News24.com | 2008 Singapore GP bombshell: Hamilton's maiden title threatened as Massa seeks legal action

• Felipe Massa is seeking legal action over the scandalous 2008 Singapore Grand Prix.
  
• An orchestrated crash by the Renault team impacted the outcome of that year's Formula 1 championship.
• Massa is acting in response to recent comments made over the race - 15 years after it happened.

The 2008 Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix is remembered for various reasons. Fernando Alonso won Renault's first race that year, Felipe Massa finished outside the points after leading the race, and Alonso's teammate, Nelson Piquet Jr, crashed on lap 13.

While this may seem normal and like a typical run-of-the-mill race, it wasn't the case. Almost a year after the race, it came to light that Renault team boss Flavio Briatore ordered Piquet to crash one lap after Alonso made his pitstop.

The safety car's deployment handed Alonso the lead and the win, with Massa, driving for Ferrari, dropping from the lead after his hurried pitstop went awry and he left the pit box with the fuel hose still intact (see image below).

The race would ultimately impact the outcome of the 2008 championship, with Lewis Hamilton (McLaren-Mercedes) sealing his maiden championship win by one point over Massa.

Now, 15 years later, comments made by the sport's former supremo, Bernie Ecclestone (92), have shed light on that momentous race under the Singapore night sky, prompting Massa to take action against a race that changed F1 forever.

Ecclestone's damning comments

Though we're inching closer to two decades since the 2008 Singapore GP, it is still as relevant a topic as the day it was dubbed 'Crashgate'. Briatore and Piquet Jr may have been banned from F1 for life, but the impact of the race, and the lengths teams would go to secure a win, cast an immense light on the sport's operations.

Earlier in 2023, Ecclestone sat down for an interview with F1 Insider and made shocking revelations on the '08 Singapore race.

READ: F1 Gold | How a stuck fuel pipe dashed Felipe Massa's 2008 championship hopes

"Max Mosley (the then FIA president) and I were informed during the 2008 season what had happened in the race in Singapore," Ecclestone said.

"We decided not to do anything at first. We wanted to protect the sport and save it from a huge scandal.

"We had enough information in time to investigate the matter. According to the (FIA) statutes, we should have cancelled the race in Singapore under these conditions. That means it would never have happened for the world championship standings.

"Then Felipe Massa would have become world champion and not Lewis Hamilton."

Massa claps back

Ecclestone and Mosley may have acted in the sport's best interest, however, in retrospect, they caused more harm than good. By keeping a lid on a scandal as big as this, they jeopardised F1's credibility - the very thing they tried to prevent.

For Massa, this was hard to hear, and the former F1 driver is now seeking legal action to understand what had happened. More importantly, the Brazilian hopes to have the 2008 Singapore GP results scrapped from the history books.

"There is a rule that says that when a championship is decided, from the moment the driver receives the champion's trophy, things can no longer be changed, even if it has been proven a theft," Massa told Autosport.

"At the time, Ferrari's lawyers told me about this rule. We went to other lawyers, and the answer was that nothing could be done. So, I logically believed in this situation.

"But after 15 years, we hear that the [former] owner of the category says that he found out in 2008, together with the president of the FIA, and they did nothing [so as] to not tarnish the name of F1.

"This is very sad to know the result of this race was supposed to be cancelled, and I would have a title. In the end, I was the one who lost the most with this result. So, we are going after it to understand all this."

Will Massa have any success?

It's not unusual for athletes or organisations to overturn a championship result. One of the most infamous instances of such an action was Lance Armstrong and him being stripped of his seven Tour de France titles.

In that case, the International Cycling Union (UCI) opted not to have winners for the seven races between 1999 and 2005.

But in Massa's case, he is only seeking clarity on why the race was never nullified, and if it means the championship will be overturned, it's a bonus.

Making matters more complicated is Mosley having passed away in 2021. Ecclestone could be asked to shed light on the issue in a court of law, but it remains challenging to predict the outcome of the possible case and both the 2008 F1 season and that year's Singapore GP.

However, if Massa is indeed successful in his quest and Hamilton is stripped of the 2008 title by some work of wonder, it could have far-reaching effects on the sport and many drivers and teams coming out of the woodwork to have past results overturned.

It is a can of worms F1 does not want, but the can would never have existed if Ecclestone and Mosley had done the right thing according to the FIA statutes.

"I intend to study the situation, study what the laws say and the rules. We have to have an idea of what it is possible to do," Massa said, confirming that he would proceed with legal action.

"I would go after it thinking about justice. I think if you've been punished for something that wasn't your fault and it's the product of a robbery, a stolen race, justice has to be served.

"In fact, the right situation is to cancel the result of that race. It is the only justice that can be done in a case like this. We have already seen other situations happening in sports, such as Lance Armstrong, who was proven to have doped, and he lost all the titles.

"What is the difference?"