The former Ferrari boss Luca di Montezemolo has dealt against the Scuderia Formula 1 team, which is currently not particularly successful and has fallen short of its own ambitions, and only excluded two people from his angry speech.
As Chairman of the Board of Directors, Luca di Montezemolo was the face of Ferrari for more than two decades. His era saw the successes of record world champion Michael Schumacher, with whom di Montezemolo was often seen celebrating on the podium. But those times are long gone. Ferrari’s last world title was 16 years ago. In 2007, Kimi Räikkönen let the Scuderia fans and those in charge celebrate di Montezemolo for the last time.
Now the 76-year-old, who held his position until 2014, has dealt against his former employer, or more precisely: against the Scuderia Formula 1 team, which, contrary to its own expectations, has had little or nothing to do with the World Cup fight in the current season had nothing to do and instead is only in third place in the constructors’ championship behind the dominators from Red Bull and the second-placed Mercedes team.
Di Montezemolo cannot understand that Ferrari will burst into celebration in 2023 if Charles Leclerc or Carlos Sainz even reach the podium.
Ferrari should be the “protagonist” in Formula 1
“I don’t like where they’ve gotten to now,” the ex-boss told the “Gazzetta dello Sport” and added: “I don’t like that they’re celebrating a third place there. In my time, something like that was tantamount to a defeat .”
The Italian’s criticism was not aimed at Leclerc and Sainz, but more or less solely at the engineers. “The drivers? I think they are the smallest problem Ferrari has, the problem is the car,” he said about the SF-23, which cannot be compared to the superior Red Bull car and at times not to the 2023 Silver Arrow can keep up.
Di Montezemolo had recently emphasized to “Quotidiano Nazionale” that “as a fan, he doesn’t dream of a Ferrari that always wins, but that competes for the title until the last race.”
As in many years under his aegis, it was okay to lose, “but not as an extra but as a protagonist,” said the 76-year-old.