Q: Andrea, why don’t we start with you? It’s not a home race for McLaren, but it is a home race for you. You must have great memories of Emilia, and I’m thinking of battles when you were at Ferrari between Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso. Just tell us how special this one is for you.
Andrea Stella: Oh yeah, definitely a special venue. I work in Formula 1, but I also have quite a lot of passion for Formula 1, and Imola resonates with this passion. Let me say, first of all, from a circuit point of view – the layout, the fast, flowing and narrow track – you don’t find many like it. Suzuka is another one. Quite unforgiving; as soon as you make a mistake, it can be quite penalising. The going up and downhill. I think it’s great for the drivers, it’s great for the fans, and we do hope that this venue will stay as part of the calendar for the future because this would be fantastic for Formula 1. You talked about memories, and you mentioned the battles with Fernando Alonso. Yes, they were very interesting and, interestingly, they were opposite sides in 2005 and 2006. So, it goes back in the years, but I would like to take this opportunity – especially for the younger fans – to go and take a look at those two races, 2005 and 2006, because that was, I think in both cases, one of the closest races we have had in dry conditions. For me, a couple of additional memories – 2003, this Imola, I’m particularly attached to that race, because it was the season changer in the championship with Michael Schumacher. After a difficult start, we won here in Imola. I do remember that weekend very well, like it was yesterday, and then the season changed after that success. The final one is the winter testing of 2004. At the time, you could still take two cars of different seasons, and we had the 2003 and 2004 cars here in Imola, and they were going around at the same time – one driven by Michael and one driven by Rubens – and we realised that we had a super car in hand for 2004 because the lap time and the consistency of that car was great. So, a lot attached to this circuit, definitely from me. I would like to take advantage, if you allow me – and hopefully I’m not abusing all my time – as we talked about memories, to pay tribute to Fabrizio Borra. Fabrizio, I got to know him as Fernando Alonso’s physio in 2010. Since then, we have shared a journey in Formula 1. He has always been, since then, a great friend to me. Fabrizio was a person of dedication and generosity – a person that applied this dedication and generosity to the people, but also to the subject that he was the expert on. For me, I remember all the chats with Fabrizio – I learned a lot from him. He has been not only the physio and the reference for Fernando Alonso but also Gianmarco Tamberi, a gold medallist in high jump, and Marco Pantani in cycling – just to say the versatility of this individual. So, it’s a big, big loss. We are all very sad. All our thoughts are with the family, and definitely I want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to pay tribute to Fabrizio.
Q: Thank you for those kind words. Quick performance question now. You talked about a supercar in the 2004 Ferrari. Clearly the 2025 McLaren can be talked about in a similar vein. Talk to us about Miami and the dominance you had there. Do you understand why you were so far ahead?AS: Talking about Miami, I think we are understanding the strengths of the MCL39, which overall is a competitive car, but in some conditions it seems to have a certain advantage over the rest of the field. These conditions materialised very well in Miami with the track layout, the speed range, the ambient temperatures. But we know very well that in some other kinds of circuits like Saudi or Japan, it’s a different story. Everything gets quite a lot tighter. So, hopefully we will be able to retain this characteristic and this advantage over the course of the season. But I think this will require the car to be developed, to be upgraded, because we see that no one is waiting, no one is standing still. We see upgrades being brought trackside by our competitors. We do plan to upgrade the MCL39 and try and, if anything, possibly make the car even more suitable for a wider range of conditions and cornering speed.
Q: Final one from me: Oscar Piastri was sitting where you are yesterday. He talked about marginal gains and the improvements he’s made since last year. He said he’s looked in every column of performance but gave no more specifics than that. Where have you seen Oscar improve?AS: Well, I think the most important improvement, if anything, is that Oscar has become a faster driver. I think when you are a faster driver then you have more opportunity, more time to process, more bandwidth to process things. And this is true when you are in the car, and this is also true when you are outside the car. Because the speed is there – let’s process all the other marginal gains that will then then, at the end of the weekend, constitute the performance that you need to have the kind of results that he’s having at the moment. In addition to that, over the winter, there’s been a very specific amount of work that has gone – has paid attention to different areas. It’s been quite holistic. While Oscar is definitely the main one to praise for these developments, I would like to mention the team around Oscar – his engineers and all the support from the factory with all the analysis – and even the team, Mark Webber, that works with Oscar. He’s definitely a great source of thoughts, insight and identification of opportunities. So, there’s quite a lot of work behind this progress. But ultimately, hats off to Oscar who has been able to capitalise.
