According to leading German automobile magazine ‘Auto motor und sport’, Scuderia Ferrari would have been in a much stronger position to fight for the 2018 Formula One titles against Mercedes under the guidance of Sergio Marchionne, the Former Ferrari chairman and CEO who passed away at the age of 66 in July. It was announced that John Elkann would become chairman, and Louis C Camilleri was named as CEO.
“Sergio Marchionne was not openly seen in the daily business of Ferrari but he was respected and people were afraid of him” – Michael Schmidt from ‘Auto motor und sport’ said, as reported by the German automobile magazine – “With Marchionne, Ferrari would have done the logical thing and concentrate on the championship and the mistakes in Monza and in Singapore wouldn’t have happend because he would have asked them “what the hell are you guys doing?”. This is missing.” – he added.
Michael Schmidt also talked about Scuderia Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel’s current chances of winning the championship: “Now it is getting really difficult. 40 points, Sebastian Vettel can still win it if he wins all remaining races. The problem is statistically Mercedes already had their one DNF per year so Vettel can‘t hope for that. Singapore was the best opportunity for Ferrari because Red Bull could have taken points from Mercedes but instead they took points from them. Vettel needs to win 2-3 races and hope that Lewis gets P3/P4 so he can reduce the points gap.”
Regarding the next two rounds of the 2018 Formula One season, Michael Schmidt said: “Now races are coming (well we said that for Singapore as well but..), were Ferrari should be really good. They did well in Silverstone, you could say Suzuka is similar to that and they were already good in Sochi last year, long straights and power, that helps them. We really need to hope that Ferrari wins the next race, it doesn‘t help, otherwise the championship is over if Hamilton increases his lead. I would say, Ferrari infront of Mercedes at Sochi.”
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