yifeiyay - Tumblr blog

yifeiyay · 1 day

Note

Hello the anon who asked about ferrucci here! I basically wanted to know why you don’t like him, since I’m still a bit new to watching indycar and I don’t want to stan the wrong people

hello thank u i am more than thrilled to tell anyone why we don’t stan santino on this blog.

short version: he’s an entitled little bitch with a bad attitude, bad temper, history of dangerous driving, is racist, and is a proud trump supporter (i usually don’t stick my nose in drivers’ political beliefs [e.g. snooping on their social media and making assumptions based on who they follow] unless they’re very forward about it)

long version (get ready to scroll, i’m so sorry but i simply cannot be brief):

background: in 2018 santino was racing in F2 with trident alongside his teammate arjun maini. pietro fittipaldi, who was signed as a part-time driver for dale coyne in indycar, suffered some serious injuries in a WEC crash, so in the early summer, santino took his place for the two races in detroit and sucked in both of them (contact w/ charlie kimball put him out of round 1, and he finished 20th in round 2). he was also a junior driver for haas f1 at this time

sometime in the early 2018 f2 season, santino requested to run a “make america great again” livery on his f2 car which was denied by his team principal and, when the family insisted, subsequently blocked by the FIA as it violates article 10.6.2(a) of the international sporting code, which states “competitors taking part in international competitions are not allowed to affix to their automobiles advertising that is political in nature” (source: racefans.net) (source: espn)

quote from trident team principal maurizio salvadori (in the espn source): “When I was approached with this request on behalf of the Ferrucci family, I tried to explain the impossibility to adhere to this demand. Against their insistence, I requested a written opinion from the FIA that once received, I forwarded to the Ferrucci family. The fact that this letter is circulating today on social media seems to me like a clumsy attempt to take the attention away from the principal problem that is, Santino’s and his father’s behavior on and outside the track in these last weekend races. Obviously Sunday’s tweet had nothing to do with Ferrucci’s MAGA livery request and was based solely on Santino’s and father’s behavior on and off the track.“

here is the letter mentioned in the quote:

and here’s what salvadori meant by santino & co.’s behavior: trident tweeted that santino & his father were displaying “uncivilized and unsportsmanlike” behavior towards his teammate arjun maini & family throughout the weekend. there’s nothing to officially confirm this but pretty much everyone (teams, media, fans, people who were actually there, etc.) is in agreement that santino & co. were mocking arjun & co.’s accents and making other racist remarks. (link to tweet)

during the silverstone weekend, santino was disqualified from the sprint race for forcing arjun off track, and also drove his car from the paddock to pit lane while using his cell phone, for which he was fined 60,000 euros. after the sprint race incident he made deliberate contact with arjun (cool down lap, i assume; here’s the video) which got him banned from the next two f2 events (hungary and belgium, totaling 4 races). when santino and arjun were called to the stewards about these incidents, santino refused to attend.

santino also felt the need to act like a little bitch about this whole situation on twitter. the tweets are now deleted and i can’t for the life of me find screenshots anywhere (believe me i tried, i went all the way back in my blog archive) but luckily i vividly remember the exchange so you’ll just have to take my word for it. when the deliberate contact happened, arjun complained over the team radio, calling santino “mentally unstable” and “needing a mental/drug check”. this clip was posted on twitter, and santino responded something along the lines of “it’s funny that he [arjun] is calling for me to have a mental check when he’s the one crying over team radio” essentially making fun of arjun for being upset by santino’s unacceptable behavior. while i can’t find this receipt, i did find this that also sums up his attitude:

in the weeks following the silverstone races, santino was finally fired by trident for “behavioral issues and non-payment of money required by contract” (surprise surprise, he was a pay driver). here are the official statements:

summary of everything santino did during silverstone + all his fines

trident terminates santino’s contract

santino’s take on these events (namely the deliberate contact). notable quote: “if i wanted to hit him, i’d have wrote off the cars.”

ultimately the italian courts mandated the ferrucci family to pay trident 502,000 euros plus interest and legal fees.

so this was the end of his european racing career. he was eventually fired by haas as well but i can’t find exactly when. from what i remember it was super lowkey, like they just replaced him rather than outright saying he was fired.

and finally, here is santino’s “apology” for the entire situation. he tweeted this but it’s now deleted, the link is to a blog post at the time it happened (with my edited version of his apology. i’d put both images here but i’m trying to save y’all some scrolling i’m so sorry) .

