Ferrari staff now believe Frederic Vasseur has one ‘very, very good’ leadership quality

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When the chequered flag flew at Silverstone, it ended another weekend of action that Ferrari won’t look back on too fondly.

While Carlos Sainz had arguably the strongest weekend he could produce, that only resulted in a 5^th-place finish.

The Spaniard should have finished 6^th but benefitted from George Russell retiring from the race.

Sainz received praise from Max Verstappen in the cooldown room, but he couldn’t find a way past the Dutchman in changeable conditions.

For Charles Leclerc, it was the third disastrous weekend in the last four races.

Ferrari’s upgrade that was introduced in Spain has coincided with the Monegasque driver suffering plenty of bad luck.

Leclerc’s win in Monaco should have been the catalyst for him and Ferrari to challenge Red Bull, however, that’s not been the case.

Journalist Edd Straw was speaking on The Race Podcast about the situation in Maranello.

While Ferrari appear to have taken a step backwards compared to Mercedes and McLaren, team principal Frederic Vasseur’s leadership is still key to the recent success they’ve enjoyed.

He’s one of the main reasons Lewis Hamilton has agreed to join the team in 2025 and is bringing in key personnel from other teams such as Jerome D’Ambrosio and Loic Serra, something Karun Chandhok has praised Vasseur for.

However, he’s also just lost Enrico Cardile to Aston Martin and will be filling in temporarily in his position while they confirm a replacement.

READ MORE: Everything you need to know about Scuderia Ferrari from team principal to factory

Ferrari staff praising team principal Frederic Vasseur

Talking about the situation at Ferrari, Straw said: “It sounds ridiculous and it is because he’s [Frederic Vasseur] not a technical director but I think that’s just…he’ll do it all with a joke and a smile, that’s the Frederic Vasseur way.

“This signals to me that they’ve got a very clear plan because obviously Loic Serra’s coming in, he had a role announced that isn’t that but maybe he could do it.

“They’ve definitely got a plan, I don’t think this is [Enrico] Cardile’s going now, this is panic stations, I think it got to the point where it had to be announced.

“There is kind of a next step of technical leadership and I see it as a good thing.

“Fred Vasseur talks very regularly because he’s asked, ‘When will this build-up of the team be finished with these appointments?’ and he says it never is because you’re constantly doing it.

“What Ferrari people talk about in the benefit of Vasseur is he’s very, very good at simplifying the problem in terms of aside from all the general panic and media pressure and all these things, what do we need to do?”

Straw then refers back to Vasseur’s comments after Silverstone and how the team spent an entire practice session at Zandvoort last year to understand performance last year rather than optimising it.

Ferrari did the same at the British Grand Prix this year, trying to work out with both packages what was going wrong with the bouncing the car was suffering from.

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Ferrari need to find solution to Charles Leclerc’s recent bad luck

Vasseur’s ability to simplify solutions and keep a team who are typically heavily impacted by internal politics and external noise working together makes him an ideal leader for Ferrari.

However, after looking like Red Bull’s closest rivals earlier in the season and putting Leclerc in a position to threaten Verstappen, they’ve fallen away as the grid has converged.

Leclerc has been told to be more like Lando Norris and be more introspective when it comes to the issues he’s facing.

It’s easy to understand his frustration, with both qualifying for the Sprint Race in Austria and the Grand Prix itself both ruined by things out of his control.

Martin Brundle has said that Leclerc is having an especially difficult time at the moment and Ferrari need to get back on track according to Brundle after their recent difficulties.

A rare weekend off will help the team analyse their next steps and with Vasseur now taking on additional responsibilities, it’ll be interesting to see what impact that has.