Formula FIA Formula 1 race director Michael Masi has revealed he received death threats in the months which followed his controversial decision which swung the outcome of last year’s world championship in Abu Dhabi.
The FIA confirmed earlier this month Masi had left the organisation. He was replaced as race director after it found he made an “error” in his decision to arrange a final-lap restart of the race at Yas Marina.Masi’s decision to only allow a portion of the drivers to un-lap themselves contravened the FIA’s rules and handed Max Verstappen an unexpected opportunity to pass Lewis Hamilton to win the race and clinch the world championship. In an interview for Australia’s Daily Telegraph, which states Masi has signed a non-disclosure agreement with the FIA which prevents him from discussing the decision, he described the abuse he received in the wake of the controversy.
He said he received “hundreds” of messages on social media immediately after the race, and many more in the months which followed, some of which included death threats and racist abuse.
“Thankfully, I don‘t have an Instagram account or Twitter,” said Masi. “I don’t have any of that.
“Being old-school I do however have Facebook, which I used to stay in touch with family and friends. I opened my messages that night to check in with them. I had no idea that I could receive them from people I did not know. But I was wrong. I was confronted with hundreds of messages. I wouldn’t say thousands but certainly hundreds.
“And they were shocking. Racist, abusive, vile, they called me every name under the sun. And there were death threats. People saying, they were going to come after me and my family.
“And they kept on coming. Not just on my Facebook but also on my LinkedIn, which is supposed to be a professional platform for business. It was the same type of abuse.”
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Masi said he “thought I would ignore it and get on with it because I knew it could take me to a very dark place” at first. “I tried to cut myself off mentally, and I thought I could.”
The barrage of abuse made Masi fear for his personal safety. “Walking down the street in London a day or two later I thought I was okay until I started looking over my shoulder. I was looking at people wondering if they were going to get me.”
He described the physical and mental effect the abuse had on him. “I didn’t want to talk to anyone, not even family and friends,” said Masi. “I only talked to my close family – but very briefly.
“I also lost my appetite. I have heard some people become binge eaters during times like this but I didn’t eat much. It did have a physical impact, but it was more mental.”
Although he “didn‘t go and talk to a professional” about what he was going through, Masi said “with the benefit of hindsight, I probably should have. I should have gone and spoken to someone in a professional sense.
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Having returned to his native Australia following his departure from the FIA, Masi is now considering his next career move.
“The whole experience has made me a much stronger person,” he said. “I have a number of exciting options going forward. I am considering a number of different projects, both domestic and globally. My intention is to base myself out of Australia and to use all the skills I have gained in what has been an incredible journey so far and one I am extremely proud and thankful for.”
Yesterday F1 launched a new campaign, “Drive it Out”, intended to tackle abusive behaviour and messages online and at races.
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Armchair Expert (@armchairexpert)
31st July 2022, 8:51
#DriveItOut Oh, wait… Latifi and Masi are white males, who cares they received death threats (from those pesky Dutch Verstappen fans, I’m sure!)! Only females and “minorities” matter!
bosyber (@bosyber)
31st July 2022, 8:58
Or alternatively it is being reported because it is seen as a relevant story.
falken (@falken)
31st July 2022, 9:02
He certainly did Drive It Out. Right out of his own job…
Sandra D
31st July 2022, 9:06
Somebody greased his palms for the result. Imagine all the punters that made millions.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
31st July 2022, 10:18
That theory, which I don’t believe anyone has ever offered any evidence to back up, was quashed in the FIA report.
Chaitanya
31st July 2022, 11:54
Kangaroo courts and sham of investigation like we saw 1997, post Singapore GP 08, etc… FIA doing everything to save its skin.
Ploss (@f1-ploss)
31st July 2022, 12:16
The FIA investigating itself, sounds totally legit to me….
