Massa's lawyers are done with it: FIA & FOM get another month

Fighting in Formula 1 is increasingly being fought out in court as well. But often these are fairly recent events. The case of Brazilian former F1 driver Felipe Massa is unique: it concerns the 2008 Formula 1 world championship.

According to Massa, he was entitled to the 2008 title, and not Lewis Hamilton, because the FIA and FOM had withheld information about the infamous Crashgate incident during the Singapore Grand Prix. Had this information come out immediately, Massa said, the race would have been cancelled and Massa would have been world champion. It is a complicated matter, and Massa has taken legal action against Flavio Briatore, Renault and Ferrari in addition to the FIA and FOM. An additional problem for Massa is that one of the protagonists of that era, Fia president Max Mosley, has since died.

But that has not stopped Massa, who drove for Ferrari in 2008, from starting the legal battle. The dispute with the FIA and FOM revolves around Massa's demand that these organisations conduct an internal investigation into the situation surrounding the 2008 championship. In doing so, Massa hopes to uncover new incriminating information.

The request was made by Massa's lawyers on 15 August, with a deadline of 15 October. FIA and FOM could not get this done and asked Massa's lawyers for an extension, Reuters reported. The team of lawyers around Massa agreed: the deadline was extended by a month. But it is the last time, according to the lawyers: if nothing is above board by then, Massa's public lawsuit against the FIA and FOM will immediately follow. The new deadline is 15 November. To be continued.