Statement by Nelson Piquet Jnr on his Singapore crash leaked online
Nelson Piquet Jnr claims Flavio Briatore ordered him to crash at Singapore
Nelson Piquet Jnr’s statement to the FIA about his controversial crash during the Singapore Grand Prix last year have appeared online.
F1SA has published the documents which are reproduced in full below.
Piquet’s statement includes the following remarks:
At the time of this conversation I was in a very fragile and emotional state of mind. This state of mind was brought about by very intense stress due to the fact that Mr Briatore had refused to inform me of whether or not my driver’s contract would be renewed for the next racing year (2009) as is customarily the case in the middle of the year (around July or August). [...]
After the meeting with Mr Symonds and Mr Briatore, Mr Symonds took me aside to a quiet corner and, using a map, pointed me to the exact corner of the track where I should crash. This corner was selected because the specific location of the track did not have any cranes that would allow a damaged car to be swiftly lifted off the track, nor did it have any side entrances to the track, which would allow a Safety Marshall to quickly move the damaged car away from the track. Therefore, it was felt that a crash in this specific position would be nearly certain to cause an obstruction on the track which would thus necessitate the deployment of a safety car in order for the track to be cleared and ensure the safe continuation of the race.
Mr Symonds also told me which exact lap to cause the incident upon, so that a strategy could be devised for my team mate Mr Fernando Alonso. [...]
During these discussions, no mention was made of any concerns with respect to the security implications of this strategy, either for myself, the public or other drivers. The only comment made in this context was one by Mr Pat Symonds who warned me to ‘be acreful, which I took to mean that I should not injure myself.
I intentionally caused the crash by letting go of control of the car just before the relevant corner. In order to make sure I would cause the incident during the correct lap, I asked my team several times via the radio to confirm the lap number, which I would not normally do.
After the FIA officially announced its investigation Renault declared it would not comment on the matter before the hearing on Monday 21st September. Will Renault stick by that and allow Piquet’s damaging claims to go unanswered?
Source: FISA via Tazio.com.br and F1 Around
Renault Singapore crash controversy
- Did Piquet crash on purpose? (Poll)
- Renault face Singapore crash hearing
- Nelson Piquet Jnr and Fernando Alonso in renault Singapore claim
- Fernando Alonso’s bad luck turns good for win (2008 Singapore Grand Prix)
- 2008 Singapore Grand Prix analysis
- Piquet’s scathing attack on Briatore
- Nelson Piquet Jnr dropped by Renault
- Alonso and the Piquet-Renault fall-out
That’s kind of incriminating. It isn’t looking good for Renault. I’d HATE that Fernando only won because of NPJ crashing. I also hope he isn’t involved in this AT ALL.
Sept 21st can’t come soon enough for me.
Do you think it’s all true, Keith? I don’t think I’ve seen your opinion on it.
Well, this being true or not he DID come into the position to win thanks to the safety car Piquet jr. caused…
Were you replying to Fernando winning because of the crash or the Fernando involved part?
I assume it was the second – while he would be involved (by winning, obviously) he wouldn’t have KNOWN that’s why he won. That’s what I meant. I hope FA didn’t know NPJ was told to crash!
I was replying to ”only won because of NPJ crashing”.
Oh, OK lol. Again, though, my point above covers that, too. Fernando was involved because he won but that doesn’t mean he was in the know. I pray he wasn’t in the know!!
I never said that he won ONLY because of Piquet’s crash. It helped a great deal as his race strategy was based around safety car directly after his first pit-stop.
Thank God that stupid rule got scraped by the way…
Yeah, Renault took a huge gamble – if they did – crashing NPJ when Fernando might not have even won.
IF the crash was a plan and IF Alonso knew about this plan, then I think even more shame should go on Alonso’s shoulders than his bosses as he is meant to be the famous, double world champ, sporting, fair, racing driver. who people look up to.
Leah – I gave my opinion on it in this piece: Did Piquet crash on purpose? (Poll)
What is interesting is this is still Piquet’s word against theres – they haven’t, apparently, left any documentary evidence – which you would expect if they were going to do something like this. I still have a hard time believing it’s all true though. Piquet’s got nothing to lose.
Sorry, didn’t see that!
I think this statement adds a bit more to the whole thing but still doesn’t 100% prove anything.
Still worried for Renault, it isn’t exactly looking like Nelson Piquet Jr just made it up for revenge.
I’m not with you this, Ketih. He’s young and has a promising career in front of him, despite his unsuccessfully results with Renault.
Do you think any F1 team will take him after this?
I think he will be lucky if he gets to keep his superlicence after this, his whistle-blowing could grant him some slack though…
The real question is – can they punish Renault based on this statement?
If he was a good driver then yes!
But really, he’s actually done no worse than Hamilton at Melbounre in some respects, as he’s going along with what the employer wants him to say/do.
Personally though, I think we would all like to think we’d tell Pat and Flavio where to go if they asked to do such a thing!
Did any team took Alonso after prensenting his Emails to FIA and blaming McLaren for Spygate while he was driving for them?
Whats incriminating about the statement for me is if this is being fabricated by Piquet then why doesn’t he just go the whole hog and say he was promised a 2009 seat for his troubles.
It’s effectiveness is in it’s plausability, although Piquets admitted effecting the outcome of the race, he has some sympathy in so much as it’s “The big bad wolf Flavio” V’s “Bullied little Piquet” But although we all know its not that simple, that will be a lot of peoples perception, Flavio has done himself no favours in being so one-sided in his driver management that Piquets statement rings true. Personally I think Flavio and Pat are guilty at some level, but proving it will be very difficult, if they prevent a case of blackmail, and can convince the FIA/WMSC that this is an orchestrated effort by Piquet snr/jnr to extract some revenge on Flavio then it may be difficult to prove wrong doing either way and Piquet Jnr may end up carrying the can, as he has admitted crashing the car delibrately.
