6 - Formula 1 and the Law

Hello and welcome to the Sports Law Podcast with me, Nick Democker, KC of Blackstone Chambers. Today's episode, Formula One and the Law, is actually being recorded at the incredible Williams Formula One Experience Centre here in Oxford, where the racing cars are built and where you can visit one of the largest private collections of Formula One cars in the world. As this episode is focusing on legal issues in Formula One, I'm delighted to be joined by three of the team's top lawyers, Jeremy Stone, the director of legal at Williams Racing, Tim Murnain, the group legal director at McLaren Group, and Oliver Ramsey, the legal director at Aston Martin, Aramco, Coltnuson Formula One team. We'll be talking about what Formula One lawyers do, some of the big legal issues in Formula One, how they became lawyers in elite motor sports, and what hot topics to look out for in the future. So let's start with a typical week for a Formula One lawyer. What work you guys actually do, can I start with you Jeremy? What things come across your desk at Williams? Anything really, all sorts. So there's no typical week in the life, I think, of any of us here, certainly in my life. It really just means you're dealing with whatever comes across the desk. So you're the contact person, there's a legal team for any legal issues that the business may have, and that ranges from employment issues through to driver issues, through to disputes, through to anything e-sports nowadays as well. So there's an element of an eveness of tailor the advice that you provide to different individuals. So if you're advising the board on certain issues, then they may be more used to dealing with lawyers and legal teams, then maybe a new joiner in say the HR team or somewhere else. So you need to be able to be slightly flexible with your advice, be able to provide that to different sorts of people. But generally speaking, there is no typical week, there's no typical piece of work, and in any given day I've got no idea what's going to come across my desk, which is great for me. I was the way that I prefer to work. I'm more of a generalist than I'd like to think I'm a probably a specialist in certain areas, but I certainly enjoy the challenge of the general type of work that comes across. So from a formula one side, there's an element of a cycle, I suppose, where from an idea or concept in a designer's head through to designing the car, through to building the car, through to testing it and racing it for a full season, and then becoming obsolete in the factory downstairs, in the museum, sorry downstairs, then that whole cycle is 18 months. So there's always that cadence going on in the background, and I guess one of the main benefits of formula one is there's no relegation, so you can plan a little bit from year to year, and there are always parts of the year you can rely on, so car build is massively busy. You then go into testing, it's both safety testing, and then on track testing through to the season, and then the shutdown periods as well. So there's a bit of planning that you can do, but from day to day, no idea what's going to come across my desk, and that's the challenge. Is there then a quiet time of the year? So shutdown is probably the quietest time of the year, these two might think differently, but certainly shutdown when it's mandated by the regulations that the teams can't do any work on a formula one related work, then by definition, those tend to be quieter periods, so the summer shutdown, and then if it happens, the winter shutdown as well, but generally speaking, those would be the only quiet times I think in any given year. Tim, what about your work as a lawyer at McLaren? Yeah, I think echo many of Jeremy's comments really in terms of there's never really a normal sort of set week, where we're a little bit different is that we've perhaps a little bit more diversified than some of the other teams in the sense that we've got in addition to formula one now, we've got basically an Indie car team, an extreme E team and a former E team, and also the esports Jeremy mentioned. So we've got lawyers in the automotive side of the business, we've got lawyers in formula one. I'm quite hands on on the formula one because it's an interesting thing to be involved with, it's very important, and I think the lawyers potentially can make a bigger difference there than they can, perhaps in areas you actually can influence the outcome. In terms of things we're involved with, as I say, there's not a typical week, but over the last year or so, we've done a lot of driver contracts because we've now got four racing series and I counted before I came over here today and I think during 2022 I think we've done driver contracts with 12 different drivers, so it's at least one of those is Zollian, Jeremy will know are quite a significant endeavor you're talking about promotional appearances, IP rights, exit rights options, terminations, fees, tax, all that kind of thing. Any other one that's been been sponsorship because we as an independent team aren't relying on the large OEM to finance us, we have to finance ourselves, so basically we're very active in the sponsorship market. Again, that's where a lawyer can make a difference, we're quick to and around like for me, I'm often waking up to stuff that's coming from the US overnight and we try and turn it around as quickly as possible because we want to win the contract or retain the sponsor, so that's probably the highlights for me would be those to flag those up. I was just reading coming up this morning about the importance of being careful, this was in relation to football in sponsorship with reputation issues, I think, to do some of the NFTs who've sponsored and then gone, is that an issue you have to think of? Yeah, it's an F1 to. I've been in for a long, well a long time, I remember