Alonso’s third championship out of threat for team ordering case
The two times Formula One Champion, Fernando Alonso is sinking deep into trouble for the past few races of the season.
The Ferrari driver had a wonderful start to the season as he was able to bag victory in the first round of 2010, held in Bahrain. However, as the season passed by the Ferrari car kept loosing pace as well as grip on the title for the season. Finally, the team emerged again in full force at the German Grand Prix, where the team was able to have a one-two finish.
However, this victory brought along a lot of controversies as they were accused of following team orders, which is strictly forbidden as per FIA rules. The Italian team had been fighting back the issue, claiming that nothing as such had been done by them, until yesterday when the World Motor Sport Council gave the final verdict in their favour.
The team as well as the entire Ferrari and especially Alonso’s fans had feared that the final decision could terminate the hopes of the Italian driver for winning the third Formula One Championship of his career.
The team had been already fined $100 000, for the Brazilian driver, Felipe Massa moving aside as Alonso passed by him at the German Grand Prix on July 25, thus winning the race of the day, while Massa settled for second place.
The initial 49 of 67 laps were led by Massa on the race weekend, however at the 49th lap he received a coded message on his car’s radio, telling him that Alonso was faster than him, following which Massa let the latter pass on.
Well, six races of the season are yet to go, while Alonso stands at fifth place having bagged a total of one hundred and forty nine points, being shy of 41 points from the chart leader, Lewis Hamilton of McLaren.
With his last week’s victory, Hamilton’s total score has reached up to 182 points followed by Red Bull’s Mark Webber who stands at second place with one hundred and seventy nine points.
Well, now the current difference of 41 points of the Spaniard from the chart topper might seem chase-able as the speculations that Alonso might have been stripped off from his top place finish at Hockenheim have been blown away. Had that been the case, it would have eliminated 25 points from his collection, and would have thus brought his championship dream of the year to an end.
Earlier when the team got accused at Hockenheim, the German stewards did not nullify Ferrari's 1-2 finish rather they accused the team of breaching article 39.1 of FIA Regulations and handed the case to WMSC for further investigation.
The 39.1 rule claims that any team’s strategy that alters a race result is forbidden. The team had also been accused of bringing disrepute to the sport under article 151 (c) of International Sporting Code.
Well, an important thing to remember here is that Article 39.1 got introduced in the year 2002 after Ferrari were accused of manipulating the results of Austrian Grand Prix by following team orders, as Rubens Barrichello’s victory was handed to Michael Schumacher by a collective plan of the team.
Then, FIA’s prevailing president, Jean Todt was the team principal of Ferrari.
Well, it has been several times that the team has been caught following the same strategy to secure the Driver’s as well as Constructors’ Championship.
However, a day before the team heads for its home race next week at Monza, Ferrari seems to eventually have a peace of mind.
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