Luigi Mazzola by birth, "the Engineer" with a capital I for all fans and professionals in the world of Formula 1 and beyond. He immediately had clear ideas about his place in the world, the track. Mazzola he entered Formula 1 and Ferrari in 1988 after a first experience in Lamborghini as a recent graduate. Dedication and commitment take him to the gates of Maranello, whose threshold represents passion, creativity and the pursuit of performance. All values that unite an entire nation making it, still today, unique in the world, and which in the following years led the engineer Mazzola to say "this is my way”, or at least the beginning. Because you never know where life can take you.
The long career in F1
The myth of Ferrari attracts him, the combination with Villeneuve, such a unique and special driver motivates him even more. Over the years in Maranello Mazzola becomes a point of reference, in a role, that of Race Engineer, which now has less power and less responsibility than in the years in which he held it. Now each task corresponds to a specific figure whereas previously you had to have a complete vision and knowledge not only of the car, but also of all those who worked on it, including drivers, mechanics and engineers. Throughout his career Mazzola won eight constructors' world championships and six Formula 1 drivers' world championships, working closely with champions of the caliber of Prost, Schumacher, Raikkonen, Massa and Alesi. In 2009 he bid farewell to Ferrari, to follow the next path in his career, which now leads him to teaching leadership in the field of management, carrying forward the messages and lessons he has learned in this strange and complex world of F1.
Mazzola: between Ferrari, Red Bull, directive and beyond
On the occasion of the Suzuka Grand Prix, we had the opportunity, and the honor of interview the engineer Luigi Mazzola, touching on various themes. From his professional career to Ferrari's first victory this season in Singapore, and the Red Bull debacle, penalized - perhaps - by the FIA directive, which could give a different twist to the final part of the season.
Engineer Mazzola, do we want to retrace your path that led you to enter F1?
"It all began following his degree in mechanical engineering at the Polytechnic of Turin. I started from there, for a couple of months, working for Lamborghini and then being called by the Ferrari sports management in F1. I joined Maranello on 1 September 1988: I was in charge of the calculations, technical and drawings office, but my real destination has always been the track. For this reason, I immediately began to deal with tests. I had two superior colleagues who were engineers from Alboreto and Berger. I started with them. Subsequently he arrived in Alboreto's place mansell and I started to get busy tests together with them, and then I focused alone on the work dedicated to test drivers, until arriving in the race as Prost's engineer".
"I did the 1990-1991 championships with him but I didn't agree with the development policy that was taking place at Ferrari and for this reason mi I fired. Peter Sauber heard the news, he called me and in the spring of 1992 I decided to sign for Sauber. We built the car, in which I was practically the only F1 exponent, and then we started the championship in 1993. In South Africa, in the first race, we were in front of the Ferrari and president Montezemolo called me asking me to come back".
The new return to Ferrari
"I returned at the end of 1993 and from that moment the new course began. Jean Todt was there and from there I went back to being a track engineer, and then took over the test team in 1995 which became an incredible Ferrari task force with three structures, three working groups and much more. It became a huge department that allowed us to develop and see the evolution of the car by practically having three on the track: one in Mugello, one in Fiorano and one in Barcelona. From that moment on I started to get more and more involved of the performance and reliability sector, before saying goodbye in 2009. I decided to leave the world of F1, abandoning my job to be able to dedicate myself to the new job that I still do today. I miss competitive F1, but what I do today also really energizes me".
During his career he never hid the fact that his years at the Polytechnic were difficult. This is why I ask you, but once you arrived in F1: "I deserved it"Have you ever thought that?"
"I deserved it only for the will I had to enter that world. I was blown away by the Ferrari-Villeneuve pairing, which for me was truly incredible: Ferrari which has a legend and an explosive driver like Villeneuve. If you want, I can say yes, I deserved it just for the perseverance of believing in it. Then, instead, say I deserved it for the competence and for the work I'll leave that to someone else".
The role of the engineer: “How many changes it has undergone”
Compared to the past, how much has the figure of the engineer in F1 changed?
