Hamilton and Trulli Behind the safety car in Australia (Trulli in front). Trulli ****s up and goes completely off the track, then rejoins behind Hamilton This is all ok cos although overtaking not allowed, if the other car leaves the circuit you can keep your place. Hamilton on radio to team "should I let Trulli past or not?" Team say "Yes, let him past" LH slows and moves over to let JT past McLaren on radio to LH "Actually no. Don't let him past" LH "But I just did. Should I overtake him now?" McL "No. Stay where you are" The race finishes with JT 3rd and LH 4th. After the race JT, and LH are summoned to the stewards Steward to LH: "Did you let JT past?" LH "No. He overtook me." Stewards give JT a 25 sec penalty for overtaking behind safety car. In Malaysia the stewards have had time to listen to the radio transmissions and ask to se LH again: Steward: "Did you let JT past?" LH "No" Steward "please listen to this recording" LH "Gulp!" McLaren fired Dave Ryan as he accompanied Lewis to the Stewards meetings and 'misled' Lewis into lying.
McLaren lesson #1 for a racers: Lying is OK to Stewards or Race Officials as long as you have a good lawyer.
Another victory for the "scapegoat" defense. FIA thinks it'd be "cool" to have a late race, to maximize euro broadcast profits. After the race, the stewards are tired, it's late, they want to get to the party, they make a quickie decision. Four days later, they realized that the "irrelevant" radio transmissions they'd skipped were actually important, and had to change their decision. Stewards and FIA are embarrassed. Somebody must pay. But not, of course, the dweebs who put the race too late in the day in the first place, or the stewards who didn't do the job right the first time. The stewards get to blame the ousted schlebb. Their butts are covered. Dennis is gone, FIA is happy. "Just be more careful next time!" -- Aka, don't be around when we screw up, or you'll have to dump somebody else off the staff. (Does Ryan weigh the same as a duck?) (He has to push the pram-a-lot.) Yep. Camelot *is* a very silly place. Cue the calliope music. News flash: FIA blames swine flu on Porky the Pig. Tha-tha-tha-that's all folks!
+1,000 Let's move forward...I expect to see improved cars from 3 of the 'big 4' teams and better results from BMW Sauber in Barcelona. Now that the clouds of uncertainty has been removed, I hope to see Ferrari get their stuff together and at least become competitive with the front of the grid.
You forgot the part where LH said he let Trulli past in an interview directly following the race. This was at the core of the controversy, because it indisputably proved that McLaren was being dishonest. It probably also exonerated Hamilton because it doesn't seem logical that he would change his story on his own doing, considering the original was captured on video.
+1 He was instructed by his boss to "mislead" the stewards - A stupid mistake I'm sure he'll never make again.
What would a little team, which has a lot more to gain from a few points, look at this and say "hey, it's worth the risk to lie to the stewards and get some points.... look at what happened to McLaren... nothing." McLaren tried to cheat their way onto the podium. They lied to do it. If you can get away with it, it shakes the fundimentals of the entire system. I'm not sure a suspended race ban is really an effective deterance from others to try.
So you mean, Slappy happy Max and Bernie don't make the sport look a fundamental joke. Fact Bernie lied this year when he said he had the teams backing for a medals system. Max back tracked when he was caught out by his own rules changing rules at a late stage, then to compound the issue, they couldn't decide whether cars are legal to race (diffusers), Imagine this was a safety issue, also flexiable back wings (Toyota) ..And thats for starters this year. The fundamental issue was Max had a raging hard on for RD for as long as I can remember, with him gone like the rest that stand up to him, and Whitmarsh bending over at Max's alter, I hope some sort of service will be resumed, without the interference of the FIA.
True. But they still should have penalized Hamilton personally by 10 points or so for being such a lying ******bag. That would have just spiced up the show a bit without killing it.
+1 McLaren / LH wanted to take away a point from Trulli then the punishment sould have come in the same token. Clearly a 3 race ban would have affected the show but IMO it's a joke to let them go so lightly simply because Whitmarsh apologized so profusely. There are sanctions in between and decking WC and DC points would have been appropriate. Anyway, let's get over this and continue with what has been a great start of the season.
He lost 6 so do you mean 16! overall. His ego and his teams his ego has taken a good battering, RD and Ryan the sacrificial lamb gone. Last time it cost 100 mil, thats what it can cost if you don't grovel at the Max alter. And by Max's own words, it's not the money that hurts, as with the case as with his slap my a$$ sleaze, it's his rep, there all laughing behind my back, when I go in a restaurant....
I can't be bothered to back this up, but ineffect the stewards must have initially thought Trulli lied otherwise they wouldn't have penalized him would they, so why wasn't treated with the same uproar, It was only when it was pointed out to them by speed TV I think! that LH had told them the real truth when he got out of the car.. read the DGS post, you get the idea. Mclaren made a stupid mistake trying to pull a fast one in the confusion of the stewards own failings, so therefore Mclaren are there own worse enemy in this case.
So now you managed to blame the Stewarts for Hamilton lying. That is like blaming the traffic cop for you speeding and getting a ticket. If he did it once, he will do it again its just a matter of time.
The logic is he has probably lied before, did again and will again. This is not something new I would imagine. No matter though, Mclaren escaped unharmed for the most part and if this had been Ferrari the uproar would be defeaning over such a light sentence. The more I think about it this matter is a joke. The world champion can lie at the behest of the team and suffers virtually nothing(ok a bad press conference), and the team is in contention with a car rapidly improving and lost virtually no points. They fired one man and the team principle resigned as token gesture. Sure they are repentant. I dont buy it. Its very very sad actually and I hope Mclaren suffer very very bad luck from now on. They have made a joke of this sport, and its bad enough the sport is also bringing that onto itself with such a joke of a penalty. I know money matters and Daimler made lots of calls and inquiries about this situation along with other sponsors.
Yet again you see what you want to see. Max is a very good lawyer, we have to swallow it or turn off it's that simple.
