Lewis third, Jarno given 25s penalty > Trulli 3rd, Lewis DSQ

[vall]

Although I have been very harsh to LH, I start to think that indeed McLaren is to blame most. However, I must say I was surprised how easily LH took the advice of McLaren to lie! I mean, these guys have been competing all their lives. They must have encountered unfair behaviors, decisions, etc, throughout their careers and they must be very sensitive to this, not matter which way it goes.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

Although I have been very harsh to LH, I start to think that indeed McLaren is to blame most. However, I must say I was surprised how easily LH took the advice of McLaren to lie! I mean, these guys have been competing all their lives. They must have encountered unfair behaviors, decisions, etc, throughout their careers and they must be very sensitive to this, not matter which way it goes.

Oh I agree, but I doubt they've ever come across something as crazy as being advised to mislead the stewards. With regards to the cloak & Daggar side of things F1 is almost in a world of its own....up there with Cold War espionage lol!

Still Lewis is a grown man, and should have made the right choice. While I understand the many possible reasons why he may not have:
+ Be a team player
+ Confusion after race
+ Belief that team knows something he doesn't and therefore implicitly believes them (after all why would they lie?! lol) <----Ironic eh?
It was still his choice to perform said duty, and he and the team deserve their punishment. I just hope all parties involved have learned from this.

[ben_watkins]

McLaren to appear before extraordinary meeting of WMSC - that's when the s*** will hit the fan!

http://www.f1technical.net/news/12088

http://www.fia.com/en-GB/mediacentre/pr ... sc_ex.aspx

[Cyclomethicone]

Still Lewis is a grown man, and should have made the right choice. While I understand the many possible reasons why he may not have:
+ Be a team player
+ Confusion after race
+ Belief that team knows something he doesn't and therefore implicitly believes them (after all why would they lie?! lol) <----Ironic eh?
It was still his choice to perform said duty, and he and the team deserve their punishment. I just hope all parties involved have learned from this.

Agree with this the most, one of the sayings I heard most at school is "If x told you to jump off a cliff would you do it?" In my opinion Hamilton knew exactly what he was doing and since has been a backstabbing little **** which has resulted in one of the longer serving members of McLaren being suspended (probably fired?) and for that I would throw the book at him more than what he actually done. He should have been a man and accepted responsibility for his actions.

[De Jokke]

Again another subjective attitude of the FIA(rrari).
A complete witchhunt. Mcl has already paid enough for their mistakes, it should be case closed.

[vall]

Again another subjective attitude of the FIA(rrari).
A complete witchhunt. Mcl has already paid enough for their mistakes, it should be case closed.

hmmm, these are very serious charges. I thought they lied only on 29 Apr, but it now appears that they kept doing that on the meetings on 2 May (with MW also doing so on an interview after the meeting on 2 May I should add). I don't see how this is a witchhunt!

[Ciro Pabón]

McLaren hasn't paid for its "mistakes". When you lie, steal, cheat you're not making "mistakes" but you're behaving like a criminal.

McLaren was fortunate enough for not being expelled from the championship after stealing plans and specifications and paying (you have to assume some interest had the parties involved) for a spy acting inside a competitor.

Then they expelled the former World Champion after an embarrassing internal incident among their drivers: it was evident to me that expelling Alonso was Hamilton goal, I wasn't born yesterday.

Now I think FIA should punish Hamilton for "allowing himself" to be a "team player", that is, for knowingly lying to a refereee and colluding with other people to get an unfair penalty for Toyota. Where I live that's not called "team playing", that's called "lack of character".

I have to hear that he was witchhunted. People, if you're a witch, then a witchhunt is adequate!

Was he inocent? Look, who benefited from the "mistake" involving Trulli? Lewis Hamilton. Who benefited from Alonso expulsion? Lewis Hamilton. Who was the only one at McLaren (beside Ron Dennis... a thing that defies belief) who did not know they were using information from Ferrari? Yep. Lewis Hamilton. This guy lives in the clouds, if you believe to his fans. A robot has more responsibility...

Same thing can be said of the "Director-that-doesn't-direct", Ron Dennis: everybody and his dog, even tyre changers, knew what McLaren was doing. Everybody except Ron Dennis. Thank heavens he has no clue of what's going on in his team! Because if he knew, then he would be a fat liar, don't you agree?

To the people that feels sorry for Hamilton mistake, I only can say that there is a clear line dividing collaboration from complicity.

I'm really tired of a team cheating its way and being caught several times while many people still chant the "Ferrari is to blame" song. Oh, c'mon. Did Ferrari planted everything? Did they force McLaren to behave, for the last two years, like a house ran by the Mafia?

