(from autosport) McLaren boss Ron Dennis has hit back at claims by former driver Fernando Alonso that he may not have had the chance to fight for the championship this year if he had stayed at the Woking-based team. Alonso said in the build-up to the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend that he is not dispirited by the season he has had at Renault because there was no guarantee he would have gone any better if he had remained at McLaren. "Last year again it is true that I had a possibility to fight for the championship and it was okay," said Alonso, who McLaren replaced with Heikki Kovalainen. "I knew that this year it was not possible any more. But if I was racing for McLaren now at this moment maybe I would be in the same position as I am now without the possibility to win." Alonso's comments are believed to revolve around his suspicions that McLaren's focus may have been on Lewis Hamilton - which would have effectively made him the team's number two. But on the anniversary of Alonso's row with the team in Hungary last year, Dennis has rubbished the Spanish driver's claims and insists his team have always operated a policy of equality, and will continue to. Speaking on Sunday morning about Alonso's provocative remarks, Dennis said: "Firstly, when the contract with Fernando was terminated there were pre-conditions which determined the behaviour of both parties post-termination. We have no intention of breaching that agreement. His opinion is his opinion - I'm not going to voice my opinion about anything that Fernando has done or said. "What I would say is you can't see any strings leading to Heikki's shoulders and he's an honest guy. He will more than convince anyone who talks to him that this is a team absolutely committed to equality. It always has been, and it always will be. "People will point to the last grand prix and say it's absolutely obvious there were team orders in that event because it was clear that Heikki moved over and let Lewis past. The essential fact was that throughout that race Lewis was nearly seven-tenths of a second faster than Heikki and he knew that, he was told that. He was not told to let Lewis past. "But when you are in a team and you know that your teammate has the opportunity of winning the race and you don't, if you have the right values and values that are not lodged solely and exclusively in your own motives, your own objectives and your own selfishness, then you take a decision. Which is allow the driver past to have a chance of winning the race - which he did." Dennis added: "The proof of the pudding is in the eating. You could go back through the entire history of McLaren, you could talk to any driver that has driven for McLaren and you will not find anyone - save for one - who will not verify that this team always runs on the basis of equality and always will."
"Dennis added: "The proof of the pudding is in the eating. You could go back through the entire history of McLaren, you could talk to any driver that has driven for McLaren and you will not find anyone - save for one - who will not verify that this team always runs on the basis of equality and always will."" Uh, how about the admitted preference by McLaren Honda to Senna over Prost???? It is beginning to appear that Ron Dennis is a pathalogical liar.
Ron said you can go talk to any McLaren driver and they would say there was equality. Good luck having that conversation with Ayrton Senna. Ron Dennis is not a pathological liar, but some folks are consistent McLaren haters and are unable to consider anything McLaren in an unbiased way. This phenomenon will continue and worsen if McLaren continues to beat Ferrari in the 2008 season. The point is that Ron's message is right on the money... there are very clearly no team orders at McLaren, and he says Heiki was not told to move over, and I believe him. They let Ferrari win last year only because there are no team orders within McLaren, so suggestions to the contrary are ridiculous.
But you can have the conversation with Alain Prost. I rememeber reading somewhere that in 89 at Suzuka Senna had 20 guys working on his car. Prost had about 5.
It dosnt really matter who won...it about team atmoshpere and continuing down the winning road by being a TEAM, something Ron Dennis and Alonso dont do very well.
No they're not. You are ofcourse allowed to believe RD, but I don't, no matter what he says. His credibility is shot after last year. IMHO.
Let me get this straight... Last year McLaren was criticized for not favoring one driver over the other. Now they are being criticized for favoring one driver over the other?!?
Its funny but the magazine article had a picture of Senna and Prost in the garage. There was a crowd of people around Senna's car. Not so many around Prost's...
Give it up Michael, what is truly ridiculous first is to think there are no team orders in F1, includng Ferrari. Second what is ridiculous is to believe anything that Ron Dennis says. Dennis' comments were just PR BS.
It's not a matter of belief, it's a matter of fact. It is an indisputable fact that, despite having a 2 x WDC winning driver and a rookie paired up, McLaren did not implement team orders. It is a fact because the very fact that they competed every race for points is the sole reason Ferrari won the WDC. Therefore, when I say there are no team orders at McLaren, it's based on facts, not speculation. There are facts to support that there are no team orders at McLaren, but no facts to support that there are. Therefore, it's not a matter of whether one believes one side or the other... it's a matter of there are facts in support of one side, and zero facts in support of the other. So, yep, you're free to think that there are team orders at McLaren, despite the fact that the facts say otherwise
That's cool - I just am pointing out that it's not a 50/50 "do you believe or do you not believe" type of thing... the facts are on the side of no team orders, so those thinking there are team orders are believing something despite the fact that the facts say otherwise Nothing wrong with that... I still think Massa sucks donkey balls, and even if he wins the WDC (and the facts show me wrong), I'll still think it
Finally someone who is mature enough to 'agree to disagree'! I still find it hard to believe that there are 'no team' order's but I personaly do not have an issue with team order's when it come's down to winning either the WDC or WCC. Heikki will fight as hard as he can until it become's apparent, statistically, that the team need's to make a choice.
Other than Ron Dennis' statements, what exactly is the "proof"?? Seems like there are a few ex McLaren drivers that have complained about team orders. So am I to assume they are wrong, and Ron Dennis is the only one to be believed? Ferrari's, actually Raikkonen, winning the WDC in 2007 had more to do with a McLaren driver, maybe both, voilating team orders than not having team orders. Like when Alonso intentionally violated team orders and held up Hamilton's qualifying. Please, what proof are you talking about?
Up until last year, I thought that RD was a class A jerk but a fairly honest one at that, but the way that I think they handled the whole Fernando/Hami blow-up indicated otherwise. It wasn't that there weren't team orders, in a sense there were from one race to the next due to the logistical problems with qualifying two cars from the same team using one pit stall and both drivers gunning for pole position. It seems that RD was doing a good job of trying to even things out until Hungary when Hami decided he did not like the running order and disobeyed team orders for qualifying, and Fernando took matters into his own hands which ended up penalizing him even more. The problem isn't that there were team orders, the problem was that when Lewis disobeyed the same team orders that weekend that he benefitted from at Silverstone, RD failed to discipline him for it, and that reeks of favourtism. I'm sure RD has rationalized it in his head and now, a year later, most people have forgotten the details surrounding that weekend, but RD clearly expressed favourtism towards one driver when he failed to discipline him for violating team rules to the detriment of the other.
Prost won that year despite McLaren's and Senna's efforts, which is why I will always rate Prost higher than Senna. To win so obviously against your team takes a pretty damn stronger driver/mind. So the point still stands. That year atleast McLaren favoured one driver over the other. Yes they did not make Prost's car fail, but ... they did exactly what they did to Alonso last year, support one and leave the other to their own devices. Pete
