So, Tomorrow's the day! (FIA World Council)

[woof]

I've just been reading the FIA's full releases.

My god - it's simply unbelievable.
The FIA found that Ferrari were guilty of interfering with the race result a breach of
Pretty much it's in black & white that the FIA found Ferrari in breach of article 151 ( Fraudulent conduct or any act prejudicial to the interests to the interests of the championships & sport.

Ferrari had to pay the costs of the hearing etc but as we know didn't receive any further penalty.

You should read this http://www.fia.com/en-GB/mediacentre/pressreleases...

Especially all the lead up and communication before Massa pulled over.

[Wanta996Gotta]

woof said:

I've just been reading the FIA's full releases.

My god - it's simply unbelievable.
The FIA found that Ferrari were guilty of interfering with the race result a breach of
Pretty much it's in black & white that the FIA found Ferrari in breach of article 151 ( Fraudulent conduct or any act prejudicial to the interests to the interests of the championships & sport.

Ferrari had to pay the costs of the hearing etc but as we know didn't receive any further penalty.

You should read this http://www.fia.com/en-GB/mediacentre/pressreleases...

Especially all the lead up and communication before Massa pulled over.

Great stuff. Ferrari told both drivers to turn engines down then told ONLY Alonso to turn his back up to make it look like he was so mush quicker! LOL - What a pathetic bunch they really are.

[flemke]

35secToNuvolari said:

flemke said:

35sectonuvolari said:

All I see is an assertion and an unsupported statement that there was a pre-race arrangement. Do we have to operate on force of personality? One can express their certainty and base it on appearance, inference, and suspicion, but none of that is ultimately persuasive. I am not a fan of rhetoric. I know, then what am I doing on the internet?

The mechanism Ferrari used was the same form other teams have used before. The "save fuel" messages are most likely pre-arranged as well. People don't like the look of what resulted and somehow conclude that the ugly-looking thing was brought about by cheating.

The FIA came to the right conclusion, in that there is no way to prove an order was given. How would a team ever be able to defend itself if a driver decided to move over voluntarily? As written many times before, it is very difficult to prove a negative. Instead, the FIA has to find evidence that a rule was broken.

Come on, bro. You know you're being ingenuous. The whole point of a "code" is to disguise the reality of the message. Even in a criminal trial with people's lives at stake, if the prosecution cannot find the smoking gun that the accused has taken care to conceal, the jury is allowed to make reasonable inferences.
This isn't a criminal trial with people's lives at stake, it's a silly little motor race. We all know what Ferrari did. If they'd done it better, and not brought the sport into disrepute, nobody would mind. Because they mucked it up, and by so doing did bring the sport into disrepute, they should receive a genuine penalty.

Ferrari Race Engineer Rob Smedley said:

Do. You. Understand?

I have to say, Flemke, you do argue energetically in the whatever style you decide upon. You would not have accepted what you yourself just wrote if someone had written that in response to your analysis of the spy-gate issue. And your analysis of that issue was persuassive--and I agree; evidence is good, and teams shouldn't be punished because they fail to prove a negative. I believe the FIA said that it was punishing Mclaren based on inference. You didn't like that then, but now it's ok? I think people are upset over appearances.

The Stepney affair was very different from this one.

1. There is an explicit rule against team orders, and that rule was written for the narrow and specific purpose of preventing an Austria-style swapping of places in order to gift points to the more likely WDC candidate in a blatant way, at the expense of the less likely - but still legitimate - candidate. That is to say, what happened at Hockenheim was precisely what that rule was designed to prevent.
What rule did McLaren supposedly violate in 2007? According to Mosley, it was 151c, which proscribes "any act prejudicial to the interests of any competition or to the interests of motor sport generally."
What does "any act prejudicial to..." mean? The whole point of competition of any sort is for each entrant to create prejudice or bias that improves the likelihood that he will win. What the entrant may not do to create that bias is written in the rules (or perhaps agreed informally by all competitors). That is, it makes no sense for the regulator to declare that to create any prejudice is forbidden, as all entrants all day long are striving to create such prejudices, and indeed are lauded for doing so.
That leaves us with the other meaning of "prejudicial" - to cause detriment or harm. We all agree that entrants should be sanctioned for willingly or recklessly harming motor sport. Whether an entrant has been guilty of that, however, is highly subjective.
The regulation 151c is designed to entitle the regulator, in the absence of an explicit rule such as "no team orders", to sanction whatever it wants to sanction. As such, it serves a useful purpose but, at the same time, it is subject to gross abuse. For this very reason - that it can be used for anything - the standard of proof for conviction must be much higher than the standard of proof for a narrow, explicit rule such as "no team orders".

2. The outcomes of the two offences - Hockenheim team orders and the Stepney affair - were hugely different.
The Hockenheim team orders resulted of a gift to Alonso of 7 points, which may prove to be crucial in the WDC. That much is black-and-white.
The outcome of the Stepney/Coughlan stuff was never ascertained. Despite its massive efforts to find fault, the FIA was unable to point to any part for the McLaren car that came from or was inspired by illicit information that was even produced, much less used on an actual car or affected a race result.

3. The penalties, as well, were always going to be hugely different.
In the team orders case, what is the worst that the FIA might have done? There was no way that they were going to strip Ferrari of all its '10 WCC points. But that is what Mosley did to McLaren.
Furthermore, it is inconceivable that the FIA would have fined Ferrari what Mosley fined McLaren - $100,000,000, a sum intended to cripple the sport's second oldest team. In fact, we know from his own admission that Mosley sought even more draconian penalties, the likely result of which would have been the complete destruction of the team, and the loss of many hundreds of jobs.
I am not suggesting that, if McLaren had been guilty of what Mosley accused them, the penalty should have been the same as what Ferrari should have got for the blatant team orders. However, Mosley went to the opposite extreme, imposing what IINM is the harshest penalty in the history of sport - certainly in the history of motor sport.
For the team orders incident, the FIA should have taken points away from the beneficiary, Alonso, and imposed a tolerable but noticeable fine on the guilty team.

To impose an all-time record penalty, on the basis of ambiguous circumstantial evidence, for contravening a woolly, grab-bag, "We-can-do-what-we-like-to-you" rule, which alleged contravention had no detected effect on any race result, is totally different from breaking a rule that was specifically designed to prevent people from doing what Ferrari did and benefiting from it as they did.

[Mazda Baiter]

O/T
Derek, I hope you will see this.

You might be interested to 'listen again' to today's edition of "Woman's Hour" on Radio 4. It was a long interview with the youngest Mitford sister. Quite a bit of background information for the book on Moseley that you really should write.

(I can't believe that I have just recommended anyone to listen to woman's hour. I feel ill.)

[35secToNuvolari]

flemke said:

35secToNuvolari said:

flemke said:

35sectonuvolari said:

All I see is an assertion and an unsupported statement that there was a pre-race arrangement. Do we have to operate on force of personality? One can express their certainty and base it on appearance, inference, and suspicion, but none of that is ultimately persuasive. I am not a fan of rhetoric. I know, then what am I doing on the internet?

The mechanism Ferrari used was the same form other teams have used before. The "save fuel" messages are most likely pre-arranged as well. People don't like the look of what resulted and somehow conclude that the ugly-looking thing was brought about by cheating.

The FIA came to the right conclusion, in that there is no way to prove an order was given. How would a team ever be able to defend itself if a driver decided to move over voluntarily? As written many times before, it is very difficult to prove a negative. Instead, the FIA has to find evidence that a rule was broken.

Come on, bro. You know you're being ingenuous. The whole point of a "code" is to disguise the reality of the message. Even in a criminal trial with people's lives at stake, if the prosecution cannot find the smoking gun that the accused has taken care to conceal, the jury is allowed to make reasonable inferences.
This isn't a criminal trial with people's lives at stake, it's a silly little motor race. We all know what Ferrari did. If they'd done it better, and not brought the sport into disrepute, nobody would mind. Because they mucked it up, and by so doing did bring the sport into disrepute, they should receive a genuine penalty.

