Turrini points to the real problem: Verstappen is going to finish runner-up driving a car that was practically falling apart?

Ferrari has once again missed out on its long-awaited title in 2026. The prospect of at least beating McLaren and Red Bull in the Constructors’ Championship offers the team some consolation. Yet the Scuderia has failed to realise its full potential this year, and Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton bear a significant share of the blame.

Brake problems, strategic blunders, individual errors, an inability to work together, dreadful communication between the drivers and the pit wall. These are just some of the biggest issues that have cost Ferrari points this year. No, addressing them would not have been enough to beat Mercedes and Antonelli, but banking points and extracting the car’s full potential could be crucial in 2027.

Ferrari must keep addressing its weaknesses and cannot settle for second overall, a position which, according to legendary Italian journalist Leo Turrini, flatters the team after a season like this.

“Watching Mercedes celebrate in Brazil after clinching their first Constructors’ Championship since 2021, I couldn’t help but recall something John Elkann said a few years ago. In 2022, if memory serves me right. The Ferrari chairman made a promise that nobody had asked him to make: ‘By 2026, we will be back on top of the world. Mark my words’,” wrote Turrini in his column for Quotidiano.

“But things have turned out rather differently. And so here we are again, telling ourselves that Ferrari somehow failed to extract the full potential from its car in damp conditions, in the wet, and everything in between. And believe me, “failed to extract the full potential” is a remarkably generous euphemism,” said Turrini.

According to Turrini, the dispute between Leclerc and Hamilton in Mexico completely overshadowed Ferrari’s real problem: it has lacked Mercedes’ pace this season, its drivers have not performed as well as Max Verstappen at Red Bull, and the team has won fewer races than McLaren. The drivers’ dispute in Mexico is therefore just one of many issues that need addressing.

“For now, we distract ourselves with the Hamilton–Leclerc feud. But to what end? Have we stopped to consider that Verstappen is going to finish runner-up in the Drivers’ Championship, despite having spent the first part of the season, right up until the beginning of summer, driving a car that was practically falling apart?” asked Turrini.

“Which brings me to a question: can we really go on like this indefinitely? Absolutely not. Do those entrusted with one of Italy’s last remaining national icons — Ferrari itself — actually have a plan? A strategy? A project? Even the faintest semblance of an idea about what the future might hold? In Formula 1, naturally,” wrote the well-known Italian journalist.

“An answer would be appreciated,” he concluded.