suspended mclaren employee is mike coughlan

Oh dear why does he always have to comment. I thought it was ferrari that wanted renauly dq last year. Does he not think had mclaren seen the data they would have gone for a longer wheel base? does he not remember these tyres are not from last year? Maybe mclaren just done their home work better, why were bmw ok with the new tyres then did they also have the documents?

Only 4 things know the facts, mclaren, ferrari, Mike and Nigel. Even ferrari say mike did not get the info until march.

Briatore wants McLaren excluded

By Michele Lostia and Biranit Goren Saturday, August 4th 2007, 09:53 GMT


Renault team chief Flavio Briatore launched a scathing and attack on McLaren, calling for their exclusion from the Formula One world championship.

Briatore met with the Italian media yesterday at Hungary, and spared no words against McLaren and his long time nemesis Ron Dennis.

In fact, the Italian has even suggested that McLaren may have had confidential information from within Ferrari long before their claim of March this year.

"Last winter, I was saying how lucky McLaren are to be immediately that quick on Bridgestone tyres," Briatore began. "I'm a lucky guy, so it's OK for other people to be as well.

"We, on the other hand, were in full crisis mode: Michelin's retirement turned out to be a disaster for Renault."

Q: What did the McLarens have that your cars didn't?

Briatore: "It's evident that they had the data on the weight distribution by Ferrari, who used Bridgestone tyres for almost ten years. That page in the famous stolen dossier would have been enough to save months of work and to find the solution immediately."

Q: So you believe the transfer of information began before March, maybe in December?

Briatore: "Look, we made the mistake of concentrating on wind tunnel work - it took us a month to set it up with the new tyre parameters.

"Two more months were wasted, in fact also thanks to Ron Dennis: he was the one who protested us on the mass damper. He is not the immaculate saint he pretends to be on his statements."

Q: So is the 2007 championship corrupted, then?

Briatore: "Yes, and not just for us and Ferrari, but for everyone else. Here is a team that acquired an advantage illegally."

Q: What should the punishment be?

Briatore: "I'm not a judge. Just read the regulations: for intellectual property theft the punishment is exclusion."

Q: Will you go to the appeal trial?

Briatore: "Yes, obviously. In my opinion we are an injured party."

Q: What do you think about Nigel Stepney and Mike Coughlan? Ron Dennis talked about the ex-Ferrari mechanic as some sort of a hero

Briatore: "Hero? Some people, technicians and engineers, would thank their lucky star for working in F1. Coughlan and Stepney made tons of money - but that's wasn't enough for them, it seems. They should be banned."

Q: Do you have a system to avoid such information theft at Renault?

Briatore: "There's an alarm that alerts us when someone breaches out of his sector of action. But obviously you can't control everything. If someone goes to another team he will bring something with him. A page could be OK, but more than that is illegal.

"I can give you an example: we couldn't understand why Honda were pitting whenever they felt like. I took two of their engineers, and I learned that they had a twin fuel tank..."

Q: These things should be managed by the FIA

"The ideal thing would be to have Formula One with rules decided by the teams, with the FIA's seal of approval. But it can't be done. The teams are never in agreement, and we are always held up by the minority, which us usually made up of the small teams."

Q: In 2008 you will also have to use the Electronic Control Units (ECUs) made by McLaren and Microsoft (after they won the FIA tender for sole supplier)

Briatore: "That remains to be seen. At the moment I'm writing a protest. We don't want them. First of all, because they don't work on our cars: the cars don't even start up. And second, why should we send some of our data to McLaren?"

marcl Wrote:
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> Oh dear why does he always have to comment. I
> thought it was ferrari that wanted renauly dq last
> year.

Oh marcl you are not scared fo Flavio are you?

and yes i also tought it was Ferrari..... mm interesting, another thing to scratch off from the action cheating list people claim on Ferrari..

Please ignore





Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/05/2007 09:12AM by chrislewis.

Flavio has now said the italian press misquoted him and he never said mclaren should be banned etc.

hehe Chris, i read your post last night but can't remember what it said now!

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RIP Jules, never to be forgotten. #KeepFightingMichael

It was off topic so it didn't need to stay.

I remember reading about Flavio's views just after the verdict was given a couple of weeks ago. Renault will be present at the appeal, it is their right to do so as well as any other team. When is this appeal to take place?

Also, for those talking about a 'set up', don't you think Ferrari would be better served with investing the time, effort and capital into their car rather than trying to set up an employee, and create a giant espionage farse out of it?

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If someone is trying to cover their tracks within the team then it would not take much effort to set up Stepney, they would just use his email not theirs.

But I think Nigel is lying anyway, his name is being used by people and he just denies the whole lot