Ferrari F1 Meltdown From The Brazilian Grand Prix: Transcript & Trailer

Below you’ll find a transcript of the original content video that tells the story of how the Ferrari F1 meltdown occurred in 2019 after coming to a dramatic peak with the double DNF of Charles Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel at The Brazilian Grand Prix. Below is the trailer to that video. You can watch the full Ferrari Double DNF & How It Happened video here. 

Ferrari F1 Meltdown From The Brazilian Grand Prix Transcript

When you combine the Ferrari pedigree with the rapid rise of a young star who has something to proof and then you throw on top of that an experienced talented four-time world champion. Also, consider they are in equal technology and arguably of equal talent and ambition, you have an absolute recipe for disaster. To make matters worse, you have a rookie team boss whose extensive history and background come in the form of technical engineering as it relates to Formula One Racing – not necessarily the leadership of a team in factory. Ferrari were destined for a tough 2019, but I’m not really sure how many saw this coming. The goal of this video is to walk through how we got to where we are with Ferrari in 2019 and how the Brazilian Grand Prix Double DNF was a long time coming. In order to do this, we need to do it in three different acts. Act one, who are the players? Act two, how did we get here? And act three, what do we do now? Let’s begin with act one.

 Sebastian Vettel has been with Ferrari since the 2015 season. He came from a highly successful career for Red Bull where he won four consecutive world driver titles. We all likely know the career of Sebastian Vettel, as we followed it right before our very own eyes, but the important thing to call out here is that Seb is a proven and established race winner, a four-time world champion, and someone at least going into the 2019 Formula One season felt very secure in his position. When you have an accomplished driver like that, the only thing that can really upset the balance of that dynamic is to bring in a young, hungry, and potential world champion that threatens your priority standing. This is precisely what happened to Sebastian Vettel when he was with Red Bull when a young Daniel Ricciardo showed up. We’re not here to argue whether Danny Ricciardo could win a world championship, but it’s for sure that Daniel Ricciardo showed promise to be a mighty quick and a talented young driver. 

That season that Daniel Ricciardo was actually brought into Red Bull was one that Sebastian Vettel struggled the most. They left many believing that it was this very fight with Ricciardo that took the German to Ferrari after Ricciardo beat Seb in his maiden Red Bull season and went onto a very impressive 2014 season. All of this is very important to remember as it plays into the dynamics that are at play in 2019. This is why it’s so important to talk about the promotion of Charles Leclerc, the second player of our act as many thought it was too early to bring him on to the Scuderia. But as we delve into the career of the second player in this act, we can understand Ferrari’s decision to actually sign him. But not only that, extend his contract until the 2024 season.

Just as Sebastian Vettel was pegged early on as to likely be a talented Formula One driver having a lot of early success, Charles Leclerc saw the same degree of success and was a young prodigy in carding himself. He made his way through junior series for his first real test, Formula Two. He won by more than 70 points and he was promoted yet again. But this time it was to Formula One with Sauber. He made handiwork of Ericsson by quite a large margin with some very impressive results under his belt. Ultimately, he finished the 2018 season in P13. He was then called up once more to Ferrari to drive next to a four-time world champion, Sebastian Vettel. After being consistently promoted so fast due to such strong results, it was always going to be difficult to manage that kind of talent. Team bosses are forced to do it all the time, just not normally as a rookie season. This brings us to the third player in the act, Mattia Binotto.

Binotto has essentially spent most of his professional career with Ferrari. He joined the team right around the time that Schumacher was actually racing, working his way up through the ranks within the works team. Then in 2016, he took over as chief technical officer replacing James Allison, who went on to Mercedes. After a brief stint in that role, he took over the management of the team in 2018. The 2019 season was his first appointment as a team principal. All of the players mentioned in this first act all matter. All of these dynamics contribute to what has occurred through the 2019 season for Ferrari. History does have a way of repeating itself and if Ferrari are not careful, all these issues could plague them in the 2020 season. But let’s break down what happened.

Act two, how did we get here? After what many called an impressive winter testing, Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc were already showing promise and having a lot of pace proving that the Ferrari was a force to be reckoned with, or so they thought. At the time, they really did look like the team that was finally gonna challenge Merc in the hybrid era. Much of the early hype dissipated, vanished as the Ferrari car opened up with three disappointing race results and three controversial team order decisions. Even leading up to the Australian Grand Prix, Mattia Binotto made it very, very clear in 50/50 decisions, Sebastian Vettel is going to be given priority treatment. Team order decisions and the choice to use them is not all that uncommon to Formula One, but to be so overt and prescriptive about it, that was gonna always cause a problem.

