British former racing driver Johnny Herbert, who currently works as a television announcer for Sky Sports F1, has pointed out what he is most excited about ahead of the 2023 Formula 1 championship, as he believes Scuderia Ferrari will be able to come back stronger next year, when Frederic Vasseur will be in charge of the Ferrari Racing Division, with the French manager replacing Mattia Binotto.
Scuderia Ferrari began the 2022 campaign spectacularly: Charles Leclerc won the first round of the season, at the Bahrain International Circuit and confirmed the strong potential of the F1-75 car with a second place finish in Saudi Arabia and another great race win in round 3, at the Albert Park Circuit in Melbourne. However, it all went downhill from that point, with Scuderia Ferrari unable to build on the solid start and challenge Red Bull for the 2022 F1 titles.
In the end there was no problem for Red Bull to secure the Drivers and Constructors’ championships, as Max Verstappen went on to dominate the 2022 season, while the Maranello team was almost overtaken even by Mercedes in the final stages of the year.
However, the show of pace at the start of the 2022 Formula 1 campaign should make a return for Charles Leclerc and the Italian side next year. Ex-Formula 1 driver Johnny Herbert feels the Maranello team will make a resurgence and predicts Ferrari and Mercedes will be able to challenge Red Bull in 2023.
“I’ve heard mixed things from the end of the year in Abu Dhabi,” the Sky Sports F1 commentator said in an interview for Motorsport Magazine – “On the one hand, that it still didn’t fully understand the porpoising issue, yet on the other hand that the opposite is true. Let’s hope it’s the latter!” – he said about Mercedes – “We want to see continued brilliance from George Russell, while there were still signs that Lewis Hamilton hasn’t lost it. You’d hope that a restructuring of the concept at Mercedes has been implemented from what it has learnt.”
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Johnny Herbert is confident Ferrari and Mercedes will also take advantage of Red Bull’s penalty for exceeding the budget cap, with the Austrian side having to deal with limited development time next year as a result of their financial records:
“It’s probably not going to hurt it overall as much as the problems Ferrari and Mercedes have got. Red Bull will still be the target to topple. Is it beatable? Damn right it is, as Ferrari showed early on last season, as did Mercedes.” – Johnny Herbert concluded.
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