Renault race-fixing at Singapore 2008

[Richard]

LOL - Pat & Nelson admit the plot took place, and say they have come clean and explained everything.... except ...

Pat Symonds - "when the idea was first suggested to me by Nelson Piquet Jr."

Piquet Jr - "I bitterly regret my actions to follow the orders I was given."

I never thought I'd say this but Flav actually looks dignified compared to the other two!

Quotes from http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 269972.stm

[Sawtooth-spike]

I have to admit, my first thought was Alonso. But i don't think it was.

I was reading the BBC website
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 269972.stm

The interesting statement I found was this one

Pat Symonds

"I was the one who, when the idea was first suggested to me by Nelson Piquet Jr, should have dismissed it immediately.

I keep asking myself how NP Jnr has come out of this without a ban? Ok, he was under pressure from Flav and he is young. So he has done something stupid. But He should of atleast got the same as Symonds? Maybe slightly less. It was his Idea to fix the race in this way.

Would you get protection from the law if you said to the police "I had this idea to rob this Bank, So me and some friends have gone and done it. Here are there names and Addresses. I am really sorry and i wish i never did it".

Edit: You beat me to it Richard!

[gcdugas]

I keep asking myself how NP Jnr has come out of this without a ban? Ok, he was under pressure from Flav and he is young. So he has done something stupid. But He should of atleast got the same as Symonds? Maybe slightly less. It was his Idea to fix the race in this way.

NP Sr. went to Charlie Whiting last year and told him about it. Guess who was NP Sr's chief engineer at Brabham? His initials are CW. Can you now see why Jr didn't get banned?

[vall]

Funny chap this Mister X - at his evidences it was apparent he was at the meeting where all three protogonists of the story were present. But on the hearing when Nelson was asked whether there was somebody else present at the meeting and denied it, it was asked at what meeting witness X was present. You could hear whispers "qualifying.... qualifying...." and when FIA lawyer stated "witness X was present at meeting at Saturday right after the qualifying".
Funny, ain't it?

yeah, Mr. X claims s/he was told of the plan suggested by NPjr by PS in the presence of Flav. Then how comes FIA lawyer stated "witness X was present at meeting at Saturday right after the qualifying EDIT: when NPjr was present".?

[Sawtooth-spike]

I keep asking myself how NP Jnr has come out of this without a ban? Ok, he was under pressure from Flav and he is young. So he has done something stupid. But He should of atleast got the same as Symonds? Maybe slightly less. It was his Idea to fix the race in this way.

NP Sr. went to Charlie Whiting last year and told him about it. Guess who was NP Sr's chief engineer at Brabham? His initials are CW. Can you now see why Jr didn't get banned?

Ahhh, Funny how these things work out?

Well hopefully Natural Justice steps in and no team will hire him again.

[Big JS]

This is all a setup by Bernie and that Nazi Max Mosley to get Flavio out of the way.... as was about to break away and pioneer a far more exciting series or take the reins of the current FIA led championship.

[timbo]

Another funny bit is a request by FIA (via an e-mail) to clarify Briatore's involvement after they got results of Renault's internal inquiry (which didn't esteblish clearly that Flavio was involved), after which Renault sent another letter with "by Nelsinho by Pat Symmonds" and in which involvent of is stated is definite.

[Hudsonhawk.]

i really feel for F1. There is so much money tied up in this sport that F1 has become a victim of the mighty dollar. Money is the root of all evil and the rot starts right at the sports covering body.

The double standards set in punishments between McClaren and Renault stinks of absolute corruption. If the Renault event was more sever why wasn't the monetary punishment more, yet no fine was issued. McClaren should have rights to a refund of their fine. This is criminal isnt it??? What.....don't tell me the economic events mean a fine cant be issued.....or couldn't the FIA afford to loose Renault....or did the nazi lover just want to that Flav down. use the FIA for your personal vendetta???

this is why F1 is rotten and will continue its downward spiral. this is a quote from Martin 'the Blind man' Brundle taken from http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/22092009/ ... ed-f1.html . Shows how much he knows !!!

