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If the platform for the interview was utterly predictable, its timing certainly was extraordinary: during the very week that Formula 1 board member Sir Martin Sorrell faced shareholder criticism over his £70million pay packet and lack of concrete succession at WPP, the global advertising/PR agency started by the 71-year-old, the series' official website published a "frank and enlightening discussion" with the "plainspoken" Brit.
The full text can be accessed here, but, where various media outlets were bullish about Sorrell's responses closer scrutiny suggests that not only are his comments arguably designed to deflect attention from WPP's recent media coverage - but that, rather than provide a road map for F1's future, hard facts in many ways do not support his views.
For example, he states that F1 CEO Bernie Ecclestone, 86 years old this year, "is somebody who is unique - and this will get me into trouble - by definition cannot be replaced." The fact of the matter is that one of humankind's characteristics is that every member is as unique as the next individual.
