In the round-up: The police investigating emails sent to F1 personnel alleging a plot against Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes have determined no offence has been committed.
In brief
Mercedes continue to investigate Hamilton emails
Mercedes alerted the police after F1 personnel were sent emails alleging Hamilton was the subject of a ‘sabotage’ plot, amid conflicting reports over whether the messages were sent by someone claiming to be an employee of the team. Northamptonshire police have now stated no offence has taken place.
However Mercedes are continuing to look into the matter. “We have an open line to the police,” a spokesperson for the team told RaceFans, “and are continuing to take steps to identify the source of the email and messages.”
Team principal Toto Wolff last week rubbished claims it would undermine the performance of its driver, who will leave Mercedes at the end of the year to join Ferrari. Hamilton enjoyed his best result of the season so far in Spain, finishing third.
Extensive resurfacing at Spa
Around half of the seven-kilometre Spa-Francorchamps circuit has been resurfaced ahead of this year’s Belgian Grand Prix. The track owners confirmed new asphalt has been laid from Blanchimont to Eau Rouge, including the pit lane, from Kemmel to Brussels and again from Campus (turn 14) to Paul Frere.The track has also taken steps to improve the flow of water off the track surface during rainfall by installing new gutters, drains and adding grooves to the track.
Porsche lose Formula E appeal
The FIA International Court of Appeal rejected Porsche’s attempt to overturn Antonio Felix da Costa’s disqualification from the first race at Misano in April. The case hinged on Porsche’s use of a throttle damper spring designed for the earlier ‘Gen 2’ car in its current ‘Gen 3′ machine.
The ICA rejected Porsche’s argument the spring had been homologated, and though it accepted the manufacturer had not violated the Sporting Regulations, found it had infringed the Technical Regulations and therefore upheld the stewards’ decision to disqualify them.
Herta urges Safety Car “consistency”
Colton Herta said IndyCar needs to be consistent in its deployment of the Safety Car following criticism of the series’ reaction to Marcus Armstrong’s crash during Sunday’s race at Laguna Seca.
The deployment of the Safety Car was delayed, giving drivers the opportunity to pit before the pack formed up, despite Armstrong’s car being sat by the barrier at the exit of a corner, facing oncoming traffic. A notable beneficiary of the delay, which has also occured in previous races, was Josef Newgarden, who was briefly promoted to second place as a result.
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“I don’t know what happened. I don’t know if Marcus just spun and stalled or if he hit the wall or what the scenario is. At the end of the day if somebody hits the wall, you have to throw the yellow just to see if they’re okay most of the time.
“I know they try to help as much as they can when they’re allowed to. When they don’t have to throw the yellow, they try not to.”
Verstappen to make Goodwood Festival debut
Max Verstappen will make his first appearance at the Goodwood Festival of Speed as the event marks 20 years of Red Bull’s F1 team. He will drive an RB16B of the type he used to win his first world championship in 2021, while team mate Sergio Perez will drive an RB19, the most successful car in F1 history.
Team principal Christian Horner will drive another of the team’s cars, an RB8 from 2012. The team’s other three-title winning cars from the V8 era will also appear: Daniel Ricciardo will drive an RB7, Mark Webber will be reunited with the RB6 he nearly won the 2010 title in, and David Coulthard will appear in an RB9. Christian Klien will drive their original RB1 from 2005.
McLaren has also announced Emerson Fittipaldi will drive an M23 he won his second world championship with, and Bruno Senna will demonstrate his uncle Ayrton’a 1991 championship-winning MP4/6.
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Links
Motor racing links of interest:
Verstappen: Red Bull driver would 'look good in silver' according to Mercedes chief (Sky)
Ola Kallenius: 'The cards will be reshuffled in 2026. New order with new rules. That's also an opportunity. Who knows.'
Ferrari rules out near-term expansion of 499P program (Sportscar 365)
'We made a huge effort this year in order to implement a third car. We made this decision in mid-November, early December. The third car was a further complication, but we are happy with this decision because we have the chance of collecting more data.'
Correa's Barcelona weekend in his words (Formula 2)
'We had the pace today in the Feature Race to come back from P8 to P3 and almost challenge for the win. It's very fun to come back through the field like that but you also need to stay cool. It's very easy to get excited, to cook your tyres and then you are not going to get very far.'
Patatas Bravas (Ricciardo via YouTube)
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Social media
Notable posts from X (formerly Twitter), TikTok and more:
Christian Lundgaard made an unintended aerodynamic adjustment to his car at Laguna Seca. He finished 15th.
