By Les Tan/Red Sports
Fernando Alonso won the inaugural Singapore F1 Grand Prix night race because his teammate Nelson Piquet Jr (in background) deliberately crashed. (Photo © Van/Red Sports file photo)
In the face of what looks like irrefutable evidence, Renault has all but admitted that its team fixed the Singapore F1 Grand Prix.
In a statement, Renault stated that they “will not dispute the recent allegations made by the FIA concerning the 2008 Singapore grand prix.”
“It also wishes to state that its managing director Flavio Briatore and its executive director of engineering Pat Symonds have left the team,” Renault added in the statement.
Renault are due to attend a hearing before the FIA world motor sport council in Paris on September 21st.
Renault had earlier initiated legal proceedings against Nelson Piquet Jr and his father, Nelson Piquet, over “the making of false allegations and a related attempt to blackmail the team into allowing Piquet Jr to drive for the remainder of the 2009 season”.
Piquet Jr is however, standing by his statement to the FIA which has been leaked on the internet. In it, Piquet Jr says:
“The proposal to deliberately cause an accident was made to me shortly before the race took place, when I was summoned by Mr Briatore and Mr Symonds in Mr Briatore’s office. Mr Symonds, in the presence of Mr Briatore, asked me if I would be willing to sacrifice my race for the team by ‘causing a safety car’.”
“Mr Symonds took me aside to a quiet corner and, using a map, pointed me to the exact corner of the track where I should crash,” said Piquet in the July 30th statement.
YouTube.com video of the crash
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrdbBJTfh68&feature=player_embedded
Piquet’s telemetry at turn 17 shows that he accelerated much earlier than expected. This caused his rear wheels to spin. He then eased off before speeding up again to make the car spin. (Photo: Public Domain)
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