Peter Sauber has denied all conspiracy theories that emerged soon after the Malaysian race speculating that the message told on Perez’s radio to conserve his position was in fact a coded message not to attack Alonso.
At about the same time as the young Mexican was told on the radio by his Sauber engineer that “we need the position”, his charge to catch Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso ended with a mistake that almost took the young driver into the gravel – or at least this is what was seen on TV.
Many forget that radio messages have a delay so it could have been transmitted one maybe two laps before it aired on TV.
During the race, when Perez was attacking Alonso, the Mexican’s engineer came over the radio saying: “Checo be careful, we need this position.”
When Sauber F1 Team boss was asked about the issue he replied: “No,” “100% no, 100% nothing.” Additionally Martin Brundle, a Sky Sports commentator wrote on the Sky website saying: “No I don’t think Perez’s mistake was intentional.”
Speaking to media after the race Sauber explained:
“We told him be careful, we need the result, because behind us, all of our competitors scored points. We needed the result, not just the position, so there is some misunderstanding. Behind us our competitors, all the midfield teams, scored points and it was very important that we kept the result not just the position.”
The team boss was then asked outright if there was any collusion with Ferrari, and the Sauber F1 Team replied once more:
“One hundred per cent – nothing. We had no discussion about Checo and we had no discussion about the position.”
Info: GMM, Image: Sauber F1 Team
