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After Ferrari's repeated strategic errors that have cost the team significant championship points over the course of the first half of the 2022 F1 season, fans urge the team to "fire" Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto.
The Scuderia's latest error cost Charles Leclerc a potential win at the Hungarian Grand Prix last weekend, when the team decided to shockingly pit the Monegasque for hard compound tires, with which the driver simply found no traction and finished the race in sixth place.
In a post-race media interaction, Leclerc admitted that the race was pretty much over for him after he pitted for the hard compound tires:
“I think starting on the Medium was the right choice. I think stopping for the Hard was the turning point of the race. I’m pretty sure that this was [Verstappen’s] call, to put us under pressure. But I don’t think we should have maybe reacted to that because then it was a snowball effect for us, and we lost a lot more than what we should have.”
Mattia Binotto also spoke to the media about the team's call to move to the hard tires, admitting that the strategy just did not work. He said:
“Based on our data and our analysis, we knew the hard was not as fast as the medium, but it could have been as fast 11 laps into the stint…Yes, it didn’t work and we would not have fitted them had we known they would be as bad.”
Fans were left absolutely furious after the race, where Charles Leclerc once again watched his shot at the championship slip right through his fingers for no fault of his own. Max Verstappen, on the other hand, charged to the checkered flag to secure his eighth win of the season despite starting the race in tenth, and now enjoys a massive 80-point advantage over the Ferrari driver.
Binotto insists that there is "no reason" to make any changes to the staff over the summer break despite fans insisting that the strategists have had one-too-many blunders. Former F1 driver Ralf Schumacher has suggested that the Italian's role as team principal may be at risk, given the magnitude of the blunders made by the team over the recent races.
Here are some tweets from fans urging Ferrari to reconsider keeping Binotto as team principal:
Ferrari team boss admits to being "frustrated"
Mattia Binotto admitted that while he may not look it, he is certainly "frustrated" by the mistakes that have cost the team important results over the season.
Speaking to Channel 4, he emphasized that for the first time this season, the car was not performing at its highest level at the Hungarian GP:
“I’m frustrated no doubt, even if I’m maybe not showing it too much, but I’m certainly frustrated. Because I know what is the potential of the car, what it has been so far, even if today it’s the first time in the first half of the season that the car was not so great.”
Ferrari has proven to have the fastest car in several races this season, only to lose wins to Red Bull over strategic mistakes, such as in the case of the Monaco GP. It will be interesting to see how the team fares after the summer break.
