Fernando Alonso Is A Weasel

The FIA, the governing body of world motorsport and, more to the point, the organization that writes the rules for Formula 1 racing, met in Paris yesterday to review the team orders issue at the German Grand Prix that I wrote about here. The results of that World Motor Sport Council meeting is that Ferrari did use team orders but they did it in a way that wasn't obvious enough to warrant further punishment.  Among the punishments considered were a 5 second time penalty to Fernando Alonso, which would have dropped him to second place or loss of driver and constructor championship points for the race, suspended for the rest of 2010 if Ferrari didn't use team orders again (fat chance).

But the FIA did nothing, although they said that Ferrari did use team orders.  Even Jean Todt, President of the FIA and former team boss of the Ferrari F1 team, and a prodigious user of team orders (he got a $1,000,000 fine for the 2002 Austrian GP team orders incident) said that what Ferrari did was team orders. 

But the hearing today did reveal more about the character of Fernando Alonso.  Apparently, before Massa was told that Alonso was faster than he was (which was Ferrari code for 'move over and let the whiney Spaniard past'), both Alonso and Massa were ordered to reduce engine speed to conserve fuel. 

Both did.

For a while anyway.  The hearing revealed the Spaniard was allowed to turn his up again.

"Alonso increased his engine speed without Mr Felipe Massa's being informed," revealed the FIA document. "Mr Fernando Alonso was therefore benefiting from a definite performance advantage over Mr Felipe Massa in the moments preceding the contentious overtaking."

I've known that Alonso was weasel for many years - certainly before he started racing for McLaren.  Now the whole world knows.