F1 rivals have lauded Frederic Vasseur for his role at Ferrari amid speculations about his future, while he remains under trial by Italian media and fans.
Having joined Ferrari a couple of years back as a replacement to Mattia Binotto, Vasseur has come under fire for the first time after the downer in 2025 F1 season. The team found success last year after missing out on constructors’ championship, but has dipped this year.
Even though they hired seven-time F1 champion Lewis Hamilton, things hasn’t gone smoothly since the direction taken with the car this year hasn’t come to fruition. They have decent pace still to be nicely in the Top 4, but they are yet to pick up a main race win apart from one sprint victory.
In addition, Hamilton hasn’t made it onto the podium still, even though Charles Leclerc has on multiple occasions. Off-late, Vasseur has come under fire in the Italian media. Some reports linked his potential exit, as he nears the end of his current contract as Ferrari team principal.
The chiefs are Ferrari has signaled about ongoing negotiations, which has led for certain section of Italian media to speculate if they are going to drop Vasseur all together. The Frenchman along with Hamilton and Leclerc rubbished it, as colleagues like Toto Wolff, Zak Brown and Christian Horner (now former) shared similar views.
Here’s what F1 team bosses said –
Toto Wolff: “Yeah, it seems to be a bit of a revolving door with teams generally. I think Christian and I were the only dinosaurs left with many of you here in the room. And I think in Formula One, you can’t buy time. And you need to give senior leadership the time to get on top of things. We talked about Jean Todt. If I’m not wrong, he joined the team in 1993. They won the first championship in 2000. So, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 2000, that is eight years. That’s how it goes. And it comes in cycles. Look at us. I’m not enjoying being in a phase that is the third year in a row that we are not fighting for a championship. We’re not useless. We have really good weekends. We’re winning races. It’s respectable at times. And when it’s not good, nobody’s questioning in a way whether the top guy is doing a good job or not. Leave him the space. Let him do. Allow him to structure an organisation that isn’t going to grip from day one.
“Lewis is there six months or seven months. They need to just let them do. And Fred is one of the best racing managers that I know. If I wasn’t here, I would take Fred. So I respect him a lot. He’s a great personality. He’s a straightforward guy. He doesn’t do politics and lies. And he knows what he’s talking about. You just need to be given the trust to run this. And he’s perfectly aware that in Italy, he’s like managing the football national team. And you’re going to have the scrutiny from the media. Maybe that’s something you need to grow a little bit of a thick skin. Because if he wins, he is Jesus Christ. And if you lose, you’re a loser. That’s how Italy is. And that’s fantastic. That’s the passion that is in there. And you’ve got to embrace that. And maybe that’s something he needs to learn. But the rest, he should be given the confidence in running this team. They won’t get anybody better.”
Zak Brown: “I’m a Fred fan. I’ve known Fred for a long time, as we all have. I find him to be very sporting, so I enjoy racing against him. He’s very technical. He’s a racer. He’s in multiple disciplines of motorsports. He was one pass away from winning the World Championship last year. So, I think the results, they’re winning races. It’s hard to see from the outside looking in, but I’m a Fred fan. I think he does a good job and almost won the World Championship last year.”
Christian Horner (before getting dropped): “Well, look, I think in any organisation, stability is tremendously important. We’ve had 21 years of stability and that has borne the kind of results that we’ve achieved. I think Fred is a very capable manager. He’s obviously managing what effectively is a national team in Ferrari, and with that comes expectation and pressure. He’s still relatively new to the role, and it takes time to put the right processes in place, the right people, the right culture. There are no silver bullets in this business. It’s about collectively getting a group of people to work towards one objective. And with Ferrari, there is the added pressure of national expectation.”
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