short format game you know you look at uh you know the everybody said that the hundred was going to be a complete waste of time and now look at what the franchises are selling for look at the crowd attendances that they're getting but of course you've got a lot of people in cricket say well no it's for me it's just it's the the four five day format you know Everything else is not really cricket.

36:36So you're always going to get that. And obviously, generally, those opinions are overweight with journalists that have been following this circus for the last 30 years. They're all going to say, oh, you're killing it. You're Americanizing it. Already I've seen criticisms of, you know, in Massano, they did very similar to how they do in Formula 1 for the anthem. They always play the anthem before the race, but from now on the riders go down and they all go in a sort of a semicircle and remove their hats and play the anthem in front of the flag. already you've got people in MotoGP, oh, he's so American, and they're ruining it already, and why do we have to copy everything that Formula One does?

37:13And it's like, okay, guys, is that really a big opinion? Is that really changing the sport one way or the other? It's actually an opportunity for the TV viewers to have a good look at the riders before the race, all these kind of things. So I think the noise is probably always worse than the actual casualties, but of course some people won't like the way things change. you know we've had people that come in here and they've bought an asset and they've had loads of confidence that they can affect it that they can make it better that they can commercialize it more that they can build a better fan base but where they've come unstuck and where they've had to learn is that actually they can only do so much because they sit in a wider institution where they don't lead a lot of the rules and regulations where they are completely subservient to the decision making moves of others how much of this for you now how you work with moto gp central to bring this sport forward i i think this is something that i'm personally huge on because it's so easy to get carried away and the analogy i gave you about you know 100 heads in the commercial department red bull is the equivalent of this entire paddock right so we cannot run before we can walk and this isn't just limited to the business and commercial element it's also the on-track stuff you know there's absolutely no point making any changes of any kind for the first 100 days right i need to get understand this asset understand this team understand these people Same on the commercial stuff.

38:33Some of our investors are very, very well-connected people, and they sort of want to see instant results and instant turnaround on big sponsor announcements. And let me tell you, sponsor hunting is elephant hunting. The average gestation period of a deal for a title deal is like a year. So we're not going to change the world in the next three months. We obviously have some contracts in place for next year. These things always take longer than you want to, but it's about sort of keeping those targets realistic. And it's going to take some time. And we don't have like a load of resource. And also in terms of Liberty's ownership, the value proposition has not changed overnight just because now Liberty own it.

39:15You know, the value proposition is the same as it was the day before. You know, it just simply hasn't changed. So it's going to take a while for that to flow through. And again, from sort of a management perspective, not just on the commercial side and the business side, but also the sporting side, you know, you have to take a bit of time to understand actually what you've got, what the strengths are, what the weaknesses are. And how many times do you see in sport, and you've met a lot of these guys, where people come in and they want to change the world overnight, and they make big written branch changes, and you're like, how can you possibly understand the strengths and weaknesses of the organization you've taken on?

39:48You can't. Do you think you have grown-ups around the table here? And what I mean by that is you've got a sport built on the individual success of certain teams, but to your point here we need collective mindset to to grow it so for all of us to win it's the right the age of rising tires lifts all boats right but that mindset does that exist within the sport now is it easy to get all of the owners of the teams together with liberty central and go this is where we're going this is where we want to go no and and the reason i say that is you know and i'm actually let's use herve as the example like the guy who's who's who's who's this is his life's work he's been running this team for for 30 years you know he openly admits his his weaknesses he openly admits that perhaps in the last years he's been a bit of a handbrake on a few things regarding the commercial side but he loves racing I mean he just loves motorbike racing he gets more excited about the moto 3 team results than he probably does the moto gp I mean when I when I sit and watch a race with him in moto 3 I mean the guy is literally on the ceiling I mean he literally is absorbing every single corner he's literally it just flows through his veins and it's that passion and that determination that has allowed him to build a really good race team but I think he kind of knows that it's time to pass the baton on and a lot of his peers are similar and these peers will some of them will be I'm sure in the next 12 months openly critical about certain things that Liberty are doing you also have the the sort of power struggle between the manufacturers and and MotoGP itself there's a lot of these stories they're going to take a while to sort of play out.

