Former Ferrari chief designer Nicholas Tombazis has given a revealing interview to Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera following his unceremonious exit from the team at the end of last year.
Ferrari's top management was almost entirely overhauled over the course of 2014, with team principal Stefano Domenicali leaving last April and his replacement Marco Mattiacci exiting before the end of 2014. Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo also left after a long and illustrious career at the team to be replaced by FIAT boss Sergio Marchionne. Further down the chain there were more departures, including Tombazis, head of the engine department Luca Marmorini, engineering director Pat Fry and head tyre engineer Hirohide Hamashima.
This year the team has returned to the top of the podium with two victories in 11 races, but Tombazis believes much of the credit belongs to Ferrari's old regime. Asked if he expected to be fired, Tombazis said: "No, for two reasons. I don't want to shy away from my responsibilities, but I worked less on the 2014 car than the others before it. Second, the car of 2015 car was the first one since 2008 on which I was able to work on with a lot of time on my hands.
"It is also the first to exploit an up-to-date wind tunnel. We would not have matched Mercedes this season, that much is obvious, but we would have improved. But my opinion was not shared by those who came to Maranello."
He added: "I felt sorry for Stefano [Domenicali] and [Luca] di Montezemolo, they always gave me a lot of confidence and their exit was a shock. Everyone has made mistakes, but the 2015 revival was started with the old staff."
Tombazis said much of the team's struggle in recent years was rooted in its wind tunnel and the pressure to deliver results against the likes of Red Bull.
"Red Bull and the British teams do not have the same pressure we had in Ferrari," he added. "The environment in the team was bad, it was like having a gun behind our back. The introduction of the wider front wings since 2009 exaggerated the role of the wind tunnel, and ours had problems..."