Formula One news
Trulli speaks of Australia incident
15 April 2009Jarno Trulli has spoken out over the on-track debacle between himself and Lewis Hamilton during the final stages of the Australian Grand Prix; the Toyota driver lost third place to Hamilton by off the track under safety car conditions, although the English team's subsequent actions eventually led to their disqualification from the race.
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| Trulli's podium in Australia was his first since France last year |
Trulli, initially docked 25 seconds, saw his penalty lifted when the FIA discovered that McLaren had in fact lied to race stewards, claiming that Hamilton did not hand the position back to the Italian; with radio communications proving otherwise and Hamilton disqualified, Trulli - who remained silent on the matter until regaining his position - has now given his full opinion on the situation.
"My feeling is that the FIA took such a strong decision (against McLaren) because they felt that someone was making a joke of them, at the end of the day," Trulli told Autosport. "The FIA wants to show to everyone that it is just like a judge - go infront of a judge and you have to be honest and tell the truth. You might get away with it once but it's better not to do it, you're taking a lot of risks. That is what happened, basically.
"I think it was a very, very unfortunate circumstance for both of us. I personally don't know who had lied, or why; in my opinion, there was no interest there to lie - really, no interest. But someone has really misjudged the rules." Trulli stressed that he is in no position to lay the blame personally at the door of any individual, but expressed his disappointed of being accused of being unjust by passing Hamilton. "I'm not the kind of person who thinks about revenge or anything," he continued. "I get on with everyone. I say live and let live."
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| Ryan and Hamilton emerge from the stewards' office at Sepang |
Despite being initially penalised for no fault of his own, the Italian is thankful to the race stewards for reviewing their decision. "It was great that once they had announced the decision of giving the position back, I was doing some interviews with some journalists and two of the stewards walked straight up the paddock to find me, shake my hand and say 'you deserve it, because you have been honest' - in front of all the press. This was really appreciated by me.
"That's why I say in that, in this particular case, I believe that the FIA has shown good common sense and a lot of strength, re-opening a case that was basically closed; they felt and they smelled that something was wrong, they were good enough to do it. This pays a lot of credit to the FIA, after so much trouble in the first race, with so many problems."
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