Nope. Regardless of the outcome of the hearing this is a severely career limiting move.
Yes, daddy will buy him an f1 team
Maybe this is his last shot. Probably after his bad result with Renault, any team will take him as well. I don’t know. I’m just trying to make some empathy.
@Keith,
So Piquet actually DID have something to lose by coming out with his confession?
Piquet Jnr. has made a HUGE mistake by saying these things. He should have just kept his mouth shut. Out of resentment at being fired in 2009 because of being a poor driver, now he talks about something that went on in 2008.
I dont think any team will want him. Unless his daddy funds his career out of his own pocket, he is finished.
No team or sponsor will want their name associated with such a loser.
I would say it’s quite brave of him to be honest.
He could have easily kept his mouth shut. Instead he’s standing up to that horrible man Flavio.
I like it.
Agreed Bartholomew. @ John H., he is only standing up to Flavio after being fired. If he had real balls and was truly brave, he would have stood up to Flavio by not crashing his car.
You can red the full report here:
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/78451
No surprise there – just as I thought. If there’s no concrete evidence, they will just be taking Alonso’s word for it, and Symonds/Briatore probably wouldn’t want to ruin his career by implicating him. But really, if you believe that you believe anything!
A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.
That Churchill quote comes to mind when I see your rabid comments against anything remotely related to Alonso and anything against Hamilton.
Times change
comic that you don’t seem to see the irony of Churchill saying something like that.
Indeed Alonso has participated in these types of underhanded tactics to gain advantage before or have we forgotten the Mclaren Hamilton incident? It would not surprise me that he did in fact have working knowledge of the plans set forth by Flavio & Symonds for NPJ crash…
Interesting. Thanks for posting!
and now it hits the fan…
Boom….mushroom cloud
Won’t piquet get a big sign for actually crashing on purpose and not saying this until renaut sacked him for being rubbish?
Biggest ever scandal in motor sport history, Biggest since the watergate scandal. Nuff said!
Nixon was a racing driver?
Guffaw. Nixo Lauda? Alessandro Nixinni?
Yeah, but that was Nascar and rubbin is racing.. And he rubbed the democrat opponent out.
this scandal is tricky dicky’s style aswell
No, only the Biggest in 2 Years, NOT 37!
come to think of it, is this whole crash thing actually that big a deal?
safety wise, F1 cars are safe, and there were fences protecting the spectators there. In sporting terms, I think this was just a bit of a cheeky trick by Renault. If this had happened 20 years ago, i doubt there’d be such a riot.
That being the case, if injury or worse had occured to spectators/marshals, would it mean that the race organisers would be more legally responsible than Piquet, regardless of whether the crash was deliberate or not?
good point, probably Piquet and Renault would take the responsibility, but if’s and buts don’t mean much and F1 just moves quickly on.
Unbelievable reading…
Amazing to think that they didn’t need to go to all this effort to secure a win, when Alonso reached the top step of the podium in the following race in Fuji.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing
Very true!
Keith, you seem to believe Alonso is on the side of angels in this one, but I wonder how it can be. I mean, this story about only believing it if someone can categoricaly prove it is a bit weak – What would you expect? A neat document trail left behind? On the circunstancial field, however, there is plenty to cast a doubt on Alonso’s aloofness. He started with a lightly fueled car, on the back of the grid, in a track were you have the same expectation of overtaking other cars as one would in Monaco. That would have been a downright stupid strategy – stuck in the back with low fuel? Nobody does that, let alone an experienced guy like Alonso.
Exactly, and the article in the Official 2008 F1 Review book confirms that rival strategists thought that the strategy was crazy unless you knew that a crash would occur.
But its not implausible that he was gambling on a strategy like that working because it was very possible for someone to crash anyway, being such a bumpy and narrow street circuit. And running long will only get your a points paying position at best unless something insane happens.
But also, when you’re starting that far back, sometimes it’s better to try something different to everyone else.
I very much doubt Alonso knew anything about this and he would have accepted the strategy.
If Alonso was in on this plan, then he will lose alot of respect from alot of people. and rightly so…
If it all comes out to be true, then I would find it hard to believe that Alonso wasn’t in on it.
Yes that’s true but Alonso probably would have won if he started in the first rows, his car was very good that week.
Really bad move by Piquet, one that wreaks of arrogance. His only chance of returning to F1 is through his daddy, who also had a big mouth but at least had the skills to match it.
Sure, Alonso did get a seat in Renault (and will get one in Ferrari) after essentially blackmailing Ron Dennis, but there’s one difference between him and Piquet Jr.: He’s a double world champion!
Fore sure, it doesn’t look good.
Shocking. I think it’s true, but whether the FIA find it so is another matter.
So true.
Here Here S Hughs, I fear for Piquet Jnr in this, his actions are the only ones proven at this time, and may well be the only ones proven by the end.
I can understand Keith’s incredulity, but haven’t Renault basically admitted they planned the crash, and all they are doing now is quibbling over who thought it up?
yeah can’t believe they said that! idiots.
I think that Renault are trying to apportion blame to Nelson and seek compensation through the courts, it will be the lesser of scenarios for them, the fact will remain Nelson crashed on purpose, Flavio was in charge, so the best they can hope for is to prove slander against Nelson, and at least lessen the impact on their brand.
Can you point to the bit where Renault admitted it was deliberate?
No, they cannot.
I thought I saw leaks to the effect that Symonds in one breath said that the crash wasn’t discussed and in another said that Piquet suggested it. See link: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/78446
As much as I wouldn’t want to believe this is all true the pieces are fitting in and the leaks seem legit.
Could people go to jail if found guilty? I think even a private investigating agency “Quest” is involved in the investigations.
