Nelson’s father has spoken to Gazzetta dello Sport’s Pino Allievi about the background to the story and it makes very interesting reading. He has no sympathy for Renault boss Flavio Briatore, who has been banned from motorsport for life,
“He deserved it,” says Piquet. “Admittedly it wasn’t his idea, but to convince a young driver to do something like that is huge. He should stay far away from racing.”

Piquet reveals that he was keen to move his son on from Renault at the end of 2008 and says that he had lined him up a good alternative,

“It was (Flavio) Briatore who wanted an extension (for 2009). I wanted Nelsinho to leave Renault and had found him a seat at Toro Rosso with Gerhard Berger. But Nelsinsho wanted to stay with Renault because there was the chance that Alonso would go to Ferrari.”

Piquet reveals that he spoke to Briatore at the Hungarian Grand Prix about Nelson’s likely sacking and Briatore told him to take him to court if he had a problem “He spoke with the air of superiority which is typical of someone who thinks he cannot be touched,” he said. Piquet became angry and went to see FIA president Max Mosley, who told him to get his son to make a sworn statement.

Mosley would have already known about the Singapore crash because Piquet Sr had told the FIA’s Charlie Whiting about it last November. The FIA was clearly biding its time on this one. Mosley offered Piquet immunity and, according to his father, “I told him it was up to him to decide whether to go ahead with it or not, with the risk that he may never drive in F1 again. He took four days to decide then went to Mosley.”

Piquet again implicated Fernando Alonso in the scandal, “They all knew about it, ” he says. “Do you think Alonso would conceive a race where he starts 15th and makes a pit stop almost straight away? It was a perfect plan.”

After Massa raising it yesterday, you get the feeling that this is not going to go away for Alonso, despite being cleared by the FIA world council of involvement and despite the fact that none of the protagonists in the case has mentioned him in their evidence.

Incidentally, Alonso said that he intends to speak to Massa today in the Interlagos paddock, “Not about this story, but about his health. The most important piece of news this week is that he drove an F1 car at Fiorano and has recovered 100%. I want to ask him how he found Ferrari when he first went there and get some advice from him, to make it easier for me to fit in. He’s been there three or four years and I have to learn everything.”

Where did it all go wrong, Nelson? (Photo: Darren Heath)

He has made a fortune from motorsport and many other businesses, so his life and livelihood are not ruined. He will suffer some associated difficulties with Queens Park Rangers as he will be disqualified from holding more than 30% of the shares as a result of his F1 ban. But the real pain he will be suffering is the double whammy of Piquet hanging him out to dry and Max Mosley using this as an opportunity to finish him off as a player in F1.

Piquet knows that he is not everyone’s favourite person at the moment and that many people in the sport find it impossible to accept that the person who actually stuck the car in the wall in Singpaore walks away without so much as a slapped wrist from the governing body.

He says he had no choice but to crash the car, because Briatore had control of his career. But if he thinks that he is being a real man by standing up to Briatore now, surely a real man, if he felt it was wrong, should have said no. He has learned some very tough lessons in life and it has almost certainly wrecked his career. But he must have known that was the likely outcome when he decided to go to the FIA.

He comes out of this very badly, as an over protected boy who could only succeed in racing when driving for his Dad’s team, but who could not get to square one or even make simple moral decisions when driving for someone else’s team. I cannot think of a single sponsor in F1 who would want to be associated with him after this.

Piquet, though, says that while he regrets his actions, it’s all over now and he’s keen to show one of the F1 teams what he can really do.

His point is that many drivers have suffered what he suffered at Briatore’s hands; the uncertainty over their futures, being treated as a commodity and discarded at will. Piquet, having found himself on the scrap heap at 23 decided not to take it lying down, but to take a stand and that is what led to the Singapore scandal seeing the light of day.

Piquet’s father, Nelson Sr revealed an unfortunate truth this week when he said that he told the FIA’s Charlie Whiting what his son had done last October. It was up to his son to make a sworn statement in order to launch an enquiry and that is what they did second time around in July.

