“The penalty that we’ve imposed is the harshest one we can but because Renault have demonstrated that they have no moral responsibility for what took place, it would be wrong in the circumstances to impose an immediate penalty.”
The charge was leveled against Renault, because Flav Briatore and Pat Symonds (and Piquet Jr) did this alone and had left the team, the FIA let Renault off with the two year suspended ban. Essentially a “don’t get busted doing anything this bad again” slap on the wrist. No fine or point deductions means the FIA understands the current fairly perilous state of the manufacturer’s commitment to the sport.
Flav does not have many fans in the pitlane and the FIA found a way to severely punish him by effectively banning him from any involvement with F1 or any other FIA sanctioned series. If the ruling survives the inevitable appeals FIA will have successfully removed all of Flav’s influence over the sport.
Looking at the broader picture, Renault has other problems. The team’s main sponsor, Dutch bank ING, had already announced their departure. Renault are expecting to make a loss this year and decisions about racing are not made by engineers and enthusiasts, but by suits in board rooms based on numbers, and bad publicity around race fixing will not help there.
Honda left F1 last year, BMW have stated this is their last year and the FIA is very aware that they can’t afford to loose another manufacturer backed team. The two teams that are usually mentioned as questionable are Renault and Toyota. This would leave Mercedes and Fiat (through Ferrari) as the only two car companies left in F1.
If the sport were to loose Renault and/or Toyota then the engine supply suddenly gets really tight. Cosworth reentering makes it a little easier, but Brawn, RedBull, Williams and Toro Rosso don’t have contracts with engine suppliers at a time when packaging and final design for next years car is in full swing.
Renault did not help calm things down with a statement that ended “We sincerely hope that we can soon put this matter behind us and focus constructively on the future. We will issue further information in the next few days.”
With 3 or 4 new teams and the return of Cosworth, this off season promises to be as interesting as the championship has been this year.