Luca stepping on more than a few toes. Ferrari F1 team has been lucky in 2015 says Luca di Montezemolo - F1 news - AUTOSPORT.com Former Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo believes the Prancing Horse marque has struck lucky this season in emerging as the nearest challenger to Mercedes in the Formula 1 title race. After 23 years with Ferrari, di Montezemolo departed in September of last year following an internal power struggle with current chairman Sergio Marchionne. When Sebastian Vettel ended Ferrari's long barren run with Malaysian Grand Prix victory in March, di Montezemolo suggested it was a result "that comes from far back", seemingly taking a degree of credit. In an interview with Repubblica, di Montezemolo has now described that comment as "a faux pas", although he may fall foul again of Ferrari's fans for implying good fortune played a part in Vettel's success. Di Montezemolo, now non-executive chairman of Italy's national airline Alitalia, said: "I sincerely think they have been a bit lucky. "This year, except for Mercedes, they have no other rivals. "Williams hasn't improved, Red Bull has imploded - I know [Dietrich] Mateschitz is thinking of selling, he's told a common friend: 'Either I convince Audi to enter, or I'm out' - and McLaren is in dire crisis, so now Ferrari starts every race with a podium in its pocket. "But luck is useless if you don't know how to make the most of it, so in my opinion that's a merit, as is the intelligence they had of not throwing away what had been done before they came. "Perhaps I wouldn't have been so imprudent in December as to say that 2015 would be an ordeal, that huge mistakes in the preparation of the new season were made, and that winning a couple of races would be a miracle. But anyway, that's the past." VETTEL CHASE BEGAN IN 2009 While new team principal Maurizio Arrivabene has hailed Marchionne as the reason for the arrival of four-times champion Vettel, di Montezemolo has again laid claim to playing a part, taking a swipe at Fernando Alonso in the process. "The first person at Ferrari who talked about Vettel was [Michael] Schumacher," said di Montezemolo. Luca di Montezemolo "It was the summer [of 2009] when he would have returned to stand in for [Felipe] Massa. He told me 'The perfect driver for you is Seb.' "[Stefano] Domenicali wanted him at all costs and brought him to my home in Bologna. He arrived with a box of Swiss chocolate. "He was already a world champion, yet his manners were somehow clumsy. Everyone was finely impressed. "[Marco] Mattiacci carried on that work. Finally, when with Marchionne we saw Alonso had become gloomy and surly and was always showing scepticism with the team, we decided for the change. "Vettel certainly gets [paid] less than what Alonso asked for his renewal [of his contract]. "And then he has strongly helped Arrivabene, who is a man with great personality, to impose a new, better, and more positive mood."
I'm not going to call him the clown hack lawyer I'm now going to call him bozo the clown . Still to this I can't believe he went around Monza Italy saying I am still running Ferrari and don't you forget it haha what a clown hack lawyer oh sorry
I think we knew that after he blew up the Schumacher/Todt/Brawn team too early so that he could pursue Kimi. I doubt KR would have demanded they get rid of Schumacher as a condition of being on the team. It just seemed (to me) that a megalomaniac was giving himself too much credit for the team's success and out-thought himself.
I've been saying the same thing on here from the day I joined the forum. most people gave me a had time for calling ldm a clown hack lawyer . GA saved ferrari not ldm . GA reinvested in ferrari with 550 and 360 then hiring the little french man to fix the f1 program after the passing of the Aguilera brothers ldm went out and got the left Italian media to try to rewrite history of ferrari
Well, OK, but other than passing along Mateschitz's comment about Audi, what's so bad about ldM's comments? Any of the points about Ferrari that aren't pretty accurate?
He likes to hear the sound of his own voice. Since he "retired " he is free to say anything he wants. It doesn't matter what he says now, it just makes him look like a loser.
Well, LDM is Chairman of Alitalia, on the BOD for CVC F1, and now leading Rome's bid for the 2024 Olympics so he might be slightly busy for a guy past retirement age. I think he should stay out of commenting, particularly in a negative way, about Ferrari because it serves no one well. Agree with above that it is rampant in F1. However, to say that he had nothing to do with Ferrari's success both on the track and selling cars is just ridiculous.
Non-executive chairman. I wonder what that means. Figurehead? But he did a lot for Ferrari. No question about that. Piech did a lot for VW, fought a lot with Porsche.
