While it might take a few days for the European Grand Prix scandal and backlash to settle down (remember the on and on about Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel?), there is another Formula 1 argument waiting in the wings:
The testing ban. More specifically, whether Ferrari violated that rule during its filming of Fernando Alonso at Fiorano.
Heading into the race weekend, some of the other team bosses were, at best, scratching their heads about Ferrari’s promotional day, which just so happened to allow Alonso to drive a car with the new blown exhaust system. Both Martin Whitmarsh and Christian Horner were pretty clear that they thought the day violated at least the spirit of the rules.
Today, Autosport has Stefano Domenicali striking back:
“I think that a lot of people like to speak,” said Domenicali when asked by AUTOSPORT about the testing situation. “If I have a problem I use my mobile phone and I call personally. This is my style; I don’t use you to say something.
“But, I think that the filming day was pretty clear. If the people want to be more comfortable then I know there are discussions in order to tidy up the wording, and I have no problem with that 100 per cent.”
Domenicali is adamant that Ferrari did nothing wrong in taking footage of its car at Fiorano – something that is allowed under the testing restriction regulations.
“A filming day is something related to the fact that we wanted to use our possible 100 km in order to produce filming for the customers, our network, our dealerships,” he said.
“If you want to do some filming then you have to pay and this is what we were doing. And if someone has a problem, they can call me and I can explain.”
Now, I know the Ferrari team is a bit, shall we say, cranky today, but Domenicali definitely ratchets things up by saying his fellow FOTA members went to the media rather than dial up his number.
We’ll see if this one has any legs. But I think it is one to watch, especially with Ferrari already in a pretty bristling mood.
(We all know there needs to be a slight tweak to the testing ban rule. Maybe this incident will move F1 in the right direction. or is that just too much to hope for.)
