Frederic Vasseur clarifies that both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz are important and key part in the Ferrari F1 project.
With a tight situation at Ferrari and things not as smooth, there is bound to be speculations about F1 drivers leaving the team. And it is nothing new with Leclerc and Sainz, even though both have a contract in place for 2024 season as well.
In fact, Vasseur noted how Leclerc is an important pillar at Ferrari when the speculation of him leaving to Mercedes popped up. “He’s clearly part of the project, that means he is not a spectator of this,” said the team boss. “He is involved in the development of the team, he is part of the development, because he’s developing himself.
“He is a performance contributor on track and out of the track. And as long as he will play this role, we are on a good path. It’s true in every single team that you are always building a team around the driver. If you ever look over the last 20 years or even more, all the successful top stories in F1 took time.
“But it was always a team built around someone, a driver. It was true with Lewis at Mercedes. And it was true before with Michael at Ferrari, it was true with Alonso at Renault, it was true everywhere. You can find tonnes of examples. For sure that Charles is an important pillar of the performance, and he has to play the role in the car, outside of the car, to be a performance contributor.
And he’s fully supportive of this part of the job. And I’m really convinced that it’s also a personal commitment from himself,” summed up Vasseur. This statement was mistaken as a view where they thought the team was being built around Leclerc, leaving Sainz in cold.
But Vasseur clarified it wasn’t the case to be with both equally important in Ferrari’s revival. “That it’s a good one because I think that there was a kind of misunderstanding,” he said. “The question was about Charles and I said that we have to build up the team around the drivers and I didn’t say that we want to build up the team around Charles.
“For me the drivers are a key pillar of the performance, not just in terms of pure performance, pure driving and performance into the car but they have to be also somehow keen to the development into the project, midterm and long term, and I want to have two drivers fully committed and it’s the case with Charles and Carlos,” summed up Vasseur.
Here’s F1 drivers and teams welcoming the cancellation decision
Here’s F1 bosses on new teams joining
Here’s Charles Leclerc on Frederic Vasseur porgress
Here’s Jock Clear on not wanting to calm Charles Leclerc down
Here’s Charles Leclerc on not getting the confidence with Ferrari car