when I first started out, reputation issues weren't really something, I think it used to come up, but now it's a big area of emphasis where sponsors basically want to get out and it's just really a negotiation then as to whether it's objective, subjective material or just any damage to brand, that kind of thing, you tend to have a discussion about, probably now in, I would say, most contracts. Yeah, I think that's happened both ways as well, so it started out, I think originally with the rights holders, the teams, whether it's football or Formula One, looking for those provisions in the relevant contracts, and then as brands become more sophisticated, then they've asked for the reciprocal provisions, which is quite difficult to logically argue against. Yeah, like for example, if you've got a large partner, contemplating, sort of losing them mid-season, just out of the blue because of the fact that a particular person say, who's in a quality junior position has done something they shouldn't, that's obviously a quite difficult situation to tolerate, so those kind of discussions you're going to be having really seniority of the people, if you terminate the person, then does that make the right go away? Also, all sorts of sort of minutiae around that, I'm sure it's the same for Molly and Jeremy. Yeah, well moving on to you, Ollie, tell us about the issues that you come across most frequently at Asdom Martin. Well, I definitely agree with other shaps in their comments. There is no such thing as a normal day in the office. I have a bit of a phrase that some of my colleagues know, it's everything from drivers to doormats, you don't know what you're going to get, and it's that sort of SME style in-house generalist skill set that you need to start with to service the business. But then from there, you obviously have to do the more specialist stuff, whether it's drivers or sponsorship, the more sports-oriented things that come up. I was really interested in two things that Jeremy and Tim said separately. Jeremy mentioned the cycle, and I was really interested by that because that's definitely something that I recognise, particularly when I started informing them on at the beginning of 2010. In the early days, I saw that a lot, but actually, as time has gone on, I've actually found that's eroded as a concept. You've just flat out all of the time now. It used to be the case that you had an off-season and it was quieter and you could predict and plan, and that's when we'll do our filing and we'll get our precedence updated and so on and so forth. That time has been eroded. I don't know if you feel the same way, but I've definitely. I definitely do all of you. I think also the pandemic has changed things. It changed people's working practices, and it's still, in my opinion, is not settled down since then, and it's still got this slightly manic element about the way the world conducts itself. I think that throws up issues for us as lawyers because we've got to obviously try and make things more orderly. I definitely still feel that. I don't know if it's the same for you guys. I think in terms of the quiet time point, there is no quiet time, and I think for people listening in the podcast, they're perhaps considering a career in sports and Formula One. You've got to be prepared to be available 24/7, and as in literally 24/7. It varies, but, and again, especially since the pandemic, that's really intensively itself. The 24/7 point is a really good one too, because it's easy to forget if you're not into it. As of next year, F1 will be racing in 24 international jurisdictions, all in a different time zone. You're not as a lawyer in each of those time zones. I don't know about you guys, but I don't go to that many races. People always ask you to go to the races. I don't go to that many races. The point is, if the issue arises track side, they will call, you better answer, because some of the deadlines for things like appeals and protests and things, which we make them on to later. They're 30 minutes in the local time frame. Whatever time it is, from Melbourne to Vegas or whatever, you've got 30 minutes to answer the phone until a'r ymwch i'n gwneud. Ymwch i'n gwneud. Ymwch i'n gwneud. A'r ymwch i'n gwneud. Mae'r ymwch i'n gwneud. that can perform and compete with the big teams goes up. And then you also, and Jeremy didn't touch on this, but it is something that I think he would agree as a feature of the financial regulations. As the teams are starting to diversify and do other things as a result of the regulations to optimize their position legally under the regulations. And that means that their technology is being applied in other areas, not just on track. So on track technology is being applied off track. Now we've got two pioneers of doing that here, because we had Williams advanced engineering and McLaren applied technology. So we've got two very early adopters sitting on the other side of the table. But they've done this very well. And I think that if teams can respect the cap, optimize under the cap, and make a genuine business of diversification coupled with more exciting racing, no relegation, as Jeremy mentioned already. This is something that can really help increase the value of teams. So there's a whole load of good reasons for doing this. And as much as it's been, you know, they've been teething issues in the introduction. But I think that as we move forward, I think it will be really good for the teams, even if some teams have struggled with the initial introduction maybe a bit. That's fascinating about the way in which it may strengthen the sport. And of course, the other point you make, which is very different to football, as Jeremy alluded to, is that it's about competitive balance here, whereas in football the more money you earn, the more money you can spend. So it doesn't promote competitive. Yeah, as