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 21:42
@keithcollantine The same one that made a number of blatantly false claims (including that the result could not be changed, when by the FIA’s own regulations it had to be)? At this point, offering the FIA report as evidence for anything regarding Abu Dhabi 2021 is not going to help any point to be made. (Although I also doubt any money changed hands, that is based on other evidence and cannot credibly use the report to support that doubt).
André
31st July 2022, 13:04
I think people try to overcomplicate the story. Masi made a mistake under pressure, in the heat of the moment, that’s all. A big mistake, for sure, which contradicted the rules and his own history of SC decisions. But in the end it was just a mistake. He tried to “go racing” under pressure from Redbull, and in doing that while bypassing the SC procedure, he took away from Hamilton the chance to have Mercedes’ strategy paying off by keeping position by finishing under the SC. So Max “won”. It’s definitely a stain in the history of the sport, but nothing justifies the death threats that he and Latifi received. That’s not compatible with a civil and peaceful society.
NoName (@noname)
1st August 2022, 8:29
@André Masi didn’t made a mistake, he cheated. He knew what he was doing and he knew the rules, he could easily pull a red flag but he knew that Lewis would have had fresh tyres as well and he was faster than Max the whole race. They simply wanted Max as “champ” no matter what, hence we heard nothing from Perez’s DNF who was underfueled of course.
Yaru (@yaru)
31st July 2022, 14:03
Masi isn’t corrupt, he is just an idiot who didn’t follow the rules he himself explained to the media in French GP 2020.
ajpennypacker (@ajpennypacker)
31st July 2022, 15:47
Laughable, slanderous, and as Keith said, absolutely disproven. You’re probably the kind of bloke that believes the moon landing was faked haha
Marcel
31st July 2022, 9:08
I wonder how much of the Toto whining at Abu Dhabi contributed to this behaviour? These ‘fans’ haven’t got much brain capacity, so must be very easy to influence. Good thing they allready stopped the radio messages from the teams to the FIA being broadcast. This definitely adds fuel to a fire.
I also wonder if DTS and the (incorrect) portraing of some drivers and/or rivalries contribute to this?
F1 is a sport, trying maybe a bit to hard to be a show. Maybe time to let it just be a sport again? Maybe better for the health of a lot of people around the sport?
tielemst
31st July 2022, 10:50
None, as far as I’m concerned. You can whine and stir the pot as much as you like, there is not a single excuse to sit at your desk and type death threats to anyone.
Ploss (@f1-ploss)
31st July 2022, 12:24
I wouldn’t be surprised if 99% of those threats were made by people who didn’t even know there was a race on and just jumped in on the feeding frenzy cause they are the saddest most vile people who now have a way to anonymously get there kicks. Sort of people who live in there Mums basement in there underpants eating cheese out the packet.
André
31st July 2022, 13:10
This has nothing to do with Toto. In fact he was right to feel aggrieved, because a title was taken away from Hamilton unfairly. The rules were not properly followed, by the man who should have executed it by the book. That was not a racing incident which is part of the sport, but a direct, black on white, contravening of the SC procedure. That’s not equivalent to a tyre blowout.
Yaru (@yaru)
31st July 2022, 14:04
Firing Masi for his incomeptence last season was the first step in trying to be more of a sport and less of a show. So they are in the right path at least.
jff
31st July 2022, 9:36
This is a misrepresentation of the facts.
I’m disappointed you keep doing this on this site.
The incorrect application only disadvantages Sainz (read the report) as he still had lapped cars in front of him. It did not (directly) impact the fight between Hamilton and Verstappen.
And I’m not repeating this because I’m supporting Verstappen (I actually think that Hamilton should have won that race). I’m just disappointed that this site keeps on repeating the wrong storyline.
Not sure if you do it because you’re British and supporting Hamilton, or if it’s to constantly stir up the readers and get a repeat of the toxic comments.
Both are wrong IMO.
Schummel Schumi (@schummelschumi)
31st July 2022, 10:17
Thank you!
