GPWizard F1 Forum
F1 News & Discussions => General F1 Discussion => Topic started by: Steven Roy on December 16, 2007, 05:47:59 PM
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http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19936.html
The transcripts of the Renault spy case still have not been published. Considering how the FIA rushed out the McLaren transcripts this seems most odd.
Maybe they are looking for a busy news day to bury something that we may mis-interpret.
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They haven't published the updates to the 2008/2009 aero rules that were promised on October 22nd either. The FIA really are slow at some things...
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The transcripts have been published and are at the link below. 77 pages of them.
I have read the documet and the evidenceis damning. Renault can be demonstrated to have used the McLaren info to 'seek clarification' on the J damper 10 months before it admitted to having it. Tim Densham admits to discussing McLaren designs with Phil Mackereth but can't remember drawings. Bob Bell and Pat Symonds have been shown to have seen the documentation.
The bit I love is that Renault invited the FIA to inspect its 2007 and 2008 cars to see if there was any McLaren info used. Charlie Whiting spent one day at Renault checking both cars and interviewing people and checking though their computers. Rather different to the team of experts who camped out at McLaren.
Given that weight distribution was one of Renault's major problems and clearly not one of McLaren's it seems odd to describe a layout drawing of the McLaren as having no commercial value. Renault say that the entire package has no commercial value.
The FIA stated that the championship was not affected by Renault's possession of the data. Given that it was possession of the data that enabled them to protest the J damper that is an odd conclusion.
http://www.fia.com/public/Transcript_6_Dec_2007.pdf
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The similarities in the two cases are amazing. Virtually every point that was brought up in the McLaren case appeared again in the Renault hearing. Yet with totally different results. McLaren used information from Stepney to query (not protest) the legality of the movable floors (after Stepney had tried to stop Ferrari using it and informed the FIA to no effect) and they were castigated as a result. Renault use the McLaren info to protest the J-damper and are excused because "they didn't understand it properly" (presumably it's okay to use a competitor's data as long as your engineers are too stupid to get it right).
Renault engineers admitted to discussing the information before deciding it was no use to them; in McLaren's case it was only "inferred" that their engineers "must have" used the Ferrari info. Renault are let off because they didn't use it (ignoring the fact that the WMSC declared in McLaren's case that it was not necessary to prove usage - penetration of the info into the team would be enough), McLaren are fined and excluded from the constructors championship because Max thinks the info must have gone beyond the Spanish drivers.
And before Rainy cuts in here with the equally inferred "proof" that McLaren started and then halted a Ferrari-based project when the Stepneygate case broke, I would point out that the FIA had already shown its bias by deciding against McLaren before anything was known about any projects; why then should we believe a later investigation of theirs that also relies heavily on assumption rather than proof?
As for Charlie Whiting's "investigation" of Renault, a day spent chatting to engineers is hardly comparable with the exhaustive inspections McLaren have been put through. Charlie, in fact, has plummeted in my estimation through all this, first by ignoring Stepney's information regarding a Ferrari device designed to circumvent the rules, and then by conducting so cursory an examination of Renault. My illusions have taken a severe battering this season and many that I thought worthy of respect have fallen off their pedestals.
The Renault transcript has decided me - McLaren's apology is nothing more than a recognition that the team cannot expect justice from a governing body that treats one team differently from another and so the best thing to do is to take the medicine and hope they get off your back. It does not, in fact, matter whether McLaren used the Ferrari info or not - what is clear is that Renault used the McLaren info and yet has been excused at every turn. No excuse was ever good enough when it came to McLaren.
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Question: Has MacKereth even been suspended or fired from Renault?? I'm only on page 3 so far, but the bit about him taking a screen grab (print screen), emailing it home, forwarding to Renault are pretty damning, and his only defence is that he 'doesn't remember'??
You don't have to be a brain surgeon to do a screen grab as a way to copy a secure document, but you have to have certain deceptive thoughts to do so and would certainly have some memory of the scheme. Um - guilty.
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He was suspended evenually. But by that time he had been with Renault for a year and it had been 15 or 16 months since he started taking data from McLaren so I guess they had everything they were going to get from him.
I love that Renault keep saying they have been open since day 1. Day 1 is a year after they received the info and 10 months after they used it to protest McLaren's J-damper. Interesting definition of day 1. Clearly the information was common knowledge at Renault in a way the Ferrari data has never been shown to be at McLaren.
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So far, looking at Max's comments, he seems to be working with the Renault defence team in his clarifications (why is this one shaping up to be a McLaren vs Renault case, while previously the Stepney case was clearly an FIA vs McLaren case?).
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Having slept on it which is easy to do after 77 pages of pseudo-legalese the one thing that really stands out is the reason why Renault have had such a lousy year. No-one in any way associated with the team can remember anything about anything. The only person assciated with Renault in this whole affair with a functioning memory is the guy who left to go to McLaren and told them what he remembered. Mackereth can't remember when or why he took most of the data. He can't remember who he showed it to at Renault or how McLaren's new man ever saw or heard about it. Despite Renault's in depth investigation no-one who has admitted knowing anything about the files knows how this guy knew about them.
Tim Densham the Deputy Technical Director who used the info as the basis of the protest against McLaren's J-damper cannot remember seeing the files or cannot remember knowing they existed but he does remember discussing the matter with Mackereth. Bob Bell remembers the protest but cannot remember asking Densham where he got his info from. It goes on and on and on like this. Except where Max keeps interupting just when McLaren's barrister looks like he is getting somewhere.
McLaren were hammered because two of its drivers had text messages and e-mails which have not been proved to say very much. Renault is admitting to ten of its engineers (not including the McLaren defector) having examined the files but apparently they only looked at them out of engineering curiosity and none of them ever though about using the info.