From Joe Saward’s blog:
“The really alarming thing is that these days fixing a race is beyond being a sporting matter. There could be other side-effects that people in F1 are not yet focussing on. In recent years F1 has become a sport that is increasingly followed by gamblers and that means that manipulating results can be considered to be fraudulent behaviour. Remember the furore that occurred a few years ago when there were orchestrated finishes at the Austrian and United States Grands Prix? Thus, there exists the possibility that there could be a criminal investigation as well.”
http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2009/09/01/thoughts-about-singapore-2008/
That never occurred to me before.
Incidentally, was there ever a threat of criminal proceedings aimed at Ferrari in 2002?
re posting from wrong thread:
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind part 2!!! Never ever have i seen anything like this! This might be the biggest scandal of all time !! Ooh this has to be the mother of all scandals. This will be spoken for years to come. Everything pales into insignificance before this!!OMG, we are all f up!! What a sham. Even Mario Puzo couldn’t have written this script. Its a thriller letter, Dan Brown must bend his head in shame !!
quite
u ok?
If this is true then Alonso could be in trouble too. Alonso is one of the most tactical drivers on the grid so it’s hard to believe he didn’t question Symonds’ decision to fuel him for just 12 laps.
What does everyone think?
I agree, but he won’t get any blame because he is like Teflon man. He is connected to all kinds of ****, but ends up smelling of roses.
There’s nothing in this that implicates Alonso, though.
C’mon Keith we all know Alonso.
“C’mon Keith we all know Alonso”
No you don’t know Alonso. You are all simply prejudiced against him, nothing at all has implicated him in this. Nelsinho makes it pretty clear the aleged conspiracy was between Flav Symonds and himself. Not even his engineers were in on it nvm Alonso who need never have known.
As we’ve been saying for weeks the 12 lap strategy was unusual, but entirely plausable as a high risk high reward strategy to try and salvage something from the weekend. The strategy is in no way evidence of a conspiracy, nor would it have aroused Fernando’s suspicions.
yeah, why would it? You are just in 15th place, in a Monaco style track, heavy fueled cars in front and behind you…starting with 12 laps of fuel seems great!
but I still see Alonso as the kind of guy who would hear this plan and just let it go ahead without any argument.
It wasn’t plausible at all (see F1 2008 Review book article I’ve posted many times).
I had originally thought that Alonso had 12 laps of fuel carried over from Q3… until I remembered he had started 15th and therefore not participated in Q3. His strategy was odd. Very odd, and he is clever enough to have known that.
It’s not exactly a mark against his name, just a question mark.
But surely, when Fernando was told he was pitting on lap 12, he must have found it strange. So either, Symonds said something like “It’s a gamble on an early safety car” which is still a ridiculous strategy, or told Alonso the full truth. Like I said, Alonso has a bigger say on the race strategy than most other drivers on the grid.
Renault have tried these ultra-aggressive strategies on other occasions, though – at Spain last year, for example, and at Hungary this year when he was 13kg lighter than anyone else on the grid.
But Pat Symonds was heard on a radio call telling other race engineers not to worry it will be alright when they questioned the strategy, surely Alonso would have as well, the Alonso/Flavio relationship is almost incestial, I can’t believe that he wasn’t at least aware.
Not starting from 15th on the grid at a street circuit though! =/
yeah, i agree adz2193. Spain 08 he was 2nd on grid, and Hungary 09 he was 1st. not 15th on a street track keith!
They have indeed, Keith. I can’t get my head around why gambling a strategy on safety cars on a tight street circuit is bizzare. Surely it’s a better gamble than a huge fuel load which may gain you a couple of places at best. I think the phrase is “**** or bust”. (apologies for any intentional circumvention of wordfilters).
Reanult fuelled Alonso light in Q3 at Spain and Hungary in order to secure a good grid spot. The fuel loads were then frozen.
At Singapore he never participated in Q3, starting 15th.
Remember fuelling light is not just gambling on an early safety car – it is gambling on a safety car coming out between your early pitstop and the time other drivers have to pit.
So it’s an idiotic gamble… unless you can control when the safety car will come out.
Its not the first time Alonso has been fueled light. Lets not also forget that Alonso despite his extreme views has a level of fairness about him. In my opinion Alonso didn’t need to know about it, as he would always push, so telling him about this would just have distracted him from driving his best.
I agree Oliver, but surely Alonso’s stomach must have turned over when he learned that Piquet had crashed on such a very opportune lap. As was proved when he was at MacLaren, Alonso is not reticent about involving the authorities – or at least threatening to – so if he had any suspicions, perhaps he should have spoken to the FIA at the time. The fact that he didn’t speak up must count against him in the FIA investigation.
In the transcript, it says that Piquest asked the pit “to confirm the lap number, which I would not normally do.” Does the FIA keep radio traffic tapes or transcripts nearly a year after the event?
If you were doing something like this, you would want the minimum number of people knowing about it – that way it’s less likely to get out.
Presuming this is true, Alonso didn’t need to know the details of the plan, so why tell him? It’s one more person who could give the game away.
As you point out, given his track record, he’s not necessarily someone you want to have in possession of your secrets.
100% spot on Keith I think.
I’m not exactly the biggest Alonso fan, but I think he’s innocent here. I feel a bit sorry for him actually.
Yes, I’m guessing Alonso is probably innocent and deserves the benefit of doubt.
But… question marks will always remain. Did he suspect? If not, why not? If so, did anyone confirm his suspicions?
Wasn’t Alonso fuelled for a few laps longer, and brought in on lap 12 unexpectedly early?
Teams sometimes bring drivers to pit a bit earlier, if they are catching up on backmarkers for example. Obviously on lap 12 this wouldn’t have been the case. I’m interested at what Renault’s explanation would be for this.
Alonso was very fast that whole weekend, and also won the following race in Fuji. Give him some credit.
I just cannot believe that alonso had no prior knowledge of this. He’s trying to wash his hands off. He did this to Ron, now he’s doing this to Flav. i’m sure he will do the same to Stefano.
he better be careful with the italians, he might find himself with a whole different car than the others. ferrari has destroyed drivers as well as made them.