Ferrari Race Engineer Rob Smedley said:

Do. You. Understand?

I have to say, Flemke, you do argue energetically in the whatever style you decide upon. You would not have accepted what you yourself just wrote if someone had written that in response to your analysis of the spy-gate issue. And your analysis of that issue was persuassive--and I agree; evidence is good, and teams shouldn't be punished because they fail to prove a negative. I believe the FIA said that it was punishing Mclaren based on inference. You didn't like that then, but now it's ok? I think people are upset over appearances.

The Stepney affair was very different from this one.

1. There is an explicit rule against team orders, and that rule was written for the narrow and specific purpose of preventing an Austria-style swapping of places in order to gift points to the more likely WDC candidate in a blatant way, at the expense of the less likely - but still legitimate - candidate. That is to say, what happened at Hockenheim was precisely what that rule was designed to prevent.
What rule did McLaren supposedly violate in 2007? According to Mosley, it was 151c, which proscribes "any act prejudicial to the interests of any competition or to the interests of motor sport generally."
What does "any act prejudicial to..." mean? The whole point of competition of any sort is for each entrant to create prejudice or bias that improves the likelihood that he will win. What the entrant may not do to create that bias is written in the rules (or perhaps agreed informally by all competitors). That is, it makes no sense for the regulator to declare that to create any prejudice is forbidden, as all entrants all day long are striving to create such prejudices, and indeed are lauded for doing so.
That leaves us with the other meaning of "prejudicial" - to cause detriment or harm. We all agree that entrants should be sanctioned for willingly or recklessly harming motor sport. Whether an entrant has been guilty of that, however, is highly subjective.
The regulation 151c is designed to entitle the regulator, in the absence of an explicit rule such as "no team orders", to sanction whatever it wants to sanction. As such, it serves a useful purpose but, at the same time, it is subject to gross abuse. For this very reason - that it can be used for anything - the standard of proof for conviction must be much higher than the standard of proof for a narrow, explicit rule such as "no team orders".

2. The outcomes of the two offences - Hockenheim team orders and the Stepney affair - were hugely different.
The Hockenheim team orders resulted of a gift to Alonso of 7 points, which may prove to be crucial in the WDC. That much is black-and-white.
The outcome of the Stepney/Coughlan stuff was never ascertained. Despite its massive efforts to find fault, the FIA was unable to point to any part for the McLaren car that came from or was inspired by illicit information that was even produced, much less used on an actual car or affected a race result.

3. The penalties, as well, were always going to be hugely different.
In the team orders case, what is the worst that the FIA might have done? There was no way that they were going to strip Ferrari of all its '10 WCC points. But that is what Mosley did to McLaren.
Furthermore, it is inconceivable that the FIA would have fined Ferrari what Mosley fined McLaren - $100,000,000, a sum intended to cripple the sport's second oldest team. In fact, we know from his own admission that Mosley sought even more draconian penalties, the likely result of which would have been the complete destruction of the team, and the loss of many hundreds of jobs.
I am not suggesting that, if McLaren had been guilty of what Mosley accused them, the penalty should have been the same as what Ferrari should have got for the blatant team orders. However, Mosley went to the opposite extreme, imposing what IINM is the harshest penalty in the history of sport - certainly in the history of motor sport.
For the team orders incident, the FIA should have taken points away from the beneficiary, Alonso, and imposed a tolerable but noticeable fine on the guilty team.

To impose an all-time record penalty, on the basis of ambiguous circumstantial evidence, for contravening a woolly, grab-bag, "We-can-do-what-we-like-to-you" rule, which alleged contravention had no detected effect on any race result, is totally different from breaking a rule that was specifically designed to prevent people from doing what Ferrari did and benefiting from it as they did.