41:20And, you know, wherever you get sport, wherever you get money, you get politics, right? And to build a consensus with the other teams and the other manufacturers, I think is going to be difficult. But I think it's also an element where Gunther and I, because we've seen the Liberty side firsthand, we've got good, close personal relationships with key people within Liberty. I think that we'll be a little bit of a bridge between the two in some ways. I don't say that arrogantly whatsoever. I just think we can be really helpful in the sense that we can understand a slightly bigger picture. But also, we're not sat here going, we're new blood and we're going to spend money on stuff.

41:53I'll give you one example. There was a lot of talk about MotoGP having another launch event. They had a very successful one in Bangkok last year, and this year they wanted to go to Melbourne. At the moment, it's not our circus, not our monkeys, so we haven't got a decision. But from what we understand, a lot of teams are like, we don't want to go to Melbourne. We've all got to sit on a plane from the testing we're doing in Malaysia. We've got to go to Melbourne. It's 12 hours. We've got to ship bikes there. and what do we get out of this right now we'd be absolutely cool going to melbourne if it's an open event but we just need to understand what is the utility to us as a race team what is the commercial commerciality that we can apply to this to make something of it ourselves we're all about this whole collective and we're really supportive of dawn on what they want to do but bring us into the tent we're not just going to turn up in melbourne because you think it's a great idea we want to turn up in melbourne because it's a collectively good idea for everybody and that there's good things that can come from it, right?

42:47Can I ask, when you make an investment in my business, I think it's very important to understand the core risks that you're underwriting. And when I think about kind of the core risks that you're underwriting when buying this team, for me, it's like the ability to disperse audience away from the concentrated existing base of Spain and Italy. If you stay in Spain and Italy so concentrated, this will not be a great investment. It's hard to grow, correct, yeah. What do you think the core risk is that you're underwriting when making this investment? I mean it's an interesting question I think there are some risks around like you said not being able to grow and that's one area where we feel very confident with Liberty because I think that what Liberty have done in F1 if they haven't just chased money they've looked at different territories this is a territory that's mature and we should monetize it this is a territory we need to grow in and therefore money is not the number one KPI here it's how many eyeballs we're going to get We feel really confident around that, but you're right, because that's not just a case of where we're going to put these races on.

43:47This is a far wider reaching thing where you need to get to grassroots level and have talent coming through from other countries, which builds audience from other countries and so on and so forth. I think there's also a slight risk regarding the manufacturer's element and how that plays out with the independent teams. I think everything's tracking in the right direction, but you've only got to have a big global recession or a big incident and you've suddenly got motor manufacturer, bike manufacturers, OEMs that are not going to want to commit this kind of budget. And at the moment, the independent teams are wholly dependent on those manufacturers, on those five manufacturers of one which has gone through an enormous refinancing in the last six months where they are dependent upon them for their technology.

44:28So there's a fundamental risk there that if you have huge global macroeconomic events where manufacturers are not putting money into the sport, then that instantly affects. F1 doesn't have that because that risk is internalized within the team, correct? I would say it does have those risks, but it's not to the same level of exposure. And I think this is also a direction that MotoGP will probably ultimately take. Why not? Is that, you know, if we look this year, McLaren are almost certainly going to win the Drivers and Constructors Championships, right? But that car has a Mercedes engine. It has a Mercedes MG UK.

45:03It has a Mercedes gearbox, I believe, right? So from the bulkhead back, that car is a Mercedes. But I think to the casual fan and the people that are watching Formula 1 and they're looking at the statistics and the heritage, they're like, well, it's a McLaren championship. McLaren are the champions. And I think there's a lot of manufacturers that could potentially come in that, let's say, a level two manufacturer. So you've got people like Honda that produce 20 million bikes. It's very easy for them to have a big R &D department, spend a load of money on MotoGP, win on Sunday, sell on Monday. But there's other OEMs that are just not in that kind of league.

45:36but it probably in the league where they could say do you know what we're going to do our own chassis we're going to do our own bike but we're going to buy the electronics and the engine from Ducati or Honda or whatever it is and white label it which is exactly what happens in Formula One but there are risks at the moment in the way that's set up but we think they're fairly minimal and likewise the support the sport has been sustainable to date you know these teams do make money it's been a well-run asset and the majority of tv and on-site audiences are increasing even before the liberty announcement what are the media rights deals what's the structure of them particularly where should we say the geographical focuses that you've spoken of so again massively overweight to to southern europe you know and you really feel that when you're in the paddock you know so many different sort of spanish italian greek you know all these kind of channels whereas very little interest from like u.s media um and the again i think that this area is going to change but as we both know there's a media rights are generally long form deals they normally take a long time to put together they're normally quite long-standing contracts so again this isn't going to be like next year bang here we go all the media rights landscapes completely changed and we're now getting like loads of free eyeballs in these countries and we're getting loads of money from it it doesn't it's not going to work like that liberty going to take some time my understanding is and it's really not my swim lane so i don't want to opine on it too much but i think this is one of the major holdups with the european commission was that they they saw that motor gp and formula one are different sports but what they didn't want was liberty sort of monopolizing the media landscape by saying okay you know spain wants motor gp but if you we're going to grant you these rights as long as you pay x for motor gp or the other way around.