“I am relieved that the FIA investigation has now been concluded,” Piquet Jr said. “Those now running the Renault F1 Team took the decision, as I did, that it is better that the truth be known and accept the consequences. The most positive thing to come from bringing this to the attention of the FIA is that nothing like it will ever happen again.

“I bitterly regret my actions to follow the orders I was given. I wish every day that I had not done it.

“I don’t know how far my explanation will go to making people understand because for many being a racing driver is an amazing privilege, as it was for me. All I can tell you is that my situation at Renault turned into a nightmare. Having dreamed of being a Formula One driver and having worked so hard to get there, I found myself at the mercy of Mr Briatore. His true character, which had previously only been known to those he had treated like this in the past, is now known.

“I can only hope that a team will recognise how badly I was stifled at Renault and give me an opportunity to show what I promised in my career in F3 and GP2. (both of which he did with his Dad’s team) What can be assured is that there will be no driver in Formula One as determined as me to prove myself.”

Whiting (left) with another ex Brabham man, Herbie Blash (Photo Darren Heath)

This does not tally with the version of events I understand from the FIA. They contend that, although there were rumours and insinuations about the incident at the end of last season, they only got involved when Piquet came to them on 26th July 2009 with the information and FIA president Max Mosley asked him to get his son to make a sworn statement, on the basis of which they would launch an enquiry.

This latest development is not helpful from an FIA point of view because it begs the question, if what Piquet says is true, why did they not launch the enquiry last November? And, as with the double diffuser row early this season, it puts Charlie Whiting in an awkward position.

Piquet and Whiting go back a long way, to the Brabham team in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The team was then run by Bernie Ecclestone and Piquet was the driver and Whiting a senior mechanic.

Piquet also alleged that Fernando Alonso was in on the plot, something which Alonso himself denies and for which the FIA investigators can find no evidence.

“Look, if, if you wanna ask me if Alonso knew what was gonna happen, of course he knew. Of course he knew.”

What’s interesting about this is that in their summing up of the case against Renault, leaked yesterday, the FIA stewards conclude that Alonso was not involved. To reach that conclusion they must be discounting Piquet’s suggestion that he was. Piquet has no evidence to back up his claims.

Incidentally, Spanish colleagues I spoke to today say that they put Piquet’s comments to Alonso and he said, “No, I knew nothing of that.”

Alonso has said to investigators that he knew nothing of the alleged plan and has said publicly that he will speak about it only after the world council hearing.

Other drivers I have spoken to lately find it hard to believe that he knew nothing of this and wasn’t at least more inquisitive about why he was being put on such an aggressive strategy with little hope of gain from it.

Other teams I have spoken to say that the whole way the crash plot was originated and executed, with only one person in on it from the strategy/engineering side, would be impossible in their teams. Other operational and race engineers would have to know because the system for evolving strategy is more collective.

In other words, the set up at Renault, with Pat Symonds in a position to decide strategy in advance and dictate operations with no recourse to other junior engineers, was possibly unique in F1, creating the circumstances for something like this to happen.

On the face of it his F1 career appears to be over, in the sense that it is hard to see another team taking him on. However there are strong rumours here in Italy that he and his family are looking at taking a stake in an existing team, possibly Sauber, if Peter Sauber goes ahead and saves the former BMW Sauber team.

Piquet’s success in motorsport has come in the family environment of his own team, both in F3 and GP2. It’s not a bad time to buy a stake in an F1 team as the costs are set to come down radically, making it quite possible for a team to make a profit if it is able to sell sponsorship.

If the Sauber deal is going to happen it will have to happen by Wednesday as that is the deadline for the team to sign the Concorde Agreement, signed on Friday night by the other teams. Failing that the family may look at taking a stake in another team, possibly one of the new ones.

Piquet has not impressed during his season and a half in F1. He claims it is because he was not given the same conditions as team mate Fernando Alonso. Looking at it from the outside, with information sources from within the team, I think the team gave him plenty of opportunities to prove himself. Many teams would have dropped him after his poor showing last season. He has some good days, even beat Alonso on the odd occasion, but the engineers know the truth and both the Renault guys and the engineers from other teams reckoned that he just isn’t good enough.

