It wasn’t me!
After a day long hearing, McLaren has been found guilty and have been issued with a number of factors which will affect their integrity within the sport and have overshadowed what has been one of the best seasons for many a year.
McLaren have been docked of all of their constructors points, effectively making Ferrari the Constructors Champions by default as well as being fined £50 million for their possession of the 780 page Ferrari 2007 dossier. However both drivers Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton will keep their drivers points, keeping the title race alive and well. Also McLaren’s car’s for next season will be scrutinised to detect if there are any traces of Ferrari’s development used for performance reasons, something which I think would be difficult to trace and justify.
Another interesting point is that Ferrari have been in talks with Ross Brawn it seems on his return to the Prancing Horse outfit but as to what capacity it is unknown.
Going back though to the Spygate chapter not much has been mentioned about Ferrari’s involvement - It was alleged that one of their chief senior engineers Nigel Stepney passed on the documents to McLaren’s chief designer, Mike Coughlan, both of whom deny such involvement and both has since been sacked from their respective companies.
While this may or may not have happened the fact is that Ferrari’s technical documents were found in McLaren’s possession and the real question is how much, if any of this information was used to enhance McLaren’s F1 cars.
I personally think that the FIA should have acted upon this earlier as a few months ago the FIA deemed McLaren as guilty yet issued no punishment, which makes no sense. How can someone be guilty and escape punishment, especially after creating such a scene over it? Now they have found more evidence and a possible email trail between Mike Cloughlan, Fernando Alonso and test driver Pedro de la Rosa they had to act if they wanted to or not.
This row will go on I’m sure into next season but it has overshadowed a fantastic season thus far with plenty of passion and some superb driving skills and if anything, it has got the general public more aware of the sport. If it will hurt the sport in the future we would have to wait and see. In my opinion business will return to normal where the fight for the Drivers Championship looks more and more like a 2 horse race, ironically to the drivers of the team that have been scrutinised and punished thus far, McLaren.
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Snige66 says:
Wow! That is a pretty big points dock! ALL OF THEM?!! I cant imagine their sponsors will be too happy, but then any publicity……
I doubt anything on this years car ( or next ) would have been Ferrari by design. Mclaren may have been stupid with this, but copying a desgin that Ferrari could easily prove was theirs just would not be contemplated imo. All the papers would have used for would be to see what Ferrrai were upto and to see where they thought the strict design guidelines were open to a bit of bending. Then Mclaren would try a design based on that.
This is a bad thing, but it’s nothing that no-one tried to do before. No way, with all the money involved that nothing like this has gone on before. This has just been the biggest example, and that has just happened to have been exposed. Every team tries to get the edge by some incredible ways. This time it’s just gone a wee bit far.
I’m glad the drivers points have been kept. As much as a team is a team and drivers make the points, both Lewis and Alonso are still just pawns in a giant money making machine. Ron Dennis really doesn’t care which of his drivers win, or even how to a certain extent. It’s all about satisfying sponsors, and getting constructor points. How they get them and by who just doesn’t figure in his mind. Yes he very close to Lewis, but I’m sorry to say, in the end it was all about seeing talent, and picking it up early and at a cheap price. It just so happens Lewis has done a bloody brilliant job for them and Ron I’m sure like him more than any other driver he’s had.
But how much damage has this done to them? Well to a non fan, quite a large amount. But to everyone else, I think they could see past the hype and see that, it was the work of a few individuals and that the design of the Mclaren F1 car is still very much Ferrari free.
I still think the pathetic US race where the tyres were not up to the job did more damage than this. All that power between everyone involved was without joy.
This will be no doubt be talked about till the season closes, but come next year it’ll be mention on the first race, and that’s it. Something else will no doubt takes it’s place
Good job Walking for the breaking news
Sep 13, 2007, 2:42 pmNeoBlade says:
Hehe it was me that wrote it as Elton is on a break ^_^
Yeah I believe all constructors points are deducted which his a huge blow. Granted it’s nothing like the farce that was the US GP where the tyres were not up to spec, but this is quite a serious allegation in terms of spying (it happens anyway) so an example had to be made and the right one was in terms of not penalising the drivers but the team itself.
Lets hope it doesn’t get out of hand though in the future and lessons are learnt.
Sep 13, 2007, 6:13 pm