Given Alonso’s proven (but unpunished) guilt in the McLaren spy case, I wouldn’t put it past him.
If this is true, which very well could be, whats all the fuss about? Isn’t this akin to diving for a penalty in football?
While both are extremely unsportsmanlike, the latter is pretty common you have to say. Cristiano Ronaldo, who is the so called best player in the world has scored a healthy number of goals from penalty and free kicks that we won diving…and the whole world is still awestruck by him.
So whats the difference? Football managers have been known to tell their player to go down if they can to win a penalty in difficult games. There is no difference here. Renault had the pace that weekend, and if it wasn’t for Alonso’s brake failure in qualy, they would have been up the grid.
So…the saw an opportunity..told Nelsinho to take a dive..thats all..the won the penalty…and scored.
I’m not condoning this one bit..I hate divers. We know that simulation is illegal in football..is it illegal in F1?
Imagine nobody had dived in football for 30 years, and then someone dives and wins the match for it. Then you have a beautiful thing destroyed, and are a sad and shocked fan.
In football we are well past that point, but for F1, this would be a completely new (and easy to repeat!) cheating trick. By the same token, once we are ready to crash on purpose, one can as well take the first three rows out of a race at the first corner.
For some reason I believe that they told him to. Although Symonds says that it was Piquet’s idea (http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headlines/news/detail/090910102106.shtml), I still think that in the world like F1 where business and money rules everything, they would go for it. Who knows, maybe Renault had warnings from their sponsors that if they didn’t achieve some certain goals they would lose their sponsorship.
It all seems so neatly lined up.. Causing an accident which allowed Alonso to win and sign on for another season b/c there was improvement.
While I am not a huge Alonso fan I really hope he knew nothing about this whole said incident.
On a side note, with all of the live telemetry and radio feeds, why do teams insist of playing the silly games? Eventually the truth comes out, especially with the amount of data that is collected by the teams and FIA.
If this is indeed the truth. And you have to wonder if there are other similar stories that never come out…
keith could you do an article on all the main conspiracies and arguments since 2000 or so? (team orders, michelin tyre accusations, renault j-damper, double diffusers etc….) perhaps trying to discuss their similarities and trends.
What puzzles me, is that, if this is true, then why did Flav dump Piquet knowing that this would all come out?? Hasnt the ol’ playboy ever heard of ‘keep your friends close and your enemies even closer’???
Arrogance can make one feel that they are untouchable. I know someone who knows him well, and I get the feeling he has supreme arrogance.
A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.
That Churchill quote comes to mind when I see your rabid comments against anything remotely related to Alonso and anything against Hamilton.
Perhaps he was banking on Piquet trying to get another drive?
Perhaps Flav thought nobody would take the accusations seriously.
I think Flavio was counting on Piquet not wanting his professional credibility ruined by this scandal – but after being laid off Piquet had nothing to lose and decided to drag Flavio and Renault down with him.
Well, he had to dump him sometime. Piquet couldn’t stay with the team forever. So this was the time. Just strange that they dumped him in the middle of the season. Could have at least waited till the end of it.
And given Grojean’s performance so far, it doesn’t seem Piquet Jr was doing such a bad job after all – the guy who drives the other car…the crappy one.
that’s my point, the timing is bizarre….
Great share. Thank you, Keith.
This is unbelievable! What a shame! I remember the support of Alonso to Felipe near to the end of the championship. Was it because of guilt? What a shame!
Well first up, Piquet claims he was asked to do something that he knew was wrong & he still went & did it, clearly he has no moral compass as he could simply have said no. To have made this statement however is a bold move, he is risking his own integrity, reputation & future, I have to now believe that there is some fire where perhaps there had been little smoke.
Briatore & Symonds can simply deny the accusation & it will come down to the FIA believing that one side is lying & the other telling the truth.
The question will be asked, is Piquet a highly disgruntled former employee bent on revenge whatever the cost? Or is he a victim (despite having the ability to have refused). I can’t really see how Renault could claim that he acted alone believing that it was in his best interests for a future with the team, & that the team had no complicity in his actions.
Is Piquet lying? It is one hell of a tale to concoct. Is it possible that this is the petulant temper tantrum of a spoilt child. And what of Piquet Sr, did junior not tell his own father before or after the alleged staged accident.
That’s a fair point, but I think the FIA might look kindly on him as a ‘whistleblower’.
Agreed, but that’s a pretty expensive whistle!
Sadly, many employees will do what the Boss tells them. If they don’t they risk getting sacked. Didn’t Lewis lie on the instruction of his Boss?
Indeed he did.
You have to remember that these F1 drivers are staggeringly young men hired for their driving talent, not life experience or sound judgement… as they so often remind us.
biggest evidence in my eyes that all this is true comes from Symonds statement that says ”it was all Piquet’s idea”. He basically admitted they planed it.
yep, thats what nailed it.
Well, exactly. Only if Symonds has made this statement, how would it exonerate either himself or Briatore? As Piquet’s bosses, wasn’t saying ‘don’t do that Nelson’ an option?
I’ve got an idea fellow posters, let’s all go out tonight and trash as many cars as we can with a cricket bat!
Having an idea is one thing… actually going through with it is infinitely worse.
What is Symonds playing at?
All unconfirmed quotes so far, but spot the difference:
Briatore: I confirm the meeting with Piquet on Sunday morning, but nothing like that was ever talked about.
Symonds: It’s true, during the Sunday meeting with Piquet the issue of deliberately causing a SC deployment came up, but it was proposed by Piquet himself. It was just a conversation.
And now it emerges Pat Symonds has refused to answer several incriminating questions from alan donelly.
Im sorry but what F1 driver volunteers to help out their team mate by crashing. F1 drivers dont help out their team mates willingly at all, thats why there are team orders. Especially one bearing the name of Piquet… his dad drove in an era where drivers would take out their team mates.
Worst excuse he could have ever come up with, he is only digging deeper.
