Yawn, this isn’t even popcorn worthy. No one cares. Sure he was robbed. Oh well.
he was robbed by his own pit crew I don't see any way this works out in Massa's favor. but he's chosen to ruin his reputation by pursuing this, which is sad.
I don’t think people even care enough to feel he ruined his reputation. It’s a nothing burger. It’s simply a monumental win for all the lawyers draining every account they can claw their way into.
To me it's an embarrassment and I think he needs to lose this case and lose bad for the sake of Formula 1. I haven't read the lawsuit so perhaps he is only looking for financial retributions. However, if he looking to have the history books changed, this needs to go down in flames. The can of worms it would open would be incredibly damaging. Ferrari screwed the pooch in Singapore all by themselves and the team and Massa wasn't good enough to recover. Rosberg had a 10 second stop and go penalty in the race and still finished 2nd. Ask yourself this, would Massa be filing a lawsuit if the team didn't screw up and they scored enough points that would have won him the WDC?
It's pathetic to watch Massa disgrace himself like this. Many drivers have lost championships in cruel ways. Prost and Hill were literally driven into by their rivals to be denied championships, yet neither held on to their grief long. They got over it, put their best foot forward, and each won a title afterwards. Hamilton was the best driver in 08'. If Massa wants to blame someone, he should look to his pit crew for fumbling a low pressure pitstop, or the engine department for what, imho, really cost Massa the title in Hungary when his engine blew within 2 laps of the flag. Better still, he can point the finger at himself for how drove in Malaysia and Silverstone, when he didn't score a single point. Hell, why didn't Massa push harder in Singapore? One point would've made the difference. He had the whole race to get back in the points, and couldn't do it. Ferrari staying far away from this sideshow has been the wisest thing they've done in years.
even if he's just going after money, he's going after the money he lost *by having the championship stolen from him* so he still has to prove he's the rightful champion. and you are right...Kimi was double stacked behind him and slowed by Massa's cluster of a stop, and still got to 5th place before crashing out. all Massa needed was one point...so he needed to finish 8th. he would have won the title on tie breakers. instead he finished 13th
Well, giving the tittle to Massa and Ferrari 16 years later may please some, I have no doubt. But it would mean first a revision of F1 history, and second taking away the title from those who received it. They have commited no fault, so why should they be punished by this woke reaction ? I know that Revisionism is in fashion, but this is going too far, IMO.
Most worrying thing is that this would open a Pandora box in case of success.. Absolutely unsustainable.
Bernie opened his mouth! Ok no title but he presented this angle to Massa. A team conspired to literally cheat and alter race. Bernie openly admits he knew and hid the information!!! Go Massa!! Thanks ole sack of crap Bernie lol! Todt stated recently the race should have been cancelled. He is not to be discounted and is more than an honest leader in terms of this. The FIA and FOM should have settled. Now its in court. Preventable but Massa did this AFTER one stupid old idiot opened his mouth.
When is the last time a GP was cancelled because a team has been found cheating ? Usually the offending car is simply disqualified, and the team fined. Jean Toft should know that; it happened to his driver !!
has that ever happened in any FIA sanctioned race at any level? not that I'm aware of. if Renault had been disqualified (and that is probably the "correct" action), Hamilton would have won the championship by 3 points not 1 that's why Massa needs the race thrown out entirely.
I think the result of the race should be removed, but it is simply vacated at this point. Alonso should be stripped of his trophy/official win. The race was been discovered to be tampered with, and by his team. Like NCAA wins or TDF these can/have been stripped, but the 2nd place finisher does not get the win, and they shouldn't. I see the championship independent of the race protest. You cannot alter the points. These guys raced as needed for the situation as they experienced it. You can't just retcon one race under the assumption every other race would still happen as it did. Championship results from 08 remain. Alonso's race wins drops by one and he accidentally loses his trophy in a boating accident before being able to return it. Done.
If Massa wins this procedure why not asking for the 1990 title unfairly won by Senna against Prost ? Ayrton openly recognized a year later in Suzuka he did it on purpose.. You understand what kind of mess it would be ?
The FIA could also take his first title away from Schumacher and give it to Damon Hill perhaps ? Remember Adelaide 1994 ? If we start revisiting previous results years later, no record is safe.