Q: Fred, let’s come to you next. Definitely a home race for Ferrari. Can we start with that? How much of a shot in the arm is it for the team just to see the tifosi in their thousands?Frederic Vasseur: Yeah, but it’s always a special one. A bit like Monza. This one is different because it’s even closer to the factory. A lot of people of the team live in Bologna or even closer to the track, and this is a special place for sure. But at the end of the day, we have to approach the race in the same way as the others and try to do the best job that we can. It’s perhaps an extra pressure, but we have to take this as a positive – as a push more than something else. And to see all the fans and the tifosi in the grandstands is, for sure, an extra motivation.
Q: Has Lewis commented about it? Is he feeding off the support?FV: Yeah. Even this week, you know, from the factory – from Monday onwards – we had people outside the factory in front of the gate. This is a huge push for the drivers also. They were there in the morning when the drivers arrived, and they were there waiting until the evening. That means… I want to take it – and I think the driver is doing the same – to take it as extra motivation and a good push.
Q: Let’s talk performance now. You said yesterday that there have been occasions this year where you’ve left the Grand Prix feeling you haven’t extracted the maximum from the car. Just how much potential does it have and why is it proving so difficult to get that performance?FV: I think except McLaren, who are flying, we are all in the same situation – sometimes we are in a more or less good shape, and sometimes not. If you have a look at our performance, I think in Jeddah in the race we were in a very strong position – we did a very strong race – and in Miami, it was not the case at all. It means we have to understand this and make better usage of the car and the tyres if we want to be more consistent and try to catch up a little bit with McLaren.
Q: You mentioned Miami. It was a frustrating race for the team on many levels. You’ve had a bit of distance from it now. Let’s start with the radio traffic. What lessons were learned about that?FV: We don’t have to learn something. I took a decision – I think it was a good one – and then we explained the decision to the drivers. We checked the end and the chapter was closed. The chapter is still open for you, but not for me.
Q: Alright, well, let’s throw it forward to Monaco. Charles dominated that race last year. How much confidence do you go to the principality with next week?FV: It’s not a matter of being confident when you go somewhere, it’s a matter of doing a good job and to prepare very well the event. We know that Monaco is a one-off, a special one. But the situation is a bit different compared to last year. We have to do the best for Monaco, but exactly the same way we’re trying to do the best in Imola. Everybody will push for Monaco – not because it’s a special one that we have to do more or better. We are all trying to push at every single event of the season. For Charles, it’s a bit different because he’s at home. But I think now 85% of the drivers are at home in Monaco. It’s not anymore the case of the past. But for Charles, it’s a special one – for sure it is – but we don’t have to pay too much attention to this. We just have to prepare the event in the best way.
Q: Tim, let’s come to you now. Welcome to the FIA press conference. Nice to be back at a team having done a stint at the FIA?Tim Goss: Thank you very much. Yeah… No, no, don’t laugh, Fred! My time at the FIA was fantastic, to be honest. You know, it was a real pleasure and an honour actually to be helping, with the teams, to run the sport, as well as shaping the future of the sport. And it’s a fantastic place to be. You get to learn a lot of what’s going on. You feel that you’re giving a lot back in terms of the direction of the sport. But you miss the passion and the competitiveness, and ultimately that draws you back into a team. There’s nothing that beats being there – designing, developing a car, competing, building a team and an organisation that can work across disciplines, across locations in our case. So, no – ultimately, it’s the excitement and the passion. When the red lights go out, there’s something that you’re invested in, as opposed to just watching.
Q: You use the word competitiveness. This year’s car is clearly a very good one. How much potential do you think it has?TG: Certainly, we learned a lot from last year’s upgrades – what worked and what didn’t – learned a lot about how we worked together, how we made those choices, what characteristics were important, and we went about the 2025 car in a slightly different way. We also recognised during 2024 that our race pace wasn’t good enough. We were qualifying well but spent our races defending rather than consolidating our position. We built on those learnings over the winter and concentrated on providing a car that not only had load improvement but had a platform the race engineers could access more effectively – in terms of set-up and controllability from the car – and that allowed the drivers to get more out of the operating envelope. That in itself is not news to any Formula 1 team, but you have to try to get the balance of getting those characteristics right against ultimate load. I think we learned a lot out of 2024 and early 2025 and reaped the rewards with this car.
Check out our Friday gallery from Imola here.