“He has upset a lot of people [and] he has a difficult track record in some respects in Formula 1, but he’s done a lot of good things too for the sport. It will move on, though – Formula 1 is all about tomorrow, not yesterday – and it’s sad to report, but Flavio won’t be that much missed.”

Dear Blind man says "f'ed 1 is about tomorrow, not yesterday". Well at the moment tomorrow is full of last years issues....what happened yesterday hasn't been exposed yet.

Everything about F1 is about history. About the only think it hasn't retained is its racing culture.

The F1 rot is a pandemic.

[Ciro Pabón]

Ciro, I accept your criticism for not checking the FIA web site for the transcript...

Oh, no, WB. It wasn't a criticism. You know I don't like Pitpass too much... I was kind of joking about that.

Thanks for calling our attention to Witness X, btw. His declaration was the key to decide FIA stewards to throw Mr. Briatore out.

However, I still find a little amusing that, after 50 solid pages of opinions, few people has read the decision they were expecting (me included! I just read it the day before yesterday). Some people still mantains Mr. Briatore is not guilty as charged and that it is a conspiracy by Mosley.

[xpensive]

Well Ciro, perhaps Briatore won't go down in history as the gatekeeper to the land of eternal honesty, but being sentenced for life based on the testimonies from one disgruntled x-employee and an anonymous witness?
Get outa here!

[SZ]

Some people still mantains Mr. Briatore is not guilty as charged and that it is a conspiracy by Mosley.

Ciro, that opinion is quite selective - I'll stress again, I don't think anyone in this thread seriously thinks Flav is bone-china-white innocent. It's at least established that he was aware of the suggestion to throw the race.

Well Ciro, perhaps Briatore won't go down in history as the gatekeeper to the land of eternal honesty, but being sentenced for life based on the testimonies from one disgruntled x-employee and an anonymous witness?
Get outa here!

That's a far more reasoned opinion Ciro.

I don't quite understand the need to interpret it as black-or-white, is-he-innocent-or-isn't-he. Far more to it than that.

If anything there's far more evidence suggesting it's all a fairly elaborate setup than there is to suggest that Flav deserves the most serious ban of all...

[tarzoon]

Well Ciro, perhaps Briatore won't go down in history as the gatekeeper to the land of eternal honesty, but being sentenced for life based on the testimonies from one disgruntled x-employee and an anonymous witness?
Get outa here!

Neither as the gatekeeper to a London dungeon, I suppose.

The guilties were found, 2 of them got away nice and sweetly, no possibility of proper defense, the constructor can show its yellow teeth again, 600 jobs were secured at the expense of 2, mr. X kept his job, Mr.M kept his revenge, mr.B kept his pockets full, the bully kept his victory, the young one lost his dignity, daddy-the-rock-star spent a couple of extra grand, the stewards kept their lives.

Someone should write an instruction manual: "10 good reasons not to piss off the president."

[WhiteBlue]

I have now listened to the whole audio transcript of the WMSC meeting and I have come to the conclusion that no reasonable person can have any doubt about the facts as they were put before the counsil. Many questions were asked and the proceedings were made public so if the findings of the counsil were wrong, we would have had a protest from the Renault team members, Briatore or Symmonds by now. So my view is that we should take those submissions as fact until they are challenged by somebody in public.

1. A meeting took place on Saturday between Symmonds, Mr. X and Briatore where Mr. X protested the strategy to have NP crash his car to help Alonso. No other person knew about this plan. At this point Symmonds says that NP had proposed the plan (which is disputed by him).

2. A second meeting took place between 16:00 and 20:00 hours on Sunday shortly before the race in which Briatore, Symmonds and NP were present. NP claims he was ordered to crash and did not know before that time what was planned.

