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JUDGMENT DAY: The FIA yesterday handed down a suspended three-race ban for the McLaren F1 team for “lying to race officials at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.” The sanction will be applied “if further wrongdoing emerges or if there is another rules breach by the team in the next 12 months.” The FIA said it suspended the penalty in part because of “the open and honest way” in which McLaren Principal Martin Whitmarsh handled yesterday's hearing in Paris (BLOOMBERG NEWS, 4/29). In Manchester, Maurice Hamilton wrote a "suspended three-race sentence is the best [McLaren] could have hoped for as punishment." While McLaren "will deny it, a substantial factor behind what ...  is a welcome but surprisingly lenient decision, has been the complete removal" of former McLaren Principal Ron Dennis from the team. The suspicion "remains that the hand of Dennis was behind the hopeless attempt at deception, which explains his hasty departure... and the FIA's willingness to accept [Whitmarsh's] word that his team has turned over a new leaf" (GUARDIAN.co.uk, 4/29).

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