47:24We'll give you Metal GP, but you've got to pay this much for Formula One. They didn't want that sort of bundling in the media rights landscape. So again, really not my wheelhouse, but I think they're the kind of things that take always longer than you anticipate. They're always like long form deals and normally like three, five year deals. Obviously, there's a load of deals that are in place at the moment. So that's going to take time to get right. We talk about something that we termed the attention economy, the competition for eyeballs, the amount of sports now that are competing for quite a finite amount of attention.

47:55And Harry joked earlier, you know, he said we compete with Taylor Swift if we're on Spotify as much as we do with high-performance podcasts. When you're sitting in your car, you can listen to Taylor or you can listen to us. It's a great choice. In the morning, I'd listen to you. In the evening, I'd listen to Taylor. Fair enough, I'd listen to Taylor twice. But, you know, the point is that you compete with anyone who has a media proposition that's trying to capture the attention of an audience. But a big part of that and the reason why people want to get involved in sport is often their ability to participate in some way, especially at an early age.

48:29Grassroots, the foundations of growth globally will be built on the exposure of younger people to that. What does it look like in MotoGP? Because you start in a car. You don't begin on a bike when you're eight years old. Well, you do, but they're like little peewee bikes. Really? I mean, absolutely. And I have to say, so my other business has another sort of leg in the motorcycle world. And I've become incongruously close or closer than I would be just through MetalGP with the FIM president, which is the governing body of motorbikes. And they're on a huge youth push because they really feel like we need to make more of this.

49:10And at the moment, that's one thing I'd say is very different from Formula One is that Formula One, you have Formula Two and Formula Three, right? And I think Formula 2 go to, I don't know, let's say 15 of the Formula 1 events. And I think Formula 3 probably 12 or 10 or something. But when I go to a Formula 1 race, depends slightly on the market. But overwhelmingly, if the Formula 3 race is on, the stands are 10 % full. Yeah. I mean, they feel empty. They really do feel empty. And yes, of course, these drivers are learning their craft. They're learning their trade. they've got sponsors or family money or whatever it is behind them backing them to race in Formula 3 and they're learning the circuits and they're also on Pirelli tyres and all these different things that make a difference.

49:59In MotoGP you have Moto2 and Moto3 but the majority of Moto2 and Moto3 riders are getting paid whereas in Formula 2 and Formula 3 either through family or sponsors or whatever else they've literally got to buy their seat which in Formula 2 would be probably 3 million euros a year and formula formula three probably one and a half million euros a year whereas in moto two and moto three a lot of these guys are actually getting paid and if you you know again slightly depends on the territory but i've just done the races in barcelona and the race in in massano in italy and the stands are basically full i mean i mean the the the fans are so engaged with the racing and the racing in moto three particularly is just incredible i mean you just never know who's going to win.

