Vasseur takes firm stance: 'Don't spread rumors like this'

With the rumors laid to rest following official contract extension, Frederic Vasseur has returned to address the speculation linking him to a potential departure from Ferrari a few weeks ago, as well as his outburst during the press conference in Canada.

Just days before the Canadian Grand Prix in June, an Italian media outlet reported speculation that Frederic Vasseur’s position was at risk, with Antonella Coletta, head of the WEC division, reportedly ready to replace him at the end of the season.

These rumors, however, proved unfounded, as Ferrari confirmed the Frenchman’s stay with a multi-year contract extension a few weeks later, effectively putting the speculation to rest.

Vasseur’s reaction to the rumors in Montreal caused quite a stir, with the Frenchman visibly angered during the press conference by the leaked information, which ultimately turned out not to be true.

Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur

Vasseur knew he would have been more exposed at Ferrari

Appearing on the F1 Beyond the Grid podcast, the Ferrari team principal revisited the incident, clarifying his position: ''When I signed at Ferrari, I knew about this. I knew that I would be exposed to the gossips, to the rumors, to this kind of polemic.''

Vasseur also highlighted two other aspects of that article that had upset him: ''The first one was, ah, probably that Loic (Serra) is not the right guy for the job. Loic arrived after the car. And I was a bit upset that you can throw a name like this under the bus just to create the polemic. It was absolutely nonsense.''

''The second point was about Charles. They said 'Charles will go to Mercedes. It was the same article, the last five, six races. And Charles, each Thursday, is coming back to say, 'guys, it's not true. I'm at Ferrari. I want to stay.'''

''At one stage, I think this article is more to create the mess than something else. And it's where I say, guys, please calm down. If you want to, I'm not asking the press to be positive with Ferrari when we are not doing well. You can have a negative judgment.''

He then joked: ''I don't want to say the word because I don't want to have to go to the steward, but to spread this on the team each weekend, please calm down. Be negative when we are doing a poor job on track, but don't spread rumors like this.''

Finally, Vasseur emphasized that his concerns were directed less at himself and more at the employees, who could have been negatively affected by the rumors.

''What you have to understand is that behind the names, you have families. You have to imagine that we have someone in place doing the same job. It means that the guy can imagine that he's fired. The wife of the guy can imagine that he will be fired.''

''And each time that we have to calm down this, it means that I will never stop the guys to write something like this, but they have also to understand they are not helping at all.''

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