{"id":252493,"date":"2025-10-31T14:46:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T14:46:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/252493\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T14:46:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T14:46:10","slug":"ex-f1-bosses-accused-of-conspiring-to-cover-up-crashgate-by-felipe-massas-lawyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/252493\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-F1 bosses accused of \u201cconspiring\u201d to cover up Crashgate by Felipe Massa’s lawyer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Felipe Massa<\/a>\u2019s legal counsel has asserted that Formula 1\u2019s leadership was involved in a \u201cdeliberate concealment\u201d of Nelson Piquet Jr\u2019s 2008 Singapore Grand Prix crash, as part of Massa\u2019s case disputing that year\u2019s title.<\/p>\n

Massa had filed a lawsuit against the FIA, Formula One Management (FOM), and Bernie Ecclestone seeking damages for the outcome of the 2008 championship, which is now being tabled at a pre-trial hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice in London.<\/p>\n

The Brazilian is seeking \u00a364million in damages from the three parties.<\/p>\n

An interview with former F1 supremo Ecclestone had been released on F1-Insider in 2023, where Ecclestone had apparently suggested that he and former FIA president Max Mosley knew enough about the Crashgate plot in the 2008 Singapore GP to potentially expunge the race from the official standings \u2013 but chose to avoid potentially drawing attention to a scandal.<\/p>\n

Ecclestone has subsequently stated that he does not remember giving the interview, a defence mounted by his lawyer David Quest KC.<\/p>\n

Regardless, Massa had subsequently seen this interview and chose to mount a legal challenge to seek damages. Having led that year\u2019s Singapore race, Massa left a pitstop with his fuel hose stuck to his car \u2013 he finished the race in 13th place as a result.<\/p>\n

In the race, Piquet was instructed to crash on the 14th lap, after Renault team-mate Fernando Alonso<\/a> had made a pitstop. During this era, the pitlane tended to remain shut during the initial application of a safety car; as a result, Alonso ultimately won the first F1 race in Singapore. Crucially, Massa\u2019s title rival Lewis Hamilton<\/a> finished in third \u2013 and in that year\u2019s Brazil finale, beat Massa to the title by one point.<\/p>\n

Nick De Marco KC, Massa\u2019s lawyer, stated that those in charge of F1 at the time were involved in \u201cdeliberate concealment\u201d of the events in Singapore to protect their own interests.<\/p>\n

\"Felipe <\/p>\n

Felipe Massa, Ferrari F2008, and Lewis Hamilton, McLaren MP4-23 Mercedes<\/p>\n

Photo by: Steven Tee \/ Motorsport Images<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first point is that it is no exaggeration to say the deliberate crash was one of the most serious incidents of sport manipulation in world sport, not only because it was blatant attempt to intervene in the race, but the deliberate act threatened the life of spectators and the driver himself,\u201d said De Marco.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat then happens is the deliberate concealment of the conspiracy to have a crash, the deliberate concealment by those with responsibility for protecting the integrity of the sport, deliberately conspiring together to cover up one of the most serious scandals in the history of sport.\u201d<\/p>\n

Quest had countered in court that \u201cMr Massa\u2019s poor performance in the race was not related to the crash, and neither was Lewis Hamilton\u2019s strong performance. Neither of them were aware of Renault\u2019s ploy.\u201d<\/p>\n

FOM\u2019s counsellor Anneliese Day KC has contended that Massa\u2019s failed bid to become champion was simply a matter of Hamilton having \u201coutperformed\u201d Massa over the season \u2013 and that Massa had \u201cthe misfortune\u201d to be in competition with the seven-time champion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis litigation will not result in Mr Massa getting the prize he wants, and the only \u2018winners\u2019 out of a further 12 to 18 months of litigation will be the lawyers,\u201d read Day\u2019s statement. \u201cThe simple fact is that over the course of both the Singapore Grand Prix and across the 2008 season, Mr Hamilton outperformed Mr Massa (and everyone else).<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is nothing unusual or unfair about that: Mr Massa simply had the misfortune to be up against one of the greatest drivers the sport has ever seen, and neither he nor anyone else could beat Mr Hamilton over the course of the season.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pre-trial will conclude on Friday, after which it will be decided if the case warrants a full trial, or will be thrown out.<\/p>\n

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– The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Felipe Massa\u2019s legal counsel has asserted that Formula 1\u2019s leadership was involved in a \u201cdeliberate concealment\u201d of Nelson…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252494,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[110366,49,48,117784,578,576,577,110365,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-252493","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-formula-1","8":"tag-autodromo-hermanos-rodriguez","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-ex-f1-bosses-accused-of-u201cconspiringu201d-to-cover-up-crashgate-by-felipe-massas-lawyer","12":"tag-f1","13":"tag-formula-1","14":"tag-formula1","15":"tag-mexican-gp","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252493"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252493\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}