39.1 might have been written to prevent what happened to RB in Austria, but considering the way it was written and policed afterwards, that was not the effect. The first case brought under 39.1, IIR, was Monaco '07 when Mclaren was accused of using team orders to maintain positions. The result was that their statements were supported by fact and by team strategy, and deemed ok. Ever since, the rule has effectively allowed 'factual' double-entendres to function in place of explicit team orders, and the FIA has failed scrutinize multiple questionable actions taken by teams in the mean time. This is what has made the rule a joke to every team.

On top of that, there are other means for cars to flip-flop other than team orders. An individual can choose to cede a position any time they wish. 39.1 does not police a driver's will. How is a team supposed to defend themselves when no one listens to the driver's statements? In effect the governing body would only be policing what 'looks' wrong, and not the mechanism used to achieve the outcome.

The comparison with spygate isn't the size of potential penalty, it's whether suspicious, circumstantial evidence should be used to make broader generalizations about what the team did or intended to do.

Mclaren had intellectual property of a competitor. A company cannot possess the IP of a competitor, and if they are suspicious about an employee, or where info is coming from, they have to respond immediately. Mclaren managers abdicated their responsibility when they were presented with multiple suspicious situations. [Neale was suspicious and told Coughlin to get rid of whatever he had without further investigation, despite knowing Coughlin previously received information from a Ferrari employee. There was communication from a senior manager that certain developments should be stopped until the FIA scrutiny passed. Another manager inquired whether new information (not related to Ferrari's floor) came to them via their 'mole' at Ferrari. Drivers were talking with engineers about Ferrari's IP. And the '08 car had three developments in the pipeline that otherwise wouldn't be on the car, and were directly the result of having Ferrari's info.] And Mclaren's response was to hide behind the unequivocal assertion that they knew the provenance of every item on the cars they make? At this point they knew the info Coughlin had, and they didn't talk to the people he worked with and ask what ideas he brought to the team? Instead they say he's just a 'draw-er.'

They weren't off the hook because the info some of their employees tried to use wasn't effective for the '07 car, they were incorrect because multiple employees didn't respond to the situation and bring it to light sooner. Because of this circumstantial evidence, should one make wider assumptions about what was 'probably done?' No. Should one assume that engineers were probably lying about what they knew of the Ferrari info? No. In some ways Mclaren were a victim of Coughlin as well. In other ways, some of their managers were responsible because they failed to act. Punish what there's evidence for.

Edited by 35secToNuvolari on Friday 10th September 14:15

[flemke]

35secToNuvolari said:

39.1 might have been written to prevent what happened to RB in Austria, but considering the way it was written and policed afterwards, that was not the effect. The first case brought under 39.1, IIR, was Monaco '07 when Mclaren was accused of using team orders to maintain positions. The result was that their statements were supported by fact and by team strategy, and deemed ok. Ever since, the rule has effectively allowed 'factual' double-entendres to function in place of explicit team orders, and the FIA has failed scrutinize multiple questionable actions taken by teams in the mean time. This is what has made the rule a joke to every team.

On top of that, there are other means for cars to flip-flop other than team orders. An individual can choose to cede a position any time they wish. 39.1 does not police a driver's will. How is one supposed to defend themselves when no one listens to the driver's statements? In effect the governing body would only be policing what 'looks' wrong, and not the mechanism used to achieve the outcome.

The comparison with spygate isn't the size of potential penalty, it's whether suspicious, circumstantial evidence should be used to make broader generalizations about what the team did or intended to do.

Yes, but this is not a binary: "Is circumstantial evidence admissable - yes or no?"
It all depends on...the whole thing.
If McLaren had been fined, say, $1m, or even $5m, we would have thought, "Bummer, dude, but 5hit happens, and this is part of the price for having stood up to a dictatorial scumbag." It would probably not have been fair, but it wasn't "fair" that Vettel took out Button at Spa, or that Hamilton took out Raikkonen at Montreal.