50:42I mean, like literally a lap to go, it could be anybody in the top eight. It's almost like a peloton. And the racing is unbelievably exciting. But I think that that's another thing with the FIM and Dorner, that sort of talent cascade is a lot more sort of mature, a lot more formalized. And now they're talking about doing Moto4, and you've also got the Red Bull Rookies Cup, where again, you've got like Red Bull putting money into something where it's properly meritocratic you know these guys they're selected on merit they get their crash damage paid for they get their travel paid for you know and if they win then they then get picked up and they have a seat in moto 3 and they they have a career prospect and don't get me wrong it's brutal i mean like you know one of our moto 3 riders who's selected by ktm he's in his second year he's done okay but he's not done great so they've got to make room for the next guy coming through so you know he's cut and it's as simple as that but wow when you say and he's cut like what does he do then he's not killed that's an exclusive exactly yeah our new team philosophy he has to try and find a you know another avenue for his career but for a lot of these guys you know then that's very difficult once you've been cut it's really difficult to get another foot on the ladder somewhere else you know what makes the best drivers riders sorry I should say you know it's a really lazy cliched expression in all of sport but it is just unbelievably true is that you know hard work can often beat talent but when talent also works hard you you that that's the difference right but then we're into I think like if you look at whether it's a driver or a rider having some level of intellect and I don't mean like in terms of academia or whatever else but you just feel in conversation that they have this extra mental capacity they have this intellect that allows them beyond the plane of just the the sort of normal run of the mill you know they always find another dimension that they're able to talk about look at follow pursue whatever else and having that kind of racing intellect is a is a huge part it was when we spoke to james voles about this actually where he was talking about like the the amount of data that you are taking in on a per second basis as a driver is just enormous and he was mentioning all the different minute elements that you're thinking about thousands of things per second and and then you actually apply that adhere to the riders that you have and on top of you know all the different things that you're analyzing you're also doing like core balance which you don't have so much in f1 but like the actual staying on a physical bike the riders hardly move the handlebars you know and if it is it's generally to correct something as in like to to to control a slide the majority of the bike's turning is from the rider's position on the bike and the rider moving and of course you know think about your head is actually a very heavy part of your body so the more sort of outboard you can get your head you know changes the weight distribution of the bike and like i said these guys are running at 60 degree lean angle and in terms of like from an aerodynamic point of view as the sort of the air flows through the fairing and sort of on the underneath of the bike a lot of that is about sort of how the air can exit the fairing to sort of give the bike more rotation in the corner so it's not just about like the downforce and the wings that are hanging off it you've also got that extra plane that when the bike's at 60 degree lean angle how are you exiting the air to try and give the bike a bit more rotation i mean without without wanting to sound morose how's the sport been made safe because you watch this and you're like how are people not dying every race i mean it's ridiculous as you've highlighted the dangers of it is super dangerous and i think that's one element of me you know very very clear with everybody coming into this i'm a four-wheel guy you know like my my knowledge base is is is low and one of the things i've really noticed is that how the team interacts with the rider is very very different to what i've witnessed in car racing so much of it is around the rider's confidence because firstly the rider is obviously a bigger part of how the bike handles and all those kind of things but secondly like it has to be said you know these these guys are far more likely to injure themselves or worse sadly so there is a real danger to it and therefore the rider's confidence is sort of paramount so even if something from an engineering and technical perspective is let's say suboptimal if it gives the rider confidence then you have to sort of pursue that so so much of it is in sort of managing the rider's head and making sure that the rider is confident and comfortable even if that's not from a theoretical perspective as to exactly where you sort of need to be and I also feel like the bond between the rider and the crew is just visually so much deeper than what I've experienced in car racing and And listen, it's pretty deep in car racing, but it's another level with bikes because I think you just know when the guy's leaving the garage that he is literally risking life and limb.

55:32And that dynamic weighs heavy. You can see that the bond is a real big part of it. Do riders die? Yeah. I mean, thankfully, Dorner have done a huge amount of work with the FAM on safety in terms of the circuits that we visit. They're very disciplined in the circuits that we go to. so again, making sure that the sort of runoff areas, because it's very different to a car, you know, the dynamics of A, where you can have an accident, and B, obviously you want to make sure that the rider has stopped before he gets to a wall. You don't really want to be going to circuits where there's a good chance the rider can make the wall, you know, and where we do, we try and have air fences and tech pro barriers and all kinds of, like, interesting stuff, and also the riders have airbags within their suits, so they have spine protector spools or airbags and things like that which trigger when they fall off and is that just activated by a detachment from the bike or?

56:28Yeah by impact actually so again all of those kind of things so the safety's come along a lot I think probably Marco Timincelli was probably the last fatality which I think was sort of 2011, 2012 just a far more it's a far more present thing and again the other thing is that the riders get injured all the time. If you're a test and reserve driver in Formula 1 the chances of you getting called up are pretty small. It's very unlikely that a Formula 1 driver these days, thankfully, hurts themselves doing their job. That's very unlikely. But in MetaGP, I mean, like, it's so common to get injuries.

