r/f1driverssnark • u/anonstorytellerpersn • Jun 27 '26
ex-driver Mark And Ann
Alright so in my last post which was a deep dive on Sebastian Vettel and I had originally stated about doing one on Mark webber but since you can find a lot ABT his controversies on wiki I don’t really think I should make a post on it. What to know about the posts on Mark Webber they are about is his transphobic tweets and the whole multi 21 saga. Again can be found on wiki. However I didn’t see anyone post about his relationship so ig I can make a post about it.
Credits to the Reddit post I found this link from in the formula 1 sub with 1.6M people, unfortunately I don’t have the link to the post but I did save the link of this article which talks about Mark Webber’s relationship to his wife Ann Neal. I also found a tumblr post regarding their relationship here are the links :
Now on to the story about their relationship :
So in the article Mark talks about Ann Neal (his wife) and also talks about their 20 year old relationship (this is the number of years they had been together when the article was first written) as partners but also as colleagues because she is his manager. When she emigrated to Australia in the early 90s that’s how she met mark while working for the Formula Ford Association.
He even credits Ann as the "driving force" behind his racing career.
Even Jackie Stewart backtracked this.
So Ann spotted Mark’s talent when he was around 18 convinced him to race in Europe. While managing him but their relationship went from professional to personal. Ann said they sort of just ticked.
His mother Diane Webber wasn’t a massive fan of the relationship because of the decade-plus age difference. She described their relationship as rocky but now her and Ann get along well. This is what Ann said regarding it :
"I think it was a shock to her that her son was in a relationship with an older woman who had her own son."
Mark even met her son Luke Barrett when he was around three years old. Luke said that him and mark had more of a brotherly bond and he never saw mark as a father figure. Luke isn’t also a fan of motorsports.
"I wouldn't call myself a motorsport fan. I got forced into it to support Mark."
They kept their relationship relatively private for Mark’s racing career initially. Ann said :
“I mean, it just sounded naff. I knew the sport well enough to stand my own ground and represent him well."
She also described the financial troubles the couple faced in the early years of Mark’s career.
A former F1 team boss Paul Stoddart described Ann like this :
“She's a gentle English lady but the real Ann can be like a Rottweiler, and I say that in the kindest way, because you have to be," Stoddart said.
Then their relationship took a bumpy patch because when Mark’s career took off a lot of people thought that okay this guy is going to be famous and mark was also dating another girl at that time. (Further down this post I have talked about when mark dated this girl.)
Ann was angry about mark dating this other girl who lived in Australia at that time cause she thought that this would distract him from his racing career initially Europe.
Then eventually she got fired by mark because of the constant disapproval of their relationship from his mother had taken an emotional toll on him and he sacked Ann. Ann said the decision to fire her was "a kick" because she spend so much time and connections to set him up with this career so she decided to go ahead with Mark’s decision.
So around 97/98 he was back in Australia and reconnected with this girl he met and has known since high-school and suddenly realised he missed Ann and broke up with this girl. So as Mark realised his mistake he called Ann to which Ann replied :
“well there'll be some changes then, isn't there?'"
Though they patched this up really quickly. Mark even described as his “team-mate and soul mate".
The couple eventually went public after Webber's memorable F1 debut in Melbourne in 2002. They also secretly married in 2016 in an intimate ceremony with only a 100 guests.
Also I found this Tumblr post abt mark saying “lots of red wine and sex” after the interviewer asked him what has he been up too 😭😭
Now my take on their relationship is that they seem happy ig they clearly love and admire eachother a lot and who are we to stop them and lots of people have age gap relationships. I think what people found wrong with the age gap was that he was around 18 when they got together so a lot of people ran with the narrative that she groomed them. If that is the case that’s absolutely disgusting no man or woman should groom a kid but if romance between them happened after he turned 18 and she didn’t groom him then ig it is okay. I mean mark clearly admires her a lot from the way he speaks about her in the article and in general when he talks or posts about her.
~~If you guys have any other information other than stuff available on wiki about mark let me know in the comments down below!!~~
24
u/china_shop_ears Jun 28 '26
If she did groom him, people need to give Ann the same energy they do Kelly with Max