To repeat what I wrote above, I myself think that team orders are entirely reasonable and should be allowed. I said this after Austria '02, when the FIA grossly over-reacted both in the ludicrous penalty for mistaken positions on the podium and in the subsequent formal ban.
Nonetheless, we have the rule in place at the moment. Ferrari's offence, IMO, was not the team orders, which we know everyone practises, but the pathetically heavy-handed, oafish way in which they were executed.
The whole reason for the regulation is not because the WMSC believes in some Olympian ideal of sportsmanship and perfect competition. I'd conjecture that at least some of the WMSC members are so intellectually crooked that they couldn't lie in bed straight. Rather, the reason is so that the lay audience can be made to believe that F1 is a fair fight. There is absolutely, positively no rule preventing Ferrari from putting all its money into developing a perfect car for Alonso, and in the process ending up with something that Massa found undrivable, and then not bothering to waste money on in-season updates to Massa's car or on even giving him a decent race engineer. That would heavily discriminate against Massa and in Alonso's favour, but it would be allowed.
This team-orders rule is just about the show, and Ferrari's offence was to spoil the show. If it were the final race of the season, with the WDC hanging in the balance, what they did would have been tolerable, although even then it would have been much preferred to attempt a bit of subtlety. To do it in the middle of the season and in the way that they did it was not acceptable within the context of the existing rules. They went too far.

[Derek Smith]

Mazda Baiter said:

O/T
Derek, I hope you will see this.

You might be interested to 'listen again' to today's edition of "Woman's Hour" on Radio 4. It was a long interview with the youngest Mitford sister. Quite a bit of background information for the book on Moseley that you really should write.

(I can't believe that I have just recommended anyone to listen to woman's hour. I feel ill.)

Despite serious doubts to the contrary, I am going to take this at face value and listen to Woman's Hour.

[35secToNuvolari]

flemke said:

35secToNuvolari said:

39.1 might have been written to prevent what happened to RB in Austria, but considering the way it was written and policed afterwards, that was not the effect. The first case brought under 39.1, IIR, was Monaco '07 when Mclaren was accused of using team orders to maintain positions. The result was that their statements were supported by fact and by team strategy, and deemed ok. Ever since, the rule has effectively allowed 'factual' double-entendres to function in place of explicit team orders, and the FIA has failed scrutinize multiple questionable actions taken by teams in the mean time. This is what has made the rule a joke to every team.

On top of that, there are other means for cars to flip-flop other than team orders. An individual can choose to cede a position any time they wish. 39.1 does not police a driver's will. How is one supposed to defend themselves when no one listens to the driver's statements? In effect the governing body would only be policing what 'looks' wrong, and not the mechanism used to achieve the outcome.

The comparison with spygate isn't the size of potential penalty, it's whether suspicious, circumstantial evidence should be used to make broader generalizations about what the team did or intended to do.

Yes, but this is not a binary: "Is circumstantial evidence admissable - yes or no?"
It all depends on...the whole thing.
If McLaren had been fined, say, $1m, or even $5m, we would have thought, "Bummer, dude, but 5hit happens, and this is part of the price for having stood up to a dictatorial scumbag." It would probably not have been fair, but it wasn't "fair" that Vettel took out Button at Spa, or that Hamilton took out Raikkonen at Montreal.

To repeat what I wrote above, I myself think that team orders are entirely reasonable and should be allowed. I said this after Austria '02, when the FIA grossly over-reacted both in the ludicrous penalty for mistaken positions on the podium and in the subsequent formal ban.
Nonetheless, we have the rule in place at the moment. Ferrari's offence, IMO, was not the team orders, which we know everyone practises, but the pathetically heavy-handed, oafish way in which they were executed.
The whole reason for the regulation is not because the WMSC believes in some Olympian ideal of sportsmanship and perfect competition. I'd conjecture that at least some of the WMSC members are so intellectually crooked that they couldn't lie in bed straight. Rather, the reason is so that the lay audience can be made to believe that F1 is a fair fight. There is absolutely, positively no rule preventing Ferrari from putting all its money into developing a perfect car for Alonso, and in the process ending up with something that Massa found undrivable, and then not bothering to waste money on in-season updates to Massa's car or on even giving him a decent race engineer. That would heavily discriminate against Massa and in Alonso's favour, but it would be allowed.
This team-orders rule is just about the show, and Ferrari's offence was to spoil the show. If it were the final race of the season, with the WDC hanging in the balance, what they did would have been tolerable, although even then it would have been much preferred to attempt a bit of subtlety. To do it in the middle of the season and in the way that they did it was not acceptable within the context of the existing rules. They went too far.