Renault carried out their own investigation where Bob Bell interviewed 20 engineers out of the 450 technical staff. Apparently it would have taken too long to interview everyone. Presumably it would have been way to difficult to send out one e-mail saying if you have any info on this matter contact me.
One interesting aspect was that Mackereth in one of the rare spells when his memory was working said that he took the files to remember the work he had done at McLaren. Strangely none of the files discussed in this case related to hydraulics which was his area of operation. They related to gearbox where McLaren has a known advantage and general layout (weight distribution, suspension geometry etc) which is an area where Renault had big problems as a result of the change of tyre manufacturer. Strange that someone wanting to remember his own work would take the files that would be most use to his new employer. Still he probably couldn't remember what he had been working on.
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Great summary Steven - you are exactly right on every point. Wouldn't you love to know what was in that mysterious 'financial document' that turned out not to be needed since there was no fine anyway. I'm sure at the bottom there was a small note from the Renault CEO saying "Max, you fine me, I say F#$% You! We will walk away"
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It would be interesting to know what it said but my guess would be that it would show that a fine of anything close to McLaren's would not be sustainable and would result in the team being financially unviable. I doubt they would be so crude as to put a threat from M. Ghosn in writing. He would either have had a quite word with Max behind the bike sheds or trusted that all the stuff he leaked to the press would do the job. Of course being head of Renault he has huge pull on the the French motoring association which will be a member of the FIA and its man in the corridors of power would have been able to campaign against Max and make his life uncomfortable. The French have always been in a strong position in the FIA. But I have no doubt that the decision was made on an entirely sporting basis.
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You make a good point Steven about Renault F1 being unable financially to meet a fine the size of the Mclaren one. A few weeks ago Flavio was scuttleing around trying to get sponsors to underwrite Alonso's return to the team, not the actions of a CEO with plenty of money in the kitty.
This of course begs the question "should all teams in F1 face the same financial penalties or should it be based on ability to pay?" I presume we will all agree that the Mclaren fine is far beyond the means of teams like Super Aguri or Spyker, sorry Fifi so how should teams like that get special treatment?
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I am a great believer in equality as far as possible in sports. I don't understand why McLaren should be fined more than for example Fifi just because they are better at generating sponsorship. But then I don't understand why they have been punished and Renault has not. Or for that matter why McLaren and Renault have been investigated and the other three cases of teams 'allegedly' having another team's data were not.
Fining teams different amounts is like giving someone a shorter jail sentence because he is older and has less time to live than someone else. The punishment should be proportional to the crime not the ability to cope with the punishment.
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The whole problem is caused by the idiocy of a sporting body thinking it has the right to hand out astronomical fines as it sees fit. Its job is to ensure fairness in competition between teams, some of whom may be financially secure, others less so. Any punishment must be in the context of the sport alone and fines that endanger a company's ability to operate in the real world are inappropriate; teams like McLaren employ thousands of people whose livelihood should not be threatened by any penalty imposed in a sporting contest.
The FIA's jurisdiction is limited to the sport alone and they should have the power to exclude competitors but not to bankrupt them. If the WMSC stuck to such principles, McLaren's penalty would have been much more carefully considered and would probably have amounted to the loss of all 2007 constructors' points only. And that would have given them a much freer hand in dealing with Renault; it would not have been a question of keeping the team in the game by ignoring the McLaren precedent but merely docking their points, something that Ghosn could stomach, especially as they didn't get a whole bunch of them.
This also addresses the issue of "ability to pay". I have seen the example of Spyker's possession of a Toro Rosso drawing used as an instance of the FIA ignoring the matter they deemed so serious in McLaren's case. But the reason for their attitude is obvious - nobody gives a flying fart what Spyker and STR get up to because they do not score many points. Were the FIA to stay on its allotted ground, they could have said, "Naughty, naughty," to Colin Kolles, docked all of his 2007 points (which amounted to nothing at the time) and everyone would have gone home happy.
The problem is not just that the FIA is seen to be biased in its judgements; it is also that it has extended its jurisdiction beyond the limits of any governing body of a sport.
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The FIA's jurisdiction is limited to the sport alone and they should have the power to exclude competitors but not to bankrupt them. If the WMSC stuck to such principles, McLaren's penalty would have been much more carefully considered and would probably have amounted to the loss of all 2007 constructors' points only.
The FIA certainly should not bankrupt teams but has to be free to impose financial penalties as this affects the sponsors who are really only interested in their money being spent on maximising their positive exposure through the media and not the score in championships for prosperity.
These penalties must be based on a team's ability to pay to avoid hardship in the first place but more importantly to stop a cheats charter emerging where richer teams can factor in averaged level fines, or no financial penalty, without loss of performance or resources.
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I don't agree. Financial penalties for drivers who disobey rules are ok, but I think in the case of teams, it should be constructor point penalties, which ultimately affect their income based on television revenue.
What you say about sponsor's being interested in their money being spent on maximising their positive exposure is hard to swallow when a chunk of that sponsorship ends up in the FIA coffers, and does nothing about enhancing their exposure.
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The pressure put on teams from sponsors if their money ends up in FIA coffers is a pretty big incentive I suggest and will certainly help to prevent teams from breaking the rules to often.
You are right, there is a financial penalty to pay for loss of points in the constructors area and this can also effect the sponsors along with the team as the lost money needs to be made up in the following year. This of course assumes the same sponsors stay for the following year.
The Drivers again need to be assessed on ability to pay, but other measures like loss of grid places or even deduction of points have their place.