Spyker lodges Toro Rosso protest

The customer car row that has been rumbling since the beginning of the season has now arrived in Malaysia. Spyker previously commenced arbitration against Super Aguri, in regard to the SA07 allegedly being last year's Honda, and now Spyker has lodged a complaint against Toro Rosso.

It's believed that Spyker team principal Colin Kolles, technical director James Key and team business affairs chief Ian Phillips spoke to the stewards after Thursday scrutineering to make an official complaint about the Toro Rosso STR2, although details of the complaint are not clear.

Spyker allegedly claimed that the STR2 is a copy of this year's Red Bull RB3. We use the words 'allegedly', 'supposedly' and 'apparently' because so far no official statement has been made about the nature of the complaint.

Reportedly there have been several meetings of the stewards with both Spyker and Toro Rosso but a decision is not likely until Friday. Toro Rosso has always believed its car is legal but, equally, Kolles thinks it's not.

Williams was thought to be supporting Spyker but so far the Grove squad has taken a conservative stance and has not officially got involved -- whatever officially means in the whole sorry mess.

Spyker's protest against Super Aguri in Melbourne was rejected by the stewards because it apparently relates to infringement of the Concorde Agreement rather than the FIA regulations. Subsequently Spyker launched arbitration against Super Aguri and Toro Rosso and Red Bull were also under scrutiny.