I appreciate the edit you made to my quote. I went on a tangent and my post would've been stronger if I stopped where you clipped it.

It seems like we're coming closer to a common understanding, but then at the last moment, we don't. My original comment was that I thought people were more upset over appearance rather than actual cheating. It seems you are starting to say something similar, but you then say "...what they did was not acceptable within the context of the rules."

I appreciate the thought you and others have put into your conclusion, but ultimately I think the way this rule has been used, or not used, in the past, there needs to be better evidence to make something stick.

Cheers, and I hope my posts have been somewhat readable. I'm not able to edit as I'd like, right now.

[Joe911]

35secToNuvolari said:

I appreciate the thought you and others have put into your conclusion, but ultimately I think the way this rule has been used, or not used, in the past, there needs to be better evidence to make something stick.

Wow - that is a very good statement - I know exactly what you're saying with that - it's an insightful summary - and I (almost) agree.

There are a million shades of grey as to what Team Orders really are and whether or not they are being used.

However - I personally think that the reason this case has outraged so many people is that it could not be more blatant than this. What better evidence could there be?

[35secToNuvolari]

Joe911 said:

35secToNuvolari said:

I appreciate the thought you and others have put into your conclusion, but ultimately I think the way this rule has been used, or not used, in the past, there needs to be better evidence to make something stick.

Wow - that is a very good statement - I know exactly what you're saying with that - it's an insightful summary - and I (almost) agree.

There are a million shades of grey as to what Team Orders really are and whether or not they are being used.

However - I personally think that the reason this case has outraged so many people is that it could not be more blatant than this. What better evidence could there be?

I'm sensing some sarcasm in your first sentence, but there's not a rolleyes icon, so I can't be sure. I'm skeptical because I don't even think the sentence you quote is worded well, or is likely to be persuasive.

Suspected code words have to be shown to have some authority behind them. That's what makes it an 'order.' Double entendres that convey team wishes have been okay to use. Other teams have said that a teammate was 'faster,' without consequence. So, in order for the same rule that didn't police those actions to prosecute this issue, and for the regulator to be consistent, one needs evidence that makes this matter substantially different from those other ones.

People cite the fact that the cars were 1-2 as a difference, or that it was early in the season, but those are not conditions recognized by the rules. Better evidence would include: if the wording of Massa's contract exposed team orders, contrary statements were obtained from team personnel revealing pre-arranged coded messages, or Massa gave a statement saying that the decision ultimately wasn't his.

Considering there's an alternative explanation as to what happened, I think one needs to prove that it is not true before one starts using circumstantial evidence to convict. Massa's actions are not without precedent. In the past, he has put the team's interests before his own.

Cheers

[Derek Smith]

Derek Smith said:

Mazda Baiter said:

O/T
Derek, I hope you will see this.

You might be interested to 'listen again' to today's edition of "Woman's Hour" on Radio 4. It was a long interview with the youngest Mitford sister. Quite a bit of background information for the book on Moseley that you really should write.

(I can't believe that I have just recommended anyone to listen to woman's hour. I feel ill.)

Despite serious doubts to the contrary, I am going to take this at face value and listen to Woman's Hour.

Thanks so much for that pointer. I've just finished listening to it.

How the other half and all that.

I could not get out of my mind that she's never done a day's work in her life, her greatest achievement appears to have been opening a shop and keeping shickens, and she was criticisng teachers from conurbations for not knowing about management of estates.

Her family were weird. I like her defending Mosley's morals but I suppose you are stuck with your relatives.

