Bizarre verdict in McLaren case

MONTREAL -- And you thought you were holding the sports pages. More like the scandal sheets these days, with tales of drug use, animal cruelty and industrial espionage in the top tiers of cycling, football and auto racing.
More bizarre than the allegations themselves, sometimes, are the verdicts.
Which brings us to yesterday's decision by the World Motor Sport Council of the Federation international de l'automobile in the spy saga that has shaken Formula One.
The ruling body found McLaren-Mercedes guilty of possession of unauthorized Ferrari documents -- but imposed no penalty for lack of proof the team had put the secret data to use.
"The WMSC is satisfied that Vodafone McLaren Mercedes was in possession of confidential Ferrari information and is therefore in breach of Article 151c of the International Sporting Code," the verdict said.
"However, there is insufficient evidence that this information was used in such a way as to interfere improperly with the FIA Formula One World Championship. We therefore impose no penalty."
Of course, it's possible that McLaren's now-suspended chief designer, Mike Coughlan, found nothing useful in the 780 pages of Ferrari intellectual property that turned up during a court-sanctioned search of his home. Maybe the guy wanted nothing more than some light bedtime reading in anticipation of the latest Harry Potter tome.
You can even argue that if any of Ferrari's trade secrets had been used to develop the McLaren cars, they'd be breaking down every other week.
Just ask Kimi Raikkonen, who won the pole position at this past weekend's European Grand Prix in Germany only to retire from the race when hydraulic problems felled his Ferrari. The only consolation for Ferrari is that McLaren championship leader Lewis Hamilton ran into trouble of his own and failed to score any points for the first time this season.