far as the main piece is from model, that's yes. The idea is to close one of the fundamental ideas is to close the grid up to make sure that you get a better spectacle. As a perhaps a cynical way of looking at it, is you get a better spectacle, higher broadcast fees, then more money coming into the sport. But yeah, the goal was to improve the equality and to ensure a level playing field. And in that way, it's much more similar to maybe the salary cap in rugby or in US sports rather than FFP, which which again are closed leagues, the US sports, which is may make it easier for these rules to exist in those environments. Obviously, the big news recently was about Red Bull being the Red Bull team find, I think, just over 6 million pounds for exceeding the cap by 1.8, 6 million pounds. So I think that must be a minor breach looks like less than 5%. And my understanding was it was one of these accepted breaches or agreed breaches. But nevertheless, the Red Bull team principle described the penalty as providing an advantage to our competitors, which is why they were pushing so hard for a draconian penalty. Of course, the penalty included not just the fine, but a 10% reduction in aerodynamic testing that that team's allowed to make. Was Christian Horner right to describe this as a draconian penalty that you were all baying for? Or I'm happy to take it. It's a trick one, because it's the first instance where the cost cap regulations have been tested and have been applied. So fundamentally, that Ollie mentioned it earlier, that in order to be effective, those rules need to have teeth. And in order to be a disincentive for other teams to breach those regulations moving forwards, those regulations have to have sporting penalty. If they were just financial penalties, teams may say, well, it might be worth it, and if I was just going to get a fine perhaps. So in order to be really effective, the regulations do need to have sporting penalties. And that's what this is. It's a sporting penalty. And I think it's really fundamental to the integrity of the sport moving forwards. We've said about a better TV product or a better product more exciting racing, but fundamentally, if a team does incredibly well on track, and the first reaction that fans have from a fan perspective is that they're querying, well, why is this happening? Is it just because of whatever it might be? Maybe an overspend, then that's going to damage the product, damage the F-bomb brand around the world, and ultimately lead to fewer eyeballs, and less money rolling into the sport from pro-class rides. Yeah, I wouldn't want to comment on any particular case, but what I would say in regard to the cost-cavonance, it's incredibly important. Make them the comments of Holly and Jeremy. I think it basically makes the sport economic to compete in. And it's not a situation where the team with the biggest checkup wins it, which has got to be a good thing. I think it has to be properly policed, and I think at the moment it is. I think the people doing a great job and challenging the teams. And I think the teams do feel the consequences of any sanction. I think the one thing we haven't touched on is aside from sporting consequence. I think there's a big reputational issue for anybody who breaches the regs. And I think that's going to be a bigger disincentive, especially for teams associated with big sponsors or parent OEMs that come stuff to not breach as is the case of the fear of sporting or financial penalty. And as Jeremy says, I think it's got to be sporting because if it's financial, it's basically you can take a risk. And it just doesn't work. Yes. I'm interested just in understanding a bit more about this that the sporting element of the sanction, in the red bull case, the 10% reduction in aerodynamic testing element of the penalty. What does it actually mean? And how will it affect the car that is produced, do you think? Well, I would normally defer to one of my erudonomousist colleagues with a question like that. But in broad terms, from the way it's perspective, just to pick up on where Tim left off, for some teams, crudely money isn't really an issue. So you can't just have financial penalties. So that, therefore, means you have to have sporting penalties. And in this particular case, there are aerodynamic testing restrictions that are placed on teams as part of the rules of the sport. You're allowed a certain quota. And based on the preceding seasons results, your quota may be greater or less if you had a more difficult season you further down the order, then you get more testing time to catch up. If you're at the front, you get less because you're in the lead. Now, to reduce that time by a percentage, would obviously have an impact upon the following season's car performance, as you would expect. Now, I'm not, I'm not, hopefully, the intricacies of the quotas. And what kind of consequence would arise as a result of a 10% reduction. But my understanding is, from a semi-lamon perspective, that it would impact upon the following season's car to have that type of sanction. But to what extent, I couldn't really say. That broadly the view around here. Well, we could talk about the cost cap all day, but we've got some other big issues in Formula One to cover as well. The second one I want to talk about is what's often referred to as team moves. Legal disputes between teams arising from drivers, for example, or key personnel leaving one team to join another, maybe sometimes taking trade secrets with them. There's been a long history of cases in this area. Tim, can you tell us about how these disputes are dealt with today in Formula One? Yeah. There's two categories I'd place this in, really. The first category is drivers, which is regulated by something specific to Formula One called the contract recognition board. And the other one, which deals with, again, Jeremy's