57:05And if you look at one of our riders, Maverick Vinalis, you know, he had a high side in the Saxon ring, and he broke his shoulder, ripped a couple of ligaments. You know, he's still not 100 % now. and again like I mean the other thing as well coming from from my world in when you walk through the paddock and you see the riders you know they don't move very well for fit young lads between sort of you know 20 and 35 most of them are carrying some kind of limp or not moving that well or whatever it was you really see that and they're covered in scars you know and whether that's from operations like they all suffer from arm pump where it's very physical riding a GP bike you know these bikes have got crazy levels of grip um and they get this thing called arm pump where it's literally like the the muscle and the fascia so they have these these surgeries where they literally like open it up and sort of like detach the fascia from from the muscle in the forearm but again with their you know i mean look at marini marini luca marini one of the honda riders this year uh he was testing for the suzuka eight hour and non-motor gp race had a big shunt broke his femur uh pelvic trauma broke three ribs uh and he was like back on the bike you know two three weekends ago but the long-term damage to these bodies is insane yeah i think it's like rugby where it's like oh you know look at mark marquez i mean you look at mark marquez is his whole arm is like a patchwork quilt you know he's had so many surgeries on his uh on his upper arm from from a really bad accident he's had and he's repeatedly damaged it so you know these guys really do put their bodies on the line you know um so i think it's a very very different thing and also like even for me and i'm only in the beginning part of this journey but sat on the pit wall of these races when the rider goes down when your car crashes in in a race it's very very rare that you're sat there looking at tv monitors wondering if he's okay and even if he's even if it is one of those you sort of wonder generally they're on the radio pretty quickly telling you they're okay we have no communication with the rider so when the rider goes off you've got no idea if he's okay so they're not mic'd up they're not mic'd up at all it's one of the things that the sport is experimenting with and they're looking at trying to bring in but again like Gunther and I have discussed this that's tough to get them in your head 100 % and there's lots of different ways of doing it but I think it's also another cultural thing because in car racing firstly the driver is super used to it because from their mid-teens they've been mic'd up in the car so they know a radio protocol and also the staff they know what part of the circuit they should be talking to them this isn't cultural in motorcycle racing radio is just not a thing so it's not just from a technological point of view it's also from a cultural point of view how's that going to actually work but yeah it's a big thing the rider goes off, the rider goes down you get it on the information that your rider has crashed you've got no idea if they're okay you can't talk to them so your reserve riders they're pretty tidy as well Yeah, so KTM have Danny Pedroza, who doesn't really want to race, but he's a really solid test driver.

1:00:10He's one of the best riders of his generation. And Paul Esparago, who substituted for Vanales a couple of rounds this year and got in the points both times. But again, if you're a test and reserve rider in MotoGP, you've got a very good chance of being used during the year. It's a very, very different sort of mentality. Let's do a quick fire, my friend. We've pelted you with questions. On the ropes. Number one, describe Gunther in one word. Mad. Is he always like that? Yeah. I mean, listen, he is barking mad by his own admission, but he is hyperlogical. Yeah, he's a hyperlogical guy. What makes him so good?

1:00:51Because he's obviously very, very talented at what he does. He has a great ability to distill information very quickly to what actually matters and what doesn't matter, making a great decision. And if you look career-wise, Gunther loves to sort of, I would never say he plays up to the camera because he doesn't. What you see, and I'm sure you've had him on as a guest, I'm sure when he was in the ante room and in here, it's the same guy, right? And I've got the pleasure of knowing most of the team principals in F1 and they're mostly slightly different media personality as they are having a coffee.

1:01:17Gunther is the same, right? The guy you spend time with over coffee swears more than the guy on the TV, right? Who's the biggest divergence between the character that they have in public versus private? I'm going to say Toto, but I'm going to say that not in a negative way. Toto I think on camera comes over quite austere and sort of there's a coldness to him whereas in real life Toto is the warmest person he makes you feel like you're the only guy in the room you feel like a real warmth from from the guy which I don't think you get on tv you sort of see this kind of Austrian kind of uh very very measured kind of response yeah and quite quite Like there's a coldness to it, you know, whereas in real life, it's very warm, makes you feel like you're the only guy in the room.

1:02:02If we're saying that the best sports organizations today are great storytellers, what's the story that you want to tell with this team? I think it's some of the subjects we've touched on today. It's the human endeavor of it. I mean, I really, really think that that is so undertold as a story. You know, I just think they're like, you know, the little story I told you about the gravel trap here or the things they have to get. That is really undertold. And I think that if people did see that, I really do buy into this kind of gladiator of the modern age. I really do. And I don't think you have to like bikes.

