Ferrari is set to poach McLaren for one of its senior Formula 1 personnel for the key role of being the new race engineer for Lewis Hamilton, it has been claimed.
Hamilton is without a race engineer since the recent axing of Riccardo Adami, who has been shuffled to the role of its Academy and TPC testing head.
The seven-time World Champion appeared to have little to no rapport with the Italian, and apparent concerns about a potential continuation of this led to the Scuderia’s decision.
It now means that on the eve of the new season, Ferrari will have to find a replacement in what is a crucial role, given Hamilton’s fierce determination to make up for a wretched first season in red.
Firstly, the team is set to re-hire, on a part-time basis, the services of Carlo Santi, a former race engineer to Kimi Raikkonen, and the man perhaps best known for his infamous “You will not have the drink” radio message to the Finn.
But Italian publication Corriere dello Sport has reported that Ferrari is “waiting for a new figure to come, it seems, from McLaren.”
The McLaren figure is thought to be Cedric-Michel Grosjean, most recently the Woking-based squad’s Lead Trackside Performance Engineer,
The Frenchman left McLaren at the end of last season, and, according to his LinkedIn page, is on a “career break”, but recently liked a post referring to this year’s car.
Grosjean has not worked anywhere else, thereforer would provide him with a real step into the unknown should he be hired for the role.
Bryan Bozzi, the race engineer of Hamilton’s team-mate Charles Leclerc, will reportedly be assisting as Hamilton’s interim over the course of pre-teasting testing.
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