STUCK IN THIRD
Want to know what’s really pu ing the brakes on Ferrari?
ERRARI’S abysmal year was summed up in Mexico. For a team that talked about winning the championship in 2016, it was a sign of its increasingly desperate state that third place for Sebastian Vettel was cause for celebration. And, then, an hour or so after the nish, Vettel was hit with a 10-second penalty that knocked him to fth.
Vettel was charged with “potentially dangerous driving” during his defence of third place from an attack by Daniel Ricciardo’s Red Bull in the closing stages. Controversial circumstances aside, the German’s almost desperate tactics – and his colourful radio messages criticising race of cials – summed up the pressure that had been putting Ferrari at risk of imploding for most of the season.
The loss of third place meant Ferrari yet again had not been classi ed as podium nishers for more than two months. Even worse, the Italians had not won a race since Singapore in September 2015. This was such a mounting disaster that the iconic team began to turn in on itself long before the season had reached half distance.
That’s the last thing Ferrari should have been doing. But it was inevitable given the emotion and expectation attached to what amounts to the only national motor racing team in the world. It was also dif cult to avoid when the boss, Sergio Marchionne, held key meetings with racing team staff to discuss where they were at.
As if they didn’t know. The problem was written large on the 2016 constructors’ championship table. Instead of
Fleading it and giving Mercedes a dif - cult time – as had been hoped after victory in the opening race in Melbourne was thrown away by poor tactics – Mercedes had scored almost twice as many points and Ferrari moved to third behind Red Bull. This was de nitely not part of Marchionne’s master plan.
Sensing early on that his goals might not be met after reading screeds of negative opinion in the national newspapers, Ferrari’s CEO took himself to the third round in China and came out with useful statements such as “the clock is on” and the team must start winning. Hardly a novel thought.
It led to Vettel’s schoolboy, “It wasn’t me, sir!” radio outburst at the rst corner in China after Daniil Kvyat’s Red Bull had come steaming down the inside in a clash actually triggered by Kimi Räikkönen in the other Ferrari. Talk about a team walking on eggs.
One of Ferrari’s major problems has been the impact of a tragedy surrounding its technical director, James Allison, whose wife died just after the Australian Grand Prix. Despite having to cope with this and caring for his family, the devastated Englishman returned to work; and immediately fell foul of Marchionne as he failed to agree with his boss’s interference in matters that Marchionne did not necessarily understand. Allison left in July.
Allison was one of the best things to have happened to Ferrari, largely because he is not Italian. Look back at Ferrari’s last run of consistent success and you will nd a French sporting director (Jean Todt), an English technical chief (Ross Brawn), a South African aerodynamic genius (Rory