“I’m not doing this for money,” Felipe Massa opens up on why he’s challenging Lewis Hamilton’s 2008 F1 title

Felipe Massa has been in the news lately after he shook the sporting world after announcing his intention to consider legal ways to contest Lewis Hamilton’s 2008 F1 world championship win. This came after former F1 Supremo Bernie Ecclestone unveiled that he and then-FIA President Max Mosely were aware of the infamous ‘Crashgate’ scandal at the 2008 Singapore GP. Now, Massa has cited the reason for the potential legal challenge.

The 42-year-old was shocked when Bernie Ecclestone mentioned that he didn’t take any steps despite knowing about the scandal during the 2008 season. Bernie cited protecting the sport as the reason for ignoring the situation.

I think the first thing when Bernie's comment [came out] I was really, really surprised, for those comments. Because everybody knows what's happened in the race, everything came out in 2009 [about Singapore].

Felipe Massa stated.

The former Ferrari driver felt that justice wasn’t served after Max Mosley and former race Director Charlie Whiting failed to take action at the right time.

We hear after that also that Charlie [Whiting] knew and Max [Mosley], so for me it’s the injustice for the sport. It shows that maybe every decision on the legal side, everything that happens, it was not correct on that situation. So I took the decision to study on the legal side everything that happened.

Felipe Massa added.

The Brazilian driver clarified that money was not a factor in this decision. Rather, the 42-year-old wanted to provide justice to himself and his fans worldwide by claiming Hamilton’s title.

Felipe Massa reckons the 2008 F1 title would’ve helped Brazil

Felipe claimed that an F1 driver winning the world title could do wonders for their home country. The 42-year-old insists that his title win could’ve prevented the current shortage of Brazilian drivers in the sporting world.

You also know what a championship does for a country? You can develop the country; we don't have Brazilian drivers now racing as well, so there are so many things.

Filipe Massa explained.

The 2008 runner-up admitted that sometimes luck doesn’t go in a driver’s way. Be it an engine failure or an incident. However, Massa made it clear that the 2008 Crashgate was not one of those situations as it was a planned affair.

This is racing, everything that went wrong is part of the game. When you have a problem in the engine or when you have a mistake. You cannot really say 'I was wrong because my engine broke down.' No. But what happened on that race is a different situation.

Filipe Massa said.

Massa declined to answer when his legal pursuit might begin as the 42-year-old was instructed to stay silent. Thus, Felipe Massa has affirmed his stance over the potential legal battle for the 2008 world title. The Brazilian driver claims that F1 ignored the situation and prevented a just championship. Subsequently, the 42-year-old is confident he could finally emerge victorious against Lewis Hamilton almost 15 years after the British driver won the title.

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