Former Renault team boss Flavio Briatore said it would take time for wounds to heal after having his life ban from Formula One overturned.The flamboyant Italian (pictured with wife Elisabetta Gregoraci) was banned in September for a plot to rig the outcome of the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix by staging a deliberate crash.
A French court ruled on Tuesday that the punishment was illegally imposed by the sport's governing body, the FIA.
"I am very happy for me and my family because I have endured some very difficult months. The verdict has given me back my dignity and freedom that were taken away from me in a very arbitrary way," Briatore, soon to be a father, told RAI TV.
"My attention is on my family then we'll see (about coming back to the sport). It will take a bit of time because the pain I felt in recent months was very deep."
Briatore, who won championships with Benetton and Renault in a career spanning more than two decades, thanked Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo for his support and again slammed former FIA head Max Mosley.
The Briton was FIA president when the life sentence was handed down and clashed with Briatore throughout last year over changes to F1.
Asked about the return of his former protege Michael Schumacher to the sport, Briatore said: "In a difficult year where everything was manipulated by Mosley, that's the only good news."
Briatore, a multi-millionaire businessman who had also sought damages of a million euros (£899,757) as well as demanding the sentence be lifted, was awarded 15,000 euros (£13,497) in compensation by the Paris court.
The FIA's lawyer Jean-Francois Prat told Reuters the FIA would "very likely" appeal the decision to overturn the life ban. He declined to make any further comment.
0 коментара:
Post a Comment