Not only did Symonds say “it was all Piquet’s idea”, but Briatore apparently denied all knowledge of it. You would have thought they would get their stories straight before releasing contradictory statements like that.
When I saw that statement from Symonds I immediately thought exactly the same thing. However im not sure if there is enough information from his comment – in that, we have to allow for the uncertainty in what context was that comment made, and how did media twist it.
If this comment is indeed related to the question of Piquets planned crash, than Renault have already lost the case regardless of whether Piquet acted alone or not, because Renault were aware of the possibility of foul play and did not come up with this information sooner.
It is indeed possible that this was all Piquets idea and he tried to talk the team into it, in order to secure his seat for the following year, as we can now see the way in which Piquet likes to back stab people simply tells one that he is capable of anything illegal.
Whatever the outcome from this saga, Piquets carrier in any type of international motorsport is over. He will be remember as the biggest failure both as human being and a driver in any race category. And a disappointment to his people and his country.
It is also possible that Flavio took the gamble by sacking Piquet, thinking that Piquet will not destroy his own carrier by bringing any information forward.
Overall the way in which Renault are responding now clearly indicates that there was indeed some “knowledge” of foul play regarding the deliberate crash by one of its drivers.
We will have to confirm the legitimacy of Symonds comments but so far nothing looks good for Renault or Piquet.
Well that’ll be the sound of Renault following Honda and BMW then after he FIA stick em with a £100m fine. Lets hope they make Fatio greaseball Briatore pay it and ban him from ever running anything in the sport again. Mr Symonds alleged involvement is a bigger surprise to me. Always had him down as a good guy. Alonso, well he’s just a spoiled kid really and I wouldn’t put anything past him. He could get into a revolving door behind you and sneak out in front.
Yeah, me too…
Me three….
I wouldn’t think anything was past Flav but i’m really shocked that Pat Symonds could have been an instigator of this. Would be a real shame to see him leave the sport.
Yes, that’s the biggest shocker – Symonds.
You took the words out my mouth Chris! I am not surprised if Flav is at the bottom of all this, but I thought Symonds was above that. Well I’ve only seen him being interviewed on TV but he seems to have more integrity than most.
However this could all turn out to be a tantrum (as it was put by an excellent comment above) so I don’t want to condemn yet. It will be interesting, especially to McLaren fans, what punishment will be handed to Renault if they are found guilty.
Don’t forget 1994 when Symonds and Briatore allegedly cheated with TC and launch control in the Benetton B194.
So they’re not quite completely clean. Maybe it’s a bit like Senna, win at all costs. Is that admirable tho?
What do you mean with “a bit like Senna”? This “win at all costs” is a sentence of that half-wit, Murray Walker, for whom Prost was god, and could not see his beloved being systematicaly trounced by Senna (along with Mansel, by the way).
Nelson Piquet is a very very poor looser, he has been kicked out by the team and now he´s kicking back.
By doing so he´s putting the whole team at risk, not only Briatore and Symonds. Sounds unfair to me …
Unless he’s telling the truth…
if he’s lying, renault will make sure he’ll go to jail.
His dad being the one who actually went to the FIA also lends some credibility in my mind.
I cant see this being a lie. After the dust had settled when piquet had been kicked out of Renault, they must of thought long and hard about doing this. His dad being involved signals that there must be truth in the allegations. He would have to be insane to do this just because of being discruntled. Whether it can now be proved is another matter.
This is just like a few guys who robbed a bank, then one going to the cops, calling the others thieves just because he didn’t get his complete share.
)
Piquet was party to it, why wait till he was sacked b4 he found his conscience. If he had a ten year contract and received a few hugs from Flavio this would never have come to light. It still boils down to blackmail.
In hindsight I believe Renault deliberately let Alonso out with a loose wheel nut.
Huh?
Which incident? Hungary 2006 or Valencia 2009???
Also, grassing out your co-criminals to the police is commonly known as a “plea bargain”…
Its not a plea bargain when unsolicited, rather its ego over powering brain.
The incident about the wheel nut was the Valencia one and just a joke anyway. But if Renault deliberately asked their driver to crash you can also assume, even though wrongly, that they can set up their car to crash, as the FIA was insisting they did.
Nelson Piquet Jr is a disgrace. This gesture will tarnish the image of F1 for a long long time
Right, because it was doing fine up until now!
Yes, that’s right. Let’s just brush these things under the carpet.. Like that will do our sport any good.
Please. Use your head.
I got a friend working in the RenaultTeam and she has always said to me that Pat is “Frozen”, “A snake in the grass”…but outward he is nice and friendly.
Personally I have never meet him,but I belive in my friend now….hrmmmm…”Pat the glider”.
What a he** for Piquet to live with this so long time…he probably didn´t tell anyone.I think he´s father get the news of this case at Nürburgring or Hungaroring this year.(?)
If the transcript is true, it strikes me as rather odd. There are points which would be confirmed by telemetry at the time of the crash, and the repeated radio messages (thats the part I find strangest – if they really did plan this, why talk about it on a monitored radio channel).
Admittedly, McLaren made up an even more obviously bogus tale in Australia, but at least they have the excuse the story was being cooked up on the hoof.
If they DID cheat, radio communication wouldn’t be irrelevant as it sounds like it had been planned before the race.
sorry: WOULD be irrelevant
Quite; if they really needed some way of confirming by radio, make it some harmless sounding message like “go to fuel mix xyz”.
How could Piquet lie about the radio communications exactly?
Of course the FIA will check these claims.
And this transcript has to be true, else we would have certainly heard Piquet rubbishing it by now.
They didn’t talk about it on the radio, Piquet just kept asking what lap he was on. See point 12 in his statement.
Apparently they are not denying it. They’ve put the blame on PK jr. Look at this . i think both parties are guilty. justice will be done only if both are punished.