N
31st July 2022, 10:38
The paragraph says the incorrect application of the rules allowed verstappen an unexpected opportunity to pass hamilton, which is entirely correct, had the rules been applied correctly, and all cars unlap themselves, the safety car would have had to do another lap an thus race end under the safety car. Thus no unexpected opportunity for verstappen to make a pass.
How is this disucssion even still a thing.
jff
31st July 2022, 10:48
You don’t know, I don’t know, the writer of this article doesn’t know, even my aunt with balls doesn’t know.
AndyPandy
31st July 2022, 11:11
Stop being flippant this is entirely correct, there was not enough time to allow all the cars to unlap before starting the final lap which would then have ended the race. The decision was taken explicitly to allow Verstappen a chance to overtake outside of the scope of the rules on safety car restarts. It was well established logistically at the time and spinning falsehoods about it only makes you appear deeply uninformed and arrogant.
jff
31st July 2022, 18:29
I know you and others want to believe that, but it is totally ignoring the obvious facts.
5 cars unlapped themselves between turn 8 & 9 (which took 11s), the 3 remaining cars could easily have unlapped themselves between turn 9 and 10, or even up to turn 11 or 12. The SC period lasted another 50s between the last unlapping and before racing started again.
The circuit has 16 turns, thus more than enough time for the SC to be called in after that (I’ve mentioned before this race that they should always do it like this rather than unnecessarily prolong it).
Gaspar Palagyi (@palagyi)
31st July 2022, 11:17
The race stewards thought otherwise, tough. As I have already stated time and again, Article 48.13 of the rules overrides the safety car having to do another lap, as the stewards confirmed after the race. Letting Ric, Stroll and Mick also unalp themselves wouldn’t have magically forced the race director to finish under safety car conditions.
So yeah. How is this discussion even still a thing.
N
31st July 2022, 12:19
“The FIA has admitted that Michael Masi contravened rules in last year’s controversial F1 finale”
How is this discussion still a thing.
Gaspar Palagyi (@palagyi)
31st July 2022, 13:47
“The FIA has admitted that Michael Masi contravened rules in last year’s controversial F1 finale”
Yes, in the sense that jff has already elaborated. Not in the sense you still want to believe in.
AndyPandy
31st July 2022, 11:06
It is not a misinterpretation in context, while you’re correct that it only hurt Sainz in theory, in reality there was no time to unlap everybody and finish the race under a green flag(Masi’s stated intention, which nobody has an issue with), so the only intended result of the incorrect application was to allow *only Max* a chance to overtake without having to go through lapped cars. Incidentally this is exactly what Red Bull had asked Masi to do on radio. If any correct and fair rules interpretation had been followed Lewis would have likely won. Red Bull and Masi must have known that. There’s simply no way it wasn’t blatant thievery of a race and championship.
Robert (@rob8k)
31st July 2022, 11:35
I mean, I get the point you are trying to get across but the fact Sainz had lapped cars between himself and Verstappen did affect the fight between Verstappen and Hamilton. Regardless of driver talent and car differences, the fact Verstappen didn’t have a car behind that could directly challenge him on restart after the SC means that he could solely focus on attack which some would class as an advantage.
I wish everyone could really just move on from it as recent events have shown that people are just creating such a negative atmosphere that shouldn’t be accepted.
jff
31st July 2022, 11:44
I fully agree with you, and also with the moving on.
Therefore, I find it so disappointing that Keith always includes that one (misleading) line whenever he mentions Masi.
Gaspar Palagyi (@palagyi)
31st July 2022, 13:51
In the spirit of fairness, you are absolutely right. But in reality, nobody can actually kid themselves that Sainz had any chance in a slower Ferrari on 18 laps-old mediums against the faster Red Bull on brand new softs. Sainz couldn’t even find his way past Ricciardo in the last lap, because of the stage of his tyres.