"We had pace for 6th, 7th, 8th, around that area without the brake marker on the front wing and then being shoved off the track by Santino in the Corkscrew…"#IndyCar pic.twitter.com/WKaZ6ubvoZ
— RaceFans (@racefansdotnet) June 25, 2024
The @FIA asked for this change before last year's race, then got slated for the track limits farce which ensued, so good to see they've finally been listened to:https://t.co/jXQrcR8xPp#F1 #AustrianGP #RaceFans
— Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine) June 25, 2024
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- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Comment of the day
RB’s backwards step in Catalunya highlights the difficulty of car development in the budget cap era, says @Slowmo:
I think it just proves like with the Mercedes this year and Aston Martin last year that if anything is slightly off in your modelling the number of variables that can affect the performance on these ground effect cars mean you can go round in circles trying to identify if the issue is in setup, your concept or a unforeseen interaction in your package as a whole. In 5-10 years time the ground effect modelling will be so much more effective and we’ll be back to predictable development improvements.
Ultimately the biggest flaw of the budget cap era is if your modelling is not producing the results there is no way to ever recover. You can’t throw more time or resources at the problem so you just fall further and further behind until you solve the problem, at which point if you’re lucky you’ll take a big step forward. All the budget cap does is seal in the advantage for the lead time and prevent anyone from having any tools to catch you. The engine freeze has compounded this.
@Slowmo
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Alex Bkk, Greg, Kathryn S, Lemon, Jayson D, Mehtab Ahmed and Derek Nickels!
Rhys Lloyd (@justrhysism)
26th June 2024, 4:14
Re COTD:
Yes the budget cap does “lock in” missteps—but I think what we’re seeing is the closing up of the field so tight that if you pass wind on the wrong corner you’ll drop 3 places.
The top teams are still in front as unfortunately they already have the facilities from the pre-budget cap era. Over time that advantage will diminish.
Asd
26th June 2024, 11:50
The COTD ignores the double edged reality of everything: If there was no budget cap, Mercedes would throw in gigantic resources and much quickly resolve their problems and catch up to RedBull… but not really, because RedBull would’ve also throw in gigantic resources and already gone far ahead and the gap would’ve remained.
Meanwhile, half the team with less resources would be driving 4-5 seconds a lap slower, just as it used to be.
Every race would finish with 8 drivers on the lead lap and everybody else lapped once, twice or even three times – just as it used to be.
Nobody wants that.
Keithedin
26th June 2024, 13:00
This is true, apart from diminishing returns. Redbull would gain less from their additional investment than Mercedes did, so the gap would shrink faster as they converge towards the optimum solution, but both teams would still pull away more from the smaller teams which can’t keep up with the amount of money being invested. So, not having a budget cap can potentially lead to more competition at the front of the grid in these circumstances, but more disparity between the top teams and the smaller teams.
AlanD
26th June 2024, 12:20
Whenever the regualtions change, we start off with one or two teams well ahead, and they close up until we have really close racing. Then no sooner would we get there than the regulations change agian and we are back to square one but with a different team streets ahead. I know the budget cap is intended to stop teams spending their way to the top, but it stops the inseason development. Perhaps the budget rules need restructuring, broken down into three parts, a pre-season R&D element, a going-racing element, and an in-season testing and development element, with more scheduled test days in season. More test days would surely help teams close the gap, and give more opportunity for test drivers to get some mileage.
Nick T.
26th June 2024, 5:07
Agreed with COTD. There should be at least some in-season testing optional. Like with the wind tunnel and CFD hours, apportion it out with even larger allotment for struggling teams.
Nick T.
26th June 2024, 5:09
RE: Mercedes police complaint. Pretty obvious a crime wasn’t committed. The most Mercedes could do is use Britain’s absurd libel laws to find and sue the person.
AlanD
26th June 2024, 12:24
I thought Toto was just blowing hot air when he spoke about complaining to the police. I am surprised that the company lawyers didn’t actually stop him and tell him that it isn’t a police matter. What a waste of police time. Why would anyone believe this was anything other than a delusional fantasist? Why on earth have journalists even given this the time of day?
Nick T.
27th June 2024, 2:37
Cause they love TPs living in a fantasy world. Although I did like his speech about unbalanced Ham fans. Of, which, we have several.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
27th June 2024, 19:54
Libel is a crime in the UK.
Alan Dove
26th June 2024, 6:26
What possible criminal offense did Mercedes think had taken place?
Red Andy (@red-andy)
26th June 2024, 6:40
It is a strange one – the details as reported don’t appear to amount to a criminal offence (apart from crimes against spelling and grammar, if Keith’s account of the email is accurate).
Toto did mention emails about “death” in his remarks at the weekend, which could imply some kind of malicious communications offence (death threats etc) or perhaps there’s a potential hacking/computer misuse angle that isn’t clear from the details that have been made public. But it’s also possible that the police were contacted simply to scare off whoever was sending the emails.
