Fabiana Flosi is a Brazilian lawyer-turned-businesswoman who has been married to former Formula 1 boss Bernie Ecclestone since 2012. She’s 46 years younger than her husband, the mother of their son, Ace, and someone who had her own career in motorsport marketing long before anyone started calling her “Bernie’s wife.”
Most articles about her stop at the basics: who she married, how old she is, maybe a line about their age gap. But there’s a lot more to her story, from the career she built before Bernie, to a kidnapping that shook her family, to the record-breaking mansion she bought in Portugal earlier this year.
Let’s go through it properly.
Who Is Fabiana Flosi?
Fabiana Flosi was born in Brazil in 1976. Long before she was known as Bernie Ecclestone’s wife, she’d already built a career for herself in motorsport. She worked in marketing for the Brazilian Grand Prix at Interlagos, and by most accounts, she was good at it. Some reports describe her as vice president of marketing for the event before she and Bernie ever met.
That’s worth sitting with for a second. She wasn’t someone who married into the racing world and picked up an interest along the way. She was already in it, doing real work, years before Bernie Ecclestone entered the picture. In my experience, that background tends to shape how a person carries themselves later on, and it’s easy to see that in how Fabiana handles her public life today. It’s the kind of specific detail people love digging into, similar to how readers get curious about Chase Stokes’ height or other small facts that round out a full picture of someone.
How Fabiana Flosi and Bernie Ecclestone Met
The two met in 2009, at a World Motor Sport Council meeting in Brazil. Fabiana was there working, representing the Brazilian Grand Prix’s marketing interests. Bernie was there because, well, he was Bernie — running Formula 1 and doing what he’d done for decades.
At the time, Bernie was divorcing his second wife, Croatian model Slavica Radić, after nearly 25 years of marriage. Fabiana, for her part, was reportedly in a relationship with a paediatrician before things with Bernie developed. Their connection built slowly rather than exploding into headlines right away, which honestly says a lot about how private both of them tried to keep things in the early days.
The Wedding in Switzerland
Bernie and Fabiana got married in August 2012 at his chalet, Le Lion, in the Swiss resort town of Gstaad. It was a private ceremony, small and quiet, nothing like the media circus you might expect from a couple this high-profile.
That’s fairly consistent with how Fabiana has approached her public life ever since. She’s not someone chasing attention. When she does end up in the news, it’s usually because of something specific — a family milestone, a business move — not because she’s courting the spotlight for its own sake.
The 46-Year Age Gap and Their Son, Ace
Let’s just address it directly, because everyone asks: Fabiana Flosi is 46 years younger than Bernie Ecclestone. Bernie was born in 1930, in a small village in Suffolk, England. Fabiana was born almost half a century later, in Brazil. It’s the single most-searched fact about her, and honestly, it’s understandable why people are curious.
In April 2020, the couple announced they were expecting a baby, which made Bernie a father again at 89. Reaction online was mixed, to put it politely. Bernie’s own response was typically blunt — he said he didn’t really understand what all the fuss was about. Their son, Ace, was born that July in São Paulo. Fabiana has said the birth itself was quick, and Bernie has spoken warmly about becoming a father again at his age.
Parenting with a 65-year age gap between father and son isn’t something most families deal with, and Fabiana has spoken about the balancing act it involves. In one interview, she described how she and Bernie split parenting duties as a team, with Bernie explaining rules to Ace calmly while she tends to be the stricter one. They’ve also talked about keeping screen time limited, reportedly to one day a week. It’s a small, human detail that makes their family feel a lot more relatable than the headlines suggest — not unlike how readers enjoy learning small, specific things about other public figures, like Nicki Minaj’s height.
The 2016 Kidnapping of Her Mother
This is a part of Fabiana’s story that a lot of articles skip over entirely, but it’s a significant one. In July 2016, Fabiana’s mother, Aparecida Schunck, was kidnapped from her home in São Paulo. The kidnappers demanded a ransom reported at around 120 million reais, or roughly $37 million (about £28 million) — at the time, described as one of the largest ransom demands in Brazilian history.