But I also absolutely agree with the moving on part.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 21:51
@palagyi It only needed to be for 4 corners. It was entirely plausible.
Gaspar Palagyi (@palagyi)
1st August 2022, 16:43
Well, Sainz tried, but it didn’t happen for 16 corners even against the weaker of Mclarens. So that’s that.
Yaru (@yaru)
31st July 2022, 14:10
Wrong. If Masi allowed all the cars to unlap like he was supposed to, the race would have finished before Max could have an opportunity to attack Hamilton. That is why Keith is right to call it an “unexpected opportunity”, because there wouldn’t have been time for that to happen.
If they were more laps remaining, you would have been correct, as there would be time to unlap all the cars and then resume the race under green. As it was Masi’s screwup gave Max that chance.
jff
31st July 2022, 18:33
There was more than enough time, see comment above.
Just check the final SC lap for yourself.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 21:48
jff, your claim is false, quite a few people were disadvantaged by the move (depending on which of the two legal options had been applied, some different people would have been disadvantaged, but Sainz wasn’t the only one who lost out on either legitimate version). Simply because you don’t care about the entire field doesn’t mean pretending they don’t exist is valid.
If you are seriously claiming that FIA misconduct does not matter and everyone should pretend Verstappen is champion, then you are claiming nobody should watch F1 at all. Becuase you’re claiming the FIA should just state who they want to be champion at the beginning and then nobody would need to race. It’s the very disrespect you are claiming those who believe that Abu Dhabi 2021 needed (and still needs) to be resolved within the regulations are displaying.
jff
1st August 2022, 9:00
I understand that you don’t like the outcome, but that doesn’t make my claim false.
Yes, of course the lead lap drivers behind Sainz were disadvantaged as well, but the continuous misrepresentation is that Hamilton was disadvantaged (or Verstappen advantaged), which is pertinently not true according to the Stewards and the formal report.
I don’t like the race proceeding/outcome either (never been a fan of SCs), and to me Hamilton should’ve won that race. But there is nothing wrong in my claim (read it again).
This site, should stop stirring the pot with incorrect representations of the facts.
And whenever I see this ‘stirring’ again, I’ll speak up.
This site can be (and has been) better than that.
Kribana (@krichelle)
31st July 2022, 9:50
Great… that’s one evidence down. We may never know the truth.
Kribana (@krichelle)
31st July 2022, 9:52
I still believe the FIA and Liberty told Mercedes and Red Bull to deliberately make the championship go down to the last race when either of them could have won it earlier.
Ajaxn
31st July 2022, 10:10
What?
Do you mean like in Baku when ‘Hamilton’s ‘magic’ button saved Verstappen’ effectly give up on a championship defining 25 points?
Nah, there’s no one anyone would concieve a plan to control the narative of the season, with only the promise of a close run victory. Its not like this is Hollywood.
G
31st July 2022, 10:41
Saved Verstappen?
Max had a tyre blow out and lost a ‘championship defining’ 25 points, a situation completely unfortunate and out of his hands. Lewis on the other hand produced an unforced human error under pressure.
Fred Fedurch
31st July 2022, 12:43
I’m surprised your post has been up for a couple of hours and none of the Hamfosi on here have pulled anything out of their “I have an excuse for that” folder and posted a retort in response to your unforced human error under pressure comment.
G
31st July 2022, 18:06
8 hours and counting. Still nothing….
Jere (@jerejj)
31st July 2022, 10:18
@krichelle LOL. Of course, entirely unfounded theory.
Bob C.
31st July 2022, 9:55
There is no excuse for this, and no one should ever be subjected to things of this nature.
That’s all.
F1 frog (@f1frog)
31st July 2022, 10:01
This is where the problems lie. Why on earth do these social media sites allow people to send messages to those who are not their ‘friends’ (or whatever the word is on social media)?
