Why I hate Ferrari.

[Starling]

I'm Italian so this is like taking the Lord's name in vain, right?
My late Mom was a Ferrarista. She said Ferrari is one of the few good things Italy is known worldwide for. Fair enough.
Also I love red.
Period.

I started seriously watching F1 in 1986 (because I fell in love with ABB - Another Bloody Brazilian). Correct me if I'm wrong, but that was the last frickin' time they hired an Italian driver, the great and sorely missed Alboreto***. Despite having a pool of young talented Italian test pilots, they never hired one again. No, it had to be the latest champion, the coolest guy, the one full of cash - at one point it didn't even feel like an Italian team anymore. (I only loved Kimi because he was Kimi; incidentally the last one to win a championship for Ferrari.)

And the toxic fans. Now, maybe all F1 fans are so frickin' bigoted and moronic for their home team, but somehow I doubt it. Watching quali in Monza in person, I heard Italian guys on the stands saying "I don't care if Senna dies". "Close friends" (I booted them immediately) even said "I HOPE that Senna dies." After Imola 1994 I wanted to ask them: Are you happy, are you satisfied? How long can you stand the heat?

A few years ago another Italian "close friend" (not a strict Ferrari fan, but still) said that F1 now was boring and someone needed to die. (Jules Bianchi has entered the chat.) He also said that grieving for Senna was stupid because Ratzenberger died too. Have you noticed that I never say "When Senna died" but only "Imola 1994"? Yeah, HE didn't notice. I literally RIPPED into him.

Then there's a question I'm not qualified to expand on, but at the time it made me mad. After Imola '94 I stopped buying Autosprint and even reading the newspapers' F1 pages. It took me 12 years to get over it. (Now I'm finally at peace.) But something keeps bugging me: the fact that regulations changed because the precious Ferrari darlings kept losing, so they took away a lot of electronics that could have saved my boys' life. I repeat, I might be completely wrong. Please enlighten me.

Now finally I follow F1 with a degree of serenity and I love Ferrari's drivers. Leclerc actually gives me Senna vibes. What does the team do? Throws away victories because since 1950 they haven't figured out yet the frickin' pit stop strategy.

Thanks for letting me vent, and again, feel free to correct me. But I just have to ask: do British fans wish death on rivals so that Hamilton wins?

***EDIT! Ivan Capelli in 1992 - he hated it and they sacked him before the season ended. Figures.

[erwin greven]

To be short with the first reply: Many designers in F1 urged the FIA to be less rigorous with banning all driver aids. In particular, with the active suspension. The announcement of the ban was pretty late in the season (1993). And the designs of most F1 cars for 1994 were in a late stadium. The designers feared that the cars would be next to uncontrollable.
Therefore, the designers asked the FIA to ban the driver aids in steps. First the traction control, ABS and other systems that did not impact the stability of the cars that much. Drivers would get used to the absence of TC very fast. And then a year later, the active suspension. Sadly, the FIA did not agree and Senna/Hill got confronted with a car that was barely drivable.

[Starling]

To be short with the first reply: Many designers in F1 urged the FIA to be less rigorous with banning all driver aids. In particular, with the active suspension. The announcement of the ban was pretty late in the season (1993). And the designs of most F1 cars for 1994 were in a late stadium. The designers feared that the cars would be next to uncontrollable.
Therefore, the designers asked the FIA to ban the driver aids in steps. First the traction control, ABS and other systems that did not impact the stability of the cars that much. Drivers would get used to the absence of TC very fast. And then a year later, the active suspension. Sadly, the FIA did not agree and Senna/Hill got confronted with a car that was barely drivable.

Thanks, this is what I did not absorb at the time. Thanks also for mentioning Hill, the man who got back in the car that had just killed his teammate.

(Theories on why exactly Senna lost control belong elsewhere, but I agree with Hill's statement in his biography that it was "a perfect storm" of circumstances - car, track, a stressed and obsessed driver.)

[Nononsensecapeesh]

Hope Ferrari can learn from last year and get their act together for once.