Is Vasseur the man to end Ferrari’s championship drought?

Fred Vasseur’s move to Ferrari was the headline item from this week’s Formula One management merry-go-round.

There were four different moves in under 24 hours. After Jost Capito left his role at Williams on Monday, three followed on Tuesday — Vasseur’s expected move to Ferrari as Mattia Binotto’s replacement, and McLaren’s decision to promote Andrea Stella to F1 team principal following Andreas Seidl’s departure to the Sauber Group. The Williams job remains vacant.

The moves follow what was also a dramatic driver market in terms of movement over the past few months/ Here we look at how the most recent moves came to be and what they mean for F1 in 2023 and beyond.

Vasseur steps into the big time

After six years with one of F1’s least competitive teams, Vasseur has moved into what is probably the most difficult job in all of motor racing: Ferrari team principal. It is unlike any other job in that it carries the expectation of an entire nation as well as just a fanbase or a board of directors.

Ferrari’s championship drought now stretches over 15 years — Stefano Domenicali, Matteo Mattiacci, Maurizio Arrivabene and now Binotto have come and gone without ending it. The pressure seems to grow every year that number increases.

It is the biggest challenge of Vasseur’s career to date. It would be easy to glance over the Frenchman’s F1 record and completely write him off. He’s not overseen a race win or podium finish in either his 2016 with Renault or the six following seasons with Sauber/Alfa Romeo. But those statistics are misleading.

Vasseur is one of the most respected team bosses in the paddock. He won multiple championships in junior categories before joining F1. Ferrari superstar Charles Leclerc won his GP3 and Formula 2 titles with the ART team Vasseur co-founded, before the two worked together in the Monaco native’s rookie season at Alfa in 2018. Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg also won the GP2 title with the ART team before stepping up to F1.

Leclerc, who won two of the first three events of 2022, was clearly irritated by Ferrari’s mistakes and his radio messages over the final months of the season were increasingly despondent. He will no doubt welcome reuniting with Vasseur, who he has spoken highly of in the past. The appointment of Vasseur can be seen as a move to keep Leclerc happy at a time he could…