1:02:34I don't think you have to like motor racing to understand and appreciate that. So I think we've got to really try and tap into that as a sport, but also as a team. You know, we want to be able to tell these stories in the right way. Where does MotoGP not have a race that you would most like to do a race? Do you know what? This is, and can I answer this completely selfishly rather than commercially? Yeah. I've been super lucky in my life to travel the world from, you know, when I picked up as an apprentice at 16. So I think I've worked out I've been to something like 95 countries. Wow. But I've never been to India.

1:03:03And India has a big two-wheel culture. They used to have a race there. They're looking at going back. But I've never been to India. So I would really like to go. You've had a life on four wheels. What surprised you the most about moving into this industry? It's a little bit of a Galapagos economy, you know, in the sense that it has completely evolved on its own. You know, it's very, very separated from the rest of motorsport, I would say. There's always been a bit of a divide sort of, you know, across the pond, you know, like US and the rest of the world in motor racing. But there is definitely crossover and people go and work from one on the other.

1:03:35But I would say this kind of like pyramid within MotoGP is sort of Galapagos economy where these people have only done this. And there's some really good things to that because some things and some skill sets are so unbelievably honed and special and incredible in what they do. but there's also a little bit myopia around that as well because like well i'll ask questions okay so why do we do it this way and sometimes there's a super logical clear concise answer you go right i get that why didn't i see that and other times it's a because we've always done it that way and i'm like okay well i'll write that down my list we'll have another chat about that because these things have just developed in their own way so i was quite surprised at how not closed it is but it's been its own thing for so long which sponsor do you not have that you're most like to have i would love to bring in a lifestyle product or a luxury product i think i think i think the sport will open up more to that category and i'd love to be one that that sort of brings brings one of the first to bring those in because i think whoever comes in no because then i'll have to start thinking about what free stuff i get you know the reason to do exactly right you know so so yeah i'd have to think about you know some kind a brand that was going to give me loads of cool free stuff would it be a patek or would it be a i don't i don't think it necessarily needs to be even even that but i think it i think somebody who will promote the partnership in their own uh swim lanes is super important you know if you if you have a big brand that comes in that has their own conventional advertising and their own conventional commercial reach if they then start using motor gp to tell their stories you get so much more coverage you know and to an audience that isn't necessarily the one that's marching by the gp so i i think the sport's got to move more in that direction and i would love to be one of those sort of people that bring that kind of kind of brand in does money equal success if you spend more will you win um the short answer is no but of course in all sports it's really hard to find a sport that isn't there's a direct correlation between how much money you've got and how well you perform there is a huge graveyard full of people in sport that have had loads of money and have not performed so it's not always the case but there's very few people that have really performed and had not the budget to get the job done so there is a very high correlation between that final one in five years time over under game is moto gp worth over 12 billion dollars what was the timeline five years deliberately tough i'm gonna say no because i know someone will just throw this in my face in five years from now but i don't think it's going to be far off that i think i i think it's going to take a little bit longer these things always take longer than you realize and i think if we even let's draw comparisons with formula one was it worth double five years in probably not but it probably wasn't far off and now it's probably worth you It's not going to be a linear graph.

1:06:40It's going to be a fairly parabolic graph, I think, in the end. But that's just my own sort of confidence in it. But I think five years, there's a few economic headwinds at the moment. It's going to take longer than everybody thinks. And there's not the resources we've touched upon today that's existing now to get it done. That resource needs to be built out. So it's going to take some time. Richard, it's been an absolute pleasure to have you. Thank you so much. It's been so interesting to hear all about it. Thanks so much for having me on. a new motorsport has arrived on the business of sport and i can't wait to see what happens as moto gp enters this next stage of development all sports are under pressure to modernize capture attention prove relevance this is a die-hard entertainment product that now has the opportunity to open its doors to more people who may previously have not experienced the excitement that comes with in Richard's words, high octane gladiatorial competition.

1:07:32It was a compelling insight into team ownership and the wider sport. So a massive thank you to Richard for coming in and talking us through it. I can't wait to see how the dynamic duo, including Gunther, of course, take on this project. Now, if you want to see more from today's show, you can do so by going to YouTube and typing in business of sport. But before we leave you, some words from our valued partners. What if I told you that the same private equity deals that built sporting empires like Liverpool FC and the Golden State Warriors were now accessible to everyday investors? Well, meet Stride, the regulated digital platform that's democratising sports private equity.

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