And the scandals just keep coming: the president of the FIA, Mohammed Ben Sulayem, is alleged to have interfered in the result of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix last season. Oh boy.
First revealed yesterday by BBC Sport, Ben Sulayem is accused of using his influence to overturn a penalty for Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, thus handing him a podium finish.
Alonso had crossed the line in P3, but was given a 10-second penalty after his team was deemed to have worked on his car illegally while serving an earlier five-second penalty at his first pit stop.
That longer second penalty was later struck off. At the time, the stewards argued that it wasn't clear if touching the car—which Aston did with its rear jack—counted as ‘work.’
The rules were then changed to remove the grey area.
It meant Alonso kept his P3 race result behind the Red Bulls of Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen, and Mercedes' George Russell returned to P4.
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The fiasco had an effect on the world championship: had Alonso been demoted to P4, he would've been classified sixth in the drivers' standings rather than fourth.
And it could so easily have changed the outcome of the constructors’ championship. Mercedes narrowly beat Ferrari to P2 by a margin of just three points: had they finished third, they would have lost millions in prize money but gained valuable wind tunnel testing time for 2024; and Ferrari vice versa.
So this is a huge deal. The claim has been made by a whistleblower and features in a report written by an FIA compliance officer to its ethics committee, which will investigate over the next few weeks.
If proven, it would be the latest in an increasingly long line of controversies that Ben Sulayem has been involved in since taking up his post almost two-and-a-half years ago.
These include misogynistic remarks attributed to him on an old website, receiving a cease and desist order from F1 for interfering in a commercial matter, delaying an increase in sprint races for 2023 against F1’s wishes, and launching a process to attract new F1 teams that no-one in the sport (except for the fans) really wanted.
That of course led to the doomed Andretti bid, which was rejected by F1 last month after a withering assessment of the benefits it would bring and its prospects of being successful.
Ben Sulayem also recently oversaw a bizarre episode in which the FIA launched a conflict of interest investigation into Toto and Susie Wolff that was widely condemned by F1 and the teams. It was wound up after two days.
He also reportedly asked Max Verstappen to publicly back Christian Horner amid the saga engulfing the Red Bull team boss, for reasons unknown.
We need a liedown. F1 can’t take much more of this, surely?
NOTE: This article first appeared on TopGear.com. Minor edits have been made.
