I don’t even know where to start with Ferrari anymore. After the Formula One São Paulo Grand Prix, it’s become impossible to pretend this season isn’t an absolute disaster. Both Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton DNF’d, Ferrari is sitting fourth in the championship, and now John Elkann, the company’s own chairman, decides this is the time to tell his drivers to “talk less and focus on driving.” Really? That’s the takeaway from yet another humiliating weekend?
Let’s be clear: Brazil wasn’t some unlucky one-off occasion. Leclerc was wiped out through no fault of his own when Kimi Antonelli got shoved off track by Oscar Piastri and spun into him. Hamilton’s race ended after various incidents of contact wrecked the floor of his SF-25. Brazil was one to forget for the Scuderia with two DNFs, zero points and a championship position that flatters them. Ferrari is now fourth in the Constructors’ Championship, behind Max Verstappen Racing. One driver, one car, out-scoring the entire Scuderia. If that doesn’t show how bad things have gotten, nothing will.
Both drivers called the weekend a “nightmare,” and they were right. But then Elkann, in all his corporate wisdom, decided to go public and say the engineers have “done their job,” the car “has improved,” and the “rest,” meaning the drivers, “are not up to par.” He even compared F1 to Ferrari’s success in the World Endurance Championship, basically implying that if the endurance team can win, so should Hamilton and Leclerc. The logic is laughable. F1 isn’t the same as WEC. You don’t win here by giving PR speeches about unity and your heritage in the sport. You win by building a car that works.
Both Leclerc and Hamilton posted their subtle responses to Elkann’s statements, promoting unity and standing by the team. At the end of the day, they are extremely PR trained and stopped short of calling out Ferrari’s pitfalls. Whether it’s a weakness, Charles Leclerc has been loyal to Ferrari since before he drove in F1, and on the other hand, Lewis has acknowledged the “Ferrari dream” even if it is tarnished.
When discussing the competence of these drivers, Charles Leclerc has been dragging this team up the standings for years. He’s taken Ferraris that had no business being near the front and stuck them there through sheer talent. This season alone, he’s put the SF-25 on pole in Hungary, finished second in Monaco and Mexico and somehow pulled off a podium in Austin, all in a car that’s nowhere near the top on pace. There hasn’t been any improvement to the car. Simply put, Leclerc is doing what great drivers do: performing miracles with broken machinery.
Lewis Hamilton, meanwhile, is still adapting to life in Rosso Corsa but already has a sprint win in China to his name. He hasn’t stood on a Grand Prix podium yet for Ferrari, but you can see the effort he’s putting in. You can hear it in every debrief and his improvement over the season. He’s bringing years of knowledge from Mercedes, a team that dominated nearly the entire turbo-hybrid era and trying to steer Ferrari in a better direction. And instead of listening, the chairman tells him to keep quiet and drive? It’s tone-deaf and insulting.
What exactly does Elkann think the drivers have been doing all year? Leclerc and Hamilton have been pushing this year’s car to the limit in a car that’s inconsistent, unpredictable and constantly underdeveloped. They’re not “talking” for the sake of it; they’re calling out what’s wrong because they’re the only ones inside the system who can see it clearly.
And here’s the part Elkann doesn’t seem to get: if you don’t let the drivers talk, you don’t get their input into making the car better. That’s how development works. Drivers are there to drive, but they are also part of the feedback loop that turns a good car into a great one. It’s the reason drivers do so much testing over the course of a season. Shut that loop down, and you stagnate, which is precisely what Ferrari’s been doing for years.
This whole “shut up and drive” mentality is exactly why Ferrari keeps failing. It’s this outdated, prideful idea that speaking up is disloyal, that criticism is weakness. The rest of the paddock has evolved. Red Bull and Mercedes encourage their drivers to collaborate directly with engineers. Ferrari, meanwhile, acts like it’s still the 1990s, more concerned with headlines than lap times.
And let’s talk about that supposed “car improvement.” Where is it? Analysts have said the SF-25 hasn’t made a meaningful step forward since the mid-season floor update, and even that didn’t solve its most significant issues. The car still struggles in high-speed corners, still chews through its tires, and still loses balance in dirty air. That’s not an improvement, but sure, blame the guys driving it.
Ferrari’s obsession with image has become its downfall. Everything has to be about “heritage” and “honour” and “being Ferrari.” Meanwhile, McLaren, Red Bull and Mercedes they’re focused on process, technology and execution. Ferrari’s still busy trying to protect its legacy from criticism. You can’t innovate when you’re terrified of admitting something’s broken.
Elkann’s comparison to the WEC team is the perfect example of how out of touch this leadership is. The Le Mans program won because it was built on collaboration and freedom. The F1 team, on the other hand, is drowning in hierarchy. Everyone’s protecting their corner instead of fixing the core problems. The moment someone speaks up, even the drivers, they’re told to be quiet.
Ferrari needs to stop silencing its talent and start listening to it. Leclerc knows what he needs from a car; he’s been there long enough to understand precisely where Ferrari falls short. Hamilton knows what a championship-winning culture looks like; he lived it for over a decade. You don’t tell those drivers to “talk less.” You give them a seat at the table.
Ferrari’s not failing because the drivers aren’t united. It’s failing because the team itself isn’t. There’s no shared direction, no accountability, and no willingness to evolve. Every time progress seems possible, corporate pride gets in the way. And until that changes, the red car that once terrified the grid will keep being just another midfield machine wearing a famous badge.
Leclerc’s talent is being wasted in his prime. Hamilton’s experience is being ignored. The engineers are doing their best with what they have, but leadership keeps rewriting the narrative to protect itself. Telling your drivers to shut up and drive isn’t leadership; it’s deflection.
Ferrari can talk all it wants about unity, but that doesn’t mean silencing the drivers when something isn’t working. It’s instead trusting in them. It’s admitting when you’ve failed and working together to fix it. Until Elkann and the rest of corporate Ferrari figure that out, it won’t matter who’s behind the wheel, whether it’s Leclerc, Hamilton, or anyone else. They’ll all be driving the same thing: a car weighed down by the past and sabotaged by its own arrogance.