Felipe Massa’s courtroom crusade to rewrite Formula 1 history hit turbulence on day one of his London hearing, as lawyers representing the FIA, Formula One Management, and Bernie Ecclestone tore into the Brazilian’s version of events – and, at times, his driving.
The former Ferrari driver, who lost the 2008 title to Lewis Hamilton by a single point, is suing the sport’s power brokers, seeking damages for “lost earnings” of approximately $80 million over the infamous “Crashgate” race in Singapore
Massa claims the FIA’s alleged cover-up robbed him of a world championship. But if the Brazilian hoped for sympathy, he found none in the courtroom on Wednesday.
Ecclestone’s Lawyer: Massa ‘Performed very poorly’
Bernie Ecclestone’s legal representative, David Quest KC, set the tone early on, telling the High Court that Massa had no one to blame but himself for missing out on the world title.
Quest said the 95-year-old billionaire “does not remember giving this interview” to German website F1-Insider, in which Ecclestone supposedly admitted knowing about Renault’s deliberate crash at the time. Ecclestone has since claimed he was mistranslated.
In a blistering statement, Quest argued Massa’s case “is a misguided attempt to reopen the results of the 2008 F1 Drivers’ Championship.”
“Mr Massa argues that, but for the FIA’s handling of the crash, he would have won the Drivers’ Championship,” he continued, quoted by Crash.net.
“These declarations treat the court as a sports ‘debating club’, asking it to embark upon a counterfactual exercise concerning the ‘refereeing’ of a sporting event which took place nearly 17 years ago.”
Quest didn’t stop there, noting that Hamilton – the man Massa still insists he should have beaten – was “equally exposed to the crash.”
He also reminded the court that Massa “performed very poorly” during that fateful night race in Singapore, where Ferrari’s pit blunder and Massa’s own mistakes turned a potential victory into humiliation.
FIA and FOM Join the Pile-On
If Ecclestone’s camp had landed the first punch, the FIA and Formula One Management quickly followed up with their own legal blows.
The FIA’s counsel, John Mehrzad KC, dismissed Massa’s case as the legal equivalent of a desperate late-braking lunge. He called the claim “torturous as it is overly ambitious” and said it “conspicuously overlooks a catalogue of his own errors.”
Meanwhile, Anneliese Day KC, representing FOM, went for the jugular in written submissions, declaring flatly that Massa’s claim “will fail.”
“In truth, it was not the deployment of the safety car which changed the course of history for Mr Massa, but rather a series of subsequent racing errors by him and his team during the remaining 47 laps of the race,” she wrote.
“The simple fact is that over the course of both the Singapore Grand Prix and across the 2008 season, Mr Hamilton outperformed Mr Massa and everyone else.”
A Courtroom Reality Check
Massa’s argument rests on the belief that had the FIA acted sooner on Renault’s orchestrated crash, the race results would have been voided – and he, not Hamilton, would have been crowned champion.
But nearly 17 years on, the defendants seem united in one view: the Brazilian’s legal gamble is less a quest for justice and more a nostalgic attempt to reclaim lost glory, and some big bucks in the process.
As the hearing continues, Massa faces not only the burden of proof but a barrage of reminders that, in Formula 1, even the best lawyers can’t rewrite a botched pit stop.
Read also: Massa’s 17-year ‘Crashgate’ grudge hits the London Courts
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