Anyone who speaks Portuguese do check out the two links above that had the documents:
http://tazio.uol.com.br/f-1/textos/13420/
http://f1around.wordpress.com/2009/09/10/a-declaracao-de-nelsinho-piquet-a-fia-na-integra/#more-8409
Keith, you should try reading your own Forums!
#
S Hughes
Member
See this link – here is Piquet’s actual statement: http://www.f1sa.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=17075&Itemid=219
I had a feeling from the minute this came out that it was true (although we don’t know for certain, I think it is true). There is no way Piquet Jr would say something like this if it wasn’t true – there is the whole psychology of it. The fact that they are leaking bits of the investigation says a lot.
How utterly disgraceful. Just as I am convinced it is true (although, again, the verdict is not out yet), I am also convinced that Alonso knew because he doesn’t get bossed about, he gets involved in his strategy. But I am equally convinced that he will get away with it. If Lewis was in Alonso’s situation, he would be immediately implicated. Alonso will get away with it Scott free. Such is the justice in F1.
Posted 4 hours ago #
yes, i agree. even piquet with all his inabilities is not insane enough to utter a satanic lie of this magnitude. if its a lie he’s told, i’m sure he’ll be going to jail.
Can’t read everything at once! It was posted on the comment thread for the Santander story as well.
“I am also convinced that Alonso knew because he doesn’t get bossed about, he gets involved in his strategy”
What makes you think Alonso knew? There is as of yet no evidence implicating him in the conspiracy, even Nelson said it was only him flav and pat. And i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again the super agressive strategy was not something that would have made Alonso at all suspicous, it was a plausable high risk high reward gamble to get something from the weekend.
That’s a shock to us all. Only two eyes…
I wary of such leaks. Who has an interest in leaking this? Of the four parties who left the meeting with a copy only the FIA gains from this. But it just seems ruthless to Piquet to leak it. It puts paid to any leniency Piquet would get from the FIA and presumably sought by means of this full on the record admission–not being banned—because no team will touch him now whatever the FIA says.
It’s rather surprising that Piquet had no counsel present, according to the statement, when he was admitting to commiting various crimes—especially since a leak by the other side could put young Nelson is 100 flavors of legal trouble. But he can no longer surprise with foolishness.
Piquet has been an idiot but I feel sorry to see a talented person’s career end in such a fashion. At least he has his family wealth to fall back on.
I would say the Piquet camp definitely want this information in the public domain. There is no way this ends with him getting back in an F1 car, this is purely about them inflicting maximum damage on Renault.
And to maybe gain some sympathy?
Well Flav may be in big trouble but Piquet’s problems will go beyond a ban. His mutual-assured-destruction calculation may bring him more pain than he thinks:
Without looking in the Singapore Code I can conceive of criminal sporting event fixing crimes, criminal commercial fraud, and consumer fraud charges. And he could be subjet to various commercial tort and contractual claims by race organizers, the FIA, and other teams, media companies, whoever. So could the FIA. Daddy better get his checkbook out.
Let me go to this place: What was the payout for an Alonso victory in betting markets? I’m just saying, If I’m a UK prosecutor, given the huge sums at play for an F1 event in betting markets, clear evidence of a fixed up race requires me to look pretty hard at who benefited from this.
Would the drivers not have some sort of liability protection from this kind of thing?
Very good point on the betting thing as well…
Oh dear. Maybe there won’t be any family wealth to fall back on after all…
By leaking this, Piquet is showing the world the conditions that he worked under. No wonder he couldn’t perform with that amount of pressure.
Even if it’s a horrible thing it could have been worse to have never known the truth, so I’m more than happy that all of this is out and yes I do think Piquet is saying the truth.
But can you imagine what sort of an impact this will have on the sport? Its already left a sour taste in my mouth.
Yes I know it’s an awful thing and it will have a great impact on the credibility of the sport (SEE BERNIE IT SHOULD BE A SPORT NOT A SHOW!) but well it happened now they have to get severely punished and we’ll just have to keep our fingers crossed hoping it won’t happen again.
There’s one more thing I’d like to add, you know what left a big sour taste in my mouth? THE FERRARI VETO!!! No one ever carried on with this and quite frankly I’m dead sure that if you investigate the thing more in depth you will find things just as horrible as this, and the thing that is killing me is to know how many of the 7 WDCs Schumacher won has got them fair and square without the help from FIA. I’m dead dead sure that’d be ten billion times more horrible than this but we’ll never know and that sickens me so at least I’m glad this is out in the open.
So what next? What is the role of Quest Detectives? They were they same people appointed by Sir Mosley to investigate the spankgate leak by News of world. What can we expect from them?
if Piquet is making this all up, then he should go to jail but it he is telling the truth and i think he is, then they will have to not only throw the book but the whole bloody library at Renault.
Will this be treated as a criminal offense? What does the Singaporean law state on this? After all he put himself,other drivers,track officials & the spectators at mortal danger when he crashed. He could have died if had got it wrong. Isn’t that attempt to suicide?
Um, no it clearly wasn’t attempted suicide. But you are right about putting himself and others in danger, that is the bigger issue, bigger than race-fixing I’d think. Safety is one of the pillars of the FIA remember.
He’ll be fine as long as he wasn’t chewing gum when he crashed.
I think Bernie Ecclestone has argued in the past that what goes on at an F1 track is under international law…
Violins in the background while reading paragraph 8 for me. Why should anyone’s contract be renewed in July – let alone a driver on ground as shaky as Piquet was? One good result of all the arguments this year is that the silly season has moved back towards the end of the year.
Probably not attempted suicide, but they have a littering law and he certainly made a big mess when he crashed.
I dont think that Renault the mfg. is to blame here. If thois proves true then F1 renault team is to blame which is symonds and briatore, and possibly alonso. I cannot believe that the company renault would allow this to happen. This fraternity of people cannot keep anything secret for long so if this is true and it is starting to gain more traction the pat and Flav and alonso may have a hard time in the f1 circus.
