RaceFans Round-up: Vasseur can succeed at Ferrari

In brief

‘Ferrari is a huge talent but Vasseur can do it’ – Grosjean

Grosjean, who drove for Vasseur’s ASM team when he won the Formula 3 Euro Series in 2007, said Ferrari is a “huge challenge for anyone” but believes his former boss “can do it.”

“He and Leclerc are very close friends and this helps the environment, but he also knows Sainz well,” Grosjean told La Gazzetta dello Sport.

“I won the 2007 F3 in his team and we worked together for a long time,” Grosjean added. “Frederic Vasseur is a born competitor, he understands racing like few others. And above all, I’ve never met a better technician to understand us pilots. It’s as if he were a pilot himself.”

‘Get politics out of sport’ – Mazepin

Nikita Mazepin, who lost his Formula 1 drive before the season began when Haas cut its ties with his father’s company Uralkali in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, says the widely criticised Football World Cup in Qatar serves as an example of “the need to untangle sports and politics.”

The FIA banned drivers from participating in events under Russian licences in response to the war, how in its tenth month, while football’s governing body FIFA barred the country’s team from the World Cup.

“We need to get back to a place where international competition was time for athletes to interact on a fair and neutral playing field and not be pushed into public debate,” Mazepin wrote on social media.

“The choice of public neutrality for athletes is not just a slogan or a cop-out. It is a right that has far-reaching implications if we are to avoid an infinite loop of contradiction and conflict.

“Let’s leave our differences and judgements at the door so that we can gain a greater understanding and acceptance of one another as we compete together. In the long run, getting the politics out of sports will serve the common good in a much deeper, more meaningful way.”

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