{"id":6676,"date":"2010-06-30T06:59:42","date_gmt":"2010-06-30T10:59:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/?p=6676"},"modified":"2010-06-30T06:59:42","modified_gmt":"2010-06-30T10:59:42","slug":"contrite-alonso-backs-down-on-manipulation-claim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/formula-1\/contrite-alonso-backs-down-on-manipulation-claim\/","title":{"rendered":"Contrite Alonso backs down on &#8216;manipulation&#8217; claim"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Fernando Alonso says he is no longer angry after reacting furiously to the outcome of Sunday&#8217;s European grand prix.<\/p>\n<p>Insiders suggested the Ferrari driver had risked sanctions for questioning the actions of the FIA stewards in applying a drive-through penalty long after Lewis Hamilton overtook the safety car in Valencia.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;On Sunday evening, I was very angry about everything that happened, but now that anger has been transformed into positive energy driving a desire to fight back,&#8221; he wrote in a diary entry posted on the team&#8217;s official website.<\/p>\n<p>His calmer comments are being viewed by some headline writers as an &#8216;apology&#8217; to the FIA.<\/p>\n<p>Writing in a Telegraph blog, correspondent Tom Cary said it might be the result of a &#8220;behind-closed-doors deal with the FIA in return for the governing body taking no action&#8221; against Alonso and the equally angry Italian team.<\/p>\n<p>Alonso, 28, continued: &#8220;I reacted emotionally and in that situation, it is all too easy to adopt a tone and say things that can be interpreted wrongly, giving rise to suspicions, something which I had no intention of doing.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Sure, I understand that the stewards have a difficult job to do and they have to take decisions that are not easy.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What I meant was that those drivers who, like us, respected the regulations, unfortunately, in this situation, suffered much more than those who broke them, even though they were given a penalty,&#8221; said the Spaniard.<\/p>\n<p>He also played down suggestions the affair is a re-opening of his personal war with former McLaren teammate Hamilton.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I am not referring to any of the drivers in particular: it&#8217;s a general matter and I think we should talk about it together in a calm way, to ensure that things like this do not happen again,&#8221; said Alonso.<\/p>\n<p>But if Alonso is feeling contrite, the same cannot be said of the writer of news items at the official Ferrari website.<\/p>\n<p>Once again citing the forum comments of fans, one fan is said to have discovered that stewards &#8220;were watching the Germany-England match on TV after the race&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Can you believe it?\u00a0 &#8230; We want professionals!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Another fan advocated Ferrari staging a &#8220;boycott&#8221; of next weekend&#8217;s British grand prix, and yet another hit out at the fact that &#8220;the sport&#8217;s ruling bodies are controlled by Brits&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><em><span style=\"color: #c0c0c0;\">\u00a9 RIF|GMM<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fernando Alonso says he is no longer angry after reacting furiously to the outcome of Sunday&#8217;s European grand prix. Insiders suggested the Ferrari driver had risked sanctions for questioning the actions of the FIA stewards in applying a drive-through penalty long after Lewis Hamilton overtook the safety car in Valencia. &#8220;On Sunday evening, I was &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[3],"tags":[1828,5262,149,93,5300,5340],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6676"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6676"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6677,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6676\/revisions\/6677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}