Ferrari has been called in front of the World Motorsport Council (WMSC) for their actions at the German GP. For those that can't remember, or need refreshing, Ferrari ordered Felipe Massa to let Fernando Alonso pass. That is the short version. In reality there were the unforgettable radio messages that FOM broadcasted to the world to allow us all to hear what exactly was happening at Ferrari. Never have I heard an engineer so apologetic on the radio. Rob Smedley and Felipe Massa have such a close relationship it must have been hard for him to order his driver to pull over for a team mate.
Amongst the fans there was outcry at Ferrari's tactics but it is important to keep a level head in the matter. We all know that team orders exist in the sport but they are rarely so blatant as they were in Hungary. The anger amongst fans was probably more to do with how Ferrari treated the fans of the sport. We are not a stupid group of people but yet we were treated as such.
What was interesting to me was the reason given by Ferrari over the radio: Fernando is faster. Fernando was indeed faster over the weekend but I don't think he was faster within the race. If Fernando was noticeably faster than Felipe during the race then surely this would show in his sector times. As far as I could see Felipe was doing a good job on race day of matching Fernando's sector times.
Was Ferrari wrong to tell Massa to pull over? Yes and no. Yes, Fernando stands a better chance of winning the title for both Ferrari and himself. No, because team orders are banned in F1. My issue was with how they conducted the swap. Ferrari may have forgotten that their radio is no longer encrypted meaning that any and all radio transmissions can be broadcasted. Even so, I believe they could have used a better reason for swapping their drivers.
A side story of this sorry saga is the fact that this is the third time a team with Fernando as a driver has appeared before the WMSC within the last 4 years. McLaren were the first to be hauled in front of the WMSC in 2007 for the cheating scandal. Fernando was granted immunity for providing the WMSC with evidence of McLaren's apparent cheating. McLaren lost all their constructor points for that season and were fined $100milion. Next in line was Renault in 2009. Who can forget the now infamous Nelson Piquet crash in Singapore that handed Fernando the win? The fact that a driver was told to crash on purpose in order to benefit his team mate seemed like something from a Hollywood blockbuster. Sadly this wasn't a Hollywood blockbuster it was real life. Flavio Briatore was handed a lifetime ban from the sport (this has since been overturned) and Pat Symonds left Renault. Now Ferrari has been called in front of the WMSC for deploying team orders.
Does trouble follow Fernando or is he one of the instigators of the trouble? If I were a team manager I would be dubious about hiring Fernando as a driver. This is in spite of him being one of the great drivers in recent history. One thing is for sure (geddit?) the name Fernando Alonso will go down in history, but will it be for all the right reasons.
Great post (as always) - as you say, team orders have always been in F1 (Silverstone '08 or Germany '08 with "A-Mill-Ton" getting past Heikki for example) but it was the way the fans were treated like idiots by Ferrari...you could see Rob Smedley biting his tongue when he was interviewed after the race.
ReplyDeleteI think the worst that will happen will be Ferrari loosing their points from the race and a suspended penalty..