It’s been a while coming, but Renault have finally taken the “naughty boys” title from Mclaren, and they have done it in style.
Team orders are nothing new, they have been around since the beginning and despite claims to the contrary are still there. However I’ve never heard of a driver being told to deliberately crash to help fix a race. And if there is a team principle who is going to do it, it’s Flav.
Today Flav Briatore and Pat Symonds left Renault, and the team released a statement indicating that they will not deny the race fixing accusation. With the FIA handing out race bans for improperly tightened wheel nuts, being suspended the sport does not seem out of the question when they meet Monday.
Clearly Flav and Pat are being thrown under the bus in the hope the FIA will see this as the work of two individuals and not the team. Past history says this may not help, it did not help McLaren when Nigel Stepney and Mike Coughlan took the fall for the Ferrari technical documents, the team was still suspended from the manufacturers championship and fined an astronomical $100M. However, F1 is not as healthy and with the departure of Honda and BMW the FIA is desperate for stability and may give Renault a stiff talking too and leave it at that.
Mr Piquet is going to struggle to find a team to give him another chance, the sport places a lot of weight on loyalty and supporting the team, whatever happens. Going public with race fixing allegations after being released by Renault after a series of poor results is going to frighten off a lot of teams.
Renault CEO Carlos Ghosn has backed the company’s investment in F1 a number of times. He stated “We are not in Formula One out of habit or tradition. We’re here to show our talent and that we can do it properly.” I wonder how he feels today?
