McLaren's Paddy Lowe was made an offer he could not refuse

Set to join Mercedes in 2014, Paddy Lowe was apparently made an offer he could not refuse, according to McLaren’s Managing Director, Jonathan Neale, who knew of his thoughts about leaving eight weeks ago. He also said that the reason Lowe might have quit is the ‘telephone number salary’ he received.

“In the market place at the moment, if you’ve a team and you want to go out and buy some short-term know-how then you can pay telephone number salaries, if that’s what your business model is. From time to time we have all done it. It’s not unique to any one particular team. But we will certainly miss Paddy, he has been with us a long period of time. He’s been here 19 years, and I’ve personally worked with him for 12. He is a great guy and on a personal level I’m sorry to see him go and do something else.”

The former Technical Director is currently put on ‘gardening leave’ by McLaren’s working-based team to prevent transfer of know-how of their 2014 car.

(Source: SkySports)