Constantijn Blondel
26th June 2024, 7:15
It made Lewis cry …
mog
26th June 2024, 21:21
…With Laughter
AlanD
26th June 2024, 12:32
I’m left wondering that myself, or what they thought the police might do about it. Even if it had been sent by a Mercedes employee, that isn’t a crime. Fortunately, we don’t lock people up for failing to agree with their lords and masters.
floodo1 (@floodo1)
26th June 2024, 17:24
None, they just wanted the headline that the police were involved
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
27th June 2024, 19:55
@red-andy Had the contents of the email been true, industrial espionage. Which is a more serious crime than libel in most instances. If not true, there are still a number of possible angles, depending on the exact circumstances (as well as a realistic possibility of it being mischief not rising to the level of an offence of any description).
Jere (@jerejj)
26th June 2024, 6:48
Admittedly, I’d never heard of Campus & Paul Frere concerning Spa-Francorchamps so I checked all corner names & immediately found them.
Simon
26th June 2024, 21:09
Maybe learn the fundamentals first, eh?
An Sionnach
26th June 2024, 9:06
Was wondering if a threat to cause harm had been made in the case of the Mercedes emails. I would have thought they would not waste police time otherwise.
3.5km is about half of the length of Spa. Am I reading that one wrong?
AlanD
26th June 2024, 12:40
You are not reading it wrong, the article is wrong. It should say
Around half of the 7km Spa track, some 3.5km, has been resurfaced
Moi
26th June 2024, 9:12
Mercedes should be fined for wasting the authorities’ time and taxpayer money with frivolous actions like this. Purely PR ‘look how tough we can be’ etc. Disgusting.
bernasaurus (@bernasaurus)
26th June 2024, 11:43
I might be wrong, but I imagine the police will have said something along the lines of ‘oh, we’ll make note of that’, and then got on with whatever they were doing prior to the phone call. There are literally billions of badly spelt emails in constant circulation saying things that aren’t true. I doubt Northamptonshire police plan to get onto it once they’ve caught that Nigerian prince.
Nick T.
27th June 2024, 2:39
My thoughts exactly. They might have wasted more time than usual though considering all the “important” people and companies involved.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
27th June 2024, 19:59
Moi, the threshold for “wasting police time” in the UK is high. Either it has to be a live crime scene where the police can demonstrate substantial and obvious impediment of the police occurred (and no other offence better describes what happened) or the equivalent of an entire shift worth of time lost. This is to encourage people who are not sure if they have a case, people with low confidence in the police or (as in this particular case, most likely) a complex case that may require the evidence to be provided in multiple tranches, to at least notify the police in a timely fashion of things it may need to be aware of.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
26th June 2024, 17:47
“We have an open line to the police” … whoo ? Sting ?
Rob (@standbyexp)
26th June 2024, 20:33
Toto thinks being able to dial 999 is an exclusive right of the Mercedes F1 team
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
27th June 2024, 10:20
he lives in upside down world.
Rob (@standbyexp)
26th June 2024, 20:32
Toto Wolff should be investigated for wasting police time. How on earth does he think a crime is committed by some keyboard warrior sending an email? JFC.
Jay
27th June 2024, 0:03
I’m a little surprised at the comments. Hurtful emails are a real threat to society and should be taken very seriously! /s
Nick T.
27th June 2024, 2:40
lol, you got me! My head was about to begin pulsating until I saw the /s.
AlanD
27th June 2024, 4:03
Nick, after seeing your post, I had to google slash S to find out why a “typo” was significant. Since it stoped your blood pulsating I wondered if it was a reminder to take your statins. But now I am educated into another apsect of the mysterious geeky language of the keyboardlanders.
Nick T.
27th June 2024, 5:35
Welcome to the club, Alan.
Jay
27th June 2024, 5:25
Thanks! I got a chuckle out of your comment too. These days, people are too busy and too serious! A little sarcasm here and there adds a smile to my face.
Nick T.
27th June 2024, 5:37
“Laughing something off” is a lost art it seems these days.
AlanD
27th June 2024, 2:52
Jay, the best way to deal with this email would have been to not give it the oxygen of publicity. Reputable journalists do not print anonymous emails from fantasists who provide zero evidence for their claims. There are a million anonymous emails every day, many of them offensive and upsetting, but by picking this one and turning it into a story, the media outlets have been complicit in amplifying it and giving it an air of credibility which it does not deserve.
Jay
27th June 2024, 5:27
I get about a dozen offensive and upsetting emails in my spam folder everyday. And some of them aren’t even spam!
Sometimes all you can do is laugh and move on with your day. Cheers.
Dale
28th June 2024, 20:03
LOL, Imagine how the police must have laughed at Toto’s fragile breakdown about some mischief emails, and him reporting them as crimes.
Can you point out on the doll where you were hurt most Toto?