Ferrari transferred Leclerc and Saint’s contracts to the new year

Both Maranello drivers’ contracts expire at the end of 2024, and although Ferrari had intended to announce its rumored new multi-year deal with Charles Leclerc on Christmas Eve, this will not happen. Now, according to the Italian press, the official announcements of Monegasque and Carlos Sainz’s new contracts will take place from the new year.

Wasser explained that the reason for the delay was Ferrari’s frantic effort to improve the SF-23 at the end of the 2023 season and thereby take second place in the constructors’ championship against Mercedes. In the midst of all this, there was no time to finalize all the details of the new contracts.

Nevertheless, the Frenchman said with certainty that Leclerc-Sainth will stay with Scuderia beyond 2024. For the former, there was almost no doubt, but for Saith, recent reports suggested that negotiations had broken down, as the Spaniard wanted at least a two-year contract, while Ferrari offered him a one-year deal with the option of a further year.

Spanish journalists pressed Vasseur for answers during the Scuderia’s Christmas dinner with journalists, and the Frenchman replied: “As you know, [οι Λεκλέρ-Σάινθ] You are under contract with us until the end of 2024, which means we still have a few months ahead of us. This year the Mercedes extended the contracts of its two drivers for 2024 at the end of August.

So I think we still have weeks and months ahead of us. A year ago I told you that I would try to make a decision by the end of this year, but I have to admit that the last part of the year was very demanding.

We have met and started our discussions, but we are a little behind our original plan. I don’t see any problem with that at all. We will make our decision soon.”, Water added. And when asked if the new contracts will be signed before the start of next season, he replied “yes”. “That is the goal”.

However, it should be noted that Carlos Sainz plays a crucial role in the 2025 transfer puzzle, as his name has been heard by half of all teams in the sport – from Sauber and Alpine earlier this year to McLaren and Aston Martin more recently. And many argue that he may choose a different path if Scuderia prioritizes Leclerc in the coming years.

Wasser was asked about it and he replied: I still remember a year ago in this very room receiving a lot of questions about “Charles will be the No. 1 driver and Carlos will be the No. 2 driver in the team.” But we have shown several times that we make sure that our two drivers are treated equally. I think Singapore was the perfect example.

There Charles agreed to start on the soft tire to overtake Russell and control his pace just to help Carlos. We have two drivers who do a good job. Carlos was very strong after the summer break with an excellent two days in Monza and Singapore and that proved to be motivation for Charles as we saw at the end of the season.

We will continue in this direction. I don’t want to have a good driver and a runner-up, we have two cars and two valuable drivers and I think one of the positive aspects of the season was the performance of Carlos and Charles. They gave the team practically the same points, with a small difference, and we want to continue like that.”concluded Fred Wasser.