Felipe Massa retired from F1 in 2017 with 11 wins to his name (Photo: Getty)
Lawyers for Felipe Massa have begun legal action against Formula One and the FIA after being allegedly cheated out of the 2008 title – which was won by Sir Lewis Hamilton.
Massa lost that championship by a single-point to Hamilton, the first of a joint-record seven titles for the British sporting legend.
But back in March, former F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone claimed that it should have been the former Ferrari star who claimed victory that year.
The controversy surrounds the infamous 2008 Singapore Grand Prix which was won by Fernando Alonso, with Hamilton finishing third and Massa 13th and out of the points.
A year later it was revealed that Renault had ordered Alonso’s teammate Nelson Piquet Jr. to crash on purpose to bring out the safety car, which strategically helped the Spaniard to victory.
Ecclestone claims that he and then-FIA president Max Mosley knew of ‘crashgate’ at the time but decided not to act in order to ‘protect the sport from a huge scandal’, and if they had spoken up they would have cancelled the results from the race and that would have made Massa champion.
The Brazilian, who retired from F1 in 2017, was left enraged by these comments and revealed in April that he was considering legal action, saying : ‘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.’
Massa lost the 2008 title to Lewis Hamilton by just one point (Photo: Getty)
Four months later, Reuters report that Massa’s lawyers have sent a Letter Before Claim, a required formal legal notice before court proceedings can be initiated, to F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali, previously Massa’s team boss at Ferrari, and FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem.
‘Simply put, Mr Massa is the rightful 2008 Driver’s Champion, and F1 and FIA deliberately ignored the misconduct that cheated him out of that title,’ the letter reportedly says.
‘Mr Massa was the victim of a conspiracy committed by individuals at the highest level of F1 together with the FIA and Formula One Management.
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‘Mr Massa is unable to fully quantify his losses at this stage but estimates that they are likely to exceed tens of millions of Euros. This amount does not cover the serious moral and reputational losses suffered by Mr Massa.’
It also warned that, without a satisfactory response to his potential claims, Massa intended to ‘pursue legal action in order to seek compensation for the harm he has suffered as well as recognition that, but for those unlawful acts, he would have been awarded the 2008 Championship.’
Though he is seeking compensation, it does not appear Massa is looking to strip Hamilton of the 2008 title, something that would have been impossible to achieve.
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Massa lost the title to Lewis Hamilton by one point.