Born in the sacred city of Imola in 1965, Stefano
Domenicali always seemed to be destined for a career in motorsport
- and more specifically, Ferrari. Soon after graduating in 1991, he
was snapped up by the legendary Italian marque and appointed to an
anonymous administrative role. Two decades later, and the likeable
Italian finds himself having reached the top of the tree, the
designated heir to Jean Todt's sprawling empire. But since he's
moved into the biggest office in Maranello, Ferrari has stumbled.
For the past three years, the formerly dominant team has finished
twice third, and once fourth in the end of year standings. For any
other team, this wouldn't be something to lose sleep over. At the
Scuderia though, it's a crisis of huge proportions.
So the question is: does the blame for Ferrari's
underwhelming form lie with the man at the top? At times in the
last two years, the cars emerging from that famous factory have
been no better than upper midfield. It is testament to the talent
of Fernando Alonso that the squad was able to mount a late title
charge in 2010, and saw the rostrum at all in a bleak 2011 - for
teammate Felipe Massa is without a win in more than three years,
and this year became the first Ferrari driver to see out a full
season without a podium since 1981. Without the skills of the
Spaniard, the team would inhabit an entirely different world to
that of the early 2000s.
Often we talk of the magical combination of Jean
Todt, Ross Brawn and Michael Schumacher that took Ferrari to glory
during those extraordinary years. Each played a huge part, but each
has now moved on. Is this the problem? It may be part of it, but
the team enjoys strength in depth. The biggest problem in the last
few years has been Ferrari's inability to adapt to rule changes
anywhere near as effectively as Red Bull, and to some degree,
McLaren. And then there's Massa, who shows the occasional glimpse
of his former self but remains a firm candidate for
replacement.
Much of the top level team responsible for the
successes of the late nineties and early noughties are gone. Todt
has bigger fish to fry these days, while Brawn and Schumacher are
trying to recreate the old magic in Brackley. Meanwhile, design
wizard Rory Byrne has returned to retirement and his successor Aldo
Costa and Schumacher's trusted race engineer Chris Dyer have been
sacrificed in the search for success. No team can recover from such
a high turnover of top level staff without a few bumps in the road,
particularly as the influx has seemingly consisted of only Pat Fry,
poached from McLaren and quickly given free reign to whip the
Prancing Horse into shape. Of the old guard only Domenicali retains
a prominent role, and he's pinning his hopes solely on Fry
producing something which will allow the team to unleash
Alonso.
The future is uncertain unless Ferrari can exploit
upcoming rule changes significantly affecting the engine and the
rear of the car to revisit past successes. However, if they
continue to occupy the land of few trophies, then there will be
consequences. Luca di Montezemolo loves his team like a first born
child, and now there are echoes of the long drought which preceded
Schumacher's arrival. His lieutenants have gone: if success
continues to evade Formula One's foremost power, then there's only
one man left to absorb the blame.