 Having the benefit of hindsight, making such a clear proclamation was gonna introduce some trouble if it turns out that your young talent was, in fact, talented and gonna be in positions where even though your veteran driver is getting priority treatment, maybe it’s so that your young driver should be getting priority treatment. And this was something Ferrari were gonna have to deal with all season. But at the time when you look back, it’s not the craziest thing to say or to say you’re going to follow, but when it starts playing out on track, that’s when you start to have issues, and Australia was the first sign. And not only play out on track but have it play out directly between your two drivers driving side by side.

 The alarm bells probably should have been rung as we could barely get through the first turn of the first Grand Prix before we started to see this actually play out. Here we see Sebastian Vettel actually pushing Leclerc off the track, asserting his dominance into that space. Now, it all looks like fair driving, but as we know and how things will play out, this was certainly not a good sign. The situation was only made worse and confirmed when Leclerc found himself behind Vettel. He was told not to attack Vettel and pass him, but he chose to disobey that Ferrari team order and this was the first time it happened all season, but it wouldn’t be the last. Leclerc actually pushed past Vettel and had a solid race. He showed some solid performance. It was just unfortunate that he had a mechanical failure just before the finish line when he was clearly gonna cross the line in first place.

 And as of this point right now, we really don’t see where Mattia could have added his influence anywhere other than making the race decision to put Sebastian ahead. However, in his post-race interview where he could have praised Leclerc for his race despite him not winning, clearly, he was going to, he didn’t. When he was asked about how close Leclerc came to his first victory and whether he had established himself as a Ferrari driver with this performance, Mattia had this to say. “I think we have found a good car this weekend. I’m happy for Charles, but I think we can count on two drivers and though it has not been a good race for Seb, he was second when he made his mistake and he can still deliver very well.” The question was very obviously aimed at Binotto’s commenting on Leclerc’s drive. Mattia went out of his way to ignore that and then to praise Vettel in the same sentence. Now, if I hear that in a McLaren, that’s a little bit off-putting to me as well and we’re talking about breadcrumbs here. It’s not the biggest deal in the world, but these things will start to pile up.

 Now, we move on to the third round of the 2019 season, the Chinese Grand Prix. And lo and behold, we see Ferrari are choosing to dictate the race from the pit wall as they try to make another team order call. Around lap 11, Leclerc finds himself in front of Sebastian Vettel and is asked to move aside so Vettel can get in front. Leclerc begrudgingly does decide to eventually obey the order, but he doesn’t back off and Vettel is not moving on. He doesn’t take advantage of the clear air and it ends up compromising Leclerc’s performance in that race. It’s worth noting that at the time that they made the team order decision, Vettel was quicker.

 Now, when we pause right here and take a look after the Chinese Grand Prix, how could Leclerc be feeling right now? He had been given three-team order decisions in which none of them favored him or his race. The decisions themselves weren’t even panning out to help the team. Combined with the fact that we have that interview after the Bahrain Grand Prix where, undeniably, Ferrari fans and non-Ferrari fans were praising Leclerc’s drive. His own team boss couldn’t muster up enough positive words to encourage him there. How would you feel if you were Leclerc? But I don’t think it’s as simple as saying team orders did this. It’s the fact that team orders weren’t even helping Vettel. The drivers are just gonna have problems. They’re not always going to like each other, but when you make team orders that drive them apart and they don’t end up helping anyone, then it’s all for naught.

 Toto Wolff, the Mercedes team boss had actually commented on this and he chimed in after the Chinese Grand Prix with this. And I think he said it best. “Nevertheless, once you start doing these things, it becomes more complicated because you start to set a precedent and you’re opening up a can of worms. And then you might have to call every single race with the car behind just saying, I can go quicker.” And unfortunately, this was true. This is exactly how Ferrari we’re actually making the team order decisions. They were making these calls very early on in the race without letting the race actually play out. And this precedent was set very early on, in Australia even. Whoever was going quicker at the time was now going to say, “Well, I deserve the team order. I deserve that call.” Because now if you’re Leclerc, you’ve had three go against you.