"When I started I was very young. At the time, to become a race engineer you had to have a lot of experience behind you, also because the role was much more important at the time. First of all because there were a maximum of thirty people on the track during a weekend. The race engineer was a catalyst for all the activities around the car, including mechanics and technicians. For this reason he had to have a vision, a knowledge of the car from every point of view: from the engine, to the gearbox, to the hydraulic system, the set-up, the brakes, the fuel management... and more. He had everything in his hands. Nobody could decide on the car except him, who was among other things the pilot's only point of reference. So, this 'little character', as I like to call him, had in his hands all the activities that were around the machine and must have competence, ability and authority to be able to make everything run like clockwork".
"There wasn't a specific strategist in that period, as perhaps there is today for strategies: he was always the track engineer. Not to mention the technology: telemetry, to give you an example, didn't exist. When it was necessary to make the reports you needed a printout of all the laps with the sampling frequency you had: you would get a 2cm thick package and you had to identify where the straight line was and where the curve was. Now, however, there is much more specialization. The race engineer has much less value, much less power. There are more people and figures who work with a specific purpose, which is why I say that the role has completely changed, almost diminished. At the time the track engineer was the pilot's point of reference".
Mazzola: “Before the engineer was the real right shoulder of the pilot”
"Now the driver, within the chain, is the weakest element from a psychological point of view, because he is the one who has to achieve the result, which the fastest teammate could have. He's the one who has a lot of pressure and needs support and the track engineer was almost the driver's psychologist too. He was the real sidekick: he had to motivate, spur or bullshit; but it was also important for the pilot. Now, around the driver you have the coach, the physiotherapist, the team principal...many figures that make everything confusing. I believe that today a track engineer does not fully know what is in the car, while some time ago you knew everything".

The importance of the psychological aspect
During his career he also focused a lot on the study of the human mind. What is a pilot's head like and how difficult is it to know how to get inside?
"The definition, from the psychologist's side, or at least let's call it that, of the track engineer is this: it is the pilot's placebo effect, such that the pilot becomes a placebo of himself. This means that the track engineer, based on his skills, in addition to those related to the car, must possess some soft skills. The need is to create those three fundamental aspects for the placebo effect, namely: condition the pilot through a technical meaning that can give explanations of what could happen to the car when it is changed, creating expectations. This obviously means conditioning his thinking. This allows the rider to believe in it and push even harder. At that point, the driver becomes a placebo of himself because for him this will be satisfactory to improve performance: he goes in the car and will go faster, even if the track engineer hasn't changed anything, but it only pushed the driver to go faster by making him believe that the car will be better".
“Only in this way will the pilot start to trust you”
"This is the attitude that I have used many times: it is obvious that initially the pilot will get angry because he will believe that I am making fun of him, but he will also realize that he has gone stronger. Only in this way can you become charismatic towards him: he will trust you and this becomes a fundamental aspect. These are topics, I tell you clearly, that no one in F1 has ever developed or studied properly. I noticed this and for this reason I chose to delve deeper into this environment, which is fundamental for managing mechanics and technicians and knowing how to cope with both my superiors and also the champions. I believe it is very important and I have tried to teach it to all my engineers, like Andrea Stella who is now team principal of McLaren".
Driver hierarchies: right or wrong?
Do you think it's right for a team to establish hierarchies among the drivers? And how much, touching the topic, can it influence them in a positive or negative way?
"You can't say right away whether it's right or not. The reason is simple: the best thing would be that the hierarchy was dictated by the track, that it comes naturally and not forced. It's a different matter if you have a champion driver and a less champion driver: at that point the situation is clear and the hierarchy is already written. When you have pilots of the same level, see Leclerc and Sainz at the moment, it is better to leave the motivation of the two drivers intact. If from the first moment you tell someone to be second, he will do everything to beat the first and he won't care about the team. Better to let it go, then the season will outline the need or otherwise to establish it if one prevails in a sufficiently substantial and evident way".
The Singapore GP: Ferrari's victory
Coming precisely to Ferrari: what he will have given to the team Singapore's victory?
"Winning is an injection of confidence. It's bringing people together, feeling like a team and enormous positivity. The victory really gave a lot".

Ferrari won in Singapore, but Red Bull was disappointing following the directive issued by the FIA: do you think it was penalised?
