Lewis Hamilton secured his first Drivers’ Championship in 2008, winning it by a single point after a last lap overtake on Timo Glock that allowed the Brit to beat Felipe Massa, despite the Brazilian winning the race.
The result was particularly painful for Massa and his family, as they thought the championship was won by the P1 finish at his home Grand Prix, only for it to be taken away moments later.
While Massa was thought to have put his disappointment over the failure to win a Drivers’ Championship in front of his home fans, his frustration with the last lap loss has re-emerged after revelations from former F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone.
Ecclestone was reported as revealing that he, and then FIA President Max Mosley, knew that, earlier in the season, Nelson Piquet Jr had been ordered by Renault to crash, giving Fernando Alonso victory at the Singaporean Grand Prix.
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Massa had been in the lead when the Safety Car was deployed but a pitstop from the Brazilian saw Fernando Alonso, who had already changed tyres, take the lead.
The drop down the order would’ve been tough enough for Massa but a disastrous pitstop from Ferrari saw him released with the fuel hose still attached and into the path of another car.
With a 10-second penalty for the unsafe release, Massa finished outside of the points, while Hamilton took third place.
Ecclestone has now admitted the FIA should have cancelled the race, as they knew about Renault’s unsporting actions.
If the race had been cancelled, Hamilton would have lost six points and Massa would have been the world champion.
“We decided not to do anything, we wanted to protect the sport and save it from a huge scandal,” Ecclestone told F1 Insider.
“According to the 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,” he added
“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,” Massa told Corriere dello Sport.
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“I intend to study the situation; study what the laws say, and the rules. We have to have an idea of what is possible to do,” Massa added.
McLaren has now responded to the threat of legal action via their TikTok account, producing a video with a montage of photos from Hamilton’s title-winning season and the caption “Denial is a river in Egypt.”
Fans of McLaren enjoyed the content, as the team defends what still remains their most recent Drivers’ Championship.