1 The “meet the team” press conference at the McLaren Mercedes motorhome after qualifying at the Hungarian Grand Prix

Sad to say the most dramatic moment of 2007, for me, was not something that happened on the track but the chaotic press conference held by McLaren Mercedes at the Hungaroring in August. It was during the final stage of that now infamous session that Lewis Hamilton first disobeyed team orders to let Fernando Alonso through and then Alonso retaliated, with the apparent co-operation of sections of the team, by deliberately delaying Hamilton in the pits.

Afterwards McLaren tried to hold their usual post-qualifying press conference (normally a highly disciplined affair) even as the stewards were meeting to investigate what had happened. It was quite clear at that point that the team were in deep trouble and were in no state to meet a huge gathering of reporters who were relentless in their aggressive questioning.

Ron Dennis, the team principal, tried to offer an explanation for what became known as “pitlane-gate” but few were convinced. Hamilton did not even turn up — something unheard of in McLaren — while Alonso sat in silence eating a pear with single-minded ferocity. Eventually after Dennis had been called away to the stewards, Hamilton appeared and contradicted almost everything his boss had been saying.

McLaren was in meltdown. By the end of the press conference, the PR people were trying to grab the roving microphones to stop further hostile questioning and eventually the session was brought to an abrupt conclusion by Martin Whirmarsh, the chief executive.

As we left “Terminal 6” we all knew McLaren were in crisis but little could we have known just how bad things were going to get for Hamilton’s team.

2 Lewis Hamilton goes off into the gravel in Shanghai

It was at the Chinese Grand Prix that the fairytale came to an end for Hamilton and his audacious bid to become the first rookie world champion in Formula One history. He may have eventually lost the championship in Brazil but China was the “tipping point” when a combination of ineptitude on the McLaren pitwall and Hamilton’s own inexperience resulted in him wearing his tyres to the canvas and then slide off trying to get into the pits. In the press room the sizeable pro-Alonso corps — mainly French, Italian and Spanish — cheered as Hamilton’s car dug itself ever deeper into the gravel.

3 Spa: the day that it emerged that Alonso had threatened Dennis and that Dennis himself had informed the FIA about e-mails incriminating McLaren

This was when we found out what had been going on in McLaren on the morning of the Hungarian Grand Prix a month earlier, when Alonso allegedly threatened Dennis that if he did not accord him No 1 status he would tell the FIA about incriminating e-mails on his computer, detailing McLaren’s use of Ferrari technical secrets.

In response Dennis informed Max Mosley, the FIA president, about the e-mails, something that would eventually cost the team the constructors’ championship and a £50 million fine. At the time it seemed unbelievable that Alonso could get away with this sort of behaviour or that Dennis would have “shopped” his own team.

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