 It’s not unprecedented for him to feel like that, some of those calls should start going his way. And in his eyes, his first race win was actually stolen from him, a mechanical failure that had nothing to do with his driving. Alternatively, on the other side of the tail and garage, you have Sebastian Vettel, an experienced four-time world champion who thinks he’s deserved of every single team order that he’s just been given, despite what his pace on track when he’s actually benefiting from that team order has shown. And to be fair, if you’re Sebastian Vettel, why would it be any different? This is exactly what he was told and this was the plan. All roads lead to the fact that Mattia Binotto made the decision to treat the drivers like this, to treat their performance on track and their behavior as a team like this. And this leadership strategy has cultivated already this early a situation in relationship between the two drivers where they’re just going to argue who should be in front rather than race and show who can be in front. And while the situation is not great right now, there still is time to actually go into damage control.

 Mattia could decide to pivot and put his foot down and say the new strategy is you dictate where you are in the track, you decide who’s in front and who’s behind based on your racing, your qualifying and that will dictate where we are as a team. It was clear the team orders were not helping, they were not working at that point in time. And for those of you cautiously on board at this point, I challenge you to think about other times team orders were called by other teams. You look at Mercedes in Russia, that’s significantly different when the team order is called Valtteri needs to go behind so Lewis can win a championship. That contrast very differently than making the team order decision race by race, who’s ever quicker, lap by lap even. All you’re doing when you persistently do that is erode the trust the driver has for the team and the other driver on track, so that when it comes time to make a decision, you’re now gonna see a situation where the driver is gonna take matters into their own hands, which is precisely what happens.

 Leclerc had a decent case that the leadership was actually harming his season, but everything kind of went against him when we got to Azerbaijan. All of the weekend, he’s the leading car. He looks untouchable in the tricky track and windy turns. And then he shunts and an unforgettable one. And just as soon as he’s able to say that his season is being hurt by these team orders, he should be the driver in charge though. Look how much quicker he is. He does something like this. He makes an error where not only is he the leading car, it’s by a long shot. The entire reason that Seb was actually benefiting from the team orders was because he’s the older driver that can be trusted, the more experienced one, to deliver consistently. Now, Leclerc quickly owned up to the mistake and famously, but it just didn’t help his case with leadership that this team can be trusted with him yet. Leclerc was showing brilliant flashes. Yes, but Mercedes were pulling off into the sunset and Vettel was the more consistent of the two drivers at that point in Baku.

 And then we move on to the Monaco Grand Prix where it went from bad to worse for Leclerc. It was the lowest of the low for Charles and we see him at his home race get absolutely screwed over by his team in terms of cutoff time. He’s told to wait as his garage tries to find the most optimum point to leave and go out on the track. And by the time he goes out, they miscalculated, they misjudged, and he missed qualifying entirely. This set him up for a very difficult Grand Prix. And we see a very frustrated Charles Leclerc drive around his home track and narrowly miss time and time again, some sort of collision, and ultimately, it caught up with him. A puncture ultimately ended his race short in what was a devastating weekend, I’m sure for his confidence. Not only at this point does he feel let down by his team and just team orders, he’s now let down by the execution. Now, he can’t even trust the team to get him on track to drive and at least control his own destiny.

 Aside from his Bahrain race, Leclerc really hasn’t shown outside of a couple of flashes that he’s a force to be reckoned with inside that team. And at this point, neither really has Sebastian despite the fact that he’s benefiting from the team orders. You get the feeling that whoever produces a strong result first is gonna win here. And as we enter the Canadian Grand Prix, we find another focal point in the story where things could have went dramatically different. Just as in Bahrain, had Leclerc won that Grand Prix, this entire season would have shaped up different. But now it was Sebastian’s turn in Canada to be on the receiving end and be dealt one of these blows that Leclerc had become all too familiar with. In route to the first win of the season for Ferrari, and while in the race lead, Sebastian Vettel has a controversial moment with Lewis Hamilton.

 Ultimately, the stewards at the Canadian Grand Prix decided that this was worthy of a five-second penalty. And despite crossing the lines first, Sebastian Vettel was behind Lewis Hamilton on time and thus P2. And it’s at this point, we see that the narrative and story starts to change to focus more on Sebastian Vettel. He’s basically been a passenger this far to all of the drama within Ferrari. But with that, he also was sitting back and watching his teammate show brilliant flashes that, yes, he could be the future of this team. And when we go to Austria and he has to watch his teammate actually battle it out with Max Verstappen for the race lead in the last couple of laps, we’re really watching the future of Formula One. With the wounds still fresh from Canada with Leclerc showing a lot of pace and like he could have deservedly even taken that race win in Austria, Vettel’s frustration begins to boil over and we can see all of this play out in the manifestation of that when we get to Silverstone.

