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Friday April 3, 2009

Italian’s reinstatement to third boosts Toyota’s F1 campaign

TOYOTA were given an unexpected boost to their F1 campaign on the eve of the start of the Petronas Malaysian F1 Grand Prix after FIA decided to reinstate driver Jarno Trulli to third place in the Australian GP last week.

The Italian attended an FIA hearing together with McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton in Sepang yesterday in the wake of new evidence into the incident involving the two drivers last Sunday.

In Melbourne, Trulli was handed a 25-second penalty and reigning world champion Hamilton was promoted to third place. The stewards had ruled that Trulli had breached regulations by passing Hamilton during a safety car period.

But Trulli was reinstated to third place yesterday while Hamilton and McLaren were excluded from the results and received no points.

In the new hearing, besides interviewing both drivers and teams, the FIA also heard new evidence, which included radio transmissions between teams and drivers, as well as technical data from the race.

The FIA in a statement said that Hamilton and McLaren “acted in a manner prejudicial to the conduct of the event by providing evidence deliberately misleading to the stewards”.

The reinstatement to third place gave Trulli six points and it put Toyota second in the constructors’ championship on 11 points, including five points from Timo Glock’s fourth place.

Trulli said that he had always maintained his innocence, claiming Hamilton slowed down on purpose.

“I didn’t break the rules. It was just a question of making sure they could see it and understand it,” he said.

“It’s good that they reconsidered it. It shows they really understand there was something they missed and can reconsider with more evidence. Immediately after the race it was probably a bit chaotic for them.”

Trulli explained that Hamilton had admitted that he was not overtaken.

“Hamilton had a problem and he slowed down, almost stopping. And he allowed me to pass. There was nothing else I could do but keep going, and in order to do that I had to pass him,” said Trulli, who gave Toyota their first ever podium finish in second place in Sepang in 2005.

McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh said that the team would not appeal against the decision but insisted that Hamilton did nothing wrong.

“Obviously we are disappointed by what happened. Lewis didn’t do anything abnormal and it was clear Trulli shouldn’t have passed him. But we have to accept the decision.”

He said there was no question of Hamilton lying.

“There is no implication that Lewis lied to the stewards. I don’t know what they meant, but I understand there was a belief the team were not explicit enough about the radio conversation,” said Whitmarsh.

“What they believe is that the omission of the information about the radio communication between the team was withheld and that is misleading.

“As you can imagine, Lewis is very disappointed. It’s a harsh decision but experience had told us that you have to accept these decisions.”

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