Mercedes SLR McLaren Stirling Moss

I’m not a real fan of Ferrari but in this case I agree with them although I come from another angle. For Ferrari participating in a Formula 1 call in which they were forced to use third party engines or in which they could not distinguish themselves from other brands because everybody uses the same hardware is not commercially interesting.
For me the cutting edge technology used in Formula 1 is part of the appeal. Forcing teams to use the engine en gearbox for more than one race is a good idea. Limiting the competitiveness by restricting the technological developments is a bad idea.

Could it be that Ferrari has gone to far in their search for speed? The last few races they were slower than most of the teams, now suddenly they are fastest but they not reliable.

Under-fire FIA president Max Mosley has called an extraordinary general meeting of the sport’s governing body to discuss the fall-out from the recent allegations about his private life.

I don’t think this coincidence. This is payback time, not by McLaren but by all the other big shots behind the scene.

I have the feeling that the only reason why McLaren is doing this is because they know that they can never win this battle and that it would have dragged on and on. The whole investigation has always been “proving that you are innocent” instead of the FIA proving that McLaren is guilty. Something they never could have done so anyway. What do you think the outcome of the WMSC meeting would have been? Any mention in the report of a similar development in the McLaren and Ferrari car would have been explained as McLaren copying Ferrari.

 

When will this charade end?
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If a formula 1 car uses a front wing which does not comply with the regulations then the results are scrapped. If a car uses full which does not comply with the regulations then nothing should happen?

There was more bad news for McLaren yesterday when the FIA president Max Mosley said that not only was it unlikely that Hamilton would be crowned 2007 world champion, even if the team’s appeal against the stewards’ decision not to penalise BMW Sauber and Williams for breaching fuel regulations in the Brazilian grand prix were successful, but the 22-year-old Briton could start the 2008 season with a negative points score should Ferrari’s intellectual property be found to have been used in his car.

“Ferrari data was in the hands of the [McLaren] chief designer at precisely the moment he was designing the 2008 McLaren,” Mosley said. “The difficulty we have is that we are not going to find a part that was designed by Ferrari. What you may find are ideas and at this level of technology, if the idea is given to the chief designer he will make a component utilising that idea which bears no relation at all to the component being used by the other car.

“So we will be looking for the ideas. The investigation will be thorough and it will use outside experts. We will do everything we possibly can to make sure that neither of the McLarens has any element of Ferrari intellectual property in it. Or, if it does, we will then have to consider taking some sort of action. That would not necessarily prevent them from running, it would be more likely that they would be given a negative point allocation.”

A McLaren spokesperson said: “We have no comment other than that we will cooperate fully with the FIA. Bring it on.”

A Ferrari source suggested managers at the Italian team would be best qualified to know what, if any, innovations on the McLaren are the fruits of espionage. “Ferrari knows what was passed to McLaren and what can be used,” he said. “It is not necessarily about copying but about gaining advantage by knowing what the other side is doing. When you play poker and know what cards your opponent has, you have an immediate advantage.”

sigh.

The statement gives you a nice insight on how all teams look at each other what everybody is doing, how they can copy successful designs and learn why some teams are more successful than others. It also gives you an insight view on the engineering side of the business and how that process is being run and how close that engineering community is.

As far as the spy issue. Judging from the evidence presented in the hearing I can only conclude that there is no factual evidence that McLaren has used data and / or designs from Ferrari in the design of their car.
What is disturbing in the ruling is that the McLaren 2008 car has to be checked for Ferrari design components but that the council has no indicated when this is going to be done en when. So in theory McLaren could be refused to participate in the 2008 competition one day before the start of the first race.

As I wrote in an earlier blog entry, I find this an internal HR problem of Ferrari which they have mishandled and which completely went out of control. Ferrari accusing McLaren of spying is completely misplaced.