Schunck was held for over a week before police rescued her in a night raid, and according to officials, no ransom was actually paid. A helicopter pilot who had worked for the Ecclestone family was later arrested as the alleged mastermind behind the plot. It’s a genuinely frightening episode, and it’s a reminder that the wealth and profile that come with being married to someone like Bernie Ecclestone come with real risks attached, not just headlines about mansions and yachts.
What Fabiana Flosi Is Doing Now
These days, Bernie has stepped well back from the day-to-day of Formula 1. He left his advisory role with Liberty Media back in 2020, and in the past couple of years, the couple has been quietly simplifying their lifestyle. In 2025, Bernie sold his private collection of 69 Grand Prix cars, reportedly worth around £500 million, to Red Bull co-owner Mark Mateschitz. He also sold his superyacht, Petara, named after his daughters Petra and Tamara. Fabiana explained the reasoning simply: they only used the boat about eight days a year, so there wasn’t much point keeping it.
Then, in early 2026, Fabiana made headlines on her own terms. She bought a mansion in Quinta da Marinha, Cascais, one of Portugal’s most exclusive addresses, for a reported €40 million (around £35 million) — believed to be the largest private home sale in Portuguese history. The property spans roughly 2,000 square metres with ocean views, a tennis court, and a private lift, and she bought it from businessman Marco Galinha after around six months of negotiations. It’s the kind of purchase that gets people searching, the same way they search for details behind other public figures’ lives, including profiles like Elaine Starchuk.
Her Ties to Motorsport Didn’t Disappear
It would be easy to reduce Fabiana to “Bernie’s wife,” but that misses a big part of who she is. She’s kept her connections to the racing world she came up in. Reports around the 2025 F1 season suggested Fabiana and Bernie played a part in helping Brazilian driver Gabriel Bortoleto land a seat with Audi-Sauber, with Fabiana reportedly acknowledging that she and Bernie had “opened some doors” for him through their contacts in Brazil’s close-knit motorsport community.
That’s a small but telling detail. She’s not just attending races as a spouse. She has relationships and credibility in that world that go back to before she ever met Bernie.
How the Ecclestone Family Has Adjusted
Blended families are rarely simple, especially when there’s this much money and public attention involved. When Fabiana and Bernie’s relationship became public, his daughters Tamara and Petra were, understandably, protective of their mother, Slavica. That’s a normal reaction, and it would have been strange if it hadn’t happened.
Over time, though, the family does seem to have found some balance. Tamara has posted birthday tributes to Bernie that include warm language about him as a father, and family photos are showing Fabiana alongside Bernie’s children and grandchildren. None of that erases the early tension, but it does suggest the family worked through it rather than staying stuck there.
Final Thoughts
Fabiana Flosi isn’t the kind of person who chases headlines. She’s a lawyer by training, someone who built a career in motorsport marketing on her own before she ever met Bernie Ecclestone, and a mother who’s been open about the day-to-day work of parenting across a massive age gap. She’s also lived through something genuinely frightening with her mother’s kidnapping, and come out the other side still building a life on her own terms, most recently with a record-breaking property purchase in Portugal.
There’s a version of this story that reduces her to a punchline about age gaps and money. The real one is a lot more layered than that — and, honestly, a lot more interesting.
FAQs
How old is Fabiana Flosi, and how much younger is she than Bernie Ecclestone?
Fabiana Flosi was born in 1976, which puts her in her late 40s. She’s 46 years younger than Bernie Ecclestone, who was born in 1930.
How did Fabiana Flosi meet Bernie Ecclestone?
They met in 2009 at a World Motor Sport Council meeting in Brazil, where Fabiana was working in marketing for the Brazilian Grand Prix.
Does Fabiana Flosi have children?
Yes. She and Bernie share a son, Ace, born in July 2020. Fabiana is also a stepmother to Bernie’s three daughters from previous relationships: Deborah, Tamara, and Petra.
What does Fabiana Flosi do now?
She stays connected to the motorsport world she came from, manages family assets including a recently purchased €40 million mansion in Portugal, and is raising Ace alongside Bernie.
Was Fabiana Flosi’s mother really kidnapped?
Yes. In July 2016, her mother, Aparecida Schunck, was abducted in São Paulo and held for over a week before being rescued by police. No ransom was reportedly paid.
