‘What did that achieve?’ Collins, Kravitz push back on Elkann’s blunt Ferrari call-out
John Elkann lit the fuse, and the paddock heard it. In the aftermath of Ferrari’s bruising double DNF in São Paulo, the Ferrari president delivered a stark message in Milan: mechanics and engineers are “first class,” but “the rest is not up to par.” He added that Ferrari’s drivers “need to focus on driving, talk less,” and underlined a goal that now feels like a rallying cry as much as a target — claw back to second in the Constructors’ standings before the flag falls on 2025.
If it was designed to sharpen minds at Maranello, it’s sparked a different debate in the meantime: is public fire-and-brimstone the right tool for a team already nursing a result that stung?
Bernie Collins, the former McLaren performance engineer and Aston Martin strategy chief, wasn’t convinced. Speaking on Sky’s The F1 Show, she reached for an old garage maxim — the beatings don’t fix morale — and asked the question many inside the sport have been muttering since: what’s the upside?
“Drivers are fundamentally selfish — that’s how they score points — but neither of them aimed to DNF,” she said of Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton. “On Sunday the team’s points and their points were aligned. Maximum points was the aim. What has that [public criticism] gained Ferrari? Not a lot.”
It was, remember, a pinball kind of race. Leclerc was eliminated in the Lap 1 chaos triggered by Oscar Piastri and Kimi Antonelli. Hamilton picked up floor damage in the early scrapping with Franco Colapinto’s Alpine and was later parked. No points, a long flight home, and a slip to fourth in the Constructors’ fight — with Mercedes now 36 points clear in second and only three rounds to go.
All of this arrived on the same weekend Ferrari were popping champagne in Bahrain, where the marque sealed a WEC title double. Elkann leaned heavily on that contrast. “Ferrari wins when it is united,” he said. “When everyone is together, great things can be achieved.”
That unity line is the crux — and the risk. Publicly pointing the finger at drivers rarely lands softly, particularly when the on-track story is more nuanced than “talk less, drive more.” Ted Kravitz, reporting for Sky F1, offered his own defence of the pair, arguing that their points haul has papered over a car that still isn’t happy at low ride heights — a limitation a mid-season upgrade around Spa never truly cured.
“It’s the drivers who’ve been plugging in the points,” Kravitz said, noting that both Leclerc and Hamilton posted messages after Brazil to present a united front. “You can say what you like about them, but they’re thinking about the team.”
That last point matters inside Ferrari’s current trajectory. Since Fred Vasseur took over as team principal, the Scuderia has made a habit of steady, incremental gains. Strategy missteps have been fewer, pit stops consistently sharp. But there’s still a gap to the outright benchmark, and the 2025 car’s sensitivity — particularly when it can’t be run low without tripping over the plank — has been a recurring theme.
Which brings us back to Elkann’s tone. You can understand the frustration. Ferrari haven’t won the Constructors’ title since 2008, and this season, with Hamilton joining Leclerc, always carried an expectation of forward motion. But Collins’ point is hard to argue with: neither driver is the source of that 17-year drought, and both are wired to extract whatever’s on the table every Sunday.
The more charitable reading is that Elkann fired a warning shot for unity, not a grenade. Collins hopes as much, suggesting it was the wrong moment and the wrong words for a message that, inside the factory, is probably more about everyone maxing out their own patch than about silencing the drivers.
Either way, Ferrari now have a choice. They can let this become a talking point about messaging and morale, or they can use it as a line in the sand. Second in the Constructors’ is still within reach — not glamorous, but meaningful — and in a year where the car’s ceiling has been below the very best, it would be a clear sign of progress.
Public hairdryers make headlines. They don’t add downforce. If Ferrari are going to leave 2025 with something tangible, they’ll need the same thing Elkann praised in Bahrain: a united team, and two drivers left to do what they do best.
