Sabatino stood on the brakes. Carrying too much speed through here could be disastrous, inviting an unforgiving rendezvous with the legendary – infamous – Wall of Champions on the far side. Even the greats – from Hill, through Schumacher to Vettel – had succumbed to that Wall.
Sabatino turned in, to the right, fighting to hold the line.
The Ptarmigan was carrying too much pace.
Shaving the corner, Sabatino bounced in hard over the kerbstones of the first apex. But before the car could be straightened up for the second, there was a huge distraction: a flash of movement entered the extreme left of Sabatino's vision.
In an instant, Baryshnikov was shooting into view – hurtling across from left to right.
After their contact, he had diverged and overshot the right-hand entry to the chicane. Turning in too late, Baryshnikov had overrun that corner, his left wheels soon out on the reinforced grass, which offered far less grip and a greatly diminished chance to slow down. Baryshnikov, cavorting over that run-off, was now cutting straight across behind the apex of Turn Thirteen – still at considerable speed. He was heading back towards the track proper, but on the far side of the chicane. Could he brake, turn and stabilize the car in time?
Sabatino watched the other car cut straight across in front.
Baryshnikov was jabbing repeatedly at the brakes.
Sabatino, desperate not to be rammed by Baryshnikov, also jammed on the brakes, then swerved to the left – hoping to pass behind him, to the rear of the traversing car.
A collision was unavoidable.
Baryshnikov slammed into the Wall. An explosion of turquoise ricocheted off the Wall of Champions immediately below the sign ready to mock its would-be victims. Bienvenue au Québec.
Sabatino felt the Ptarmigan fishtail violently as every effort was made to heave the car away from the scattering wreckage: one shard of the razor-like fragments of carbon fibre was all it would take for a puncture. Sabatino couldn’t manage it – couldn’t avoid running over some of the debris – and did so with both right-hand wheels.
Accelerating away, Sabatino prayed all would stay well for this last lap – to take the chequered flag and so take the win.
Click.
The footage was stopped right there.
The frame was frozen.
Another click.
The picture was being reversed. Someone was rewinding, scrolling backwards through the DVD. It was re-stopped a few seconds later and allowed to run on again before another frame was refrozen.
‘Right there, Mr Vice President,’ declared Chico Amaretti, a middle-aged Italian with slicked-back hair in a sharp suit with thin lapels and no vents, ‘right there, is the moment of impact between the two cars.’
Pointing at the screen, Amaretti added: ‘My client states that Ms Sabatino's failure to yield the line was a deliberate attempt to destabilize his run into this corner – and thereby gain unfair advantage in the race.’
Amaretti, Yegor Baryshnikov's business manager, affected a wounded expression. ‘By committing this reckless act, not only did Ms Sabatino cost Mr Baryshnikov his stability, she also cost him the win. And, by forcing him off the track – so that he would crash into the wall – she seriously put his safety at risk … even his life in danger.’
Remy Sabatino sat at the long table in the stark Council Chamber of Formula One's governing body, already fuming. Representing herself at the hearing, she was sitting directly opposite the seven Council members who were conducting this inquiry. She was barely able to suppress her reaction. Her dark eyes flashed. Her Mediterranean skin was flushed, rendering its olive colouring all the more striking. She breathed in, catching a waft of Amaretti's cologne.
‘Baryshnikov rammed me,’ she declared to the hearing. ‘It's obvious. Right there – on the tape. I had the line. I did not change direction – how could I be the one causing the impact?’
Amaretti gave the impression of a man who ought to be applauded for keeping his patience. ‘This council will be well aware that this move of Ms Sabatino's was ill-judged, as well as late – on a corner considered by those who know not to be an overtaking opportunity.’
Amaretti sighed, as if to say: ‘I’m sorry you don’t have the wit to see this, my dear.’
He added: ‘In any case, Mr Vice President, Ms Sabatino had not done enough – had not established enough of a claim to the racing line into that corner. My client and I therefore demand Ms Sabatino be reprimanded and fined; that she forfeit the Championship points awarded to her – unjustly – in Montreal. My client is not vindictive,’ said Amaretti, sanctimoniously, ‘he just wants to see that justice is done.’
Remy Sabatino was seething. Their lack of imagination was staggering. None of the blazers on that World Motor Sport Council had the vision – or magnanimity – to see the boldness of her move, or even acknowledge the other guy's incompetence. They were calling her sharp and reckless. What the hell? Sabatino had caught the race leader with his trousers down, got past him, and taken the win. How was it her fault if Baryshnikov had been taken by surprise, couldn’t handle a bit of rough and tumble into a corner and couldn’t control his car? Formula One was meant to be the pinnacle, wasn’t it? What was the point of motor racing if you weren’t supposed to race?
After twenty minutes of circuitous argument, Remy Sabatino was charging down through the FIA headquarters. At the bottom of the stairs she pulled on her Ray-Ban shades and strode out through the main entrance into the overcast day. Press and media were ten deep behind crowd-control barriers all around Number 8 Place de la Concorde. Sabatino's mood wasn’t helped by the journalists’ attitude and questions.
‘What's Baryshnikov's reaction to your unsporting drive in Canada?’
‘Are you going to apologize to him?’
‘Will you risk the same unsportsman-like drive in Moscow – against Baryshnikov – at his home Grand Prix?’
‘How will Russian fans receive you after what you did to their favourite son?’
‘Are you – as a woman – really cut out for Formula One?’
Steeling herself, Sabatino bit her lip and simply faced forwards, heading down the narrow alley of barriers between the press and the fans to a car waiting for her at the kerbside.
Within the hour she was at Paris Charles de Gaulle, striding just as angrily across the concrete apron towards the waiting Quartech Falcon. She had since changed, now dressed in a black cashmere turtle-neck pullover, slim-fitting black jeans and a pair of black Nike trainers.
White lights flashed at the end of each wing of the Falcon. Red beacons strobed above and underneath the aircraft. She walked up the steps and into the executive jet.
Sabatino appeared inside the cabin; a concerned-looking Bernie Callom rose to his feet. With so much bad blood shed during the hearing, his PR antennae were already on high alert. Seeing her, now, they twitched all the more. Every signal he read was ominous: an inconspicuous wardrobe, the spark in her eyes, the glow of her complexion, the barely brushed appearance of her short dark hair, while her normally expressive lips and mouth just looked tight and pained. Callom attempted to engage her as they took their seats and prepared for take-off. Every effort he made was met with little more than a sullen grunt.
Just after twelve o’clock that afternoon the private jet commissioned to get Remy Sabatino to Moscow in time for the Russian Grand Prix sped down the runway and lifted off into the eastern sky.
The ruling came through, two hours later.
They were overflying Poland, just north of Warsaw at the time. Hearing an alert, the Formula One driver looked down at her phone. Bernie Callom, sitting opposite her, noticed an immediate change in her mood. Before a word was said, he could tell it was bad.
