Team order Austria 2002, Todt: “Barrichello knew and agreed. He put the team in difficulty”

GP Austria 2002, the victory taken away from Barrichello Team orders are certainly nothing new in the world of racing. While not uncommon, they always generate controversy and often antipathy towards those who put them into practice. Among the “school” cases is that of Ferrari in the 2002 Austrian GP: shortly before the finish line, Rubens Barrichello let Michael Schumacher pass, allowing the German to move up to +27 in the standings over Juan Pablo Montoya. History showed that Schumacher didn’t have the slightest need for that team order – the Kaiser even won the title in July – but at that moment (it was the sixth GP of the year) the standings were shorter and Ferrari wanted to avoid surprises in the second part of the championship. Ferrari’s decision provoked a salvo of boos on the podium, to the point that Schumacher, aware of the damage to his image, gave the winner’s trophy to his teammate, while the Scuderia was fined one million dollars for not respecting the procedures during the post-race ceremony. The then general director Jean Todt defended that choice, accusing Barrichello of insubordination. Todt’s words “The fear of losing has always been a nightmare. We lost so many times in the last race. Probably in certain years we should have been less cautious, but for team discipline at a certain point in the season priority was given to a driver”, these were the words of the Frenchman to the High Performance podcast. “In that race we had agreed that if Rubens had been in front of Michael before the last pit stop he would have had to let him pass: right or wrong, it was agreed and accepted. In hindsight it probably could have been a wrong decision, but at that moment it might not have been. And in any case it was an accepted decision, everyone knew it.” “Rubens didn’t want to respect what had been agreed. Which created a great embarrassment. I must say that he didn’t handle it well, he put the team in a very controversial situation. It was very embarrassing, and Michael was also very embarrassed. Normally I didn’t intervene via radio, the engineers and Ross Brawn were there. On that occasion I had to do it and remind him of what had been agreed. It was part of my job, being the leader of a team also means being a firefighter. If there is a fire, you have to put it out. You don’t let the fire continue to burn. They attacked us, yes, but it was just smoke. It’s better to be attacked for a double than for a retreat.”