It's McLaren the ugly team nowadays and you all know it. FIA letter doesn't leave room for guesses: they continued to lie even when confronted with their own recordings. For the love of Pete, what's that? Not even my children do that. I have doubts: I don't know if to call it stupidity or crime. I guess I have to settle for both.

[gcdugas]

McLaren hasn't paid for its "mistakes". When you lie, steal, cheat you're not making "mistakes" but you're behaving like a criminal.

McLaren was fortunate enough for not being expelled from the championship after stealing plans and specifications and paying (you have to assume some interest had the parties involved) for a spy acting inside a competitor.

Then they expelled the former World Champion after an embarrassing internal incident among their drivers: it was evident to me that expelling Alonso was Hamilton goal, I wasn't born yesterday.

Now I think FIA should punish Hamilton for "allowing himself" to be a "team player", that is, for knowingly lying to a refereee and colluding with other people to get an unfair penalty for Toyota. Where I live that's not called "team playing", that's called "lack of character".

I have to hear that he was witchhunted. People, if you're a witch, then a witchhunt is adequate!

Was he inocent? Look, who benefited from the "mistake" involving Trulli? Lewis Hamilton. Who benefited from Alonso expulsion? Lewis Hamilton. Who was the only one at McLaren (beside Ron Dennis... a thing that defies belief) who did not know they were using information from Ferrari? Yep. Lewis Hamilton. This guy lives in the clouds, if you believe to his fans. A robot has more responsibility...

Same thing can be said of the "Director-that-doesn't-direct", Ron Dennis: everybody and his dog, even tyre changers, knew what McLaren was doing. Everybody except Ron Dennis. Thank heavens he has no clue of what's going on in his team! Because if he knew, then he would be a fat liar, don't you agree?

To the people that feels sorry for Hamilton mistake, I only can say that there is a clear line dividing collaboration from complicity.

I'm really tired of a team cheating its way and being caught several times while many people still chant the "Ferrari is to blame" song. Oh, c'mon. Did Ferrari planted everything? Did they force McLaren to behave, for the last two years, like a house ran by the Mafia?

It's McLaren the ugly team nowadays and you all know it. FIA letter doesn't leave room for guesses: they continued to lie even when confronted with their own recordings. For the love of Pete, what's that? Not even my children do that. I have doubts: I don't know if to call it stupidity or crime. I guess I have to settle for both.

No team has ever lied in the history of F1 before! Hang 'em by the balls over a vat of boiling oil! And we need a $200M fine plus exclusion until 2050. Zis ess verboten! Vee cannot have zis! Nine! Schnell!

[casper]

Some people would want Vodafone Mclaren Mercedez to be excluded from the 2009 Season. Fine I say. But Mercedez should also take with them FIF1 and Brawn's engines too. Then we'll see how Brawn's diffuser performs under a Fred Flinstone-like powered sports car.

[timbo]

No team has ever lied in the history of F1 before!

To my knowledge, in such way, none.

[myurr]

Okay I'll bite. (Apologies for picking on you twice in recent days!)

McLaren hasn't paid for its "mistakes". When you lie, steal, cheat you're not making "mistakes" but you're behaving like a criminal.

McLaren was fortunate enough for not being expelled from the championship after stealing plans and specifications and paying (you have to assume some interest had the parties involved) for a spy acting inside a competitor.

McLaren were expelled from the championship, only the drivers kept their places in the drivers championship. McLaren were also hit with a $100m fine, far more than any damage caused through their alleged actions.
No plans were stolen, there was no theft, they were given the plans by an employee of the other team.
No money changed hands, and you cannot assume that this was the case. Are you seriously suggesting that McLaren were so involved as to authorise payments to Stepney, but were unable to lend him a photocopier forcing him to go to a local printers instead!?

Then they expelled the former World Champion after an embarrassing internal incident among their drivers: it was evident to me that expelling Alonso was Hamilton goal, I wasn't born yesterday.

Alonso wasn't expelled, although frankly after his behavior of attempting to blackmail Ron Dennis he should have been. He chose to leave and McLaren chose to let him. In all of this Alonso to me is by far the biggest agitator, and lets not forget that Alonso was one of the major players in the Stepneygate affair that has you so worked up. He was aware of, and aided, the flow of information into McLaren.

Now I think FIA should punish Hamilton for "allowing himself" to be a "team player", that is, for knowingly lying to a refereee and colluding with other people to get an unfair penalty for Toyota. Where I live that's not called "team playing", that's called "lack of character".

