Ferrari now missing race pace, Domenicali admits

Stefano Domenicali admits that Ferrari has lost its race form just as it appears to have edged a little closer to the front in qualifying.

Hungary was a rare occasion when Fernando Alonso failed to improve on his grid position, the Spaniard starting and finishing fifth despite suffering no specific problem other than lack of speed.

“I don’t know,” said Domenicali when asked if the change of tyres had hurt Ferrari. “For sure we have seen that we have lost apparently the gap that we had in the first races during the race. The race pace we were clearly very strong, now in this condition at least today we have seen that we were not really where we wanted [to be], in both conditions, soft and medium. So we need to understand if this is the case, how to react, because this would be in terms of structure the tyres that will end the season.

“Of course a lot depends on the type of the compounds that will be chosen in the races that are still missing to arrive at the end of the season. So for sure this is something that we need to realise carefully. It seems for example Mercedes have solved the issue that they were suffering massively during the races in this condition, that’s for sure.”

Domenicali says he’s trying to keep the team motivated.

“It seems strange that I believe after the two bad races that we had from the performance point of view in Germany and Silverstone, we have improved the car, for qualifying for example. But we haven’t for the race. So we have already done a programme to be ready for Spa. Hopefully we will be able to manage it.

“There’s no reason to be going into depression or be negative, because this doesn’t help the people to work. I’m expecting a reaction from my technical group, and this is what I want to see.”