Is Ferrari in chaos? Enrico Cardile resigned yesterday as technical director of the chassis area, and the role has been taken on by Fred Vasseur on an interim basis. The team principal of the Maranello team as of Sunday evening, had assured that the Italian engineer departing for Aston Martin was still regularly at his post, to maintain a house of cards that only he still believes in.
The departure of the 55-year-old engineer is certainly not a surprise. We had anticipated Lawrence Stroll’s interest in May for the technician that had been working in Maranello for two decades, considered the right person to organize the technical work group at the new team headquarters that is nearing completion and to bring the Ferrari know-how on agile car 2026 and the new power unit.
Enrico Cardile, an engineer with an aerodynamics background, is not an F1 designer, but is considered a skilled organizer of the technical office. His departure from the Ferrari Racing Division, although only officially announced yesterday, cannot be considered a surprise. On the contrary, some have seen Frederic Vasseur’s move to also take on the technical delegation as a surprise, a confusion. All nonsense. The feeling, on the contrary, is that the plan that the Frenchman has had in mind for some time is being put into action: defining a Ferrari according to his wishes and those of President John Elkann.
It is true that Enrico Cardile was active until the last moment and it is true that he must take responsibility for the recent performance of the SF-24 single-seater which stalled in terms of development, but it is equally true that the head’s plan foresees a different design with figures that will move immediately after the summer break.
It would be easy to think that Adrian Newey could be the solution to all the troubles, but the legendary English car designer still does not seem convinced to move to Maranello. Some were even proclaiming that the Englishman had already signed. It is much more likely that he will let the option signed with the Ferrari team expire at the end of the month, despite John Elkann’s emissaries having raised the financial offer.
Adrian Newey wants to be a free spirit, an external consultant without the constraints of daily presence in the Racing Department. Being there when needed for the definition of a new car, but then stepping back and following the many interests he has developed over the years.
Fred Vasseur, therefore, has taken on the role of interim technical director so as not to assign the position to those already present. It is evident that he is waiting for someone who needs to be freed up to answer the call. This is a “Mister X”, because it will not be Loic Serra, the Frenchman who will arrive on October 1st from Mercedes along with Jerome D’Ambrosio, the Belgian who will become deputy team principal.
Loic Serra will be the Head of Chassis Performance Engineering, reporting directly to the new Technical Director “Mister X”, overseeing various areas such as track operations, aerodynamic development, and performance development. Lewis Hamilton has “suggested” some names and they are not necessarily all from Mercedes, indicating that it will not be just the technical director arriving. In the meantime, Cedric Sambardier, a French composite expert who previously had experience with Sauber, joined Maranello from Red Bull at the beginning of the month.
And Frederic Vasseur will never admit it, but all attention is already focused on designing the Ferrari for Lewis Hamilton. Inside the Ferrari factory it is not referred to by its project code, 677, but by the name of the Silverstone winner who will drive it next year.
We have already anticipated that it will be a completely new car compared to the SF-24: a pull rod front suspension design and the chassis will be redone not only to accommodate different mechanisms but also to set a different weight distribution, with a monocoque that will move the cockpit further back to have a greater distance between the front wheel and the sidepods, following a design favored by Red Bull and McLaren.
And the SF-24? The setback with the developments that debuted in Spain was a heavy blow: since Monte Carlo, Ferrari has lost competitiveness, falling from being Red Bull’s challenger to the fourth force, overtaken by Mercedes.
Carlos Sainz, after the disappointment for Ferrari’s performance in the British Grand Prix at the Silverstone circuit, explained that the Maranello team’s technicians have understood where to intervene, so the hope is that there will be a course correction for a car that suddenly cannot have become a disaster. The Hungarian Grand Prix and the Singapore Grand Prix are marked in red on the Formula 1 calendar because they are tracks that, at least on paper, should restore hope to the SF-24 to perform well again.
They will try to salvage what they can, considering that the development budget for this car has now been spent and they do not want to divert resources destined for the 2025 Formula 1 car. In this context, Charles Leclerc’s moment of discouragement can also be understood: the Monegasque driver has entered a negative spiral from which only he can emerge. He must believe in his potential and his ability to beat Lewis Hamilton next year. Frederic Vasseur, a great friend of the Monegasque, is not providing the human support that Charles might need in this phase. At least it does not seem to be a current problem or a priority, because evidently, there are more urgent scenarios to construct.
In a Ferrari that is quietly changing its skin, several technical figures have started to send their resumes around, which means we could soon see other key team members leave the Italian side.
