Coulthard: 'Vasseur not distracted by 'culture' at Ferrari'

Ferrari's plan to provide serious competition against Red Bull this year is already enduring fits and starts. With Carlos Sainz failing to make the podium at the season opener in Bahrain and Charles Leclerc not even making it to the end of the race, criticism is already being directed at Frederic Vasseur. Yet some argue that things do not have to turn out even more negative for Vasseur and his team.

Late last year, it was announced that Vasseur would succeed Mattia Binotto after the latter failed to achieve great success at the Italian team. People were hopeful about this change: many feel the Frenchman is the right person for the job because of his mentality. But, after the technical setbacks Ferrari suffered in Bahrain, the outlook for the team is already gloomy, despite Vasseur's arrival.

'Vasseur will not be distracted'

David Coulthard stated to Formule1.nl that Vasseur is still the man who can lead Ferrari to success. "Vasseur is a racer. Binotto was an engineer, [Maurizio] Arrivabene a marketing man. Vasseur is not distracted by peripheral issues, he is only focused on the performance of the car."

Added to this is the fact that it is advantageous that Vasseur is not Italian, according to the Scot. He will care less about the typical Italian 'culture' within the team. "It will be less about personal interests, reputations or relationships."

Word had been circulating in the motorsport world for some time, stating that Ferrari needed to appoint a non-Italian as team boss in order to create a change in the team's mentality. Now the question remains how long the process of change will take.