F1: The outrage over Ferrari “scandal”: “The FIA ​​is like FIFA. Only one letter separates them”

Updated

Friday,
6
March
2020

19:17

“In any other organization, this will be a political suicide. But Todt has approved it,” says Helmut Marko, a Red Bull advisor.

Leclerc, during the last preseason session in Montmel.
EFE

The private agreement between the International Federation (FIA) and Ferrari, with which last week the investigation of the engines of the Scuderia, has scandalized most of the grill equipment. “This matter has reached proportions similar to that of FIFA. There is only one letter of difference between FIA and FIFA,” commented Helmut Marko, Red Bull advisor, referring to the corruption cases that splashed in May 2015 to the highest body of the world football

“In any other organization, this will be a political suicide. But Jean Todt has approved it,” added Marko regarding the president of the FIA, also responsible for the five world titles of Michael Schumacher with Ferrari. According to the Austrian, 76, “the conduct of the FIA ​​is a real scandal. They have discredited a sport where we invest millions of euros every year.”

Red Bull, who finished 87 points at Ferrari in the last Constructors' World Cup, also feels very economically disadvantaged. “We should have told Christian Horner to denounce the 21 million euros in prizes that would have given us for second place if Ferrari had been punished properly,” said Marko in the newspaper Der Spiegel on the hypothetical guidelines to the sports director of his team.

38 points in three races

Of course, the improved performance of the Ferrari engine from the Blgica GP were as noticeable as its decline after the Mexican GP. In fact, in the last three races of the championship, Charles Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel could only score 38 points, for 87 of Mercedes or 76 of Red Bull.

Toto Wolff, head of the Silver Arrows, also did not miss the opportunity to charge against the FIA ​​and defined what happened as “a tremendous thing.” “What Ferrari did was not right, but even worse was how the FIA ​​handled it,” said the champion of the last six world championships with the German squad.

To the theses of Mercedes and Red Bull, McLaren, Renault, AlphaTauri, Racing Point and Williams joined the same week, who signed a joint statement calling for the FIA ​​”total transparency” on this matter. Only Haas and Alfa Romeo, Ferrari client teams, remained on the sidelines.

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