How Renault Won an F1 Race by Crashing a Car

Once Upon a 2008 these guys made sure this guy won a Formula 1 race making this guy lose a big trophy to this guy all because this guy smiing his car into this Street Corner in Singapore on purpose this is crashgate AKA The hairbrained plot to save an F1 team by convincing a 23-year-old to Total his own car but how could crashing your own car win you a car race well first you have to drive it through some well-placed loopholes and F1 strategy which I'm elated to explain because my writers never let me talk F1

in fact we're only doing this video because in exchange for writing it I offer them two extra hours of outside time this week anyway in F1 the goal is to build the fastest car and then get some daddy issued adrenaline junky 20s something to drive it in several dozen circles the fastest there are three buckets of F1 rules that would lead you to crash your own car to get ahead the first regards pit stops each driver's two-ish pit stops slows them down considerably you measure the time you lose with a stat called Delta time which

for normies is the amount of time you spend on hold with Delta Airlines when they're quote out of planes but for F1 means the amount of time your pit stop adds to your lap time if a regular lap takes me a minute and a half but my pit lap takes 2 minutes my Delta time is 30 seconds usually a pit stop will cost you something like 20 to 25 seconds which in a sport where races can be decided by milliseconds is a big deal our next rule bucket regards the safety car a Charming little fow

that hits the track in dangerous conditions think torrential downpour or a crash when it's out the race cars follow is around the track at a slower speed to keep their tires and engines warm until the scene is safe again so if the safety car is out for a few laps thanks to the slow speed all the cars end up lined up behind it like little ducklings until it leaves tightening up the race considerably you generally can't overtake another driver during a safety car but the laps while it's out do still count in the race this

creates an opportunity if everyone slowed down anyway pitting costs less of time it still takes whatever your Delta time is to pit let's say 22 seconds but if the safety car slows everyone down by 10 seconds per lap it neutralizes 10 of the 22 seconds pitting costs you even if you rejoin the pack further back in the standings making you able to absolutely rip it once the safety car leaves the third ingredient in the crashgate soup is f1's point system the two big awards at the end of the season are the driver's Championship which goes

to the individual driver with the most points across the season and the construct Championship which goes to the team whose two cars collectively got the most points points are awarded at each Grand Prix based on the driver's placement in 2008 you only got points in the top eight you'll notice there's a bigger points difference between first place in second and Seventh Place in eighth and that there's no difference between ninth and dead last all of this brings us to the beginning of our story September 28th 2008 it's the debut of the now legendary Singapore Street

circuit and f1's first ever night rate race we're most of the way through the season and this team Renault is not doing well they haven't won a race in 2 years and rumors are circulating that they'll leave F1 if they can't turn things around Singapore's qualifying session which decides everyone's start position at the Grand Prix had not gone well for Rena Fernando Alonzo the better of their two drivers had come in 15th of 20 Nelson PK Jr their other driver was in 16th Alonzo starts the pre with an unusually small amount of gas in his

car making him lighter and faster but forcing him to pit before anyone else which he does during lap 12 when he emerges he's in 19th then two laps later PK Jr after confirming the current lap number a bunch of times over his team radio lets go of the steering wheel and accelerates into this wall debris goes everywhere bringing a safety car onto the track until it's cleared which takes a while in that time everyone pits including race leader Felipe Masa who has a disastrously slow pit stop and drops to 13th Place well not everyone pits

Not Fernando Alonzo he pitted right before the crash so as everyone else takes their Pit Stop they rejoin the race behind Alonzo and when the safety car leaves he's at the front of the pack the race ends with Alonzo on top Massa in 13th and PK out at the time it looked awfully lucky for Alonzo a crash at the exact time and place to move him up 18 te spots ending renault's 2year losing streak but was it too lucky yep big time the real story of the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix Begins the summer of that

year when Nelson PK Jr son of three-time world champion driver Nelson PK sior is ansy he wants Renault to resign him for the 2009 racing season and is worried that he hasn't gotten a contract yet come September no contract has appeared and he feels his spot on the team slipping away the day of the Singapore Grand Prix Flavio briatore Rena's team principal calls P into his office to meet with him and this guy Pat Simmons Rena's technical director they ask him to take one for the team by as they euphemistically put it causing a safety

car after Alonzo pits he's not promised a contract for it but agrees anyway to bolster his rep on the team Simmons whips out of map and tells him to crash at turn 17 the only place on the circuit with no crane to pull his car out quickly and no side entrance to easily move debris out it would guarantee a long enough safety car that everyone but Alonzo would pit they tell PK to be safe which brings us back here and you know what happens next the truth is without the crash neither Alonzo or PK Jr

were likely to score any points in Singapore sacrificing PK rocketed Alonzo to First gaining both him and Renault 10 big points in the drivers and Constructor championships respectively at the low cost of the likely no points PK would have won that day anyway but what happened after well for a while Nothing Even though people were suspicious of Crash gate renault's secret was safe with rore Simmons PK PK's family friend he told and PK's dad the friend told as long as Renault kept PK junor happy he'd have no reason to snitch in the end Alonzo won

fifth place in the driver championship and Felipe Masa came in second to Lewis Hamilton by one point while Renault finished seventh of 11 in the Constructor Championship they'd officially gotten away with it leaving crashgate nothing but a conspiracy Theory as long as Renault didn't fire nelson PK Jr and replace him with Roman Gran less than a year later pissing him off so bad he spilled crash gate to the Press August 3rd 2009 Renault fires Nelson PK Jr and hires Roman Gran two weeks later the boys PK accus Renault bror and Simmons of a race fixing

initially Renault denies it then two weeks before their hearing are like actually yeah the rest is lawsuits PK got immunity for coming forward interrogators determined Alonzo had no idea of it and let him off too rore and Simmons both left Renault and were banned from F1 for a few years before finding their way back Renault paid no fines and didn't even serve their 2-year suspension but took a serious reputational hit and over 16 years later the lawsuits continued Filipe Masa is suing among others Formula 1 claiming that the 10 points he lost to crash gate

lost him the driver championship and has owed over $80 million in Damages for that so that's the sneaky way to win an F1 race by hurling a 23-year-old at a wall a perfect plan as long as you don't get caught or you know name anybody in many ways this event solidified Nelson PK Jr as the Mario Kart Red Shell of IRL Motorsports what a legacy and while Felipe m is out there getting his bread with a lawsuit how about you get this bread from this video sponsor Wild Grain look at it look at this bread

I don't have to convince you to like bread pasta And Pastries we all love bread pasta And Pastries and Wild Grain brings the best breads of your choice of course to your door where you can cook it from freezer to Table in 25 minutes and it puts flop grocery store bread to shame Wild Grain sourdough is slow fermented to be easier on your stomach and they've always got new seasonal and limited time items for you to try and none of that is even the best part the best part is that for every person who joins

Wild Grain they'll donate four meals to the Greater Boston food bank so if all that sounds good to you which it should because it is click the link in the description head to wildgreen AI to get $30 off your first box and I mean this free croissant for life so what are you still doing here