Woking, United Kingdom, Friday 16th November 2007: The FIA International Court of Appeal today rejected as inadmissible Vodafone McLaren Mercedes’ appeal against the FIA Stewards’ decision in respect of fuel irregularities at the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix.

As was made very clear prior to the appeal, the team was seeking to clarify the regulatory uncertainty that has arisen from a decision of the FIA Stewards at the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix. After the race, both Williams cars and both BMW-Sauber cars had been found by the FIA Technical Delegate, to have used fuel that had been chilled by more than the accepted margin of 10 degrees Centigrade below the ambient temperature. Despite the FIA Technical Delegate’s findings, the FIA Stewards decided that it was inappropriate to impose a penalty on the Williams and BMW-Sauber cars owing to “sufficient doubt as to both temperature of fuel on board the car and also as to the true ambient temperature.”

Despite the fact that the FIA’s Steward, Tony Scott Andrews, accepted McLaren’s appeal when it was presented to him after the race in the Interlagos paddock, the FIA International Court of Appeal has decided that the appeal was not admissible. This was despite the Stewards making the official results subject to our appeal.

MARTIN WHITMARSH
“In the interests of rule clarification and rule consistency we lodged our appeal. We have not yet seen the text of the FIA International Court of Appeal decision and hope that clarification is provided. It’s important to stress that the FIA Stewards’ inquiry at the Brazilian Grand Prix was not triggered by any action from McLaren, but by a report written and made public by the FIA Technical Delegate, which drew the FIA Stewards’ attention to what we regarded as a clear regulation breach on the part of BMW-Sauber and Williams. Our appeal was merely a logical and procedural step in the process begun by the FIA Technical Delegate’s written report. We hope that this fuel temperature issue does not remain unresolved in Formula 1 next year but we look forward to working with the FIA and the teams on clarifying matters to avoid a similar situation occurring again.”

LEWIS HAMILTON

“As I have said all along, Kimi deserved to win the 2007 World Drivers’ Championship, and neither I nor anyone at Vodafone McLaren Mercedes had any desire to take it off him in court. That was not the purpose of the team’s appeal. I am looking forward to the 2008 season and racing Kimi, and all my other rivals, on track and hopefully be able to go one better than the second place I achieved in this year’s World Drivers’ Championship.”

Our TAKE :: It was a last ditch effort by McLaren to get Lewis Hamilton the title, thankfully they got a spanking ! Their lawyer actually asked the FIA to reclassify the race result in gross contrast to their claims of clarifying the rules. Anyway Kimi Raikkonen is the champ of the 2007 F1 season officially !