Ferrari letter to FIA

[JAM]

Just want to add a topic that I have not seen discussed.

First, way to go Rubinho (que beleza meu chara!parabens)

I read Ron Dennis' comments expressing his anger against a letter sent by the Ferrari Team to the FIA to disqualified both cars after the Austrian GP.

Guys, if that is true, my respects to TGF and Rubinho, but what a shame for the Ferrari Team. Enzo Ferrari must be jumping in his grave if that letter is real and his team is trying to use this stupid move to win a championship. That is just not the way to do it!

Luca Montezemolo, how low will you go to keep your job in Ferrari?

[jarama]

I don't know if this is certain, but would be a shame winning the championships this way.

[Gerard]

Ron Dennis indeed has said Ferrari had tried to get both of his cars disqualified following the Austrian Grand Prix.

He told a news conference that Ferrari had sent a letter to the FIA's stewards to try to influence the outcome of the hearing into the case of a missing seal on defending world champion Mika Hakkinen's winning car.

The letter, signed by Ferrari's sporting director Jean Todt, urged the stewards to exclude both McLaren cars from the result of the Austrian Grand Prix in which they had finished first and second.

The hearing ignored the letter from Ferrari, but found that the McLaren car driven by Hakkinen did not comply with the sport's strict technical regulations.

McLaren were fined $50,000 dollars and lost the 10 constructors' championship point they won, but Hakkinen kept his 10 in the drivers' title race.

An angry Dennis, clearly upset at Ferrari's attempt to influence the case said: 'There is no mechanism in the regulations for a letter like this to be forwarded, but any top team is more than capable of knowing what it is doing in forwarding such a letter to the stewards.'

Dennis went on to draw comparisons between the episode and previous incidents, citing last year, when Ferrari appealed successfully following their disqualification in Malaysia.

'Some people will go to any lengths to win, but for us that would devalue the win itself,' he said.

Dennis said he sympathised with the stewards who had to deal with the case of the missing seal on Hakkinen's car and said he did not see any point in appealing against the decision.

But his remarks are certain to trigger another episode of ill-will and bitterness between the two teams following years of strained relations.

Jean Todt admitted that they sent a letter and commented on such by saying: 'That is ridiculous. How could we have been involved in this situation. We have asked for an exact implication of the rules and wrote a letter to the Stewards, in which we have given our opinion. However, that's normal.'

He added that it is not his task to judge the outcome of the investigation in which Hakkinen kept his 10 championship points and McLaren lost theirs and thus refrained from specific comment.

[Liz]

Box of kleenex and new dummy for Ron Dennis, please.

Now we know where Mika learned that trick, don't we?

[Jay]

How low can these two teams go.

What is next?

Sabatage? (The way things are going it wouldn't surprise me)

[Sharky]

I wouldn't be suprised either Jay.

As for Enzo....if he could only see what his "scuderia" has turned into.....what a shame. The only good hearted man on that team seems to be rubens.

[Peter Mallett]

Originally posted by Liz
.............new dummy for Ron Dennis, please.

Liz,

I think the point here is one of sportsmanship not personalities.

RD is right in thinking that a letter from a rival team to the judges of fact could be seen as an attempt to influence the opinions of those judges.

IMO that means that Ferrari have acted outside the spirit of the game. As it happens the stewards have come up with a worse answer than we could have expected. Maybe they were on the point of droping the entire affair when they remembered Ferrari's letter. I don't know but it could have been like that.

[Danielsun]

Originally posted by Peter Mallett

IMO that means that Ferrari have acted outside the spirit of the game.[/QUOTE]

Gee, that's a rarity... I'm surprised, mind you, that it didn't actually come off for them. I mean, they get away with everything else they and their lead driver do...

[neutral]

I can support anything that gives Ron Dennis the sh*ts.

[Mr.S]

Doesn't Ron sound like an 8 year old trying to be grown up when he is whining?