Lewis Hamilton’s drive towards the most remarkable triumph in Formula One history could be halted in a Paris courtroom. The Briton faces being suspended from the championship if his McLaren Mercedes team cannot answer allegations of spying levelled at them by the sport’s governing body.
The investigation into how a 780-page dossier belonging to Ferrari, containing secret details of the Italian team’s inner workings and the designs of their cars, found its way into the hands of Mike Coughlan, McLaren’s chief designer, had previously left Hamilton unscathed, but the FIA’s decision formally to charge McLaren yesterday could have devastating consequences for the 22-year-old who is attempting to win the World Championship in his rookie season.
The FIA’s record on punishing cheating is not encouraging for Hamilton, as Jenson Button discovered two years ago. Britain’s rising star of motor racing at the time, he was disqualified from third place at the San Marino Grand Prix and suspended for two grands prix – including the Monaco showpiece – after his Honda team were found guilty of racing underweight cars.
Hamilton is threatened with the same fate unless McLaren can convince what amounts to motor racing’s High Court – sitting in Paris on July 26, four days after the European Grand Prix at the N?rburgring in Germany – of their innocence. The FIA has charged McLaren with being in “unauthorised possession of documents and confidential information” belonging to Ferrari.
McLaren last night expressed disappointment at the FIA’s decision and emphasised that the document was held by a single, now suspended, employee, while no information was used in the building of the cars driven by Hamilton, who leads the championship by 12 points after nine successive podium finishes, and Fernando Alonso, his teammate.
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However, the World Motor Sport Council is bound to consider Article 123 of its Sporting Code – the disciplinary bible for Formula One – which states that every team bear a collective responsibility for the actions of their members.
If found guilty, punishments range from fines to suspension and even exclusion from the championship.
Coughlan has already brokered a deal for Ferrari to end their High Court action against him in return for a full affidavit explaining how he got the document. That is thought to be because Ferrari want to concentrate their attention on Nigel Stepney, a former chief engineer with the team, who is accused of providing the dossier. Stepney denies any wrongdoing. But it is believed that the FIA will also see the affidavit, which should explain whether Jonathan Neale, managing director of McLaren Racing, also saw the document.
The charges are as serious as they could be in a sport driven to paranoia about industrial espionage. Teams spend hundreds of millions of pounds developing sophisticated technologies to make their cars go faster and any suggestion that their technology has been copied invokes a harsh response. Ferrari and McLaren are among the biggest spenders, investing about £400 million a year between them.
The casualties of a heavy punishment, if the FIA is not convinced by McLaren’s mitigating evidence that the case involves a single rogue employee, will include some of the biggest sponsors in sport. Vodafone, the mobile phone company, Santander, the Spanish bank, and Johnnie Walker, one of Britain’s best-known drinks brands, appear on the McLaren cars and they will not want them parked in garages while the Formula One circus goes on. Even the gambling industry has been spooked by the spy row, with William Hill suspending all betting on the World Championship. Hamilton had been 8-13 to win the title.
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— Indianapolis, the venue last month for Hamilton’s second victory, will not feature on the 2008 Formula One schedule, raising the possibility that there will be no US Grand Prix next season. Tony George, chief executive of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway circuit, said that he been unable to agree a new contract with Bernie Ecclestone, the sport’s impresario.