In a recent interview for RaceFans, Alfa Romeo team principal Frédéric Vasseur reflects on Kimi Raikkonen’s 2019 Formula One season, the speculation about Antonio Giovinazzi’s future and rumours suggesting the current Alfa Romeo deal runs until the end of 2021:
On one side of the garage is Kimi Raikkonen who, of course, returned to the team he made his F1 debut for on a two-year deal just when his grand prix career seemed over. Vasseur is pleased with the 2007 world champion’s contribution to the team.
“I think he’s scored more or less all the possible points,” he says. “[But] it’s not just for me a matter of points. He helped us a lot also into the development of the company, the development of the car, to stabilise the system. We are still growing up and we are quite young as a team, and he’s part of the balance of the system.” – the Alfa Romeo boss explained.
Given all the speculation about Antonio Giovinazzi’s future – despite the Italian rookie having upped his game significantly since that needless closing-stage shunt in Spa – the obvious question is how much input Alfa Romeo actually has into driver selection, and whether it allows them to go as far as nominating a driver.
“We have an open discussion on this,” he begins. “We did not have the discussion so far, [but] we will have the discussion quite soon. At the end, it’s the common interest that we are in the same boat and we need altogether to get the results. We can’t be in the situation that I would like to nominate A; they would like to nominate B. They are investing into the team and they need for us to get the results.” Clearly, then, there is some ‘dissention’.”
If ever a man has the skills and experience to nurture a young driver, it is Vasseur, so has Giovinazzi done enough to merit another crack at the red/white cockpit? “Antonio is a rookie, and he is doing very well for me in [qualifying] since the beginning of the season, he’s matching Kimi [Raikkonen] equally now, about the last eight events. The first part of the season he struggled more in the races, but we have to keep in mind that he didn’t race the last two seasons. He’s a rookie in F1, and he didn’t race the last two seasons, he’s not coming like the others with two full seasons in GP2 the last two years.”
How long are Alfa Romeo committed to stay in F1? Paddock rumours suggest the current deal runs until the end of 2021, a claim which is met with silence when I put it to Vasseur on Saturday at the Russian Grand Prix. In my experience that tends to suggest the rumour is on the money; clearly Vasseur would rather say nothing than concoct a story, as has also been my experience with some F1 folk, most of whom eventually left the sport with bruised reputations.
However he opens up when I ask whether equity changed hands to facilitate the team and chassis naming deal: “It’s a naming [deal], like they are doing in football, it’s title sponsorship,” he explains, adding, “The denomination ‘C’ stays the same” – a reference to Sauber’s convention of naming cars after team founder Peter Sauber’s wife, Christiane.
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