Some people are just awful and there is nothing that any Drive It Out campaign can do about that, but this is not a new occurrence in Formula 1; in 1994, Damon Hill received an anonymous phone call at Hockenheim telling him he would be shot if he beat Schumacher in the race. But that was just one case because it was more difficult to send a message to Damon Hill in those days. The big problem is that social media allows horrible people to actually express their opinions directly to those involved like Masi so easily and he can receive hundreds of death threats in just one night (thank goodness he doesn’t have Twitter or Instagram otherwise it would have been hundreds of thousands).
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
31st July 2022, 10:28
@f1frog
Thanks for the story, never heard of it before.
StefMeister (@stefmeister)
31st July 2022, 13:02
@f1frog @tifoso1989 And from memory I think the threat was taken seriously enough at the time that the local police offered Damon extra police protection over that weekend.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
31st July 2022, 13:26
@stefmeister
Thanks for the additional info !
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 21:53
@f1frog Because some people want to use it that way. Indeed, that was the original point of Facebook – so that college students could find each other again even if they weren’t personal friends.
Of course, social media should make it clear what option they have switched on and how to change them, and in the 2020s there is no excuse for Facebook continuing to be opaque about this.
Trevor
31st July 2022, 10:11
F1 journalists still dont understand what happened in Abu Dhabi.
1. Masi allowed only 3 cars to unlap themselves (between Hamilton and Verstappen), but not the onces in front of Sainz.
AND
2. Masi allowed to Safety car to enter the pit 1 lap early (even though the Safety car should have come in “the following lap AFTER the lapped cars unlapped themselves).
thus handing Verstappen the opportunity on a silver platter to pass Hamilton in the last lap.
lucifer (@lucifer)
31st July 2022, 10:40
thank you
jff
31st July 2022, 10:55
2) is fully according to the rules. It’s mentioned over and over again, and was explained in the FIA report to be legitimate.
You can easily find it yourself in the rules and in the (summary of the) FIA. report.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:04
2) is against the regulations as they stood at the time of Abu Dhabi 2021. Article 48.12 is extremely clear about that, no matter how many times the FIA erroneously claims otherwise.
Short version for anyone who doesn’t feel like going to the FIA’s regulatory archive: the FIA had 2 options:
1) Permit lapped cars to overtake. “Any cars that have been lapped by the leader will be required to pass the cars on the lead lap,” has only one possible interpretation – a command will be issued to any car that is lapped, who then must unlap themselves. This would have guaranteed a Lewis win because there would have been no green-flag running. This did not happen.
2) Prohibit lapped cars from overtaking. “OVERTAKING WILL NOT BE PERMITTED” has to be shown in this case, and zero cars may overtake. In the case of Abu Dhabi 2021, this would have resulted in a quick restart situation, with the result depending on whether Red Bull had elected to pit instead of arguing, and then whether Max could get through the cars between him and Lewis (in contrast to situation 1), that was potentially feasible). This also did not happen.
(Also, either breach cited by Trevor casts the whole approach, and thus the whole result, into doubt).
jff
1st August 2022, 9:10
You undermine your incorrect belief by this statement: “no matter how many times the FIA erroneously claims otherwise”. FIA is the rule writer, and much better than you at assessing those rules.
You make two major mistakes here:
a) The rules explicitly allow the Race Director to call in the SC when he deems it safe to do so (even if this is earlier than ‘after the next lap’)
b) you assume that had all cars be allowed to unlap that the SC would make another tour. This is nothing more than your belief and not based on data or facts as I showed in the post above.
SjaakFoo (@sjaakfoo)
31st July 2022, 10:56
3. At the urging of the teams, including Red Bull and Mercedes, an agreement was made and documented in the pre-event directors note that it was very much preferable to finish the race under green flag conditions.
Fred Fedurch
31st July 2022, 12:49
^—– This.
ALL the teams had lobbied for a green flag finish if possible for at least a year prior to Abu Dhabi. All Masi did was find a way within the rules to grant them their wish.
