Thursday, April 2, 2009

Team veteran suspended by McLaren

Lewis Hamilton
Hamilton is at the centre of a row that has claimed the job of a senior McLaren figure

The fall-out from Lewis Hamilton's exclusion from the Australian Grand Prix has led to a top McLaren official being suspended from his job.

Sporting director Dave Ryan has been suspended after 35 years with McLaren.

Hamilton gave stewards "deliberately misleading" evidence after Jarno Trulli was docked for passing him while the safety car was out in Melbourne.

Ryan accompanied Hamilton to both of his hearings with the Formula 1 race stewards in Melbourne on Sunday.

Team principal Martin Whitmarsh said: "In my 20-odd years working for McLaren, I doubt if I've met a more dedicated individual than Davey. He's been an integral part of McLaren since 1974 and has played a crucial role in the team's many world championship successes since that time.

"However, his role in the events of last Sunday, particularly his dealings with the FIA stewards, has caused serious repercussions for the team, for which we apologise. Therefore, I suspended him this morning and he has accepted this."

Whitmarsh is holding a news conference in Malaysia on Friday.

Race stewards in Australia initially disqualified Trulli from third place for passing Hamilton behind the safety car.

But it later emerged that Hamilton had told the stewards he had not been asked by McLaren to let Trulli past him when the team's radio transmission proved that he had.

Jarno Trulli and Lewis Hamilton
Trulli (front) was passed by Hamilton (back) when he slid off the track

Trulli was running third, ahead of Hamilton, when the safety car came out three laps from the end of the race but he ran off the road at the penultimate corner.

Hamilton passed the Italian - as he was entitled to do, because the Toyota was fully off the track at the time but then his engineer can be heard ordering him to let Trulli back past again.

It is not clear why Hamilton did not make this information available to the race stewards at the time - he has not spoken to the media since his disqualification.

More to follow.

No comments: