Fred Vasseur couldn't hide his frustration. Amid pressure to bring Ferrari back to championship glory, he must deal with endless rumors about his own future. After the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Vasseur spoke with a tone rarely heard from him: he and his team are disturbed by the relentless speculation.
Since taking over as team principal from Mattia Binotto in 2023, Vasseur has yet to deliver a world title. The 2026 season has been full of twists. Ferrari is said to have the best chassis on the grid, but a power unit deficit has kept that potential at bay. In Baku, both red cars finished fourth and sixth—a far cry from expectations.
But what angered Vasseur more was not the on-track performance, but the noise off it. A recent interview with former Red Bull boss Christian Horner in The Times added fuel to the fire. Horner stated that if he were to run an F1 team again, there's only one team for which he would accept a non-ownership role. That team was implied to be Ferrari, which he called 'the dream' and 'arguably the sleeping giant of F1'.
When asked by The Race about the noise surrounding his future and Ferrari's leadership plans, Vasseur, usually jovial and deflective, turned serious. "Ah, we are not working in the perfect serenity," he insisted. "For me firstly, but for everybody in the team. For the media, for 50% of the questions to be about this, I think it's a bit of a frustrating situation."
He added that his team is fighting for second in the championship, yet discussions in the garage often revolve around the rumors. "We are fighting for P2 in the championship, and at the end of the day, we are all speaking a lot about this, and even for the guys in the garage, to discuss about this, it's the best discussion that we can have. But it is what it is, it's not in my hands. Mr Horner is looking for a job - that everybody knows - everywhere. But what can I do? Just try to do my best to push the team, to rise them to be motivated, focus on what is better today. Each interview, 25 times a day, we are coming back to this."
Nevertheless, Vasseur reaffirmed his commitment to Ferrari. He called his current job 'the best job in the world'. However, he also added a somewhat cryptic remark: "But it is like it is. We have still seven races to go, and I will push until the last corner."
When asked if he would be open to working with Horner at Ferrari, he joked: "You have to ask my assistant." That answer may have eased the tension momentarily, but it still leaves a big question mark over the future of the leadership seat at Ferrari.
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