I have to hear that he was witchhunted. People, if you're a witch, then a witchhunt is adequate!

Frankly the fact that the FIA intend to take the McLaren saga further does smack of a witch hunt. There have been many documented cases of drivers lying to the stewards in the past, with no subsequent action being taken. Take the Schumacher parking incident at Monaco - Schumacher told the stewards that it wasn't deliberate, they found against him. By definition they believe that he was lying to them.

Schumacher was only found out after telemetry was made available showing he broke something like 3 times harder than ever before at that corner. Very similar to Lewis being caught out by the radio recording this time.

In Schumacher's case he was, rightly in my opinion, excluded from qualifying. In Lewis's case he was excluded, again rightly in my opinion, from the results of the Australian GP. In both instances that should have been it, punishment given out that fit the crime and then that's it. In this instance though the FIA want to pursue McLaren further and I can only conclude that it is due to a personal vendetta on the part of Max Mosley. He blames Ron Dennis for his Nazi sex tape shame, and has persecuted McLaren ever since.

Was he inocent? Look, who benefited from the "mistake" involving Trulli? Lewis Hamilton. Who benefited from Alonso expulsion? Lewis Hamilton. Who was the only one at McLaren (beside Ron Dennis... a thing that defies belief) who did not know they were using information from Ferrari? Yep. Lewis Hamilton. This guy lives in the clouds, if you believe to his fans. A robot has more responsibility...

Same thing can be said of the "Director-that-doesn't-direct", Ron Dennis: everybody and his dog, even tyre changers, knew what McLaren was doing. Everybody except Ron Dennis. Thank heavens he has no clue of what's going on in his team! Because if he knew, then he would be a fat liar, don't you agree?

To the people that feels sorry for Hamilton mistake, I only can say that there is a clear line dividing collaboration from complicity.

I'm really tired of a team cheating its way and being caught several times while many people still chant the "Ferrari is to blame" song. Oh, c'mon. Did Ferrari planted everything? Did they force McLaren to behave, for the last two years, like a house ran by the Mafia?

It's McLaren the ugly team nowadays and you all know it. FIA letter doesn't leave room for guesses: they continued to lie even when confronted with their own recordings. For the love of Pete, what's that? Not even my children do that. I have doubts: I don't know if to call it stupidity or crime. I guess I have to settle for both.

[/quote]
The rest of your post is personal opinion and conjecture. I disagree with the majority of it, but there's little point arguing over it until we agree on the first half of your post which deals with the events and our own perceptions of them.

[myurr]

No team has ever lied in the history of F1 before!

To my knowledge, in such way, none.

First one that comes to mind is Schumacher parking at Monaco during qualifying. He claimed it was an accident / mistake, the telemetry showed it was deliberate, stewards ruled that he was lying and he was excluded from qualifying. No further world motorsport council meeting was required to investigate the team.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

No team has ever lied in the history of F1 before!

To my knowledge, in such way, none.

Just because they didn't get caught doesn't somebody else hasn't done it before.

And as myurr pointed out, Schumi's parking incident at Monaco was a clear example of F1's version of "Diving" in football.

[timbo]

He claimed it was an accident / mistake, the telemetry showed it was deliberate, stewards ruled that he was lying and he was excluded from qualifying.

Before you put a brain scanner onto a helmet, I won't agree that telemetry can show any act is "deliberate".
In McLaren's case their actions (lie) and their lack of actions (in light of Trulli's penalty) prove it's deliberate.

[Spencifer_Murphy]

No team has ever lied in the history of F1 before! Hang 'em by the balls over a vat of boiling oil! And we need a $200M fine plus exclusion until 2050. Zis ess verboten! Vee cannot have zis! Nine! Schnell!

LMFAO!!!

Wonderful quote. I have to say I do agree in as much as while I DO understand the serverity of what Mclaren have done I fail to see how this is any different to:

FIA: Michael, did you deliberately park your car at the La Rasscasse hairpin in 2006?
Schumi: No. :^o

With the notable exception of the fact there is more conclusive evidence against Mclaren & Lewis in this case than there was against Schumi & Ferrari.

or even:

FIA: Ayrton, did you deliberatly run Alain off the road at Suzuka in 1990?
Ayrton: No. :^o

It just seems a to me that recent punishments against Mclaren (including the spygate scandal) have been a bit draconian.

That all being said I have no sympathy for them, after the spygate scandal and the rather hefty punishment handed to them, you'd have thought Mclaren would have been a little more careful in future!