Pat Symonds

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Pat Symonds

Patrick Bruce Reith "Pat" Symonds (born June 11, 1953 in Bedford , England ) is a British motorsport engineer and manager. He became known through leading positions at the Formula 1 racing teams of Benetton and Renault , among others. a. as race engineer for record world champion Michael Schumacher . He was the chief engineer at the Renault F1 Team when he had to give it up in September 2009 as a result of the so-called "Crashgate Affair".

Life

After working as a designer for two manufacturers of chassis for the British Formula Ford , he worked for the Formula 2 project of Toleman Motorsport from 1981 . A year later he followed the team into Formula 1 , which was taken over by the Italian clothing manufacturer Benetton at the end of 1985 and renamed Benetton Formula One .

Symonds came from the field of research and development , but from 1984 concentrated on working as a race engineer . In 1984 he worked at Toleman with Ayrton Senna and later helped Michael Schumacher at Benetton to his first two World Cup titles in 1994 and 1995 . Symonds later rose to become a senior engineer. He kept this position after Renault took over the Benetton team in 2001.

There Symonds mainly worked on the racing cars. As chief engineer, he planned and managed the race weekends, calculated the drivers' racing strategies, determined the basic direction of the setups, observed the work during test drives and was in contact with the representatives of the highest motor sport authority, the FIA .

Symonds attended Gresham's School in Norfolk . He is a graduate and lecturer at Cranfield University and Honorary President of the Cranfield University Motorsport Alumni Association (CUMAA), the forge of British mechanics and engineers in motorsport.

On September 16, 2009, in the course of the so-called "Crashgate" affair surrounding an intentionally caused accident of Renault driver Nelson Piquet jr. at the Singapore GP in 2008, which favored the second Renault driver Fernando Alonso , his position at Renault. On September 21, 2009, Symonds was suspended by the FIA ​​for five years from all FIA events. Renault has been sentenced to probation, with another similar violation facing a ban until the end of 2011.

On January 5, 2010, the ban was lifted by a French court. As a justification, the court stated that the suspension was irregular due to the weak evidence. The court awarded Symonds a compensation of 5,000 euros. The world automobile association FIA immediately announced that it might appeal this judgment. On April 12, 2010, the divided parties came to an agreement. The FIA ​​lifted the ban. This enables Symonds and Briatore to take on a responsible position in Formula 1 again from 2013. For this they waive all legal claims and steps against the FIA. Until the end of 2012, they are not allowed to take on a position in Formula 1. According to the FIA, Briatore and Symonds took responsibility for the deliberate crash, apologized and expressed regret over the incident.

From 2011 Symonds worked as an external consultant for Marussia-Virgin , because at that time he was not officially allowed to work in the Formula 1 environment again. At the beginning of the 2013 season, he then took on the role of chief technology officer. But on July 16, 2013, Marussia and Symonds separated. On the same day it was announced that he had also been signed as Chief Technology Officer at Williams as the successor to Mike Coughlan . In December 2016, Symond's involvement with Williams ended.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Black eye: only suspended sentence for Renault! , Motorsport-Total.com on September 21, 2009
  2. ↑ FIA press release of September 21, 2009
  3. ↑ Briatore ban dissolved: Court approves him ( Memento from January 8, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) (Formel1.de on January 5, 2010)
  4. ↑ Briatore undecided on F1 return: Justice has been done ( Memento from January 7, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) (Formel1.de on January 5, 2010)
  5. ↑ Briatores lifelong Formula 1 ban lifted ( Memento from January 2, 2013 in the web archive archive.today ) (AFP on January 5, 2010)
  6. ↑ FIA opens the door to the premier class for Briatore (NZZ Online April 12, 2010). Accessed on April 13, 2010.
  7. ↑ The next bang: Marussia separates from Symonds , motorsport-total.com on July 16, 2013
  8. ↑ Williams separates from Coughlan: Symonds takes over motorsport-total.com on July 16, 2013
  9. ↑ Head of Technology Symonds leaves Williams. Spiegel Online, December 20, 2016, accessed on the same day
personal data
SURNAME Symonds, Pat
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Symonds, Patrick Bruce Reith (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British mechanical engineer
DATE OF BIRTH June 11, 1953
PLACE OF BIRTH Bedford , UK