 One could make the fair argument that Vettel’s mistake in Canada was really a product of circumstance, one thing compounded on another. But what we see happen at Silverstone where he just runs into the back of Verstappen, it starts to become very clear what Seb is actually capable of when he’s so desperate for the results based on how things have played out. Watching his teammate come close to a race victory before the breakeven, not once, but twice, and then having his race win taken away, he sees the writing on the wall, “It’s now or never.” He needs to get some sort of result. And while we’re seeing a new driving style potentially play out for Sebastian, we’re also seeing a new driving style play out for Charles Leclerc.

 After the FIA upheld Max Verstappen’s overtake of Leclerc in Austria, Leclerc decided then that he was not gonna passively let this happen again. He was going to drive more aggressively to reflect the FIA’s decision in Austria. When you combine his new plan for wheel-to-wheel combat and his rhetoric with the fact that he’s perfectly willing to disobey orders, you’ve got the perfect combination of a driver that’s going to be difficult to handle and manage. And that’s true for both of them, whether that’s their on-track performance is not reflective of where they wanna be or their team is not supporting them the way they want them to be supporting them or everything in between. The summer break ushers in a brand new Ferrari dynamic, one that we haven’t seen yet. A return to racing saw a return of Leclerc’s performance and he gets his first race win at Spa.

It was after the summer break and after his first win, we understandably see Leclerc a little bit more unwilling to accept his number two role at Ferrari. The Italian Grand Prix gave experiences to both of the drivers that were on extreme ends of the spectrum, one very low, one very high. It was unequivocally the highest point of Leclerc’s season this far. Winning in Monza, getting P1 in front of his home crowd. And it was the lowest Seb has had, not only this year in recent memory. An early mistake led to a spin, which led to ultimately, a very poor mistake by Sebastian. Him pulling out onto the track and actually getting in the way of Stroll not only cost him a penalty, but it also gave him points which put him just three points shy of having a race ban, just all things he did not need right now. His FIA where he’s paled in comparison I’m sure what the fact that his teammate had done something he’d failed to do in his time at Ferrari.

 With back-to-back wins by Charles Leclerc, it was now or never. Sebastian Vettel needed to make a move and he needed to get results to disrupt his teammate, but also stay in the fight to gain points wherever he could. And just when you begin to count him out, he actually took the win at the Singapore Grand Prix, but not without controversy, of course. If you weren’t sure of the tension that existed between the teammates and the team, well, Singapore made sure that that was very clear. Having taken pole, Leclerc continued to streak but ultimately felt that his teammate undercut him as Sebastian actually went into the pits early, unbeknownst to Leclerc. As it turned out though, Ferrari made the right call here and it’s important that we stop and mention that this was absolutely without a shadow of a doubt, the correct call. And that was the best way to explain it to the press.

 

Not only is it true, it’s obvious. But Mattia took the opportunity to say they considered a swap, which certainly could have been true, but what would be the point of actually saying that to the media? The race was already over. It looked like the right call on paper and Ferrari took the most amount of points home. Why take that opportunity to even mention that you were considering a swap? And many people commented on that and it was only confirmed months later in late December. Mattia had actually given an interview where he said that Sebastian was given the win. Some people speculate whether Mattia meant that they chose not to swap and that’s what they meant by giving him the win or if they meant pitting them early to essentially undercut Leclerc. To me, it doesn’t matter because it doesn’t make any sense to talk about that, let alone in December. And in both scenarios, you’re diluting Seb’s drive that day.

The highlight of his year and his only real major positive point, Mattia was taking away from that, and for no conceivably clear reason. And his comments about the fact that Sebastian was actually given the race win at Singapore, this comes at a very critical juncture similar to the Bahrain comments. In late December, we see Ferrari actually extend Leclerc’s contract through 2024. And just after that, we see Mattia make comments about Seb was actually given a win. So, you extend the contract of your young talent while simultaneously in downplaying the major highlight of the struggling driver on the team. In terms of team management and cohesion, this was the worst way to encourage that. It’s just not evidently clear why dividing the drivers and turning them against each other and then cutting them down behind the scenes behind their back, how that’s gonna lead to better results from either of the drivers.