I understand from the following that he is NOT asking for the results to be changed: Rgds https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/articles/single-seaters/f1/felipe-massas-claim-to-be-2008-f1-champion-goes-to-court-the-story-so-far/ [...] Massa’s claim includes a list of losses and damages said to have been caused by failing to win the 2008 championship, totalling £64m. This includes a €2m (£1.7m) bonus that he would have received from Ferrari for winning the drivers’ championship. The rest is made up of: “The difference between the salary Mr Massa earned for the remainder of his career in Formula 1 and the salary that Mr Massa would have negotiated and received as Formula 1 champion” as well as additional sponsorship and commercial opportunities that Massa would have received as F1 champion. Lawyers have asked for interest to be added to these damages as well. In addition, Massa has asked for a declaration that the FIA breached its regulations by “failing to investigate the circumstances of the crash promptly in 2008”. He is also seeking: “A declaration that if the FIA had not acted in breach of its own regulations, it would have cancelled or adjusted the results of the Singapore Grand Prix with the consequence that Mr Massa would have won the Drivers’ Championship in 2008.” [...] Crucially, the lawyers are not calling for the official championship results to be changed — this may well be beyond the powers of a civil court. Instead they are calling for the defendants to rectify the “damage” of their alleged actions by issuing: “A declaration that the FIA acted in breach of its own regulations in failing to investigate the circumstances of the Crash promptly in 2008.” In addition, they are claiming: “A declaration that if the FIA had not acted in breach of its own regulations, it would have cancelled or adjusted the results of the Singapore Grand Prix with the consequence that Mr Massa would have won the Drivers’ Championship in 2008” Where that would leave the 2008 results is another question: could Hamilton still be regarded as the champion if there was an admission that the wrong processes had been followed and Massa should have been crowned?
It seems that Massa's claim is based on the assumption that if the cheating had been sanctionned, it would have benefited him, and he would have won the title, with all the financial advantages for the rest of his career. This has been discussed before, and no certainty of that was found. We cannot assume how the FIA would have penalised Alonso and Renault, so it's impossible to guess the outcome. Would the disciplinary sanction have been a simple disqualification from that race, a further suspension (3 races perhaps?), or disqualification for the whole season? We don't know. That case is flimsy, because Massa suffered an incident of his own doing during that race. His elimination wasn't caused by Piquet's crash, but by the wrong execution of his refuelling procedure. This incident could have happened without any other factor provoking it: it was a Ferrari system failure.
The whole case is based on a coulda woulda fantasy. The race could have been canceled (not likely). He could have negotiated a champions contract with Ferrari. Sure just throw some arbitrary number out there. His delusion to ignore reality and take any accountability and searching for some sort of greedy pay day is sad.
“ The 2006 Formula A European Championship race at Varennes sur Allier was stopped but not all competitors could see the red flags. Stewards therefore annulled the results. This resulted in a series of appeals, ending with the FIA’s international court of appeal coming to the verdict that, under the international sporting code which covers all FIA series, stewards do “have the power to annul the results of a race when it is impossible to establish a fair classification in order to avoid any unfair treatment with regard to the competitors and drivers”.” does anyone know more about this? I can’t find anything about the circumstances. was this weather related? was this an FIA sanctioned race and if so is it according to the same sporting regulations as F1?
So you think 1 team cheating means the entire event should be scrapped 16 years later? Has an F1 race ever been canceled because of one team cheating? You think Massa lost because Renault deliberately crashed? You don't think Ferrari's botched pitstop had anything to do with scoring zero points? You don't think Massa/Ferrari could have recovered during that race to score at least 1 point? Consider Rosberg came back from a 10 second stop and go to finish 2nd. Was that single race the only deciding factor in the entire championship? Is there any guarantee that Ferrari would have given Massa an inflated salary by winning a championship? Just curious what part of my view on it is upside down.
found the FIA's decision: https://www.fia.com/sites/default/files/judgements/09-11-2006-ica-karting-a.pdf still not 100% clear on the circumstances but looks like it was a race control/clerk of course error on flagging. not really a relevant precedent to cheating by a team found after the fact.
Apply that analysis to any crime and you'll have complete chaos. Corruption doesn't corrupt partially, it corrupts completely. The argument that there wasn't enough corruption to invalidate *insert your favorite stolen event*, or that the plaintiff is at fault for not overcoming said corruption, is a logical fallacy that abets corruption. Anyone exposing corruption and defending truth is fighting the good fight. Massa was obviously bamboozled and convinced to remain silent before. Great step for him, and clearly, truth rather than money is the impetus. Let's go Felipe Baby !!
