And yet again it appears Formula One is about to be rocked by a brand new scandal.
If it wasn't bad enough that Renault had WheelGate last month, they now have what is likely to be dubbed CrashGate to look forward to.
On the 28th September 2008, Formula One hosted its first ever night race and the 800th GP in its history. Fernando Alonso, who started 15th, took an unexpected victory from 15th on the grid.
A good strategy, luck, or a race fix?
Currently, the FIA are investigating into the race as accusations of the latter have been made by an unknown source, speculated to be former Renault driver Nelsinho Piquet Jnr., who crashed out in that race.
Fernando Alonso - unusually for someone starting 15th - was on a short first stint, and going for a two-stop strategy, not exactly that tactics normally deployed for a street circuit.
Despite this, Alonso made his pit stop on lap 12 which went without a hitch. Two laps later - and before anyone else had pitted - his teammate Piquet crashed into the wall which brought out a Safety Car.
What would then ensue was chaos.
Running low on fuel, Robert Kubica and Nico Rosberg had to pit before the pitlane was open to them - and thus, both suffered drive-through penalties once the Safety Car was pulled in. Once the pitlane was open to the drivers, carnage took place in the Ferrari pit as a blunder meant race leader Massa took the refueling hose with him to the end of the pitlane, which took almost two minutes for the team to run to where Massa's car was and remove it. Not only that, he had been released into the path of Sutil, almost causing a collision - which meant Massa also had to take a drive-through penalty.
With the madness over, Alonso sat in 5th place - Rosberg needing to take his penalty still, and three other cars yet to pit (as they didn't under the Safety Car). Alonso was in the pound seat, and - sure enough - he took the lead and, as the pace setter that weekend, could now take advantage of that and pull ahead by over 20 seconds, until an unexpected second Safety Car incident took place when Sutil smashed into the barriers attempting to avoid a spinning Massa. Time was against Alonso's rivals though, and still the Spaniard pulled away to win.
Initially, conspiracy theorists jumped right on it and claimed Renault had fixed the race in order to win, but the drivers clearly stated it was an unfortunate coincidence that the two events (Alonso's stop and Piquet's crash) happened so close together, and that was that.
However, with this revelation, the person who has the most to lose is no one from the Renault team, but in fact Felipe Massa. If the fix was on, then Renault single-handedly cost Massa the chance to become World Champion.
Without the Safety Car hassle, Massa was looking set for a win, which - if all the other remaining races stayed the same - would've given him more points than Lewis Hamilton, and thus made the Brazilian World Champion.
It's no surprise then that of all the drivers in the field, it was Massa who was the most angry after the race had happened as it seems - if true - Renault did actually cost him his World Title status.
And it's not as if the evidence so far stacks up in Renault's favour. For what we do know:
- The strategy for Alonso is irregular for a driver in his position on the grid;
- Piquet had a set-up by the end of the practice sessions he was happy with, but was then changed by the team;
- Piquet himself span on the parade lap before the start of the race - practice, potentially?
Otherwise, we are still low on facts to comprehend the situation. The "new evidence" is unknown to the media and general public, and who has provided the information is also unknown. However, the situation looks grim for the Renault team. If guilty, they could be facing sanctions equal to or even surpassing those seen in SpyGate.
This is only the beginning of another darkened chapter in the sport.