Who paid Briatore and Symonds to run the team?
Easy, get rid of Flavio and Symonds.
But, cause of this i think Renault will use this as an excuse to quit F1 for good.
I thought he spun to the inside of the turn upon exit of the corner. That’s what I remember from the video posted here a few days ago. The description of how he lost control in the statement would seem to defy physics unless it were a lie…
Interesting point, I wonder if Renault will rely upon that in their defence?
From Autosport:
This is a rare bit of hard evidence and might stand up better than the my-word-against-yours argument.
See point 12 in NPJ’s supposed statement above.
Mp4-12D’s quote from Autosport and the video from a few days ago are consistent with oversteer causing the crash at the EXIT of the corner and having full control THROUGH the corner. But it’s not consistent with NPJ’s statement.
If you remove all steering/braking/accel inputs from a car going ENTERING a corner as he said, it should end up going straight on (see Felipe’s crash at the Hungaroring as a perfect example of this).
See point 16 in NPJ’s statement above.
I don’t think Felipe hit the barrier with all driver inputs removed. The engine revs were bouncing off the limiter when the car came to rest, as I heard on the roll-hoop camera.
I wish for the old days like when Schumacher would crash into something and he could take the credit himself.
Its called manning up.
Something missing from most people in f1 today.
but schumi would crash into people so that he won the championship! and then when he was out of the race say “ooop’s”
It’s been brought to my attention that the documents first surfaced here on F1SA:
http://www.f1sa.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=17075&Itemid=219
The more i read into this, the more i believe it! You only have to think about 1994 to get really suspicious. This would be the first time uncle flav has cheated, like fitting traction control when banned and removing filters from fuel hoses.
I’m deeply suspicious, and I hope the door of F1 smacks the *** really hard on his bottom as he exits the sport sliding on it!
Whoops thats £1 in the swear box. I’m getting bitter in my young age!
Yeah! If he’s guilty, sentence Flav to an afternoon of fun with Max!
But seriously, if it is true, and if Flav is implicated we can kiss goodbye to Renault as well as Toyo and BMW.
To paraphrase Wilde: to lose one manufactuer in a season is unfortunate. To lose two or three looks like carelesness.
Maybe it’s all a desperate plot by Piquet Senior to get rid of as many manufacturer teams as possible, which will drive the apparent value of a new team like Campos downwards, so that Piquet Senior can buy the team cheaper for Boy Wonder to play with!
If i were Nelson Jr i would have kept my big fat mouth shut for the sake of the sport. Maybe would have blackmailed Flavio for a few billion dollars, gone and settled on the foot hills of the Andes
No I totally disagree.
The more truth that comes out the better.
The better this sport will be in the long term.
Do you seriously think this sport can take anymore scandals of this magnitude?
It doesn’t matter, if these issues are covered up and unearthed at a later date the damage could be wider ranging, it’ actually quite a librating thing that in this modern age of communication we can all debate the pro’s and con’s of such a circumstance. The only way to police the sport is publicly, it is by far the biggest preventative measur of future indiscretions by others, publi humiliation is a nasty thing…..ask Dave Ryan.
Yes.
spygate really wasnt that big a deal. industrial spying happens all the time and very seldom is caught. Austrailia again was no big deal and the fia fota war isnt even on the radar, but cheating in a race and fixing the results affects the gambling world and now you are playing with a grouop of folks that are way to serious.
Who cares? This is like cleansing for the sport, the awful thing is not that it came to the light it’s that it happened in the first place.
Nelson Jr. should have kept quiet. Hope he is good at cutting sugar cane.
The revenge of Uncle Flav will be terrible.
Sorry if this has already been included …
Also read somewhere Symonds was reluctant to give any details in an interview (surprised also at him as I too thought he was a good guy).
I’ve just watched the Singapore GP on the review DVD and it’s very odd thinking a driver could and would do that just for the chance of a drive next season and at the end watching Briatore and Piquet on the pitwall it’s uncomfortable with all this news breaking.
F1 is really being let down by scandals the past few years, that said I wonder just what else over the decades could have been covered up? Though we’ll never know.
A slap on the back from Flav? A lot more than his usual coldness towards Piquet. The picture that was worth a thousand words was seeing Flav leave the pit lane after Alonso’s retirement in Hungary. Clearly he wasn’t bothered about watching the remainder of Nelson’s race.
All I can say: Oiii!!!
That’s utter crap and there will be no winners, only dead bodies. Whatever the outcome is, Nelsinho’s career is finished, he may be a cab driver or inmate, depending on outcome…
If that’s proved true, Flav and Symonds are dead bodies (not physically of course
, (and there could be criminal prosecution – risking life of driver, spectators, and so on..)
Renault utterly embarrassed will be thrown out of the championship, and most certainly walk away from F1 for a long time. Surely, they will be distracted from racing and end of their season will be really bad.
F1 in general will get really bad publicity again, and every past controversy will be dragged out of closet and paraded around.
Alonso may get away, saying either he knew nothing or he did what he was told as a soldier.
If Nelsinho made this all up, there will be no money on Earth to pay compensation to all parties involved. I guess, he made this statement still in “fragile state of mind”, so he needs to be treated..
I really feel sorry for all people involved in F1, this is not a way to end one of the most exciting seasons in history, at least last 20 years.
Shucks!! Just pity.
Hi Igor
Do you by any chance have any Piquet jr “collections” ?
Nope! Never liked him anyway..
lol!
Regardless of the truth about crash, one point lost here is that the damage to F1 is already done. Coming after Stepneygate and lying about radio transmissions, this is a very black eye.
Staging a crash is the most dangerous form a cheating imaginable. it will be hard, and take time, for F1 to recover from this accusation, no matter the truth.
I have also watched for a long time the disparaging of NP’s driving. There is no excuse for going along with the plan, but we now see the stressful beyond belief working conditions for a very young player in the world’s most ego-filled sport. I’ve decided to cut him some slack.
