https://www.planetf1.com/news/binotto-reveals-he-almost-quit-ferrari/ Thanks God someone made the right decision and the right person stayed. Doubt that was Camilleri though. And clear that as soon as Marchionne left, things started unravelling. Hope Binotto doesn’t smoke...
According to Ross Brawn, the team is new in a calm (upset after Marchionne's passing) state, and he thinks that Ferrari can win the titles again. See Formula Passion in Italy. https://www.formulapassion.it/fp-english/calm-ferrari-can-win-2019-title-brawn-425162.html
Shows how ****ed the situation was at Ferrari last year(s). A man like Binotto pushed to the edge that he wanted to leave the team he's loved. He's only ever worked for Ferrari, and as he said he's been a loyal follower since he was a child.
I think the team will appear far more English or German this year in its execution. And I suspect Binotto is a far better manager than some have expected of him. Expect great things, and let's hope that we don't have too many "torpedo" situations this year.
That's my biggest fear, some brainless guy like Max crashing into us...i sure hope he has learnt something...but i doubt it...
Max is fast, but I think he lacks a certain amount of intelligence to be an F1 driver. He did improve last year, but I'm not convinced.
The decision to replace Arrivabene has been reported as one of Marchionne’s last decisions. Elkann made sure to execute it as well as signing Leclerc to replace Kimi. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Max’s saving grace is the fact that a fast driver only needs a calm, intelligent voice in his ear-piece. Drivers drive, engineers are smart...the best teams are those that have sympathetic (or better...empathetic) views towards the partnership... The most recent example is Rosberg. He didn’t out-perform Lewis...his team out thought the competition... The more thinkers, the better...they our perform drivers constantly.
On the flip side, you need a driver who can listen and execute what the team orders are. Some people (and Max strikes me this way) don't execute and think they are smarter than the team. In some cases they are, in others they are not.
I don't think there's much evidence he can't listen. Even at Baku 2018 there wasn't a team order, except for ''don't crash into your teammate''. I agree with BMWairhead, Max's occasional hothead benefits hugely from a calm, intelligent race engineer, 2018 Monaco practice crash (and Ric's subsequent Quali domination over everyone) was the shakeup he needed to not go 10/10s everywhere. IMO when he toned it down the little bit he did was right on the edge of perfection, not going for every single gap he sees but rather calculate his overtakes. Before Monaco he had a couple of boneheaded moves that a more experienced driver wouldn't make...but hey he came into F1 after just 1 season of car racing so the odd mistake was to be expected.