F1 update - Ferrari not happy with Niki Lauda’s criticism
Ferrari launched sarcastic comments about Niki Lauda after he criticized the team for what they did at the German Grand Prix last month.
Team Ferrari was highly criticized by the 3-time world Champion Niki Lauda about what the team did at Hockenheim and he believes that they will get a “pasting” from the FIA World Motor Sport Council for sure next month. Ferrari allowed their leading driver Fernando Alonso to pass his teammate Felipe Massa to win at Hockenheim to keep the Spaniard alive in the battle for the Championship. However, this does not portray Alonso’s image as the next “Schumacher”. It was the teams fault and Alonso had nothing to do with it. He said that the team always ruins the excitement of the sport by such acts.
Alonso has been at the top of his game since the past two races that gave him a total of 43 points including a win besides all the controversies. Fernando has a total of 141 points that makes him 20 points behind the Championship leader Mark Webber who has a total of 161 points. Alonso has a quite a chance to win the championship and expects a lot from his team. He still has 4 other competitors who are not that far. Lewis Hamilton is in 2nd place with 157 points; Sebastian Vettel is in 3rd with 151 points followed by Jenson Button with 147 points. This season is getting tougher after every race. With just 7 races remaining, the Spaniard hopes to snatch the title for the 3rd time.
Keeping Niki’s accusations in mind, Ferrari accused the 3-time World, who won two of his championships with Ferrari, of hypocrisy.
Ferrari has been in the Formula 1 since 1951 and is known as one of the most dominant teams yet. The Italian team struggled to stay consistently in the sport until 1958. The team made its point in its very first full season as the team scored a total of 57 points securing the 2nd position in the constructors’ standings. Ferrari kept its momentum and won its first championship in the year 1961 with 52 points. This was a remarkable performance, however the team could not perform at its best for the next 2 years scoring a disappointing 6th and 4th place. Ferrari came back with a bang as the team won its second championship in the year 1964 with 49 points. The Italian team struggled to secure the Championship for the next 10 years before the legendary Austrian driver Niki Lauda secured his first drivers’ title and helped Ferrari secure the constructors title. Niki continued his dominance the following 2 years and Ferrari got to score 3 consecutive constructors’ titles in 1975, 1976 and 1977 with 72.5, 83, and 97 points respectively. The Austrian left the team in 1978 to join team Brabham. Ferrari won again in 1979 without Lauda. After 2 disappointing years after that, the Italian team came back in 1982 and further continued to win the title in the years 1983, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007 and 2008, making it a total of 16 championships. The teams gave a record-breaking performance in 2004 with the help of Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello when they scored 262 points. Ferrari has hopes to score break more records in the years to come and is currently in 3rd place in the constructors’ standings.
However, Ferrari launched a statement in the Horse Whisperer column on the team's official website that is often used to reply its critics. Ferrari claims Lauda will "indulge in some verbal acrobatics to reposition himself in line with the prevailing wind.”
"This time, good old Niki has missed out on a fine opportunity to keep his mouth shut, given that, when he was a Scuderia driver, the supposed Ferrari driver management policy suited him perfectly," said the column. "That aside, where was all his moral fury when, over the past years, so many have been guilty of more or less over hypocritical actions?"
This is a very harsh statement from the team. It will be interesting to see what Lauda and the critics have to say about this in the near future.
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