I found it very itneresting. Ta.

[Joe911]

35secToNuvolari said:

Joe911 said:

35secToNuvolari said:

I appreciate the thought you and others have put into your conclusion, but ultimately I think the way this rule has been used, or not used, in the past, there needs to be better evidence to make something stick.

Wow - that is a very good statement - I know exactly what you're saying with that - it's an insightful summary - and I (almost) agree.

There are a million shades of grey as to what Team Orders really are and whether or not they are being used.

However - I personally think that the reason this case has outraged so many people is that it could not be more blatant than this. What better evidence could there be?

I'm sensing some sarcasm in your first sentence, but there's not a rolleyes icon, so I can't be sure. I'm skeptical because I don't even think the sentence you quote is worded well, or is likely to be persuasive.

Sorry about my ambiguous wording - I was not trying to be sarcastic.
I agree that given all the quite probable but disguised team orders that have been going on since it was banned ... You are right - it really does matter that there is solid evidence.

Fuel map changes, Massa so deliberately slowing coming out of a corner to let FA pass, the demeanour of Massa and other Ferrari staff post race, the clear and obvious instruction from Smedley - and the final straw - Smedley apologising for giving him the instruction ... Is that combination of evidence not solid?

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck ... It's a duck!

[35secToNuvolari]

Joe911 said:

35secToNuvolari said:

Joe911 said:

35secToNuvolari said:

I appreciate the thought you and others have put into your conclusion, but ultimately I think the way this rule has been used, or not used, in the past, there needs to be better evidence to make something stick.

Wow - that is a very good statement - I know exactly what you're saying with that - it's an insightful summary - and I (almost) agree.

There are a million shades of grey as to what Team Orders really are and whether or not they are being used.

However - I personally think that the reason this case has outraged so many people is that it could not be more blatant than this. What better evidence could there be?

I'm sensing some sarcasm in your first sentence, but there's not a rolleyes icon, so I can't be sure. I'm skeptical because I don't even think the sentence you quote is worded well, or is likely to be persuasive.

Sorry about my ambiguous wording - I was not trying to be sarcastic.
I agree that given all the quite probable but disguised team orders that have been going on since it was banned ... You are right - it really does matter that there is solid evidence.

Fuel map changes, Massa so deliberately slowing coming out of a corner to let FA pass, the demeanour of Massa and other Ferrari staff post race, the clear and obvious instruction from Smedley - and the final straw - Smedley apologising for giving him the instruction ... Is that combination of evidence not solid?

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck ... It's a duck!

Other teams have had drivers on different fuel maps. Massa can make his move obvious, that's not against the rules or definite proof of an order. Hamilton quite easily got past HK. HK's engineer even gave him a similar message: Hamilton's faster..."

We're assuming Smedley apologized for giving a team order, but Smedley also thanked Massa for his magnanimity. Obedience is not often characterized as generosity.

The situation is made more difficult when other teams are quacking, waddling, and snapping their bills as well.

Edited by 35secToNuvolari on Friday 10th September 21:15

[flemke]

35secToNuvolari said:

Other teams have had drivers on different fuel maps. Massa can make his move obvious, that's not against the rules or definite proof of an order. Hamilton quite easily got past HK. HK's engineer even gave him a similar message: Hamilton's faster..."

We're assuming Smedley apologized for giving a team order, but Smedley also thanked Massa for his magnanimity. Obedience is not often characterized as generosity.

The situation is made more difficult when other teams are quacking, waddling, and snapping their bills as well.

A straight question to you, sir:

Do you believe that, if neither Smedley nor any other Ferrari official had said or signaled anything to Massa during the race, or before the race, and if Massa had thought that there would be no negative consequences to himself if he were to stay in P1, that he would nonetheless have conceded the position to Alonso as he did?

[Joe911]

35secToNuvolari said:

Other teams have had drivers on different fuel maps. Massa can make his move obvious, that's not against the rules or definite proof of an order. Hamilton quite easily got past HK. HK's engineer even gave him a similar message: Hamilton's faster..."

