FIA president Jean Todt is backing his former team Ferrari to put behind another fruitless Formula 1 campaign and quickly move forward.
2014 has marked a year of struggle for raw performance for the Italian marque against their main rivals so far, with the team having scored only two podium finishes in the hands of Fernando Alonso and are on course for their first winless season since over 1993 in the first year of the new turbo-charged engine era.
Back at Maranello the reaction to this has been management restructuring, with Stefano Domenicalli being the first big departure and Marco Mattiacci taking his place while most recently it was announced that long-time president Luca di Montezemelo will be ousted next month for Sergio Marchionne. A power unit department reshuffle has also accompanied the changes.
Ferrari’s last drivers and constructors championships were 2007 and 2008 respectively, coinciding with around the time of the departure of Todt, who was Ferrari’s team principal from 1993 to 2007, and reckons the situation at Maranello currently is not as severe as the situation he faced when he joined the team over 20 years ago and that significant changes are not a prerequisite.
“I think Ferrari, today, does not need an awful lot to put things back in order,” Todt told Italy’s Il Giornale. “This is absolutely not (comparable to) the situation I found when I arrived in 1993 at a completely devastated myth.”
Todt rebuffs the belief that Ferrari’s underlying woes are akin to the woes of the 1991 season, which four-time champion Alain Prost pointed out, and calls the scrutiny of the Scuderia “unjust”.
“When (Fernando) Alonso retired at Monza, he was the driver who until then had the record for the most number of grands prix always in the points,” noted the Frenchman. “But when I started, it was a miracle if the car finished the race.”
Discussing about Montezemelo leaving the presidency post, Todt believes it’s the case of long tenures ultimately coming to an end and moving into a new era.
“Montezemolo has been president for 23 years, which is a very long time.” said Todt.
“At some point, in large groups, this (sort of change) is normal. Even for myself, I always knew that a period eventually closes.”
