Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari on collision course
With the Formula One season still in the pits with no date for the day it enters the starting grid, the teams are looking to resolve pending dossiers at this stage and Ferrari recently offered a renewal of contract to their German driver Sebastian Vettel who will have rejected the first offer from the Italian team.
LESS SALARY AND LESS CONTRACT EXTENSION …
After reading the introduction, it is likely that he wondered about the reasons that led the four-time world champion Vettel to reject the first offer to renew his contract with Ferrari.
Well, the explanation is relatively simple since ‘Scuderia’ offered only one year of contract to the German pilot who ends his current relationship with the team at the end of 2020, and that same offer would imply a salary reduction in the order of 66%. At the moment, Sebastian Vettel is the second highest-paid driver in F1 just behind Lewis Hamilton, earning around 33 million euros annually, something that Ferrari intends to reduce substantially to around 12 million euros.
Looking at Ferrari’s first offer, it is clear that the Italian team has not really admired Vettel’s journey with the team since he has not yet achieved what he was hired for, that is, to become world champion in pylons with the formation of the Rampant Horse .
In fact, and after being runner-up in one season with Ferrari, Vettel finished in an embarrassing fifth place last season behind the two Mercedes drivers, Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc and the new Red Bull Honda prodigy , Max Verstappen.
Thus, the future of the German driver at Ferrari is still very uncertain at this stage and the two parties may even end up separating at the end of the 2020 season if the values and duration of the new contract continue so far from what is intended by Sebastian Vettel .
REVOLUTION TIME?
With Sebastian Vettel barely interested in lowering his salary so much and signing for just a year in a show of distrust on the part of the team, it is likely that it will be difficult for both parties to reach an agreement. In fact, Ferrari may already be thinking about alternatives for 2021 with several young drivers on the evaluation table.
Carlos Sainz and Daniel Ricciardo seem to be the strongest names for a possible succession to Sebastian Vettel, but the Spanish newspaper ‘Marca’ also includes young Antonio Giovinazzi in this equation and the fact that he is Italian can put him at a slight advantage over the rest candidates.
Ferrari has not been in line with a home rider in its ranks for several years and this could be the time to reverse this recent trend.
CHARLES LECLERC MUST TAKE LEADERSHIP OF THE TEAM
We don’t know if it will be this season yet, but given Sebastian Vettel’s likely departure at the end of the season, today it is virtually guaranteed that young Monegasque Leclerc will take over the team’s lead very soon. We do not know if this will happen in 2020 as Vettel will try to show what fiber it is made of in order to convince Ferrari’s managers to raise the bar for its renewal, but if the agreement does not happen, it will be Leclerc to assume himself as No. 1 of the team to from 2021 after a first season of great quality at Ferrari where he even surpassed his German colleague in the classification of the World Drivers´ Championship.
At just 22 years of age and with a tremendous margin for evolution, Charles Leclerc is naturally a strong bet by ‘Scuderia’ to attack the return to the drivers’ world titles, something that has eluded him since 2007 when Finnish Kimi Raikkonen hit ‘in extremis’ the two Mclaren Mercedes by Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso.
At the time, the Ferrari driver won the last race of the year to end with a score of 110 points, finishing with one more point than Mercedes rivals who went no further than 3rd and 7th places in the decisive race.
At the time, still without any world title, Lewis Hamilton entered the final two races of the season with a healthy lead in the Championship, however, an abandonment at the Chinese Grand Prix and a 7th place in the Brazilian Grand Prix allowed the Ferrari driver to overtake it on the chess flag thanks to two wins in the last two races of the 2007 season.
It is fair to say that, even with six world titles in his pocket, Hamilton will certainly not have missed the opportunity missed in 2007 …
