The FIA has revealed that they will be bringing in external experts to help scrutinise McLaren s 2008 race-car.
McLaren were thrown out of the 2007 constructor s championship after their chief designer Mike Coughlan was found to be in possession of confidential Ferrari documents. With some worried that McLaren s 2008 car may contain Ferrari intellectual property, the FIA decided to inspect the car thoroughly to ensure that it was completely legitimate.
Max Mosley explained, “That was in the hands of the chief designer at precisely the moment he was designing the 2008 McLaren. The difficulty we have is that you’re not going to find on the McLaren a part that was designed by Ferrari. Instead, what you may find are ideas.
“But at this level of technology and at this level of motor sport, if the idea is given to the chief designer, he will make a component utilising that idea which bears no relation at all to the component perhaps being used by the other car – so we will be looking for the ideas.
“Finding something will not be easy. On the other hand, there are sources we are going to deploy who will give us as good a chance as it’s possible to have to find it. The investigation will be thorough – it will use outside experts and we will do everything we possibly can to make sure that either of the McLarens has no element of Ferrari intellectual property in it. If it does, we will then have to consider taking some sort of action. That would not necessarily be preventing them from running – it would be more likely that they would be given a negative point allocation.”
