McLaren bosses have been summoned by world motorsport's governing body, the FIA,?

Question

Vodafone McLaren Mercedes had unauthorised possession of documents and confidential information belonging to Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro, including information that could be used to design, engineer, build, check, test, develop and/or run a 2007 Ferrari formula one car.'

What do you think coughlan handed over to ferrari that has made the fia bring charges aginst mclaren and if mclaren are found quilty ,what do you think will happen?

http://www.planetf1.com/story/0,18954,3213_2491960,00.html

Answer 1

My take is that coughlan was copying the Ferrari info in a planned moved from mclaren,however mclaren could have used the Ferrari info to study this year Ferrari car and find the cars strength and weaknesses.
Are mclaren guilty ,we will have to wait and see but if they are they should be punished accordingly.but will the fia act because Hamilton is leading the championship and he British and their money to be made for Bernie.
if it was the other way and Ferrari had mclaren info, people would be calling for Ferrari blood.

Answer 2

There will be some tough questions to be asked, and the potential for a bit of a dark cloud over the sport is there whatever the outcome! The fact that McLaren had within their engineering staff, such detail about a competitors car (a car that was both fast and traditionally reliable) would open the door for many changes on the McLaren car. It would not be a matter of them simply copying the Ferrari, but given that chief designer had a substantial amount of information, there is a strong possibility that this information at least influenced his work on the McLaren (really, if you suddenly were told something that you didn't know, it would be hard to ingnore that in the work you were doing).

I don't think that people higher up were aware of this information, but the possibility that McLaren benefited could still bring about penalities for the team and the drivers since they were enjoying an unfair advantage. Though I would expect that the lack of such knowledge would at least be a mitigating factor when any such penalties are dealt out.

I think FOM would prefer that this simply disappeared given Hamilton's involvement and possible impact on him... however the FIA will probably not take this heavily into account and will most likely focus more on what they found in their investigation and what McLaren's response is.

Answer 3

Frankly I shocked this doesn't happen more often!? The top teams pour 100's of millions of dollars (pounds or Euro's!) into these cars why not invest 100,000 in a spy or two? Never mind the ethical questions involved, history doesn't care that much about ethics in sports!

I've read that the two guys involved were putting together a file to sell to other teams (Honda had an offer I believe?). I'm not sure how much information they got or how useful it would be. The cars look very different and taking the a Ferrari part on a McLaren car would like mess up the entire balance of the car?

If found guilty the FIA would have to take at least 10-20 constructors points away. They seem to come down hard on minor things and this seems pretty serious. Suspending or taking points away from the drivers is a tougher question, I would be surprised if they didn't penalize the drivers as well.

Answer 4

Coughlan said that the info was copied when he and some other engineers were going to form a group to start a new team or go to Toyota. I don't think this is the whole story though.

Just the fact that some sort of backdoor, secret espionage took place between the teams by mclaren is a black eye to mclaren and F1. However, I think that the FIA will have to prove that Mclaren gained some sort of advantage directly from this info before levying a penalty which may be difficult to do. F1 cars and engineering are constantly evolving through the season so that info may have only very limited use to mclaren who have an entirely different car. The info would be hugely beneficial to one of the teams using ferrari engines since it would save them from doing some of their own engineering work. The constructors points should be altered but the drivers don't deserve to have their points changed for something they had nothing to do with.

Answer 5

In all honesty, Chelsea deserved to go through to the final mainly because of the compact display they put on during the entire 2 legs. How many teams in Europe can stop Barcelona from scoring over 180 minutes? Hardly any. The reality is Barcelona know only one way to play - attack (which is not enough to win the Champions League). Their back line is highly vulnerable and if Drobda wasn't smoking potevery timee he was given the ball, then Iniesta's goal wouldn't have mattered much. Answer to your question... it depends. I feel that the refereee wasn't really fit to officiate such a massive and a pressure-filled game. Not only did he not mess up w/ the penalties but also gave Abidal a red card for something that shouldn't even have been called a foul. That left the Catalans handicapped for 40% of the game and had Iniesta not scored deep into the injury time, Barcelona might have been claiming by now that the referee was trying to push for Chelsea and this question would have been put up in Spanish by some guy in Barcelona. Hence, I don't think that one should jump guns and come to a conclusion that the game was fixed. Let's accept the fact that sh*t happens and Chelsea should have really made use of the chances . United will kill Barcelona, don't you worry about that.

Answer 6

Well, if GUILTY, who's going to make the punishment, Ecclestone or the FIA. Probably the FIA. Race bans would be their most severe action. However, if Bernie were to try & "save" the McLarens, he'll request for a hefty fine instead. That's the most likely scenario I can think of right now. Banning McLaren from racing is bad for F1 business. I don't think they'll prohibit them from racing. BUT, if the FIA sees fit that McLaren DID indeed received Ferrari documents, then a race ban is inevitable.

Answer 7

It is a bit too early to jump into conclusions, but looks like McLaren is in a bit of hot water. Mosley has even hinted that even the driver's points would be docked if the allegations are true.

Being a tifosi, I'd endured hearing for the last 10 years that Ferrari are cheaters. At least now some might realize that the rest of the pack are not angel's either.

July 26th is the date of the council, till then its rumors. Sad, this happened when the Ferraris were gaining momentum!

Answer 8

Autosport is now stating that coughlan told others at mclaren about the Ferrari information,but they told him to destroy it .
One must ask the question why did non of these others inform the fia ,Ron Dennis or Ferrari of the stolen information.
to know about something as serious as this and do nothing is just as bad as using the information.
curiosity killed the cat and human nature would make you at least want to have a look and anyone who says different is not telling the truth.
would you not want to look at secret juicy information if it came into your possession.

Answer 9

first of all i think mclaren should be banned from this years championship since they have cheated from the 1st race!!! alonso should go to either ferrari or bmw!!! sad for alonso...he is an awesome guy!!! i knew when mclaren and hamilton started winning so many races that something is dodgy here!!! there is no way a british person or team can dominate a sport!!! british are not good at sport!!! so now i see how and why hamilton and mclaren have won!! they have been cheating!

Answer 10

If Mclaren are found guilty (to which I must say that they are not!), the FIA could deduct points on both the constructors and drivers championship. I personally don't believe that Ron Dennis would use that information to their advantage because they already have a great car for both drivers and there's no reason for them to use that information. In the end, Mclaren would be found innocent!