3. Renault conducted their own investigation and found a whistle blowing Mr. X who confirmed that Briatore was informed at least since Saturday of the plan to have NP crash his car. It is uncontested that Symmonds and Briatore conspired to the detriment of Renault F1 to put this criminal plan in action, regardless who came up with the idea. Symmonds did not accept the immunity offer by the FIA which implicates that he is not prepared to tell the truth. His testimony carries a lesser degree of credibility therefore than NP's.

4. Renault invited Briatore and Symmonds to resign their jobs which they duely did. Renault testified that they had fired both directors if they had refused to resign. So effectively this is a second class sacking.

I believe that none of this will be contested in a court of law. It is pretty solid evidence and deserves to treated as such by the honorable members of this forum.

Regarding the disputed inventor of the plan to crash NP's car my personal view has not changed at all. It is highly unlikely and difficult to reconsile with the other submissions that NP was the author. It is way more plausible that Symmonds cooked this up. He had the experience and the resources to do so. He had the motivation and the position of authority to make it happen. He had no personal risk of injury but NP did. Drivers have to disregard the risks of life in racing but they would not naturally do so to help the team mate. Their instinct is rather to look better than the team mate.

So what are the conclusions here?

A. Should Renault pull another race fixing stunt or should it transpire that they lied in this instance they will be banned forever from motor racing. That is fair and comparable to the penalty given to Mclaren. They also got away on probation the first time round by claiming wrong doing by individuals out of their control.

B. Symmonds and Briatore are punished quite correctly for this mad scheme. They were both responsible directors and failed to call this off. This is unexcusable.

C. Alonso, NP and Mr.X go free for various reasons but basically there is nothing to incriminate Alonso but speculations in the press. Both NP and the whistle blower go free for telling the truth. If in the future evidence is found against them they can still be punished.

To those who still think that Briatore was done harshly I say, get a grip. Read and listen to the testimonies and apply some common sense instead of prejudice.

[Shaddock]

I have to say that IMO Mr X is Alonso.

X wasn’t present at the initial meeting between NP PS & FB, when crashing was discussed. We still don’t know who suggested this idea, as they all and continue to point the finger at each other.

Mr X was subsequently told by Pat that Nelson had suggested that he should crash his car during the race and force a safety car period to benefit Alonso in the presence of Flav. (This still does not prove it was Nelson’s idea)

Remember, as race strategist & Renault #2 Pat controls everything to do with the cars on the race weekend. Flav is reduced effectively to ‘eye candy’.

Question: Who else would Pat need to confide in to make this plan work?

Well he has to put Alonso on to an ultra light fuel load, even though it’s the opposite of what he would normally do in these circumstances. Pat could speak to Alonso’s race engineer ‘we’re going light, go tell Fernando the news’ but wouldn’t Alonso ask why? and whose mad idea this was.

How does Pat convince Alonso to go light and potentially ruin his race, unless he can guarantee him a safety car period.

I might be and probably are wrong, but if I were a betting man, that’s where my money would be.

[Richard]

WB - I agree with the gist of what you say.

I disagree with this bit:

Symmonds did not accept the immunity offer by the FIA which implicates that he is not prepared to tell the truth. His testimony carries a lesser degree of credibility therefore than NP's.

Often in real courts, the paid informant's evidence has less credibility than a normal witness. This is because the informant can be seen as telling the story that they know will earn them the cash/immunity.

In this case, it seems certain that Flav, Symons & Nelson Jr successfully conspired to fix the race. Not one of them is saying they are innocent.

The individual punishment has been handed out in proportion to seniority, that seems fair to me.

The only question mark seems to be about team responsibility. We're in different circumstances to McL 2 years ago, so that financial punishment would be disproportionate now (and probably was then but McL had enough cash to survive it).

However, on principle, the team should have had all points deducted for this years WCC. Currently an individual driver cutting a chicane causes a team to lose points. Whereas the so-called the most serious crime ever in F1 causes no loss of team points, even though it was committed by not one, but 3 individuals, including the boss! Heh-ho that's principle for you.

To conclude - the baddies have been booted out and why try to rewrite history, just get on with this year's racing.