The joy and the high that Leclerc was experiencing and that he was on after his Monza victory dipped a little bit. This was also the most vocal he’s ever been on team radio talking about the strategy. He felt very strongly that the team had done him an injustice at the Singapore Grand Prix and was incredibly vocal about it on the team radio, so much so that he vowed to tone it down a little bit for the next Grand Prix. With Russia came a new man, a new driver. Seb was happy, eager, and ready to get racing again after his win. And that was the issue. Seb had hope after Singapore, and rightfully so. But that was ultimately what led to what happened in Russia. Up until Russia, it had seen that Ferrari might have been learning from their mistakes. They might have toned down those team orders a bit, but amnesia set in and we went right back to team orders, but this time, it was in front of the world.

Not only was Leclerc vocal about what happened in Russia, but so was the newly confident Seb with his actions. And if you remember what happened in Russia, just to play it back, Leclerc was actually on pole. They were attempting to protect from Hamilton, taking the slipstream and overtaking Leclerc. So, Seb just had to make sure that he had a good start, beat Hamilton to the position and take the slipstream from Leclerc. It had seemed that the plan was if that were to overtake Leclerc, he would actually give the position back. He was only given the position in the first place, at least on paper because Leclerc allowed him to get behind him and take the slipstream. Sebastian felt that he had actually taken that position on his own accord due to the fact that Leclerc didn’t have a very good start and he himself did. So, he felt as if he was entitled to that position. And as to not go too far into this, I have another video on this itself.

Ferrari ended up somehow messing up this call and there was some miscommunication. Leclerc made it abundantly clear that that position was his position and Vettel’s silence said more than anything. He was not giving that back and if he wanted it, Leclerc could come get it. After the race, Seb actually did come out and say, he probably should’ve given that back, but you got the feeling that this wasn’t something he meant, he was forced to say it. To make matters worse, it didn’t end up even helping Sebastian all that much. He ended up retiring from the race with an MGU-K problem, which is eerily similar to Leclerc disobeying team orders in Bahrain and having a mechanical problem. Just saying, not insinuating but that is weird.

The Formula One community was relatively split about who was at blame, but ultimately, most of it landed on Sebastian. Sebastian’s actions, behavior, and rhetoric at the Russian Grand Prix were proof that he had little to no trust of Leclerc at that point when he made that decision. Despite Leclerc’s promises to remain silent over radio when something bothered him, he was very vocal and for 9 to 10 laps even, he was talking about this incident, asking for the spot back rather than focusing on driving. While some fans were very critical of Leclerc and him voicing himself over team radio so much at Russia, I kinda felt bad for him. I really think this proved that he actually had a tiny bit left. He really did trust Vettel to actually give that spot back to go with the plan. Whether they miscommunicated, that really is on Ferrari for not setting the stipulations, but he still trusted Vettel. As for Vettel, he saw an opportunity, he played his hand and ultimately, it didn’t work.

Whether he learned from Leclerc’s decision to not obey team orders, go ahead and try to take the race win in Bahrain or if you remember back to the Monza incident where he was deserved the tow into the qualifying session, it’s highly likely that he would have challenged, if not taken that pole position on that second Q2 run. That wound still freshly open, that could have been the impetus for him to make his decision to do this in Russia. Either way, it’s out in the open. Both of the drivers have fallen victim to the team strategy, have fallen victim to the culture that’s been cultivated around them and just be looking over their shoulder. The Japanese Grand Prix, they were each on their own and a great race indeed for them to battle it out as this as a driver circuit. Both looked up to the challenge, but Sebastian Vettel ended up edging Leclerc for pole position.

From the exterior, this was all great news. If you’re not a Ferrari fan, you’re seeing pole after pole, front row lockout after win after win under their front row lockout for Ferrari, but another frustrated Leclerc. A frustrated Leclerc sees his race go from bad to worse as he gets a pretty poor start and gets caught on the inside of an advancing Max Verstappen who’s going to execute to pass in the outside. It’s his turn to make one of those embarrassing mistakes that we see Vettel actually pull off in Monza and he ends up taking Max Verstappen ultimately out of the race. Both of the drivers are able to actually return to the track. Max Verstappen ends up having to retire his car. And despite Leclerc’s extensive damage and the fact that his pit wall can actually see the damage, he stays out on track.

Leclerc was able to continue on in the race and actually finish. Sebastian Vettel took a second-place finish and took more points than Leclerc. What many people don’t understand fully about that race is the extent Ferrari went to. And it’s at this point where I will be the first to defend Charles Leclerc. I’m not saying that I endorse his behavior. He could have asked more about his damage, but the fact remains is the team were ultimately the ones that should have called him in. And if you listen to the exact times that the radios were given, the team were not concerned with bringing Leclerc in. The team could see clearly all of the damage flying off of his car and the debris ended up ultimately almost hurting Lewis very badly. You can see him swerve and barely miss the debris, just barely. Even after that, they chose not to bring him in despite telling Michael Massey they would.

