Felipe Massa’s former race engineer says he accepted their failure to win the 2008 world championship, which the driver is trying to claim through the courts.
A legal team representing Massa yesterday announced a lawsuit against the FIA, FOM and Bernie Ecclestone over the governing body’s handing of that year’s Singapore Grand Prix. He is seeking confirmation he should have been declared that year’s champion.Massa announced last year he was in discussion with the parties over their handling of the notorious ‘Crashgate’ episode following comments made by Ecclestone. The race was won by Fernando Alonso after his team mate Nelson Piquet Jnr deliberately crashed.
Rob Smedley, who was Massa’s race engineer during his time at Ferrari, said he had come to terms with their defeat to Lewis Hamilton in the championship. “I think the racing gods have decided on something else,” he told Formula For Success before Massa’s lawsuit was announced.
However Smedley said he had no objection to Massa’s efforts to change the outcome of the 2008 championship.
“My opinion of it is I’m somebody who never looks back. I don’t care about what happened yesterday I’m interested in what’s happening today, tomorrow, and how I can affect that.
“Felipe has been pretty clear that why he wants to do this, he wants to do it for justice as he says and he has the right to be able to pursue that. Good on him if that’s what he wants to do.
“My view on it is it would have been great to have won the 2008 world championship in 2008. We didn’t, Lewis won it, and the guy with the most points at the end of the season is the guy who deserves to win it, however those points are accrued, I think. That’s racing.”
Hamilton beat Massa to the title by a single point. Massa believes the FIA should have cancelled the result of the Singapore race because of Renault’s cheating, which would make him champion.
Smedley, who was in the Jeddah F1 paddock last weekend, is phlegmatic about their defeat. “You luck into some points that you shouldn’t have had and you kind of get points nicked off you that you should have had as well,” he said, “and I think that’s the whole point, it’s why it’s a 24-race, world championship. Because over the course of the season, it’ll all even itself out. So there you go.
“I don’t know how it’ll finish. I’ll watch that one from afar and we’ll see where it gets to.”
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Stephen H
12th March 2024, 12:25
Speaking of ‘nicked points’ – I think Rob needs to remind Massa what happened at Spa that year …
Johnny
12th March 2024, 14:42
Memory tends to be selective.
Chris Horton
12th March 2024, 16:40
Yep. Hamilton overtook illegally, and went on to win. Received a penalty. All above board.
Johnny
12th March 2024, 20:58
Charlie Whitting said it was legal when asked by McLaren and then the stewards intervened because it wasn’t.
Michael Masi said it was legal and then the stewards didn’t intervene because the race director had the discretion to do so.
They are opposite positions so how can they both be right? :)
AlanD
13th March 2024, 0:27
Chris, the rule that people say Hamilton broke was only formalised after the event. Before that point, the rule was informally “if you pass by cutting the corner, give the place back and we won’t take any further action”. When Hamilton did that and Charlie Whiting said it was okay, Ferrari and the stewards came up with this idea that giving the place back meant for at least two corners, and also came up with a time penalty for it which just happened to be enough to put him behind Massa. Once the stewards trotted out this two corner line, the anti-Hamilton lobby were awash with “everyone knows you have to wait two corners before you try to overtake again”. But everyone didn’t know, it was invented on the spot, and what had been one of the most exciting races for years ended up leaving a very bad taste in the mouth. I remember saying to friends at the time that if Massa went on to win the WDC, then I’d really hope it would be by more than the points switchround in the Spa race, so that the injustice of that race would be forgotten.
Red Andy (@red-andy)
13th March 2024, 9:56
I think the general understanding of how the rule worked was that if you gained an advantage by cutting the track, you had to hand the advantage back. In the Spa case, the stewards’ argument was that Hamilton’s move didn’t fully hand back the advantage he’d gained, even though he momentarily gave the place back to Raikkonen. The “wait-two-corners” interpretation was invented after the fact, partly as a response to the outcry over the Spa incident, but is just another example of F1 overcomplicating a concept that worked well enough to begin with.
I think a big part of the reason it felt so unjust was because Raikkonen subsequently crashed, and Hamilton’s penalty ended up dropping him behind Massa, who had not been in contention for the win at all up until that point. But that was in line with the penalties that were applicable at the time (a drive-through, converted to a post-race time penalty of 25 seconds).
AlanD
14th March 2024, 16:06
Yes, I remember it being a great battle, for P1, edge of the seat stuff, whilst Massa was driving round in third looking like he was driving a milk float.
I cannot remember who it was who effectively invented the “give the place back” convention, but I do remember wathcing a race way back, someone cut a corner entirely and took the lead, and the commentators saying “he’ll definitely get a penalty for that” and then saying “that’s clever, he’s slowed down and allowed xxxx to overtake him, I wonder what if the stewards will still penalise him for it, you know, I think he’ll get away with that”
and as far as I can remember, that was when the idea started that if you gave the place back before the stewards looked at it, you didn’t get penalised. I have this idea that it was Brundle commentating and Mika Hakkinen driving which would make it somewhere around 1997, 98ish I think.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
13th March 2024, 2:04
No matter the circumstances of the penalty, it was not proportionate to the offense: silverstone 2021 he takes out the main rival, which is worth 25 points and gets a 10 sec penalty which has no effect whatsoever, spa 2008 he overtakes a rival illegally and gets a 25 sec penalty, not balanced at all, it should be the other way around at the very least.