We're assuming Smedley apologized for giving a team order, but Smedley also thanked Massa for his magnanimity. Obedience is not often characterized as generosity.

The situation is made more difficult when other teams are quacking, waddling, and snapping their bills as well.

If this was no different to all the other waddling and quacking - why has there been such a fuss?

[35secToNuvolari]

flemke said:

35secToNuvolari said:

Other teams have had drivers on different fuel maps. Massa can make his move obvious, that's not against the rules or definite proof of an order. Hamilton quite easily got past HK. HK's engineer even gave him a similar message: Hamilton's faster..."

We're assuming Smedley apologized for giving a team order, but Smedley also thanked Massa for his magnanimity. Obedience is not often characterized as generosity.

The situation is made more difficult when other teams are quacking, waddling, and snapping their bills as well.

A straight question to you, sir:

Do you believe that, if neither Smedley nor any other Ferrari official had said or signaled anything to Massa during the race, or before the race, and if Massa had thought that there would be no negative consequences to himself if he were to stay in P1, that he would nonetheless have conceded the position to Alonso as he did?

Drivers wouldn't hold position at the end of the race if they weren't given instructions from the team to turn down their fuel, as well. It has been accepted that teams can express their wishes via 'informational' messages.

[35secToNuvolari]

Joe911 said:

35secToNuvolari said:

Other teams have had drivers on different fuel maps. Massa can make his move obvious, that's not against the rules or definite proof of an order. Hamilton quite easily got past HK. HK's engineer even gave him a similar message: Hamilton's faster..."

We're assuming Smedley apologized for giving a team order, but Smedley also thanked Massa for his magnanimity. Obedience is not often characterized as generosity.

The situation is made more difficult when other teams are quacking, waddling, and snapping their bills as well.

If this was no different to all the other waddling and quacking - why has there been such a fuss?

My original point was that the fuss is over the fact it didn't look 'right.' People complained about Mclaren stopping their car on the warm down lap in qualifying because it looked suspicious as well, even though they didn't break a rule. I think some of the fuss is also the result of team rivalries.

[Mazda Baiter]

Derek Smith said:

Derek Smith said:

Mazda Baiter said:

O/T
Derek, I hope you will see this.

You might be interested to 'listen again' to today's edition of "Woman's Hour" on Radio 4. It was a long interview with the youngest Mitford sister. Quite a bit of background information for the book on Moseley that you really should write.

(I can't believe that I have just recommended anyone to listen to woman's hour. I feel ill.)

Despite serious doubts to the contrary, I am going to take this at face value and listen to Woman's Hour.

Thanks so much for that pointer. I've just finished listening to it.

How the other half and all that.

I could not get out of my mind that she's never done a day's work in her life, her greatest achievement appears to have been opening a shop and keeping shickens, and she was criticisng teachers from conurbations for not knowing about management of estates.

Her family were weird. I like her defending Mosley's morals but I suppose you are stuck with your relatives.

I found it very itneresting. Ta.

Good. I'm glad you haven't turned into a hyper-feminist because listening to the show.

The bit I laughed out loud at was (paraphrased) "I walked into Adolf's bathroom and I saw the towel had 'AH' embroidered into it and his hairbrush had his initials on too. I realised that he was a normal person..."

[kiteless]

flemke said:

It is therefore obvious that Massa did not pull over out of some Peter Collins-like selflessness, but rather because his race engineer had signaled to him what the team "expected" him to do in the circumstances.

Therein lies - for me - the rebuttal to the argument that "team orders" have been an integral part of F1 from day 1. It used to be an altruistic act by a fellow team member, rather than the seemingly commercial decision made these days by pit lane jockeys.

[RYH64E]

As it is a team sport perhaps the drivers championship should be abandoned and competition limited to the constructors championship? The only way to eliminate team orders is to remove the incentive for a team to favour one driver over another, if only constructor points were at stake it wouldn't matter to the team which driver won.