In the round-up: Former Ferrari driver Rene Arnoux says the team should have replaced Mattia Binotto as its team principal long ago. The team announced at the end of last month he was standing down after four years in charge.
In letter
Ferrari should have replaced Binotto years ago – Arnoux
Former Ferrari driver Rene Arnoux says the team should have replaced Mattia Binotto as its team principal long ago. The team announced at the end of last month he was standing down after four years in charge.
Ferrari began the 2022 F1 season strongly but slumped as the season went on, missing potential wins due to car failures and errors by their strategists and drivers.
“The mistakes he made for me in Formula 1 are unforgivable,” Arnoux told La Gazzetta dello Sport. “I’ve never been on Binotto’s side. Someone who says ‘It will be better next year, it will be better next year’, doesn’t deserve that place.”
Binotto should have been replaced “several years ago”, Arnoux continued, “I’ve said it several times.
“Behaviour like his is intolerable when you’re at the helm of the best team in the world. You may or may not like Jean Todt, but he would never have said: ‘It will be better next year’. He won, and when he won he thought about next year. But there are few Todt and Ron Dennis around.”
Alfa Romeo need “one more step” to challenge teams ahead
Alfa Romeo head of trackside engineering Xevi Pujolar says that his team are still a step behind their upper-midfield rivals McLaren and Alpine.
The team secured sixth place in the constructors’ championship this season after tying on points with Aston Martin. Asked by RaceFans if he felt the team could have offered more of a challenge to Alpine and McLaren had reliability problems not affected them so much in the early season, Pujolar said “no, I think they’re still a step ahead.
“To be at the level of Alpine or McLaren, we will need one more step,” he continued. “And that’s what we will be working on next year. The areas that we need to improve – the races, starts, lap one and many other areas where you still see some margin – that is where we will be much better prepared for next year.”
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Motor racing links of interest:
Formula 1 Grand Prix proposed for Dublin in 1992 never got over starting line (Irish Times)
“A charity based in the area, The Liffey Trust, wrote to then taoiseach Albert Reynolds with an ambitious plan to turn the streets of Dublin 1 and Dublin 3 into a racing circuit for the world’s top drivers, similar to the ‘street circuit’ for The route proposed was a 2.3 mile circuit from the East Wall Road over Annesley Bridge, into Fairview, and then turning right on the link road between Clontarf and East Wall.”
‘I took a bit of a gamble’ – Ricciardo reflects on his decision to leave Red Bull, and if he has any regrets (F1)
“I still feel like the Renault (move) was pretty good, especially 2020 – (that was) one of the best seasons I’ve driven in F1. To get the team back on the podium, I was very proud of that. But obviously the McLaren one, even with the win… the win was a high and I can’t remove that, I can’t ignore that. I can look and say, ‘I tried as well with this one (and) it didn’ t quite work out’.”
Our 2022 Formula 1 season in numbers (McLaren)
“Lando raced 1,253 laps in 2022, and Daniel 1,195. The MCL36 proved to be a reliable challenger, with just five DNF’s all season, meaning that we completed an impressively large proportion of the 2,670 possible laps set out at the start of the season. 91.69%, to be precise, which was the third highest of the grid.”
ABT CUPRA’s Frijns, Mueller: ‘Glad to be back together, and we’ll take the fight to the rest’ (Formula E)
“The car is still quite new, so we have those little ‘diseases’ which we need to try and solve. So, I think at the beginning of the season you’ll see people working with and trying to solve and improve their issues. “The ones that have their car in order will be the team to beat. We might struggle a bit at the beginning we might struggle a bit given the issues we’re having at the moment (as of testing in Valencia). But, I think half way through the season we will be more sorted and hopefully we can score some good points.”
Lewis Reacts To Fan Comments! (Mercedes via YouTube)
“We see your comments of support, motivation and love – they flood our mentions every single day. So, we picked out a few of the most special messages, to show Lewis Hamilton and find out why your support means so much to him.”
Tasting Mexican Food With Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez (Red Bull via YouTube)
“Here’s one we made earlier! Eager to give Max a taste of Mexico, Checo and us served up a selection of Mexican dishes for the reigning Formula 1 World Champion to try.”
The Goodbye… Pierre Gasly’s Best Moments (AlphaTauri via YouTube)
“It’s time for us to say goodbye, we collected some of Pierre Gasly’s best moments from the six years he spent with the team, and there sure were some fantastic ones! Grazie Pierre!”
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On this day in motorsport
- Born today in 1942: Guy Edwards, who started 11 F1 races in the seventies and later became a sponsorship consultant for Lotus.
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