Tuesday 10 March 2015

Improved atmosphere at Ferrari

(© Ben Johnston 2015)

Scuderia Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen believes that going into the 2015 Formula One season there is better atmosphere in the team compared to last year when he returned to Maranello.

The outfit endured its worst season in Formula One since 1993 finishing the year in fourth place behind Williams Martini Racing, Infiniti Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, this prompted sweeping changes within the structure of the team with Chairman Luca Di Montezemelo leaving the company along with Team Principal Marco Mattiacci.

Sergio Marchionne has now taken charge of the Formula One operation as FIAT and Ferrari Chairman and installed Maurizio Arrivabene as the new Team Principal. Arrivabene joined Ferrari from long term sponsor Philip Morris so he knows the Maranello based outfit inside out. His wife also works for the team in the communications department.

The biggest change within the team however has been the departure of the man who replaced Raikkonen, Fernando Alonso has re-joined McLaren with Sebastian Vettel joining the Iceman and this can only be a good thing as the Finn and the German get on very well together however it has been pointed out that it was the same situation with Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg when Hamilton joined the Brackley based outfit and that relationship became strained.

Scuderia Ferrari however do not foresee any problems arising between Vettel or Raikkonen and the drivers don’t see any reason why they would have issues with one another.

Raikkonen also has a new race engineer this season with Dave Greenwood joining the team from Marussia and it has been noted that Raikkonen tends to work better with English engineers having had an extremely successful partnership with his former Lotus engineer Mark Slade.

The Finn also believes that the team have done a great job over the winter and the Finn feels that the team will be able to achieve the results that they want and indeed they deserve over the course of the season as long as they can continue to improve the car.

© Ben Johnston 2015

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