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F1 is a global sport with copious amounts of glitz and glamor associated with it. Consequently, it attracts a lot of attention from the media as well. This places the sport under continuous scrutiny, resulting in controversies and scandals popping up time and again.
F1 has been around for more than 70 years and in this timeframe, there have been many controversies, some of which have marred the sport and left an indelible mark on its history. In this piece, we take a look at the top 5 scandals in F1 history.
#5 2021 F1 Abu Dhabi GP
One of the best championship battles in the history of the sport came down to the last race of the season with both contenders level on points. Whoever finishes ahead in the race will win the championship! It was as simple as that.
All of this goes for a toss when the race director decides to have a controversially abrupt restart to the race following a safety car period. All of the standard procedures are dropped. Only a small group of cars between the two front-runners are allowed to unlap themselves leaving Lewis Hamilton as a sitting duck against Max Verstappen on fresher tires.
As the dust settles, Verstappen has defeated Hamilton to the title on the last lap of the season under dubious decision-making from race control. Even nine months later, outrage over the way the entire thing was handled still persists.
#4 Max Mosley sex scandal
Max Mosley's leaked footage is one of the biggest scandals to hit the sport. The FIA president presided over the sport with an iron fist for more than a decade. The Briton, however, was caught with his pants down after footage of him taking part in a rather questionable act leaked into the public domain. Mosley ended up taking the News Group Newspapers Limited to court and ultimately got his name cleared that he was not part of a "Nazi-themed" orgy.
The incident, however, started his decline from power as he ended up leaving the position with Jean Todt replacing the Briton.
#3 The Spy-Gate Scandal (2007 F1 season)
Even to this day, McLaren's 2007 challenger is termed the "2007 Ferrari" due to this scandal!
The 2007 season had a titanic battle championship battle between McLaren duo Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso and Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen. While the battle was great and it marked Hamilton's emergence in the sport, the biggest highlight/controversy/talking point was the revelation that Ferrari's confidential data about its car had made its way to McLaren. As it turns out, the Scuderia's head of Team Performance Development, Nigel Stepney, had been passing on confidential information to McLaren's Mike Coughlan.
When the matter went to the courts, both personnel were found guilty and were fired. The FIA levied an exorbitant fine of $100 million on McLaren for partaking in espionage along with disqualification from that year's constructors' championship.
#2 Ayrton Senna vs Alain Prost: 1989 and 1990 F1 season
Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost are two of the greatest drivers in the history of the sport. While the rivalry between the two drivers started off intense, it did get dirty after a while.
It all began with the 1989 championship decider in Suzuka, where Prost tangled with Senna at the chicane after the 130R. Prost ended up winning the title that season as he was leading the championship.
The tables turned in the 1990 F1 season as Senna held the lead in the championship heading into the race in Suzuka. In a shocking turn of events, Senna ran into an ever-ending gap during the start of the race, crashed into Prost, and won the championship.
Controversy ensued in both cases, but as it turned out, neither of the drivers faced any sanctions and held on to their respective titles.
#1 The Crashgate Scandal (2008 F1 season)
Arguably one of the worst things a team can do is try to manipulate the outcome of a race by introducing external stimuli. This is exactly what Renault did in 2008.
The French outfit was struggling to reach the heights of performances it enjoyed in 2005 and 2006. It was no longer a championship contender and was facing serious pressure from star-signing Fernando Alonso.
It all came to a climax at the 2008 F1 Singapore GP where Alonso's teammate Nelson Piquet Jr. inadvertently lost control of his car and crashed out of the race. Benefitting from the resultant safety car period, Alonso's rather strange strategy of starting the race with a lighter fuel load worked perfectly as he took the lead and went on to win the race. All of this went unnoticed at the time, but revelations were due in 2009, a year after all of this happened.
When Piquet Jr. was fired by Renault in 2009, the Brazilian driver came out and spilled the beans. The result? Both team principal Flavio Briatore and his Renault deputy Pat Symonds were found guilty. Briatore received a lifetime ban while Symonds was shunned out of the sport for 5 years.