"I followed the whole weekend in Singapore. There are several aspects that surprised me: first of all Red Bull, which failed to perform and the step backwards is quite worrying. I believe that this phase may be linked to various aspects: they say from the inside, or rather, the experts, that the introduced directive shifts the team values by a tenth and no more, but in Red Bull they were significantly slower than usual".
Red Bull penalized by the directive? “It may have had an impact, but…”
"This is really strange because when you start thinking with terms you have to look at what the most important elements are in an F1 car: the first are the tires and the other is the aerodynamics. During the season I never saw Red Bull in trouble with the tires and to think that the problem originated in Singapore is very strange to me. What remains, therefore, is aerodynamics which is dominated by two aspects: the efficiency, i.e. the load, and the driveability of the aerodynamics. I don't think they have lost the efficiency and the load or it could be in that tenth of the directive, but then the driveability because the moment you go to make a dent, precisely through the directives, what are the flexibilities of the aerodynamic elements it is clear that the handling is affected".
"A flexible wing, in fact, allows you to play in such a way as to have variable aerodynamic balance depending on the speed of the car, the wind and slow or fast corners. The aerodynamic handling is present above all in transients: when the car brakes forward, it lowers while the rear rises; When you're halfway through the turn it rolls. All these transients entail a variability of parameters, such as heights, within the car which affect the aerodynamics which is not constant on the part of the driver, but is unpredictable because it can go from below to above suddenly".

“Red Bull penalized? It is impossible to believe that the directive has not contributed"
"In Red Bull this seemed to me to be the big problem, then: did they get the set-up wrong? Did they choose a surface with modifications that they had seen give more points in the wind tunnel? I do not know this. I find it hard to believe that Red Bull has been penalized by the directive, but I can think that without a doubt he made his contribution in a weekend to forget for them".
"I'll give you an example, coming to the Ferrari victory: in Zandvoort they didn't have an excellent performance, as they chose a medium-high load winger, which certainly had an impact on the performance. It was thought that that choice was right and that that machine could respond better with that level of load. They went to Singapore with the more loaded wing, with the same aerodynamic situation, as they did not bring a new fund. They obviously made a mistake in Zandvoort and put what should have been chosen for Singapore. The change in layout made it even a little more friendly for Ferrari who managed to have their say and take home the victory".
Not just the Red Bull directive: “Singapore was a non-race”
"There's been a lot of talk about Red Bull being penalized by the directive, but there's one thing that left me even more perplexed: the race. I did not get it. If you look at the rankings during the race, between first and fifteenth they were all within a second, as the leaders were going very slowly. Sainz, in fact, based his race on tire management, especially after the safety car. The thing that puzzled me is that I've never seen an overtaking attempt. Even though the drivers had DRS they never tried to overtake their opponent. I understand that Russell, in the first part of the race, was hoping for a Ferrari degradation at the end. Following the final pit of the two Mercedes, Norris found himself in second place and, with Sainz giving him the DRS, he never tried to overtake him. At least an attempt, at least to try. After that Sainz became a mix between Villeneuve, Lauda and Prost. He did a great job, let's specify, it was exceptional, I'm just saying that if you have the good Verstappen or Hamilton behind you, he will do everything to try to overtake until the end".

The new life of Luigi Mazzola
Now she plays the role of performance coach, quite right?
"One of the roles I play is that of testimonials in companies. I bring the messages that I have learned and decoded into this particularly competitive environment of F1, so that they can reproduce them. Testimonial means being present at conventions and in the moments in which they meet and I do about two or three a week. I really enjoy training people and companies: I teach leadership in the field of management and I also teach it at university. The companies also gave me the opportunity to learn about the commercial world and who knows, maybe I can also teach how to be effective in sales.".
Ahead of Suzuka: will Red Bull be penalized by the directive?
To close our interview: engineer Mazzola, coming to the Japanese GP: which are the five riders you see in form?
"I would tell you to watch out Hamilton, Sainz, Norris, Russell and also pay attention to the Red Bull of Verstappen which, regardless of the directive, I believe will come back very forcefully and I hardly think she will be penalized".