Ioverno replaces Mekies as Ferrari's Sporting Director
Ferrari have confirmed that Laurent Mekies will leave the team at the end of this week with Diego Ioverno set to take up the role of Sporting Director at Ferrari with immediate effect.
Ferrari announced earlier this year that their Sporting Director Laurent Mekies will leave the team to take up the role of Team Principal at AlphaTauri. However, it has not been known when the Frenchman would leave the Maranello-based outfit.
After graduating from the Loughborough University, Mekies started his career at Asiatech in Formula Three before entering Formula One, working for Arrows. He switched to Minardi in the following years, where he worked as the race engineer for Mark Webber, Justin Wilson, Zsolt Baumgartner and Christijan Albers.
He became chief engineer at the Scuderia Toro Rosso at the end of 2005 when Red Bull acquired the former Minardi team.
The Frenchman left the Faenza-based team to join the FIA in 2014 as safety director and was appointed F1 deputy race director in 2017. Next year, Mekies moved to Scuderia Ferrari as sporting director.
"Laurent Mekies’ time at Scuderia Ferrari comes to an end this week," a Ferrari statement read.
"The Racing Director will not be in Belgium and he leaves the Prancing Horse after four and a half seasons, during which time the team took seven wins. The entire team thanks him for his great contribution during those years.
"As from the Belgian Grand Prix, part of Laurent’s duties on the pit wall will be carried out by Diego Ioverno, who takes on the role of Sporting Director. He will be responsible for all sporting matters, as well as liaising with the FIA. Ioverno is a veteran member of the Scuderia having worked in Maranello for the past 23 years."
Ioverno started his career in motorsport as a gearbox assembly technician for Scuderia Ferrari, before becoming head of car assembly in 2008. Two years later, he became head of race operations in 2010.
After the departure of Massimo Rivola at the end of 2015, Ioverno became sporting manager, but, in 2018, he moved to a factory based job. He returned to the trackside 2021 as chief engineer, vehicle operations.
