Brought to you by TJ13 contributor Bruznic
The German paper ‘autobild’ came out with a story labelled the truth behind Mercedes protest on Verstappen’s defensive move.
They found out why Mercedes made the case and later withdrew it. As we all know Verstappen moved before the last chicane, in the braking zone, when Hamilton tried to overtake him in lap 52. Thus resulting in Hamilton taking the escape road, placed on the outside of said chicane. With this manoeuvre Verstappen would have broken the rule in paragraph 13.4.4. But as the people on twitter saw, Hamilton wrote a tweet saying:
‘people talking about a Mercedes protest are wrong. Some idiot made the story and the rest copied it. Max drove very good and that’s the end of it’
perfectly in-line with Toto’s story after the race to the German RTL, who lauded the young mans race craft. Saying how his sportive nature wants to see actions like this, but also that sometimes the stewards have a different opinion.
What both of them didn’t knew, and what the story of ‘autobild’ now says is that; at the first meeting of the stewards, both Italian marshals Enzo Spano and Emanuelle Pirro alongside their Japanese college Takashi Mitarashi would have out voted their Australian college Garry Connelly resulting in a no further actions taken.
Connelly, however, has a name of being a bit ruthless and he wasn’t satisfied with said result. To which he took matters in own hand by going to the Mercedes motorhome trying to convince Mercedes’ bosses of his case. By that time both Toto Wolff and Niki Lauda were already on a plane and Connelly only found Paddy Lowe and Ron Meadows.
Those two happily agreed with Connelly and said they wanted to protest. Some time later it resulted in Hamilton finding out, and phoning to Wolff saying he himself is opposed to the case. As stated before Wolff felt the same and, from in his plane, he got in contact with the FIA, demanding a withdrawal. Of course in the time in-between reporters jumped on it and twitter had a little storm, which Hamilton ended by saying that the protest is withdrawn and how he feels it was the right thing to do. If the case is really closed is something I don’t know.
Will there be actions against Connelly? As it isn’t really his place to take this kind of action since he was out voted 3 to 1.
What was the betting line on a 1-2 Mercedes finish, i’d carefully the guy’s connections with any Asian betting syndicate, this could cost millions.
So who are the stewards for next race(s)?
Is that guy there again? If so, Max should watch his back.
Garry Connelly is a Riccardo man and hates Max for his win in Spain. He took maters in his own hands and is therefore a bad steward. Fire this man, he is killing the sport F1. If he hates Max he can’t make a judgment on any matter involving Max.
Source?
Some Australian guy on the net.
Seems legit
I can confirm that. Aussies on the Web are hateful and racist. 😎
It’s thought, by some, that the Jews run the world. Little do they know, it’s actually the Australians. Things like the “Shoey” and partying in our “budgie smugglers” are just a front; something to throw the world off us being the great puppet masters of modern times. Connelly will now be… replaced. Not for his deceptive actions, but, like the Spartans, for being caught.
#Murdoch
That whole story is what’s wrong with our sport..we only need to go back a few years at this very track to see why we need an impartial steward panel. If this sport is ever to be taken seriously and not be tarred with the brush of a soap opera the whole system needs a overhaul. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely
interesting insight into the Merc chain of command – the buck stops with Toto then!!.
The decision made (ie that’s racing) was correct for me, but the manner of the ‘protest’ being lodged described above
seems to be yet another case highlighting the need for a consistent set of stewards to attend every race (we may disagree with them from time to time, but if it was the same people every race then at least the drivers would know where they stand).
I say just let Alan Jones handle it every race, no fuss, let em race!
If this is true Connely’s carreer as a steward should be over. It is clear that he is far from impartial and also doesn’t abide by democratic principles.
It will go into the history books as “the Great Gary Connolly scandal”.
Agreed. If this did play out this way the FIA need to get shot of him, impartiality is unacceptable.
Does not look too hot for Lowe either. Mercedes have so much tension to deal with at present and they may decide that something has to change. I reckon that the source of the tension is safe so a scapegoat could be sacrificed. Who knows!
What a crazy situation. Thank god we have multiple stewards so these rouge ones don’t ruin races.
Personally I don’t think we’d have even seen the stewards looking at this had Lewis not jumped straight on the radio to complain about the move. That said, drivers who are in the heat of the battle say things that they later retract, just like Lewis did regarding this and the drivers complaining about blue flags mid race were far more reasonable out of the car. Stewards, and commentators alike, need to take into account that the bloke with the skid lid on isn’t always the most rational individual when hitting the radio button in the midst of a battle.
Rollicking story … if true.
Google which seats judge mercyless occupies in the racing business and you can see that this man stands by his opinion fiercly, he must have been taunted to the bone to take it outside the room to Paddy Lowe.
It’s not that ackward when discussions about Verstappen’s way of driving heats up the fans, that the same thing goes around with some stewards.
One thing is for sure, this will not be the end of this discussion, Gary might as well have put the debate on a crossroad, I’m curious if it will take a left or a right turn from here.
I don’t see much debating going on..