Paddy McNally

McNally started his career in 1963 as a motorsports journalist, contributing to Autosport magazine.[4] By 1973, he was working in Switzerland as a sponsorship consultant for Philip Morris's Marlboro, headquartered in Lausanne, employed to promote the brand at Formula One race circuits.[10] McNally was then a driver manager for Niki Lauda;[11] he was also a manager of James Hunt, "looking after him at races for Marlboro in 1977 and 1978".[12]

Throughout the 1960s, McNally was involved in Touring car racing and other sports car racing events. In 1962, he raced a Lotus Elite at Castle Combe circuit for the British Racing and Sports Car Club (BRSCC) and finished second. By 1965, McNally raced a Shelby Cobra at Goodwood, Silverstone and Nürburgring, winning several races.[13] He subsequently entered for two seasons in the 1968 and 1969 British Saloon Car Championship, driving a Porsche 911 T/R.[14][15]

He retired from professional racing in 1970, becoming primarily focused on journalism and the commercial side of motorsport.[4]

McNally began working with Bernie Ecclestone in the late 1970s.[16] By 1983, he founded Allsport Management SA, a company which provided corporate hospitality and reformed trackside advertising for Formula One events.[17] McNally's company obtained the Formula One advertising rights after a fee was paid to Ecclestone, who needed an experienced sponsorship manager to run the Grand Prix advertisements.[18]

Based in Geneva, Allsport and the related Allsopp Parker & Marsh (APM) company then had full control of the lucrative advertising rights, which it acquired from each organiser and sponsor as noted by Mosley.[19]

McNally had developed a system of signage which gave advertisers maximum exposure. Formula One and related companies were under pressure from the European Broadcasting Union to introduce standards in their advertising, and Ecclestone encouraged him to form his company as such. McNally stated that he had formed a solution to "tidy up" trackside advertising with a strategy called "themed advertising", whereby one advertiser is given full exposure at each section of the course; essentially, reducing the number of advertisers and repackaging the way they were sold. This strategy proved very successful.[16] McNally ultimately took over the sales of all Formula One trackside advertising, with the exception of the Monaco Grand Prix.[20]

The Formula One Paddock Club, established by McNally in March 1984, was the Grand Prix hospitality provider and primarily modelled on Royal Ascot.[21][22] After a precarious start, by 1985, the Paddock Club gained traction as sponsors were attracted by the hospitality and advertising increased.[9]

Set up at each race around the world, with particular emphasis at Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabian events,[22] the hospitality concept was McNally's innovation and managed by Allsport.[23] It offered luxury dining, tours and superior views for VIPs at Formula One events and eventually turned into a highly profitable business.[24] In 2006, Gulf Air's CEO Björn Näf signed a deal with McNally for the airline to become the title sponsor of the Bahrain Grand Prix.[25] The F1 Paddock Club still operates presently.[26]

On 30 March 2006, McNally sold Allsport Management to CVC Capital Partners, who acquired the company via Alpha Topco. The figure agreed was around $400 million.[27][28] McNally remained chief executive of the company until April 2011, when he announced his retirement from the Formula One circuit.[29][30]

In 1967, McNally married Anne Downing, daughter of Ken Downing, a successful Connaught driver in the 1952 Formula One season who went on to establish a business diamond mining in South Africa. In 1969, their first son, Sean, was born, and in 1972 their second son, Rollo.[41] McNally and his wife divorced shortly before she died from cancer in 1980.[42][43] He never remarried.[40]