Lewis Hamilton has failed in his bid to have his Belgian Grand Prix victory restored after the FIA judges declared that McLaren's appeal against his penalty was 'inadmissible'.
Much of yesterday's hearing in Paris had been devoted to arguments over whether the appeal was actually valid, with the court taking the unusual decision to hear all the evidence in the case before the judges debated whether the regulations even allowed for such an appeal to be considered.
Hamilton had 25s added to his race time in Belgium after the race stewards declared that he had not sufficiently conceded the advantage he gained when he cut across the Bus Stop chicane during a spectacular battle with Kimi Raikkonen.
McLaren's contention was that Hamilton backed off and allowed the Ferrari to move completely ahead before re-passing it under braking for the next corner, but the officials felt he had still been in an advantageous position due to his short-cut.
The stewards gave Hamilton a drivethrough penalty, but as the incident occurred in the final five laps of the race, this was applied in the form of a 25s time addition.
Under F1 rules, drivethrough penalties cannot be appealed, so McLaren's lawyers had attempted to argue that it should be regarded differently because Hamilton never took to the pit lane and the actual penalty applied was a time addition.
But after a day of deliberation, the FIA has announced that there were no grounds to appeal the decision and that the penalty stands.
"Having heard the explanations of the parties the Court has concluded that the appeal is inadmissible," said an FIA statement released this afternoon.
The verdict means that Felipe Massa retains his inherited Spa win, and that Hamilton goes into the final four races of the season just one point ahead of the Brazilian in the championship.
Hamilton had passionately argued his position in court yesterday, engaging in heated exchanges with Ferrari's QC Nigel Tozzi before flying out to Singapore for this weekend's GP.
Another key part of McLaren's argument had been that the team had checked with FIA race director Charlie Whiting to see if Hamilton had driven correctly, and been told that the move was 'okay' in Whiting's opinion – with the judges hearing the relevant radio conversation in court yesterday.
There was a further controversy during the hearing when former FIA steward Tony Scott-Andrews claimed that the governing body had misrepresented his views in an email sent to all parties in the case last week.
McLaren's legal team had been using Scott-Andrews' decision to impose a time penalty on Vitantonio Liuzzi in last year's Japanese GP as a precedent for such judgements being appealed, but the FIA email indicated that Scott-Andrews had subsequently suggested he was wrong to apply such a penalty – a claim that Scott-Andrews vehemently disputed in a written submission to the appeal court.
The FIA court insisted that the Fuji case was not relevant on this occasion.
"None of the parties concerned had raised the inadmissibility of the appeal in that case, the FIA for its part leaving the matter to the sovereign appreciation of the Court," said the FIA's judgement.
"Therefore, the Court was able, in the conclusion of its decision, to declare the appeal admissible, but it did not give reasons for its decision on the issue, as the question was not debated.
"Consequently that judgment does not present itself as settled law with respect to this question and does not bind the Court in the present case."
McLaren has also been ordered to pay the appeal costs.