That is not how Piquet sees it and here is a flavour of his thoughts on the subject.,

“I believe without doubt in my talent and my performance. I didn’t get this far by getting bad results. Anyone who knows my history knows that the results I am having in F1 do not match my CV and my ability.

“The conditions I have had to deal with during the last two years have been very strange to say the least – there are incidents that I can hardly believe occurred myself. If I now need to give explanations, I am certain it is because of the unfair situation I have been in the past two years.

“I always believed that having a manager was being a part of a team and having a partner. A manager is supposed to encourage you, support you, and provide you with opportunities. In my case it was the opposite. Flavio Briatore was my executioner.

“On numerous occasions, fifteen minutes before qualifying and races, my manager and team boss (Briatore) would threaten me, telling me if I didn’t get a good result, he had another driver ready to put in my place.

Piquet joins a list of disgruntled drivers who have found that being the number two driver in a Briatore team is not easy. That list includes Johnny Herbert, JJ Lehto, Alex Wurz and Jarno Trulli, all of whom had unhappy experiences.

Piquet says that he was not given equal treatment or equipment to Alonso in 2008 and that this continued in 2009 despite promises of equality,

“For the 2009 season Briatore … promised me everything would be different, that I would get the attention I deserved but had never received, and that I would get ‘at least equal treatment’ inside the team,” he added.

“He made me sign a performance-based contract, requiring me to score 40% of Fernando Alonso’s points by mid-way through the season. Despite driving with Fernando, two-time world champion and a really excellent driver, I was confident that, if I had the same conditions, I would easily attain the 40% of points required by the contract.

“Unfortunately, the promises didn’t turn into reality again.”

I can see why a team would give a development part to Alonso if only one was available, but they want to score maximum points in the constructors’ championship and you don’t do that by holding one driver back. Alonso is so vastly superior to Piquet as a driver he doesn’t need any technical advantages.

However I can see how the lack of an arm around the shoulder in Piquet’s case is a problem. My own view on Piquet is that he can be very fast but that he needs too much preparation time and testing to hit the performance peaks, particularly in qualifying, whereas a top F1 driver can just get in and nail it straight away. Compare Piquet with a driver of similar F1 experience, like Sebastian Vettel, and you will see what I mean.

Romain Grosjean is expected to replace Piquet at Valencia, if the team is allowed to race there, or at Spa if they are not.

For 2010 the feeling is that Renault’s number one target is Robert Kubica.

So far this season he has not impressed, struggling particularly in qualifying. Twice 15th on the grid, twice 17th he admitted that lack of testing had caused this problem,

“Not getting pre-season (testing), not running low fuel, and then suddenly, when you put everything together, you can’t get the maximum out of it. Or you push too much and you end up overdriving the car. I think I need to get qualifying sorted.. My strong point always in my career was qualifying. Of course it doesn’t mean much in lower categories, but I have been the driver with the most pole positions all the years. This year I’m struggling a little bit more. Last year it was okay because it was my first year. But this year I should have been much better in qualifying.”

Piquet is one of those drivers who needs miles under his belt to perform. He has to play himself in, can’t just turn it on straight away. It is no surprise that they have kept him in the car for this race and Monaco because they are both difficult tracks for a new guy to come in and master on a race weekend. But also because he knows this place really well, so if he’s going to do it anywhere it will be here.

Piquet can get the job done if given the preparation and the time, but what is happening to him is an illustration of the fact that in F1 nowadays you have to be adaptable and nail it first time, as drivers like Sebastian Vettel do. With no testing during the season, drivers like Piquet will become less attractive to teams.

In an amusing exchange, where he was asked whether he just needed an arm around the shoulder, a bit of a cuddle, he said,

“I think that’s also a part of it. There’s a lot of people in the team who don’t like being cuddling. But the important people that we work with day to day, the engineers, they are trying their best.

“I’m very happy to have them because they are trying everything possible to get my back into qualifying rhythm. I think I need to get my rhythm in qualifying back and once that’s sorted in the races I’m more than capable of doing it.”

He has been given a lot of help and support. Now the pressure is really on, he has to deliver on Saturday in qualifying.