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Newly appointed Ferrari team principal, Fred Vasseur, believes Ferrari have everything they need to win this year with their eyes locked on Red Bull.
Ferrari were running their test laps with Charles Leclerc finishing 123 laps at Fiorano (Image Credit: @Scuderia Ferrari on Twitter)Vasseur has not long been in his position at Ferrari, however, he is hopeful in Ferrari’s winning abilities this year. The development of the car and the engine testing has been a major topic for the Scuderia team.
“I joined a bit more than two weeks ago and as you can imagine on some topics, it’s a very long process. I’m speaking mainly about the engine. I think and I hope that it’s under control today, that they did a good job over the last couple of months and this is one part of the equation.”
“Development very often is a strategic choice now with the cost cap, to decide if you want to be more focussed on the new car – the car of the year after – or the current one. But I was not there and I don’t want to make any judgement of what’s happened in the past. We’ll see during the season.”
Avoiding last season’s mistakes
Ferrari faced major issues last season, not only with strategies, but as a whole. Vasseur and the Ferrari team have made it their mission this season to not have a repeat of these mistakes. He said:
“When you are speaking about strategy or aerodynamics or another topic, you have to avoid to be just focused on the top of the pyramid. Very often when you are speaking about strategy it’s much more a matter of organisation than just the guy who is on the pit wall.
“I’m trying to understand exactly what happened on every single mistake of what’s happened last year. To try to know if it’s a matter of decision, if it’s a matter of organisation, of communication.
“Very often on the pit wall the biggest issue is more the communication and the number of people involved than the individuals. If you’ve got too many people discussing about the same things, when you will have the outcome of the discussions the car will be [starting] the next lap. You just need to have a be a clear of discussion and clear flow of communication between the good people at the right position for sure. But it’s work in progress.”
Red Bull
In 2022, Ferrari won two of the three opening races and were looking to be the favorites for the championship. However, Red Bull recovered from the initial setback and claimed the Constructors Championship with a 205 point gap to Ferrari in P2. The Frenchman says he is convinced this year will be different for Ferrari.
“First, I’m really convinced that at Ferrari today – and for sure my experience is limited to the last two weeks – but we have everything to win. We have to put everything together to do a good job but we have everything to be able to win.”
“Nothing is set into the stone. If you have a look at some teams that were in a very dominant situation a couple of years ago, they are nowhere today. It means that you don’t have to take this kind of directions to say ‘okay it was like this the last decades or the last 20 years and it will stay like this the next 40 years’. The F1 is a changing world and we just have to be focussed on the job, on the performance and everything is possible.”
“I think that when you are a top team you can’t have another target than the win, at the end of the day. You can’t start the season to say okay I would be happy with P2. That would be a lack of ambition. I think that we have everything to do a good job.”
“The target is to win the championship. And if you want to win, you have to beat Red Bull first.”
Headline Image Credit: @ScuderiaFerrari on Twitter