In defence of Lewis Hamilton and Dave Ryan

"For me, the situation is definitely the worst thing I've experienced in my life."

Hysteria seems to have gripped Formula 1.

There can be no doubt that Lewis Hamilton and McLaren sporting director Dave Ryan lied to the FIA stewards after last week's Australian Grand Prix. Lewis committed no error on the track, and, ironically, it was his and his team's initial desire to play things 'by the book', which triggered the whole debacle. The team over-zealously instructed Lewis to let Jarno Trulli regain his 3rd place under safety car conditions. Having done so, if the team had gone to the stewards and told them the truth, there is a good chance that the stewards would have simply moved Hamilton up to third, and demoted Trulli to fourth. However, just before the meeting, Dave Ryan advised Lewis not to tell the stewards that he had been instructed to let Trulli re-pass. On the belief that Trulli had taken the initiative, and illegally overtaken Lewis under safety-car conditions, the stewards not only was Lewis elevated to 3rd, but penalised Trulli, and demoted him to 12th.

Toyota wanted to appeal the stewards' decision, but were advised that such an appeal would be inadmissable, and by Wednesday morning had decided to let the matter drop. It seems, however, that whilst the teams do not have the right to an appeal, in which they might bring new evidence to bear, the FIA do reserve the right to find new evidence, and accordingly reverse! their d ecisions. By Wednesday evening, it seemed that the FIA had new evidence in the form of radio communications between Hamilton and the McLaren team, and by Thursday the FIA stewards had decided that they were deliberately misled, and stripped Lewis of his points from Australia.

Lewis has now been forced to abase himself in front of the world's media, and apologise for lying. More importantly, Dave Ryan, a man who joined McLaren as a mechanic in 1974, has been suspended by McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh, and sent home from Malaysia. It seems that he may even be sacked as a consequence.

A sense of proportion is perhaps called for here. We can take a guess at why Ryan and Hamilton decided not to disclose the full facts to the stewards. Given that the stewards have quite unfairly penalised Hamilton and McLaren on several occasions since the 'spygate' saga of 2007, Ryan and Hamilton probably felt that they were unlikely to get the benefit of any doubt in a marginal decision. Imbued with a sense of past injustice, and a belief that the FIA stewards discriminate against McLaren, they perhaps felt the need to present the stewards with a picture in which Jarno Trulli was unarguably at fault. So, inexecusably, they lied.

This tarnishes Hamilton's reputation, and clearly Dave Ryan made an error of judgement. However, to threaten a man with dismissal when he has worked in an exemplary fashion for McLaren since 1974 seems entirely disproportionate to the crime. Presumably, McLaren are treating this in the context of the questions raised over the integrity of the team by the spygate saga, but the punishment does need to fit the crime. When Michael Schumacher deliberately blocked the track in the final stages of qualifying at Monaco in 2006, he also withheld the truth from the FIA stewards, and was supported in doing so by Team Principal Jean Todt. I d! on't rec all Jean Todt flying home as a suspended employee that week.