but wait, there’s more! he still, for some reason, participated in the last two races of the 2018 indycar season with dale coyne, in which he finished 20th (4 laps down) in portland and 11th in sonoma.

then for some reason (money), despite giving approximately zero good impressions in indycar (except for his wealth), he was signed for a full season with dale coyne in 2019 alongside motorsport legend (mid-2000s toro rosso reject) sebastien bourdais. in my opinion, his debut season was nothing to write home about. he didn’t do horrible but he was significantly outshined by other rookies (colton herta [2 wins and 3 poles], felix rosenqvist [2 podiums, 1 pole, and scored the most points of the rookies, earning him rookie of the year title], and marcus ericsson [one podium]). santino’s most notable result was finishing 7th in the indy 500, which to his credit is a very difficult thing to accomplish in your rookie career, but again… he wasn’t able to keep up that level of success. and that one single result made a lot of people (mostly the broadcast team) quickly forget about all his f2 shenanigans and say things like he just “fell afoul of a few rules”. here is a wonderful article about this by my lovely friend elizabeth blackstock.

and here’s my favorite part: despite the media implying he’s a wizard on oval circuits, his racing conduct later in the season suggests that he’s either a straight up dumbass or his past of deliberately dangerous driving isn’t that far behind him. at the bommarito 500 in illinois, one of the series’ several 500 mile oval races, santino pulled an absolute asshole move on then 1- but now 2-time champion josef newgarden (who is known for being very fair and level-headed on and off track) that caused josef to spin out and lose several positions in a race that was very important for the championship.

here’s a video of josef explaining the incident and being way too nice about it (you have to turn off adblock to watch the video though i’m SO sorry). transcript: “it’s important to know that he’s a rookie, just what he did was, in my opinion, dangerous. he came over to talk to me and said he was loose, that’s why he was down there [blocking the racing line], but i’ve been in the exact same position and i know what it’s like to get up in the marbles and he got up in there a couple times, but he came directly back down to the racing line to try to block me in, which there was no reason to. i gave him the position twice because i was suffering with vibrations all night … so i let him go two times during the night. he’s gotta learn that this is big time auto racing, and if you do a move like that on an oval, particularly a high speed oval, you will cause a very serious wreck. he’s just gotta know that, i mean i really drilled it to him that you cannot come directly to the racing line [after going off], that was his instinct … you know, he’s a racer, you’re gonna have instincts like that, but you cannot do that in oval racing. it’s absolutely not okay.”

and, by contrast, here is santino’s response. i literally cannot stress enough how important it is to watch those two videos and compare their body language, how josef (a veteran who really knows his shit) is genuinely concerned and upset and santino just absolutely does not care whatsoever (it also shows different angles of the incident being discussed). if you don’t wanna watch the videos, here’s a screenshot that illustrates my point: a driver who could’ve gotten very seriously injured vs. the driver who nearly caused a very serious wreck and then got reamed a new asshole:

and here is a picture of josef dunking on santino post-race (just because i think it’s funny)

now here’s the thing, to wrap it up: i am all for giving drivers second chances when they make mistakes or bad decisions as kids in their early career and then seem to genuinely mature and grow from it. but all the shit santino pulled was less than two years ago, several years into his professional racing career, when he was an adult (albeit a young one at 20 years old), and people are already brushing it to the side as if it doesn’t matter anymore. while his indycar career thus far has been generally lowkey, he has shown no real signs of growing the fuck up at this point and this is why i’m mad at him, the team that signed him (dale coyne), and the indycar series in general. by signing him, they’re saying his above behavior is acceptable or forgivable, and it isn’t. so as far as i’m concerned, dale coyne racing and all their sponsors are being blacklisted from my life and there is a massive bruise on my enjoyment for my favorite racing series.

and anon, though this situation sucks, i hope it doesn’t put a damper on your interest in getting into indycar. i promise we’re better than this and i am supremely confident that the other very experienced and professional drivers will not let santino act up like he has in the past, just as josef didn’t let him off the hook for the incident in illinois last year. indycar drivers hold each other accountable for their mistakes and santino was lucky to get that wake up call from someone as nice and cordial as josef. if you have any other questions about indycar, please feel free to ask me!

#important !!#indycar #santino ferrucci

307 notes · View notes