SteveP
13th March 2024, 19:20
I believe you mean “unfortunately had one wheel in the way when Max cut right too soon after braking late to attempt a pass”
The FIA later clarified (as much as they ever do) the allocation of fault, and under the “clarified” rules fault would have largely been on the car that cut in to take the apex – i.e. Max
But, hey, why not follow that shining light of truth telling Hans Christian Horner?
DonSmee (@david-beau)
14th March 2024, 9:13
On paper it was legal. Another rule bent to push Lewis down.
Johnny
14th March 2024, 15:30
The biggest thing people forget about this incident is that Raikkonen overtook Hamilton after that when Hamilton went off track to avoid a Williams… so it was a completely negated issue. Raikkonen then was unable to keep it on the track himself and later crashed.
This was a blatant a manipulation of the sport to change a result. Now where have we seen that again in recent years?
Average F1 Fan
12th March 2024, 12:32
It was, ultimately, a competitor breaking the rules. Which happens all the time. And when it happens, an offender is penalised according to the rules and other competitors work around it. Crashgate was not prejudicial to the Massa/Hamilton battle. Massa and Hamilton were presented with the same scenario and Massa was the one who ended up driving off with his fuel hose attached.
2008 was a season decided naturally by the actions of competitors. Completely unlike 2021, which was manipulated unnaturally by an official. The punishment for a team cheating, which happens regularly, is the team getting punished. There is no clause or precedent for the voiding of a race. So if we rewind the clock, and punish either Renault or Alonso, either by removing their points from that race, or from removing their points from the entire season, with every single permutation, you still end up with Hamilton as WDC.
Massa has no leg to stand on, and is being used as a pawn to try and put shade on the frequent, regular, and strong calls about Abu Dhabi 2021 being rigged. I dont blame Massa but for the fact that he hasnt recognised that he is being used to attack Hamilton’s claim to 2021.
And, at the end of the day, Massa got screwed because of a mechanical fault in the fuel hose. That hose was going to fail the next time it was used, whether it was gonna be during a safety car pit stop or during regular running, and Massa did not, obviously, have the fuel to reach the end of the race. It was inevitable.
HAL
15th March 2024, 15:00
I agree Massa has no ground to re-claim the title. But that’s not what he is trying to do – he’s trying to get financial compensation because F1 management knew that race had been rigged and decide to just burry it and keep the result. Loosing that title by such a small margin must have been hard to swallow. But if you understand that on top of that, some guys took deliberate decision that ultimately went against you, it add salt to the wound.
Honestly, I’m not going to cry for Eccelstone or FOM/FIA. Massa is playing that game they know and love so much – get as much $ as possible. And suddently, they play the victim “how does he dear asking for compensation ? Laws and attorney are not for drivers, but for us, the big guys…”. Guess what, Massa invited himself to the party.
SteveP
15th March 2024, 16:52
So he should sue the people who were responsible for putting him at the back of the race – Ferrari
SjaakFoo (@sjaakfoo)
12th March 2024, 13:49
“FOM Employee Rob Smedley accepts his boss did nothing wrong”
Crawliin-from-the-wreckage (@davedai)
12th March 2024, 14:50
Probably not the best turn of phrase.
bernasaurus (@bernasaurus)
12th March 2024, 15:28
@davedai Ha! Well spotted. Yeah, I’m sure if this was a press release someone would quietly mention that it might be better to word that a little differently.
SteveP
12th March 2024, 14:02
Hmmm, Rob Smedley, about as closely involved in the loss that day as you can be without being even 1% guilty of screwing up the pit stop.
I bet he knows the name of everyone who had a percentage input, though, with Felipe right at the top of the list.
Christopher Rehn (@chrischrill)
12th March 2024, 14:23
Felipe baby, back down.
Neil Salton (@neilsalton)
12th March 2024, 14:32
Felipe – the judge will be faster than you … confirm (please) that you understand the message …
Craig
12th March 2024, 15:50
This saga’s gone well past embarrassing to shameful now.
Roy Beedrill
12th March 2024, 16:30
Fixed some journalism here.
Grapmg
12th March 2024, 16:38
Good point by Rob Smedley should be part of the F1 rulebook: You luck into some points that you shouldn’t have had and you kind of get points nicked off you that you should have had as well,” he said, “and I think that’s the whole point, it’s why it’s a 24-race, world championship. Because over the course of the season, it’ll all even itself out. So there you go
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
13th March 2024, 2:08
Except it doesn’t, I guess people here are familiar with the law of big numbers? With reliability how it is nowadays, how do you expect luck to even out over 24 races? It didn’t even out in 2021, verstappen only got a little bit of luck back from masi’s mistake, hamilton was still over a race ahead in terms of points-luck.
2016 with rosberg, other way around, 2008 with massa again hamilton luckier.
Grapmg
13th March 2024, 9:02
You are right although you can argue who had the most luck during a season it’s a bit subjective. But I think the point is that “luck” is part of F1.
AlanD
13th March 2024, 0:32
Something that always bugged me around that time was the way Smedley coached Massa continuously throughout the race, to the extent of telling him he could brake two meters later into turn 7 etc. Yes, drivers get told when to pit, and when to switch engine modes, but having an engineer watching the telemetry and telling him on each lap where he could change braking points etc was, to me, completely against the spirit of “the driver driving the car alone and unaided”.
RR
14th March 2024, 10:31
Smedley was always a bit smarter than Massa.