Hamilton was stripped of his points after finishing third in Melbourne

McLaren have fired sporting director Dave Ryan over the Australian Grand Prix "lying" scandal.

The team suspended Ryan following Lewis Hamilton's disqualification from the GP for misleading race stewards.

Hamilton claimed Ryan - a McLaren employee for 35 years - had told him to deliberately "withhold information".

"Ryan is no longer an employee of any of the McLaren Group's constituent companies," said the team after they were ordered to face an FIA hearing.

The Woking-based team will appear before Formula 1's governing body on 29 April to answer charges relating to a breach of the International Sporting Code.

606: DEBATE I think that banning McLaren from the Constructors' Championship is very much on the cards grezzju

Hamilton had been awarded third place in Melbourne before being stripped of his points after he and Ryan were adjudged to have given stewards "deliberately misleading" evidence in a post-race hearing on Sunday.

That evidence led to race stewards handing Toyota's Jarno Trulli a 25-second penalty for passing Hamilton behind the safety car, demoting the Italian from third to 12th.

But after discovering that Hamilton and Ryan had provided inaccurate information about the incident, the FIA subsequently stripped Hamilton of his podium finish and reinstated Trulli to third.

Hamilton had told stewards he had not been told to allow Trulli to pass him when the opposite was true, a fact borne out by team radio transmissions.

Ryan was subsequently suspended by McLaren due to a "serious error of judgement".

E-mail this to a friend

Printable version