Scandal whistle-blower gets a trip to Ferrari

BEIJING, Dec. 21 -- Ferrari President Luca di Montezemolo has invited the British photocopy shop employee who helped uncover the McLaren spy scandal to Italy to thank him.

"If it had not been for that photocopy man we would not have known anything about this story," Montezemolo told reporters on Wednesday at the carmaker's end-of-year celebration at its Maranello headquarters.

"That's why we have invited him to the Mugello race track and will invite him to our factory."

The anonymous employee tipped off Ferrari that somebody had copied 780 pages of its technical data in June.

The dossier was found at the home of McLaren's former chief designer Mike Coughlan and the scandal eventually cost his team the constructors' title and a US$100 million fine.

Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen went on to edge McLaren's Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso for the drivers' title.

Montezemolo had already dedicated Ferrari's win at the Belgian Grand Prix, where the Italian team virtually secured the constructors' championship, to the employee and to fans.

Montezemolo praised Raikkonen and his Brazilian teammate Felipe Massa and said he did not see twice world champion Fernando Alonso joining Ferrari in the future.

Meanwhile, India's Narain Karthikeyan is confident of returning as a Formula One driver after secured the first race win for Team India in the A1 Grand Prix series in Zhuhai last week.

The 30-year-old became India's first Formula One driver in 2005 when he signed for Jordan. But his tenure proved unproductive and a two-year testing role with Williams gave him few opportunities.

"I was just doing testing and had ample time on my side so I wanted a challenge to keep racing," he said. "This A1 GP victory is very essential, so that you can shut up the critics," he said. "F1 is not the end of the world, I still have time on my side."

Karthikeyan said he was not keen on a testing role and wanted at least to be considered as the third driver.

"Definitely, there is an unfinished business in F1," he said. "There is still (time), it will happen sooner rather than later.

"A1 GP for me is not a step back, only a step to the side."

(Source: Shanghai Daily)