What’s more telling to me than the “evidence” is that old F1 hands “knew” it right away, just because.
I agree. It sounds like Flavio is a monster to work for if you’re not Alonso (see Heikki …).
Ditto for Heikki@McLaren. For first year after screwing his qualifying by heavily fuelling him . Team shamelessly released in all post race briefs “Fuel Corrected Heikki was faster than Lewis”. Macca haven’t exactly treated Heikki fairly.
World is Unfair… no taking sides here!!!
Some drivers get the best out of the car when its heavier, and others while its lighter.
assuming renault have “brought the sport into disrepute” and land a $100M fine, i could see renault motors handing flav the bill. he could pay out of pocket.
Coming Soon … “Force Blue” auction on Ebay:)
LOL, Flavio thought he was unsinkable, well at least his boat still floats
What a bloody mess ! With the company in deep, deep financial trouble and likely to lose Alonso very soon anyway, I can’t see Renault making the starting grid next spring, can you ? And if that turns out to be the case, the people I feel sorry for are all the fantastic guys at the factory. What a complete disaster !
Did nobody at the top think this through and realise the terrible damage it would wreak if something like this ever got out ?
Stepneygate was losing an arm or two, Liegate was a broken nose this is almost decapitation.
I was wrong I whole-heartedly believed Renault and Piquet would be completely innocent.
I can understand Piquet being desperate for a drive but he had a choice, a hard one yes but he didn’t have to do it. He’s not only let his teammate gain an unfair advantage and helped him win, played a part in the outcome of last year’s WDC but most importantly dealt a huge blow to the sport he loves so much and wanted to race in.
Poor Piquet was off the pace…
He tried so hard yet,could not race…
The boss says “if you want to help at all…
make yourself usefull…and hit the wall”
You should write press releases for the FIA. A bit of haiku might calm everyone down
Hard one to crack!
First word vs word is hard to judge… Don’t think you can punish because of a word, because that would be a bit crazy…
Piquet has always been a bad loser, always looking for excuses why he wasn’t good enough.
He should have kept this to himself anyway, he has been given too many races in f1 anyway!
Do you guys remember this ? The Calciopoli or better known as 2006 Italian football scandal.
just take a look at some of the punishments:-
The following punishments were given to individuals [6]:
* Franco Carraro: €80,000 fine.
* Massimo De Santis: 4 year ban from football.
* Paolo Dondarini: acquitted.
* Pasquale Foti: 2½ year ban from football, and €30,000 fine [5].
* Adriano Galliani: 5 month ban from football.
* Antonio Giraudo: €20,000 fine and 5 year ban from football, with a further recommendation to the FIGC president that he be banned for life from membership of the FIGC at any level.
* Pietro Ingargiola: Given a warning.
* Tullio Lanese: 2½ year ban from football.
* Claudio Lotito: 2½ year ban from football.
* Gennaro Mazzei: 1 year ban from football.
* Innocenzo Mazzini: 5 year ban from football.
* Leonardo Meani: 2½ year ban from football.
* Luciano Moggi: 5 year ban from football, with a further recommendation to the FIGC president that he be banned for life from membership of the FIGC at any level.
* Pierluigi Pairetto: 3½ year ban from football.
* Gianluca Paparesta: 3 month ban from football.
* Claudio Puglisi: 3 month ban from football.
* Fabrizio Babini: 1 year ban from football.
* Andrea Della Valle: 3 year ban from football.
* Diego Della Valle: 3 year 9 month ban from football.
The police were involved in the investigations.can we expect something like this? i know its only one team that is involved but still…
I am italian, and know about it. Most of these punishments are pure appearance, and nothing has changed really. Most of these people are still reigning. Much ado about nothing, this sport simply can’t be cleaned, it’s dirty inside.
Blimey, are all Italians corrupt?????
Are Mike Coughlan, Nigel Stepney, Ron Dennis (repeat offender, lied under oath) all Italians
We can only imagine what happened during those Benetton years when Flavio was with schumacher
Here is an interesting article. Note the ending.
http://formula-one.speedtv.com/article/f1-symonds-evasive-during-fia-questioning/
The weight of the media and leaked reports tend to be siding with young Nelson, If it’s as cut and dry as this report and others that have emerged then Flavio and Pat are in deep deep do do (to steal a phrase from my 10 year old boy)
OOHHH I thought this was a foundless claim. Looks like they have the goods on Renault now….
How much do you think they will pay to get out of this???
I think it’s too late to buy their way out of anything… the poop has hit the fan.
I think that thanks to this incident there is a fantastic debate in this website. It certaintly looks doggie but I still can’t see how Alonso was involved. There are a lot of people out there that would love this to be the case, more than evidences that incriminate him. But I supposed that’s what happens every time Lewis or Fernando are involved in an incident, people gets passionate.
I think they should verify telemetry, If it is confirmed he went accelerating before the impact I think they have an evidence of what Nelsinho says.
In that case Nelsinho, Briatore and Symonds should be out of Formula 1. Forever.
If true, this is a shocker. But I feel very sorry for Nelson. He must have been under such unbearable stress and strain in that team. It seems those guys will do anything to be a F1 driver.
You can throw up a few theories here: Piquet resentment, Mosley trying to get Briatore and another manufacturer out of F1, or Renault actually being guilty. But no matter what the truth is, the evidence that’s there looks very discriminating. I think we all remember from Spygate (or whatever you want to call it) that the FIA isn’t as strict on “reasonable doubt” acquittals as normal law courts. They won’t need every last bit of hard proof you can find to decide against them. They may decide that if “beyond all reasonable doubt” is blocked merely by the lack of evidence to say one way or another, they may throw Renault out just for raising a serious possibility that this is all true.
The sport has already been brought into disrepute by this. Crashing to rig a race result has all sorts of implications, as discussed above.
Mind you, Max and his spanky dungeon could be said to bring disrepute to F1, yet he got off (as it were).