Flavio Briatore on Ferrari, Hamilton and Leclerc: “Drivers who are at loggerheads”

Flavio Briatore, now 76, has been one of Ferrari’s harshest critics for years. Some believe this is perhaps due to wounded pride – because the call from Maranello never came. Others take the view that the man behind the world championship titles of Michael Schumacher (Benetton) and Fernando Alonso (Renault) simply dares to say what others in Italy merely whisper.

Today, the seasoned veteran Briatore is the cool-headed strategist behind the Alpine Formula 1 team. However, the Italian has retained his sharp tongue when it comes to Ferrari.

No team is under as much pressure or comes under as much scrutiny as Ferrari. Briatore once remarked on this: “In winter, Ferrari is always a title contender or already world champion. At the presentation, a board member actually said he’d never seen such a fast Ferrari. But statements like that just stir up the fans.”

“Then there’s a promise hanging in the air that’s hardly going to be kept, and I see the Tifosi getting worked up on social media. You can’t make statements like that in the winter! Drive a few races first, then we’ll see. That just stokes false expectations. And the reality is usually that, once the other cars hit the track, some of the rivals have done a better job.”

Speaking today to the Corriere della Sera about the ongoing internal driver rivalry between Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, which is a constant source of discussion, Briatore said: “From what I’ve seen, these are two drivers who are at loggerheads. Managing two such alpha males really isn’t easy.”

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How would Briatore go about it? “You have to make it clear to everyone that the team comes first. In any case, I would never want one of my drivers to force the other off the track.”

Some of the Tifosi might be asking themselves: how would Briatore go about it in Maranello? Flavio replied diplomatically: “Solutions only come once you know the patient. You have to understand the problems before you try to solve them. In the meantime, Fred Vasseur’s work at Ferrari must be respected; mistakes happen in every team.”

“But a winning Ferrari is a boon for the whole of Formula 1; so we’re all rooting for this racehorse, to a certain extent.”

Given that there’s been talk for months about possible successors to Vasseur: hand on heart – wouldn’t that have been a role for Flavio Briatore? “It’s too late for that now. Even though Ferrari is, of course, the dream job everyone would love to have. But I was never really close to Maranello; I was practically always on the other side of the fence.”