‘Send you home’ – Guenther Steiner’s Ferrari solution to Hamilton and Leclerc’s rivalry

Fred Vasseur may be dealing with a hair-tearing situation as he deals with tensions between Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, but Guenther Steiner suggested it could be worse.

Steiner says, given Ferrari’s current driver pairing or one that featured only one of them, he knows the pairing he’d prefer.

Guenther Steiner suggests Ferrari solution

Hamilton and Leclerc went wheel-to-wheel on the opening lap of the Mexico City Grand Prix, which neither driver won despite lining up first and third on the grid.

Antics at Turn 1 and again at Turn 4 saw Leclerc run in first place, but with a five-second penalty hanging over his head, while Hamilton fell behind eventual race winner Max Verstappen.

Both drivers were unhappy, with Hamilton accusing Leclerc of “working against him”, while the new father said he too could take umbrage as Hamilton “pushed me off the track out of Turn 1”.

But no one was more frustrated than Ferrari team principal Vasseur, who spoke with his drivers on Thursday evening in Brazil.

“The conclusion of the meeting yesterday evening was clear,” he said. “It was a clear reminder that Ferrari is coming first, is coming first for the brand, for the employees, for the Tifosi, and this we have to keep in mind.”

Steiner says he’s not surprised by the growing rivalry between Hamilton and Leclerc as they are both number one drivers who want to win.

But it is a situation that beats having a number one driver and another who may not have the talent to win.

“They are both drivers who want to win, and one and only one can win,” Steiner told the Red Flag podcast.

“It’s a fantastic problem to have for Fred, but it’s a very not-so-fantastic problem to have.

“It’s a fantastic problem, because you’ve got two drivers who actually have the talent to win races, but they get in the way of each other.

“I always say, would you rather have one driver who is as good as either of them – I’m not prioritising – and then have somebody like Lance Stroll.

“Would that make you happy? If I was team principal, that would not make me happy.

“Obviously, they have got a problem to deal with. They need to deal with that.

“Do you think they will resolve the situation? I do not think so. This situation will come up again, because they want to win.”

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But while Vasseur insisted that the “guidelines are still the same” for his Ferrari drivers, Steiner believes he needs to set out consequences for any further clashes.

Quizzed on whether it was on Vasseur to lay out rules of engagement for his drivers, as Mercedes did when Hamilton and Nico Rosberg were fighting over the world titles, Steiner believes only one rule would actually have an impact.

But rather than fining the drivers if they crash into each other, as Mercedes did, Steiner suggests benching them.

“I think when you do that [make the drivers pay for the cost of the damage], you risk that they say, ‘Yeah, I will pay’. And what do you do then?” he said.

“You haven’t sorted the problem; you’ve moved the problem.

“As smart as it sounds what Toto did with Nico and Lewis, and maybe it worked, but if I were one of the two drivers – and they’ve got s**tloads of money, they don’t have to worry about a million dollars – say ‘You gave me the option, I want to pay for it, I’m alright with that, but you gave me an option’.

“So I think you need to be careful. Once you’ve said this, you gave them a choice.”

Steiner put forward his solution. “Say, ‘Hey guys, enough is enough’. Then you’ve got the problem like in this case, would you bench Charles or both of them?

“I think at some stage, Fred will say it, ‘Hey guys, if you don’t work for the team, we send you home’. Otherwise, he tears his last hair out.”

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