#do i get bonus points for the kelly piquet reference

[lightningmickqueen]

Wait who is Ann Neal?

tw for grooming!!

ok anon i fully typed this up in the notes app. please keep in mind this is an opinion based off years of watching f1 and we don't know either of them personally but also it's fucking weird

Ann Neal is Mark Webber’s wife/manager/questionable person. Almost everything I’m going to talk about next is from Mark’s book Aussie Grit which everyone should read

She is 17 years older than Mark (as per the public info on their company’s registration), which maybe wouldn’t be a problem if they started dating at their current ages but they first met and got together when Mark was 17. She was also his manager during the early part of his career. more below the cut now!!

In his book Mark talks about how their relationship went from professional to personal during the FIRST trip to Europe. Please keep in mind this was his FIRST attempt to grow his career, his first time away from home, and he knew nobody but her, his manager, who is like 17 years older than him and should know better. 

Like this woman was in a position of power, had his career in his hands, and was on a separate continent where literally the only person he knows is her. 

Mark said in his book that even his mum wasn’t happy about it, and also that Ann’s kid views Mark as a big brother…like ok

In Aussie Grit Mark literally wrote Ann’s first impression of him. Please keep in mind he was SEVENTEEN (17) and she was 34. 

“I liked how bold and cheeky he was, and how mature he seemed. When I asked someone how old he was, I was shocked when they said 17 - he was confident beyond his years.”

LIKE?? The fact she went from thinking and saying this about a 17 year old to becoming his manager and then very quickly starting to hook up with him to having a relationship is CRAZY. She also apparently remembers what he was wearing that day - like girl why were you looking so hard?!?!

They moved to England then and didn’t know anyone else and became codependent and Mark has said she was the only one, other than himself, who believed that his F1 dream could happen. It’s very cute in that it obviously ended up happening, but please keep in mind that this is still his manager and a woman almost two decades older than him.

Mark said his parents’ weren’t happy with the relationship, and at one point he went back to Australia for a break (from racing and a temporary break up with Ann because it got too serious too fast) and got a new management company and started dating someone else. Ann wasn’t happy, and Mark said she “wasn’t prepared to hang around and watch young love undermine all we’d worked so hard for”

Like. This is now not just his former manager, but also his EX GIRLFRIEND. He’s got a new girlfriend now and a new management and Mark then decided his personal life was now affecting his driving, so he broke up with the two newbies and went back to Ann because Ann wasn’t happy.

So six months after the break up and Mark groveling, saying “I want to come home,” Mark left Australia and moved back in with Ann and her son in England. Like at this point he was what? 20? And he’s basically settled down for life with a much older woman and her kid (sound familiar). 

Obviously I do not know Ann or Mark but the way this reads to me and probably anyone who’s read the book is that she was looking out for herself and herself only. She had an opportunity and she took it while manipulating an 18/19 year old man who did not know any better and whose career she held in her hands!!! LIKE. 

Anyway here are some pics of her looking old as fuck . Credit to motorsport images for keeping pics up for 50 million years so we can always find the good shit

ann with mark in october 1996. mark was 20, she’s 37

ann with mark's dad in 2004

ann with mark and the fam in 2006 - mark's 30th birthday. ann is 47

july 2009 - mark was 33, ann was 50

nov 2010 - mark was 34

in 2018 - mark was 36/37 (i forgot what month this was taken)

thank u to @brakingpoint and @multi-twentyone for their assistance in this research project