Three things are pretty clear after the Japanese Grand Prix. Number one, Vettel came out the winner that weekend, at least of the Ferrari team. Number two, Leclerc definitely is frustrated and he’s driving like it. And number three, still to this day, one of the most egregious offenses in terms of track safety I’ve ever seen a team commit live in real-time and covered, Ferrari proved that nothing mattered. Nothing mattered, but the points that Leclerc was getting that day, getting him back on his race strategy. So, while Vettel locks up yet another podium, Ferrari and Leclerc are being handed down FIA penalties and fines for what they did in Japan. Not enough in my opinion, but they are penalized. Went to the Brazilian Grand Prix with Leclerc actually in third place in the driver’s championship, chased by Max Verstappen and Sebastian Vettel in a distant fifth. 

And while the sessions were tight and it was going to be close, the one person that was out in front was Max Verstappen. After that, it could have been anyone’s game. It was Vettel who joined Verstappen on the front row at the Brazilian Grand Prix. Despite Sebastian being a row ahead of his teammate at the start of the race, they actually found each other towards the end. And as we fast forward to lap 66, the controversy happened. Something that when you look back on it, it really doesn’t seem that crazy. As you watch this video and you’ve gotten this far, it really doesn’t seem that unlikely that that would have happened, it almost seems inevitable.

Act three. What do we do next? We’ve spoken at length throughout this entire video so far about how things got to where they are now, about how things have escalated quietly, about how these things didn’t just pop up overnight. They were being systematically embedded into both of these drivers, into the garages, into the team. So, on lap 66, we see two drivers who have been told all year long, whoever’s faster gets the benefit of the doubt. One driver who wants to prove that the hype is real, he’s young, but he’s here to stay and he’s for real. Another driver who’s done it four times in fact and is a veteran and cannot lose to this young driver, no matter how talented he is. Two drivers who don’t trust their team. Two drivers who have shown that they’re going to take the race into their own hands when they have to. They have already crossed that line, there’s no going back. And finally, two drivers who are facing down a decision to trust each other, to trust the team that they’re gonna be able to look at this after the fact and fairly make the call about who deserves the right to wait here.

When you dictate the strategy from the pit wall as much as Ferrari has, when you fail team strategy and blow it as much as Ferrari has, both of these drivers know that each decision they make in the late stages of the 2019 campaign, they could be career-defining. Who’s gonna get the call next to yield to the other driver? Who’s gonna be called and told to get out of the way because they need the points? The fact that Brazil didn’t happen sooner, that’s the miracle. The season ends in Abu Dhabi and relatively quietly for Ferrari despite a small controversy regarding their fuel. Sebastian Vettel takes fifth place with Leclerc grabbing the last podium of the season in third. 24 points, that’s what separated the Ferrari drivers. Just 24 points. Zero. Ferrari really blamed no one for this. Seb was apologetic and they handled it internally. Nothing came out publicly, nothing really to save face for either driver.

In fact, in my original video, I had said that if anyone gets the blame for this, it’s going to be Sebastian Vettel. For the most part. I was kind of right, kind of wrong. They didn’t make this a big deal. It hadn’t even occurred to me that that was on the table, that Ferrari were just gonna pretend it never happened. For the foreseeable future while these drivers live out their contract, Sebastian Vettel at least for one more season, no race will be the same, no race you ever feel like they’re teammates. All of these races are gonna be them pitted against each other. And as we saw throughout the entire 2019 season, when these drivers are driving as if they don’t trust each other, when they’re driving for themselves, for the career as if it depends on it, poor results follow. And the only thing that would change that is a phenomenal car. But at the end of the day, you’re still just gonna have two Ferraris battling each other.

That’s 21 more races we see an explosive situation play out before our very own eyes, that’s just one controversial decision, that’s one corner too close, that’s one touching incident. One contact away from boiling over. Seeing as though Ferrari are the best challengers to spoil Mercedes run in the hybrid era and in the dominance, I hope for the best, but I’m prepared for the worst. I hope this had a positive impact on your Formula One experience and you enjoyed this story. If you want more just like it, make sure to subscribe, share it with a friend, leave a comment. Let me know what you think. All of it helps, and all of it is incredibly important. Here’s to many, many more Formula One stories just like it.