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F1: McLaren/Ferrari Court Date Set for September
Written by: Adam Cooper   http://www.speedtv.com
08/06/2007 - 07:00 PM
Paris, France
 
The tifosi will not be able to celebrate or protest the Court of Appeal's decision at Monza, as the appeal has been scheduled after the Italian GP and just ahead of the Belgian GP. (LAT photo) » More Photos

The FIA has announced that the spy scandal Court of Appeal hearing will be held in Paris on Thursday, Sept. 13.

Bizarrely, despite having a six-week window in which to arrange the hearing, that date is the Thursday ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix. Although no drivers are required to be present, the case involves team principals Ron Dennis and Jean Todt and their senior management – including engineers in the case of McLaren – and forcing everyone to go to Paris on that date is a major disruption.

It is also a major headache for the FIA officials connected to the case, including Charlie Whiting, who usually has a busy Thursday on race weekends.

The hearing will also be open to the media, in stark contrast to the World Motor Sport Council gathering at the end of last month. However, again the regular F1 media contingent will be committed to being at Spa on that day.

Team VIPs will no doubt be able to make the hop from France to Belgium by private jet, but nevertheless it is not exactly convenient. For the mortals of the media there are no flights between
Paris and Brussels, but there is a high-speed rail connection, or a four/five hour drive straight to Spa.

The appeal hearing was called by FIA president Max Mosley after Italian authority president Luigi Macaulso sent a letter expressing his organization's dissatisfaction with the outcome of the original World Motor Sport Council meeting on the matter. The WMSC had summoned McLaren to answer charges of breaking the sporting code after confidential Ferrari information was found in the possession of McLaren chief designer Mike Coughlan. McLaren received no punishment after the court decided there was no evidence that the team had made any use of the data that Coughlan had received.



Get the inside story of the people, science and history of Formula 1 each month in RACER. Jonathan Noble analyzes the various ideas under consideration by the FIA and others for spicing up F1 in our September issue, on sale now.