<div align="justify">The definitive departure of Ron Dennis from McLaren, announced on Friday, marks the end of an era for the Formula One team and a farewell to another of the sport's towering figures of yesteryear.<br /><br />News that would once have reverberated like a seismic shock through the grand prix paddock now sounds more like an echo from the past, however.<br /><br />Formula One has undergone a major shift since Dennis commanded the heights as an uncompromising hands-on leader, forging the team in his own image and achieving both unprecedented success and scandal.<br /><br />The sport's 86-year-old commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone went last January, sidelined by new U S-based owners Liberty Media who have since set about transforming the landscape.<br /><br />Before him, long-serving Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo had been ousted from the most glamorous team on the grid and Max Mosley replaced at the helm of the governing International Automobile Federation.<br /><br />Of the big beasts of old, only Frank Williams, the 75-year-old founder of his eponymous team, remains. He is in poor health and daughter Claire is calling the shots as his deputy.<br /><br />McLaren, the second-most successful team after Ferrari, have meanwhile plumbed the depths –– winless since 2012 and last in the current championship.<br /><br />The Honda partnership championed by Dennis, hoping to revive the glory years of the 1980s, has been a dismal failure and is now close to divorce.<br /><br />Dennis, who turned 70 on June 1, had already been relieved of his role at the team last November when fellow shareholders –– Bahrain's Mumtalakat Holding Company and Saudi-born businessman Mansour Ojjeh –– brought in American marketing expert Zak Brown.<br /><br />On Friday, McLaren announced Dennis was selling his stake in both McLaren Automotive, the profitable sports car company that was his brainchild, and also in McLaren Technology Group.<br /><br />"It represents a fitting end to my time at McLaren, and will enable me to focus on my other interests," he said in a statement.<br /><br />"I have always said that my 37 years at woking should be considered asa chapter in the McLaren book, and I wish McLaren every success as it takes the story forward."<br /><br />Obsessive perfectionism <br /><br />Dennis, who started out as a mechanic with Cooper in 1966, joined McLaren in 1980 when he took over the team founded by the late New Zealander Bruce McLaren.<br /><br />McLaren had already won championships with Brazilian Emerson Fittipaldi in 1974 and James Hunt in 1976 but a golden era ensued –– even if Dennis and the team acquired a grey image and a reputation for perfectionism bordering on the obsessive.<br /><br />A man who could be both hugely generous and short on sympathy, a pillar of the sport with sometimes petty fixations, his sometimes convoluted style of speech led to the coining of the term "Ronspeak".<br /><br />But with multiple champions Austrian Niki Lauda, Frenchman Alain Prost and Brazilian Ayrton Senna, he made McLaren the team to beat in the 1980s and early 1990s.<br /><br />The fraught and fiery Senna/Prost pairing provided Formula One with some of its most memorable and controversial moments as well as most dominant with McLaren winning 15 of 16 races in 1988.<br /><br />Finland's double world champion Mika Hakkinen and Britain's Lewis Hamilton, a Dennis protege, won more in the late 1990s and 2008 as McLaren became the second most successful team after Ferrari, with 20 world championships and 182 wins.<br /><br />"I would not be here if this guy had not noticed me when I was 10, and actually taken notice," Hamilton said of Dennis after moving to Mercedes.<br /><br />McLaren were fined a record $100 million by the FIA and stripped of all their constructors' points in 2007 after being found guilty of possessing a 780-page dossier of confidential Ferrari data, in one of the sport's biggest scandals.<br /><br />Dennis stepped down as principal in 2009, returning as group chief executive in 2014. But an attempt to buy out the other shareholders foundered and now he is the seller. <br /></div>
<div align="justify">The definitive departure of Ron Dennis from McLaren, announced on Friday, marks the end of an era for the Formula One team and a farewell to another of the sport's towering figures of yesteryear.<br /><br />News that would once have reverberated like a seismic shock through the grand prix paddock now sounds more like an echo from the past, however.<br /><br />Formula One has undergone a major shift since Dennis commanded the heights as an uncompromising hands-on leader, forging the team in his own image and achieving both unprecedented success and scandal.<br /><br />The sport's 86-year-old commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone went last January, sidelined by new U S-based owners Liberty Media who have since set about transforming the landscape.<br /><br />Before him, long-serving Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo had been ousted from the most glamorous team on the grid and Max Mosley replaced at the helm of the governing International Automobile Federation.<br /><br />Of the big beasts of old, only Frank Williams, the 75-year-old founder of his eponymous team, remains. He is in poor health and daughter Claire is calling the shots as his deputy.<br /><br />McLaren, the second-most successful team after Ferrari, have meanwhile plumbed the depths –– winless since 2012 and last in the current championship.<br /><br />The Honda partnership championed by Dennis, hoping to revive the glory years of the 1980s, has been a dismal failure and is now close to divorce.<br /><br />Dennis, who turned 70 on June 1, had already been relieved of his role at the team last November when fellow shareholders –– Bahrain's Mumtalakat Holding Company and Saudi-born businessman Mansour Ojjeh –– brought in American marketing expert Zak Brown.<br /><br />On Friday, McLaren announced Dennis was selling his stake in both McLaren Automotive, the profitable sports car company that was his brainchild, and also in McLaren Technology Group.<br /><br />"It represents a fitting end to my time at McLaren, and will enable me to focus on my other interests," he said in a statement.<br /><br />"I have always said that my 37 years at woking should be considered asa chapter in the McLaren book, and I wish McLaren every success as it takes the story forward."<br /><br />Obsessive perfectionism <br /><br />Dennis, who started out as a mechanic with Cooper in 1966, joined McLaren in 1980 when he took over the team founded by the late New Zealander Bruce McLaren.<br /><br />McLaren had already won championships with Brazilian Emerson Fittipaldi in 1974 and James Hunt in 1976 but a golden era ensued –– even if Dennis and the team acquired a grey image and a reputation for perfectionism bordering on the obsessive.<br /><br />A man who could be both hugely generous and short on sympathy, a pillar of the sport with sometimes petty fixations, his sometimes convoluted style of speech led to the coining of the term "Ronspeak".<br /><br />But with multiple champions Austrian Niki Lauda, Frenchman Alain Prost and Brazilian Ayrton Senna, he made McLaren the team to beat in the 1980s and early 1990s.<br /><br />The fraught and fiery Senna/Prost pairing provided Formula One with some of its most memorable and controversial moments as well as most dominant with McLaren winning 15 of 16 races in 1988.<br /><br />Finland's double world champion Mika Hakkinen and Britain's Lewis Hamilton, a Dennis protege, won more in the late 1990s and 2008 as McLaren became the second most successful team after Ferrari, with 20 world championships and 182 wins.<br /><br />"I would not be here if this guy had not noticed me when I was 10, and actually taken notice," Hamilton said of Dennis after moving to Mercedes.<br /><br />McLaren were fined a record $100 million by the FIA and stripped of all their constructors' points in 2007 after being found guilty of possessing a 780-page dossier of confidential Ferrari data, in one of the sport's biggest scandals.<br /><br />Dennis stepped down as principal in 2009, returning as group chief executive in 2014. But an attempt to buy out the other shareholders foundered and now he is the seller. <br /></div>