good analogy squad, which is more just the general code. So I'll deal with the Formula One C-Obi first, if I can. So this was set up in round about the early '90s, because what was happening is drivers were just signing contracts with numerous teams, complete chaos, and stuff ending up being called bad publicity for this board. So the very good idea was initiated over Formula One contract recognition board. So what does that mean? Well, essentially, when you sign a contract with a driver, you have an obligation to file that contract with the Formula One contract recognition board, which is a firm of independent lawyers based in Geneva. And they then effectively enter the name of that driver on a register that they keep. And when Formula One comes to issue super licenses at the start of a season, they match that driver name up against the name lodged on the team entry form with the name on that form. And you have to have that registration as a condition of issuing the super license, that's the policing mechanism. So question then, coming back to disputes, what happens if there's a dispute? Well, if the team is already registered to contract, and then team B sign a contract with that same driver for a conflicting period of time, whether that's fixed to a more option, 'cause also have to register options as well as contract length, the CRB then notify both teams and say, look, there's a conflict here, and they give them an opportunity to try and sort it out. If that dispute does not get sorted out, then a hearing can be in of four effectively arbitrators. one from the UK, one from Italy, one from France, and one from Germany. That's done in very rapid order, and the decisions rendered in rapid order, because basically people can't be kept hanging with this, because they know if they haven't got a driver, they've got to find another one, and the market could be moving against them. So, in the nutshell, is the CRB position? And just on that term before you move on, has that led to, in your view, a downturn or a decline in the sort of number of big disputes between drivers and clubs? And certainly our Chamber's Senior Clarke, Gary Oliver, came up with me today, and we were talking about how we remember in the early 90s and before, a lot of these cases in the high court, which could drag on for some time. Yeah, I think it has improved the situation in that regard, perhaps not for external lawyers and baristas, but for in-house lawyers. The other important facet of the system is that the teams are obliged to use this, so you basically are not allowed to go to the high court for-- With mandatory arbitration. With mandatory arbitration, you can still proceed for damages, if you think you've got a case for which contract inducement, that kind of thing, but the actual CRB is binding, and there's no scope to go around that. So that, I see, has positive and a good thing for the sport. The other side of it, dealing with the squad, I think Nick is basically still, as it always was, in the sense of you've got a situation where generally the high value members of the squad, the aerodynamicists, the engineers, this kind of thing are much sort after, because they are the people who effectively make the difference as to whether you're competitive or not competitive on track, or one of the features. And they normally sign on long-term, fixed-term contracts, and there's usually a provision in there where there's gardening leave if one of them wants to move to a competitor, so that effectively you can try and isolate your confidential information, technical secrets, so on and so forth. But quite often, some teams will not be prepared to wait for that period of time, and we'll be trying to take that employee from teammate to their team B. And that quite often results in disputes of people alleging that the breach of contract has been injunctions granted, has been injunctions lifted, and that is still, I think, a quite an active area. A lot of it doesn't get in the public domain, so I'm not aware of one of these cases ever having got to a full trial, because not just in Formula One or Sport, and I think these cases actually ever, or rarely ever get to trial, it's more at the interim stage where you have the initial skirmish, and people come in terms of their emotions, and we're never going to let them go, this kind of thing, and then usually in the end, a deal is thrashed out of some sort. So that's really the position in regard to my perspective, then on how driver and team moves out of the informal one. I think it's interesting in Formula One, specifically, as well, with those individuals that you mentioned, as then Tim, because Formula One is a slightly strange industry, in that I think seven of the 10 teams have bases of operation in the UK, but all within 30, 40 miles of each other, so you have all of this world-class talent, or aerodynamicist or design, it's like you say, Tim, all within a really condensed geographic area, and so there is a bit of movement, and because you say, as you write, they can often be the difference makers. Many of them, I'm going to say, you have very brilliant people. We have the benefit of being able to attract this sort of best technical talent, I think, because if you've got a choice of working for an engineering company or working for a Formula One team, you're going to go for a Formula One team. To pick up on one thing that you mentioned, Tim, about CRB process, actually, just winding back a little bit. So when I first came into Formula One in 2010, it struck me as a very old process. It was kind of akin to player registration. But not. The thing that struck me about it was not just the fact, as Tim mentioned, that you have this obligation to go to arbitration, which is a very legalistic thing. If you're having to explain that internally to your colleagues at a racing team, they may or