Ferrari grilled on Adrian Newey interest amid rumours of huge contract signed

Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur has praised Adrian Newey’s “mega record” in F1 amid rumours that the Red Bull design guru has already signed a contract to join the Scuderia.

Red Bull announced earlier this month that Newey will leave the team in early F1 2025 after a hugely successful 19-year spell in which the 65-year-old has designed title-winning cars for both Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen.

Adrian Newey to join Ferrari?

The terms of his exit, negotiated by his manager Eddie Jordan, will allow Newey – the most decorated individual in F1 history with more than 200 race wins, 13 Drivers’ and 12 Constructors’ Championships to his name – to start work with another team in the lead up to the huge F1 2026 regulation changes.

The news of Newey’s exit came amid speculation that he had received contract offers from Aston Martin and Ferrari over recent months.

And after Newey teased that he is likely to seek a fresh start with another team, a report by the Mail earlier this week claimed that Italian sources have indicated that he has already signed a deal to join Ferrari – potentially worth significantly more than the estimated £15million per year he currently earns at Red Bull.

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Reports in the days after Newey’s Red Bull departure had claimed he had met Vasseur in London before flying out to the Miami Grand Prix in an attempt by the Ferrari boss to seal the deal.

Speaking to reporters at Imola ahead of this weekend’s Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, however, Vasseur refused to offer an update on Ferrari’s reported attempts to sign Newey.

He said: “Adrian has a mega record. He’s the most successful engineer in the paddock. I don’t know about statistics, but I would say that it’s like this probably.

“But I have no comment to make on this.”

Vasseur has overseen a huge transformation at Ferrari since being appointed team principal in late 2022, guiding the team to two victories – at Singapore 2023 and Australia 2024 – since taking charge.

Ferrari have embarked upon an ambitious recruitment drive since Vasseur’s arrival, luring seven-time World Champion Lewis Hamilton – as well as Loïc Serra and Jerome d’Ambrosio – from Mercedes over recent months.

With Ferrari introducing their first major upgrade of the F1 2024 season at Imola, Vasseur explained that the team are currently balancing short-term targets with long-term goals as the Scuderia aim to return to the top.

He said: “We are speaking about the long term and the short term, but we are at the phase of the season where the short term is crucial.

“We are pushing like hell. I trust the guys that we have in the team, but then the future will be the future.

“Honestly, it’s the occupation of Ferrari today to improve step by step, small step by small step. And I trust the people that we have in the company that they are doing a good job.

“If you compare with one year ago and the beginning of May, which was Miami, we were one second off. And last week in Miami, we were 0.1 to 0.15 seconds off.

“It means that we made a huge step forward, but it’s not enough because clearly I think Red Bull is still ahead.

“It’s much less and not always, but they are still a little bit ahead.

“We have to continue [moving] hundredths by hundredths. And we have to be focused on the fact that it will never be five tenths by five tenths. That will be a mistake.

“If we have to compensate and to catch up, it will be hundredths by hundredths and not to imagine that there is a magic bullet.”

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