Emma
31st July 2022, 13:40
Are you sure about this?
Yaru (@yaru)
31st July 2022, 14:12
Except it wasn’t within the rules at all.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:04
@sjaakfoo The “Lapped cars will not overtake” option that was available under the regulations to the director would have provided more green running than the route that was actually taken.
Ajaxn
31st July 2022, 10:17
The people i feel sorry for are all those high rollers who must have placed big money on Hamilton winning, either at the start of the season, or based on the finally spell of victories running up to that final race.
Then you get Horner’s plea to the Racing Gods, Latifi to crash with 5 laps to go, and to top it all, Masi scuppers a certain historic victory but reinterpretting the known rules of F1.
Masi pouring salt on with his infamous – “Its called motor racing”
Ruben
31st July 2022, 10:36
Though social networks make it easier to address people directly, I wouldn’t put the blame on them alone. On a social network, but also on forums and comment sections, voicing an opinion is (by design) way too easy.
Online you don’t need the courage you would need to voice that same opinion to someone’s face. If you were to gather some courage to walk up to someone to talk to them, you would assess what wording to use and consider if/how it would land with the other person.
Small words (‘whiner’, ‘crashkid’, etc.) would in that case be filtered out. And though it’s only small words, they do set a certain scene that seems to act as a flywheel for online hatred and vitriol.
Mayrton
31st July 2022, 10:36
Some Hamilton fans taking it beyond what is healthy here.. Toto is not without a role in all of this, but can ofcourse not be held responsible for other people’s behavior. Still I hope it will lead to some reflection on his side.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
31st July 2022, 10:50
Cancel culture at its finest by the people bragging about diversity and inclusion. Mercedes F1 team and Toto disgraceful behaviour contributed to this man being literally cancelled. He lost his job and career at top motorsport, he has been remarkably bullied, harassed and received death threats. His family too.
Even now I can’t imagine Masi having a normal life in his native Australia due to the toxicity of both Hamilton and Mercedes devoted fan–boys. Masi’s mistake didn’t change the outcome of the championship. Max was the overall best driver on the course of the season and Hamilton was in 1st position in the final lap because he cut a corner in the first lap and got away with it. It only exposed Mercedes are as most hypocrite sour loser team in the history of the sport.
The way he checked Toto at the end of the race and said “It’s called a motor race” was just fantastic. Toto looked like the villain seeing his empire collapsing. I have to go back now watch the 2021 Abu Dhabi GP race highlights and radio rewind :)
Carbonized
31st July 2022, 12:21
Do you realize that one could replace the words Mercedes with RedBull, Toto with Horner, Hamilton with Max every time you use them in your comment and be just as right…..or wrong ?
Fred Fedurch
31st July 2022, 12:56
Always deflect, deflect, deflect.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
31st July 2022, 13:25
Carbonized
No, simply because you don’t see Horner, RBR and Marko lecturing people about fairness, values, diversity and inclusion and at the same time cancelling someone who they don’t agree with. RBR are a selfish, disruptive and whiny bunch of people that will try everything they can to win at all costs. Calling Mercedes hypocrite behaviour doesn’t necessary mean I’m a RBR fan, far from it.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:06
@tifoso1989 I have. Though I don’t think you’re ready to hear that one.
David BR (@david-br)
31st July 2022, 12:24
@tifoso1989 Hamilton stayed quiet – for months – after congratulating Verstappen immediately after the race and told Mercedes not to fight the FIA decision in the courts. The fact you include him as culpable for the attacks on Masi fatally undermines your argument. Hamilton has also faced this kind (and level) of abuse since even before he entered Formula 1. Maybe you should channel some of your outrage over Masi’s treatment into understanding why Hamilton himself may be motivated to campaign for diversity and inclusion. I’ve no problems saying Masi was wrong from Brazil onwards in his handling of the Verstappen-Hamilton on-track battles and was rightly removed from the post of race director. So what? Normal if harsh criticism. That’s entirely separate from abuse and death threats. You can just as easily try to tarnish Red Bull, Ferrari and their drivers for the behaviour of some of their ‘fans’ over the years (e.g. in Austria this year).