may not depend on who you're talking to, give you the time of day. But if you explain to them, sorry, but actually the driver can't get in the car. You physically can't get in the car and will not be granted a super licence to drive in less than until this is sorted. They've kind of bookended both sides of the requirement. It's actually quite a clever thing. It's an old and tried process that actually works, I think, quite well for that reason. Third issue I want to cover is how the sport is regulated generally. Again, if I come from a football perspective for a moment, you've got a hybrid situation in England where you've got, for instance, a Premier League or a Football League, self-regulation run by the clubs and then you've also got the FAA, which is semi-independent regulator. Formula One, what kind of regulation model is that, Ali? Goodness, that's a big question. Well, maybe if we split into two sections and we talk about the regulations themselves and then the formulation of regulations and please feel free to chip in at any point on either topic. So, thinking of the regulations themselves, the starting point for me really would be the International Sporting Code. So, you have the International Sporting Code and that is issued by the FIA, it's updated each year and essentially, it sets out the broad rules for motorsport, no matter what the formula. So, it could apply just as equally to say, rallying as Formula One or Formula Two or whatever and it sets out general principles, jurisdiction of the FIA is governing body, course requirements, stewards and circuits, appointment of officials, that sort of thing. So, that's your baseline. What you then have is specific regulations that apply to the different types of motorsport. So, obviously you couldn't have the same rules for Formula One races, you would for a stage of a rally, for example. So, you have specifically to Formula One, you have the technical regulations, obviously, now the technical regulations, govern things, all the technical things as the name suggests, relating to the car. So, you know, mass and dimensions and so on, but then more detailed regulation about things like power units and fuel requirements and electrical systems, gearboxes, suspension, so on. So, technical base, that tends to be car related. You then have sporting regulations and that's kind of the rules of the game, right? It's what you can and can't do over the course of a race weekend, okay? So, coming back to the previous discussion about super licenses, the rule about licenses for teams and drivers and then all the things one would generally think of when you think of a Formula One race, so qualifying and pit stops and what tyres you have to use and safety cars and protests appeals and scrutiny and so on. So, that's the rules during the weekend and then obviously we've got this new limb as we've touched on already, you know, unusual for if you were looking back and thinking 10 years ago, plus financial regulations, it's a whole new area and we've already discussed that but essentially it's restrictions and limitations regarding financial resource applicable to participation and the rules relating to that and then policing and sanction and so on. So, to sort of gather it all up, you've got the general rules and the ISC, you've got technical, sporting and financial and those are the rules in a nutshell. There are peripheral bits about judicial and disciplinary rules and what you can and can't do in front of an international tribunal or the international court of appeal but really that's more process related than the meat of the thing. So, if those are the rules as they exist broadly in terms of how they're created, it's well you start normally from the preceding seasons regulations. So, if you want to know what the regulations are in year-y, a good place to start is year-X because that's what they're going to be based on broadly and then they get changed each year obviously. So, how does that come about? Well, you have advisory committees, specialist advisory committees that deal with each of the three buckets of regulation. You have the financial advisory committee, the technical advisory committee, and the sporting advisory committee. And they're largely comprised of experts in each of those areas as you'd expect. So, you'll see if there's a form in one team, you'd have a representative from often from the regulator and each of those. You'd have your team managers on the sporting side, we were sporting directors and then your technical directors on the technical side and they talk together about what we learned from last year. This did go well, this didn't go well, how would would each week the rules in future. And then, once a consensus is reached and frequently it is not a unanimous consensus, so I think we'd agreed because obviously everyone has their own interests. The advisory committees then make suggestions upwards to the F1 commission. So, the F1 commission is a representative from each team, plus a representative from the FIA, plus a representative from the commercial rights holder. And they talk about the suggestions that have come from each of the advisory committees and they try and come to a consensus as to what will and will not be taken forward into the following seasons regulations. And if you were to read the things I described a minute ago, you'd realise that at some of them go through some of them don't and they're voting thresholds and so on and so forth as to what makes the great. Assuming something gets approved at the F1 commission, it then goes up one more level to the World Motorsport Council, which essentially is an oversight body of the FIA. and what they do is they – goch chi possiblyadomo yn b anegywod yn geros yn castraig esw arm sut fwy wrth gwrs g fırs Ó Gda'n sefyll o bagis nhw hynogi CHA capacitate at piece graeth i… Id周dd ggreatolf larva chorusiveng marat trapped. 