Reports reveal Massa was instructed by Ferrari to slow down Hamilton at Singapore GP – Formula 1
Recent reports have revealed that Ferrari’s Felipe Massa was told by team engineer Rob Smedley to slow down McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton at the 2011 Singapore Grand Prix that took place recently at the Marina Bay Street Circuit.
The Massa-Hamilton story has taken a dramatic turn with this recent development.
Massa’s post-race aggression towards Hamilton at the Singapore GP is now being viewed with scepticism after his radio conversation with Smedley has been made public in which the latter has been heard saying, “Hold Hamilton as much as we can. Destroy his
race as much as we can. Come on boy.”
During the race, there was a collision between the two drivers in lap 12, which caused them to revert to the pit lane for the repair work. Both the drivers suffered considerably and had to put up a fierce struggle to gain back their lost positions while
Hamilton was given a drive-through penalty for being responsible for the accident.
However, if Massa had received instructions from Smedley to ‘damage’ the Brit’s race before the start of lap 12, it might change the scenario in Hamilton’s favour.
Massa had been very rude to the Brit and accused him of ruining his race. Speaking in a television interview after the race, he said, “Again he cannot use his mind. What he did could have caused a big accident. He is paying for it. I was in the middle so
I got a puncture. I was not lucky with my strategy and again something happened with a guy that has done it so many times this year. I will tell him, he doesn’t listen.”
It seems quite strange coming from the 30-year-old Brazilian driver, who was himself targeting to ruin Hamilton’s race.
A special drivers’ meeting has been called by all the Formula 1 drivers under the chairmanship of the FIA chairman Charlie Whiting at Suzuka, Japan before the 2011 Japanese Grand Prix to discuss Hamilton’s race tactics in the season so far.
It seems that there is a lot more to the story that needs to be further investigated.
Let’s see what happens next in this Singapore Grand Prix incident.
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