Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur has addressed recent remarks made by Aston Martin driver Fernando Alonso, who claimed that the Italian team could be the frontrunner in the upcoming rounds of the 2024 Formula 1 championship, which are set to take place at the Monza Circuit in Italy, the Baku City Circuit in Azerbaijan and the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore.
Despite Ferrari’s recent decline, often ranking as the fourth-fastest team behind Red Bull, McLaren, and Mercedes before the summer break, former Ferrari driver Fernando Alonso speculated that the Maranello-based squad might be the “team to beat” at in the Italian Grand Prix following their podium finish with Charles Leclerc and the solid race pace showed by the two SF-24 cars in the Dutch Grand Prix at the Zandvoort circuit last weekend.
Frederic Vasseur, however, has tempered expectations, dismissing the notion and confirming that Ferrari will not be changing its approach for the upcoming events.
“If he’s trying to put pressure [on us], he has to be sure that I won’t read the Twitter of Fernando Alonso,” Fred Vasseur replied in a question from the media regarding the comments made by the Spanish driver – “I don’t have Twitter! I don’t need to have someone telling me that we are the favourite or not. We will have exactly the same approach. I hope that we will be in better shape in the next two or three events. We were in a much better shape last year on these tracks.” – the French manager pointed out.
Scuderia Ferrari secured a podium at Monza finish last year in front of the Tifosi and then went on to clinch victory in Singapore, marking the only non-Red Bull victory in the 2023 Formula 1 campaign.
The Ferrari team principal is optimistic that the Maranello team will deliver a stronger performance at Monza this weekend than in recent races, emphasizing how even small improvements can make a significant impact.
“It’s a matter of details. The fact that we’re in better shape on the short corner and so on will help us. And if you are able to do a step of one or two-tenths, it’s a game changer. But we know also that everybody is improving. We know also that [at Zandvoort] we had still a big gap with Lando, quite far away. It means that we have a lot of work to do. I will never go to Monza, Baku or whatever with the feeling that it will be an easy one.” – the French manager concluded.
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