Nelson Piquet Junior has reacted to the events surrounding 'crashgate' and the aftermath of the race in recent months. Quoted by FormulaPassion, the Brazilian tells how he experienced the race at the time and what damage he inadvertently caused to his compatriot Felipe Massa.
The 2008 Singapore Grand Prix is one of the most infamous races in Formula 1 history. Piquet was ordered by team boss Flavio Briatore to deliberately crash so that his teammate Fernando Alonso could win the race. Massa was leading up to that point but emerged badly from a pit stop during the safety car. Lewis Hamilton finished third in the race, and Massa fell outside the points, ultimately allowing Hamilton to win the season by just one point over Massa.
Officially, the whole story of 'crashgate' only became known a year later when Piquet went public with the truth. Recently, however, Bernie Ecclestone announced that he and then-FIA president Max Mosley knew about the events in Singapore as early as the season, but decided not to do anything about it to avoid controversy. Massa then announced that because of Ecclestone's admission, he will investigate whether the result can still be adjusted. According to Massa, it is only right if the entire race is omitted from the results, which would therefore retroactively win him the season.
Piquet releases his take on the situation
The central pivot in this story - Piquet - has largely kept quiet, but was recently asked in a podcast about his take on the situation anyway. " It was a team order to help someone within our team," Piquet begins his explanation. "It was never meant to hurt Massa. That was not the plan. Obviously, it was a mistake. But in the position I was in at the time, with the dream of staying in F1 for a long time, the race in Singapore came, and they psychologically cornered me."
"I am often asked if I would do it again," Piquet continued. "And my answer is then: 'Of course not'. But at that age and under that pressure... I had nobody with me in Formula 1, only a bully [Briatore, ed.] who was always complaining and constantly threatening that this was my last chance. I felt like everything was falling apart."
Young guy at that time does not know how to play his cards right. When he was fired, instead of being spiteful and just coming out to the media to spill the beans on what had transpired, he could have earned himself millions by approaching Renault to buy his silence.
Masi did nothing wrong in the f1 law book if Masi had to really fight FIA he would win
"only a bully [Briatore, ed.] who was always complaining" On the other hand, we can not say that the " bully" was wrong. I mean, just look at the results.
All this confession in the end changes nothing. Massa has live with fact that he will never a WDC winner. Victim card wouldn't work in this case.
What this proved was the the FIA ARE willing to cover things up to protect their own image and that of F1. They prefer to let it go unpunished than create a hoo-ha. That's weak and corrupt, just like Masi was. Not to mention that Masi has an NDA signed, which is obviously to protect the FIA's involvement (to whatever extent that goes), their covering up of it after they investigated themselves, and prevent Masi from talking about why he did what he did after they had to let him go. (Spicing up the show is not a valid reason for breaking rules btw). With AD'21, the FIA were directly involved in the rule breaking so imagine how much less likely they'd be to do the right thing. As for Singapore, the guilty party wasn't Piquet, it was Briatore.
Popular on GPBlog
F1 Full Results | Japanese Grand Prix FP2: Piastri P1, Norris P2
F1 LIVE | Follow FP2 for the Japanese Grand Prix here
Mercedes breaks F1 rule ahead of Japanese Grand Prix weekend