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So again another example of former one technology being used for the greater good and using the skills and expertise of the other benefitable. Did you have another hot topic? I did, it's not necessarily so green but I think it's interesting. I just wanted to open up to the floor because it's so rare we get an opportunity to sit down like this and talk about it but for me a hot topic that I find interesting is is F1 audience? F1 audience obviously being quite an imprecise term but what I mean by that is the audience for the sport is changing and has changed so it's got larger which is great for us but it's changed in terms of its demographic so it's also got younger, more women are now interested in it, women and girls which obviously feed into questions of sort of STEM subjects and so on and participation of females and also the research shows us that there's more different socio-economic demographics involved so where previously it was much more obviously male orientated sports, its sort of historic reputation has of a certain age now and people have attributed this to the Netflix effect you have heard that said I'm sure in relation to the sport so I find it interesting because we're at that sort of not crest of a wave but we're certainly on the upwards trajectory of a wave and I wonder how as teams as the governing body as the commercial rights holder we're going to continue to engage that new audience that we've got because they're looking now, they're interested, people are interested and it's expanding and I think it's really important for us not to miss the opportunity to capture it and keep the proposition fresh and interesting and I don't actually have the answer to that and I wondered if anybody else had any thoughts about that? I think just sort of reacting to that when I'll completely agree with it I think one of the important things that we and I'm sure the other teams are doing is basically a massive focus on social media and digital so basically we're doing a lot of work in that area which is obviously that exact same demographic so that I think will help a lot but I think also we've got to make sure we keep the sport lively and interesting and just build on it I think formal and certainly commercially very hot at the moment you know I was saying at the outset about how much time is running on sponsorship that's because basically teams are signing a lot of sponsorship and that's because of this demographic in part I think. Yeah Netflix has been incredibly powerful for that I mean that was really the catalyst I think has changed that demographic but it's only over over the pandemic when people were locked down I think sim racing became quite popular so when the races weren't happening there was the Formula One eSports series and I can't remember the exact name for it but there were drivers there were lots of the actual Formula One drivers were participating in this eSports series so that there was something there was content there for fans to enjoy and that eSports side of the business just exploding ever since it was really working going in that direction pre-pandemic but certainly during the pandemic and post it it's really exploding which is another way of catering to that new demographic and keeping everyone interested and keeping the commercial proposition the top people's minds. It's said quite nicely back to where we started with the financial regulations and keeping the businesses healthy and making sure that the proposition is is interesting I suppose I mean from an astamart in perspective the fact that it's a younger demographic it's a broader demographic it's for example had a big growth stateside you know it's not that I'm going to go there were no races in the USA but now we have Austin we have Miami for the first time this year we've got Vegas coming up and for astamart in and for the broader brand and considering the value of teams and so on that U.S. is a big market so it's it's a really interesting thing the whole audience top it I could talk about it I think for us the U.S. is the biggest sponsorship market and it's also probably the same for astamart in the biggest market for our road cars yes you know that's against the context of quote who used and even probably before former one became as big the U.S. as it now is as we've said Netflix certainly plays a role in that. Yeah record attendances every other weekend and as Oli mentioned earlier 24 races next year for the first time it's it's bigger and better every year. Well on that note I want to thank so much Tim Oli and Jeremy we've spoken it's probably one of the longest podcasts we've had and that's because it's just been so interesting I think even for you guys just to be able to talk to each other about and but you know for our listeners I really want to thank you for sharing your inside experience with each other your expert experience so thank you very much and I hope that we might go and see some cars now maybe. Thank you for listening to episode six of the Sports Law podcast in the next episode I shall be joined by some of my brilliant colleagues from Blackstone Chambers the leading Chambers for Sports Law and we'll be discussing some of the most important cases and legal developments in sport during 2022 and looking forward to the big issues likely to arise in 2023 so join me Nick Demarco KC and my guest to listen to episode five of the Sports Law podcast the Sports Law Review of the Year available to download in early 2023 and don't forget to download the other podcasts from our Sports Law podcast available on Apple Spotify and other platforms so you can catch up on your listening about sports law issues over the seasonal break and if you enjoy the podcast please make sure you do leave us a review or star rating it all helps