This could be a difficult couple of weeks for Ferrari.
This weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix will be Max Verstappen’s first chance to claim the 2022 drivers championship and finally put Charles Leclerc out of his misery.
Red Bull Racing will have its first shot at ending Ferrari’s forlorn title hopes at the following race in Japan.
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Even if neither title is wrapped up before the sport leaves Asia, it’s only a matter of time until the numbers become undeniable.
But despite Ferrari’s impending doom, former team boss Jean Todt says there ought to be less negativity around the Italian team’s campaign. Its four wins so far is more than it’s managed in the last three seasons, which is deserving of praise — so he says.
Whether that’ll be enough to dull the immediate blow of championship defeat remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, Haas has lifted the lid on Mick Schumacher’s struggles this season while the German’s F1 career hangs by a thread, and the FIA has formally denied Colton Herta a superlicence, ending his quest for a 2023 seat.
JEAN TODT SAYS F1 FANS SHOULD FOCUS ON FERRARI POSITIVES
Former Ferrari boss and ex-FIA president Jean Todt says people are too critical of Ferrari’s mistakes this year when they should be recognising how far forward the Italian team has come since last season.
Ferrari endured one of the worst seasons in its history in 2020, when it finished sixth, and rebounded to third last season before taking its first victory in almost three years at the opening race of 2022.
But what looked like the beginnings of a championship campaign went quickly off the rails through a combination of strategic mistakes, unreliability and driver error. Max Verstappen can beat Charles Leclerc to the championship as soon as this weekend, and Red Bull Racing will likely be able to close the deal over Ferrari from the following round.
Speaking to Italy’s Gazzetta dello Sport, Todt said Ferrari’s year-on-year progress was more important to celebrate this year regardless of the increasingly clear title outcome.
“Ferrari is doing very well now. It seems to me that people are not fully aware of this. Ferrari is back to winning,” he said.
“I think almost everyone would like to see Ferrari win championships, not just a few races. We can hope so for next year, because this year I don’t think it’s possible anymore.”
But Todt, who oversaw seven constructors titles and six drivers titles as the head of Ferrari, added that turning a team from regular winner into title contender required a raised level of performance compared to what the Scuderia has so far been able to serve up this year.
“But to win you need excellence at all levels,” he said. “It is difficult to reach it and even more difficult to maintain it.
“It starts with excellence in detail, from the one who answers the phone in the company. If a company does not answer the phone after 10 rings, that is not a good company.”
“You cannot make two identical mistakes. If that happens, it means that something needs to change.”
SCHUMACHER TO FOCUSED ON MAGNUSSEN IN BATTLE FOR HAAS SEAT
Haas has had to stop Mick Schumacher from becoming too preoccupied by beating teammate Kevin Magnussen in the crucial final year of his contract with the team.
Schumacher has scored points just twice this season, and though he’s become a more consistent operator in recent months, he still trails Kevin Magnussen in the standings.
Magnussen’s shock return to Formula 1 has proved a boon for Haas, for which the Dane has scored 22 points, but his arrival has shaded Schumacher in his second year. and having a more experienced teammate has sometimes proved distracting to the 23-year-old.
“Sometimes Mick focuses too much on his teammate,” Haas chief race engineer Ayao Komatsu told Motorsport Total. “Then I say to him, ‘Look, Kevin really likes to help you and he tells you things he would never have told Romain [Grosjean, former Haas teammate] before’.
“Then Mick thinks and realises the most important thing for the team is to get up in the constructors championship.
“I explain it to him, ‘Mick, come on, you’re doing well, focus on your own performance and not on this thing’. And then it’s fine again.”
But Komatsu said Magnussen’s presence has had a net positive effect by lifting Schumacher’s performances to the next level — so much so that he thinks the German probably would’ve scored his maiden points last year had he not had only the erratic Nikita Mazepin to compare himself with.
“It’s very good for Mick to have an established teammate like Kevin,” Komatsu said. “We didn’t know beforehand how good he was. Then Kevin came along and that gave us a reference.
“We think that with our 2021 car we would have been safe against Williams [to avoid last in the standings]. We could have fought if we’d had Kevin back then. Mick would have benefited from that in his development.”
Schumacher is out of contract for 2023. Haas boss Guenther Steiner says he expects to decide on his driver line-up in October.
F1 DOESN’T NEED AMERICAN DRIVER AS FIA CLOSES DOOR ON HERTA
McLaren boss Zak Brown says Formula 1’s ongoing success in the United States isn’t tied to having a successful team or driver in the sport, after the FIA formally rejected Colton Herta’s bid for a superlicence.
Herta has been a driver of interest for AlphaTauri as a potential replacement for Pierre Gasly but doesn’t have the required CV to earn him a superlicence. Red Bull was hoping to convince the FIA to grand him an exemption, but the governing body confirmed over the weekend that it wouldn’t be bending the rules for the IndyCar star.
“The FIA confirms that an inquiry was made via the appropriate channels that led to the FIA confirming that the driver Colton Herta does not have the required number of points to be granted an FIA superlicence,” it said in a statement.
“The FIA continuously reviews its regulations and procedures, including with respect to superlicence eligibility, with the main factors being considered with respect to this topic being safety, experience and performance in the context of the pathway.”
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AlphaTauri has since turned its attention to Nyck de Vries, who’s being sought after by Alpine and Williams for 2023.
Red Bull had been open about the commercial appeal of fielding an American driver as the sport attempts to lock in recent gains in the US market.
But Brown, one of the sport’s most prominent Americans, said that Formula 1 could be successful in the United States in the long term without trying to play up to the market.
“I think it would be great for both of them to happen; it would further enhance Formula 1 here,” Brown said, per Autosport.
“But we don’t have either today, and look how popular Formula 1 is now in America.
“So I’d love to see it happen, but I don’t think it has to happen, because Formula 1 is hot today without it.”
Williams is considering promoting American F2 academy driver Logan Sargeant should it miss the chance to sign De Vries.