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
31st July 2022, 13:20
@david-br
Where in my comment I have mentioned Hamilton as responsible on the attacks over Masi ?
I said Toto and Mercedes F1 team disgraceful behaviour and later I mentioned the toxic Hamilton and Mercedes fan–boys. I’ve commented on Hamilton’s behaviour in defeat as well as his father congratulating both Jos and Max after the race before, I don’t have to do it again.
I’ve also called out Verstappen’s fans and their utterly abusive violent behaviour during the Austrian GP. You can verify it yourself. That doesn’t mean that Verstappen is responsible for their actions. Same goes for Hamilton. He is only responsible of his actions. When I said his toxic fans, that doesn’t mean he is toxic or he has planted that toxicity in them but they are indeed toxic.
Emma
31st July 2022, 13:43
You talk about fan toxicity and then you say this.
You are pretty toxic too (and not just based on this).
BLS (@brightlampshade)
31st July 2022, 10:55
I’m not sure whether the pressure got to him or whatever but he made a monstrous error and then proceeded to effectively gloat about it over the radio.
Either way nothing he did justifies any of the abuse. Sure let him know if you felt let down and the like but abusing someone instantly puts you in the wrong. It’s in the past now, time to let it go, it’s a shame it happened as it put a lot of people off F1 and they missed some of the awesome racing we’ve had this year.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:07
@brightlampshade He made several major errors (I don’t even think Abu Dhabi was the worst one, that was running Spa 2021 against regulations). However, death threats simply weren’t on. Play the ball, not the player.
DB-C90 (@dbradock)
31st July 2022, 12:39
Not really surprised given the way things are on social media these days.
I wonder though whether Masi truly understands just how horrendous his handling of that race, and tbh most of last season really was. Given his position, and the way it panned out, the last thing he should have done is gone on to any social media.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:08
@dbradock In fairness, he didn’t appear to have realised he’d be able to see the opinion of anyone who was not a family or friend (or indeed that they’d be able to see him – which is possible on some combinations of Facebook settings). Had his beliefs about Facebook settings been accurate, it could have been a nice sanctuary against the comments happening outside that sphere.
ttongsul (@ccpbioweapon)
31st July 2022, 12:53
Nice conveniently timed artificial crisis management PR from the FIA and masi with unprovable allegations that acts as a great diversionary story for covering up the botched restart of the last lap of the last race and to take the attention from the current abuse and s*xual assaults of fans from the orange army.
Obviously I do not condone hurting Masi’s fragile feelings regarding unproven allegations of receiving text based electronic communication BUT he needs to stand up and apologize for destroying the title decider turning F1 into a WWE farce. he actually further enrages people by gloating (It’S caLlEd RaCiNg ) plus not apologizing and saying he will do it again.
I said before I don’t think Masi was the one that wanted to make the call but his hand was forced by the higher ups in the FIA who wanted to punish Lewis for: his BLM politics, stop him overtaking MS 7xWDC titles, appeal to a wider audience making wunderkind the new WDC.
FIA already tried its hardest to stop Lewis winning his 8th title:
excluded from Brazil Quali for a bogus rear wing slot gap infringement
Max not excluded (MS was in 1995) for deliberately brake checking Lewis at Saudi GP
joke meddled end to the last race(and for people saying why didn’t Lewis pit, RB would invert max and Masi/FIA would just sc until the end which was the correct protocol anyway)
This was why i think that he refuses to apologize and was put on gardening leave with I assume a huge payoff because if the FIA did fire him it would’ve gone to industrial tribunal and discovery would’ve shown to the world the meddling of the final laps by the FIA directly and not Masi himself .
