Teams drop legal overture against F1 owners as part of NASCAR lawsuit

Matt Weaver

Teams drop legal overture against F1 owners as part of NASCAR lawsuit image

Rusty Jarrett | NKP for Ford Performance

Rusty Jarrett | NKP for Ford Performance

23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports has motioned to dismiss the legal action they filed against Formula 1 owning Liberty Media in April regarding financial documents it sought as part of its federal antitrust lawsuit against NASCAR.

The lawsuit, which resulted in a countersuit from NASCAR against the two teams, is currently in the discovery phase in advance of a trial scheduled for Monday December 1 of this year.

23XI and Front Row requests documents regarding the Concorde Agreement that oversees the competition and financial structure of F1. When Liberty Media refused on the legal merits, citing the proprietary nature of the agreement, the teams pursued the information through a subpoena request through the Federal District Court of Colorado.

"Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(1)(A)(ii), Movants 2311 Racing LLC d/b/a 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports, Inc. hereby voluntarily dismiss this action against Respondent Liberty Media Corporation with all parties to pay their own attorneys’ fees and costs incurred in connection with this action."

What this means isn’t clear as the legal document linked below does not specify but the teams either settled with Liberty Media or dropped the case outright. 23XI and Front Row also have similar legal inquiries for competition and financial documents from IndyCar, the NFL, NHL and NBA.

NASCAR and the two teams will meet in a federal appeals court on Friday regarding the Sanctioning Body appealing a federal district court's injunction that awarded charter status to the teams this season.

The appeal focuses on whether NASCAR should be forced to pay financial obligations to 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports for charters they didn't agree to before suing the Sanctioning Body in the first place.

Matt Weaver

Matt Weaver is a former dirt racer turned motorsports journalist. He can typically be found perched on a concrete wall at a local short track on Saturday nights and within world-class media centers on Sunday afternoons. There isn’t any kind of racing he hasn’t covered over the past decade. He drives a 2003 Chevrolet Silverado with over 510,000 miles on it. Despite carrying him to racing trips across both coasts and two countries, it hasn’t died yet.