Regarding the unproven ‘evil’ online ‘abuse’ , I personally think women being s*xual assaulted and disgusting harassment of Lewis fans by drunken orange army who are becoming more violent and Liberty media stoking this hatred for increased engagement and views is more worrying.
I feel ZERO empathy for an incompetent multi millionaire bureaucrat whining making unproven allegations..
Maybe IF in the post Charles Whiting era of liberty media ownership they did not try to Americanise F1 and turn it into a zoomer friendly Nascar style clown show with fake reddit reality tv drama none of this would ever happen and Abu Dhabi 2021 isn’t going to be forgotten anytime soon..
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:09
@ccpbioweapon I suspect this may be getting cited as an example of why #DriveItOut is needed.
jff
1st August 2022, 9:21
You’re a very nasty person blaming the victim.
Fred Fedurch
31st July 2022, 13:12
“Nice conveniently timed artificial crisis management PR from the FIA and masi with unprovable allegations that acts as a great diversionary story for covering up the botched restart of the last lap of the last race and to take the attention from the current abuse and s*xual assaults of fans from the orange army.”
Try to keep up.
It came to light that the “sexual abuse allegation (homophobia)” made in particular by the two women was fabricated as a ploy to meet Seb. They didn’t delete their tweets from the Red Bull Ring or their tweets from Silverstone (not fast enough, anyway) before people started investigating the pair and found out they were using their Twitter accounts as weapons to baite then fabricate stories about totally innocent people (Silverstone in particular). The timeline of their (now deleted) tweets and what they were actually doing is all out there on the web for you to find.
Emma
31st July 2022, 13:46
You think those two women were the only ones that raised issues? Do you really believe all was well for female fans at that race?
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
31st July 2022, 22:10
Also, if it had been that simple, we wouldn’t have seen a heap of issues in Hungary (and some in France).
RandomMallard
31st July 2022, 13:26
I didn’t like how last season ended. My opinion is Masi, under pressure, applied the rules in a way that gave one driver an unexpected, and probably unfair, advantage. And I supported Max for most of the season. I have no problem with Max being champion, I just don’t like the way it was won.
But NO ONE deserves death threats. Under no circumstances should a refereeing error result in someone having to fear for their safety. In the same way a crash shouldn’t ever lead to someone getting racist abuse. No one should be sending anyone death threats or abuse, nor should they be burning merchandise, nor should they be harassing opposition fans.
At the end of the day, I’m a fan of motorsport and racing over any one particular driver. I want to watch exciting, clean, and entertaining racing, in an environment that people can feel safe in and enjoy themselves.
Nick T.
31st July 2022, 13:38
Honestly, I would not take death threats seriously if I were in his shows, but it’s still disgusting. Anyway, imagine, one must have absolutely no life to be sending death threats over F1. What losers.
S
31st July 2022, 13:38
I think a lot of people did (and still) massively over-react to this.
People seem to get so wrapped up in their favourite activity that they forget just how small it really is, holistically speaking.
Meaningless, even.
It’s a sport – a game. A hobby.
Not a warzone. Not a medical emergency. Not a global environmental disaster….
Certainly not worth throwing death threats and anyone.
A bit of perspective would be great – and very healthy – for everyone.
Ruben
31st July 2022, 15:29
Exactly.
Ploss (@f1-ploss)
31st July 2022, 13:50
This is what happens when you give 7 Billion people the means to shout at each other at once…
Bulgarian (@bulgarian)
31st July 2022, 15:14
Cheap cheat Michael Masi killed F1 as a sport, so it is not a surprise at all that someone could not bear it and acted so harshly.
Jazz (@jazz)
31st July 2022, 16:35
So Masi signs an NDA preventing him from ever discussing the decisions he made in Abu Dhabi and loses his job to boot.. Meanwhile we juxtapose to the sham “champion” prancing around in his golden boots and his number one decal either oblivious to the whole thing or in complete denial. Diabolical!