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Bernie Ecclestone has announced that the majority of the teams have agreed the terms of a future Concorde Agreement to run from 2013-2020.

Last week in Australia it became apparent that Ferrari and Red Bull had or were about to sign up to a new deal having left FOTA, but significantly Bernie has named McLaren in addition to those two.

Ecclestone issued a single sentence on the F1 website: “I am very pleased to announce that we have reached commercial agreements with the majority of the current Formula One teams, including Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull Racing, about the terms on which they will continue competing in Formula One after the current Concorde Agreement expires at the end of this year.”

It remains to be seen which teams have not yet agreed, but whatever the case the news would seem to be positive if it means that there won’t be a prolonged debate that pits Ferrari and Red Bull against the key FOTA members.

“It’s great news,” Red Bull boss Christian Horner told Sky’s Ted Kravitz. “Hopefully it secures the long term future of the sport with the teams involved. It’s important I think for there to be a Concorde Agreement because it protects the teams through that agreement as well. Hopefully it will all be formalised pretty shortly.”

Felipe Massa was happy with progress in Sepang today – despite being only 16^thand a lot slower than Ferrari team mate Fernando Alonso in the afternoon session.

In the morning he had been quicker than the Spaniard with a car rebuilt around the spare chassis, but changes in the afternoon made it worse – and Massa saw that as good news, as it gave the team a lot more information about what not to do.

“I started the morning with a different car, and it was very positive,” said Massa. “And then in the afternoon we tried different pieces, and even pieces we tried in Australia, and everything went in a worse direction, so I think that was very positive to understand the direction.

“The car I started in the morning was completely different to the car I ran in the second session, and I think that can be very positive at least to find why things were difficult in Australia, so I think tomorrow it’s a big step that the car can be much more competitive in terms of what you guys saw in terms of lap time this afternoon.

“Here we’re suffering with instability at the rear, especially in the slow corners, in the high speed there’s a big understeer at the front, so let’s say it’s a mix. But I think it should improve a lot, talking about my side, for tomorrow.

“For sure it was positive, now I want to go in the car with everything right, everything ready, the best we have. And this will be tomorrow.”

Massa remains confident that he can have a much better race this weekend.

“We need to concentrate on scoring points, scoring as many points as possible. How much, we’ll see how the car is going to be in qualifying, and how it’s going to be in the race as well. For sure we don’t have a very competitive car, but I hope we are able to fight to score as many points as possible.”

Ferrari boss Stefano Domenicali remains hopeful that Ferrari can get to the bottom of its problems with F2012, and says that his engineers know what they need to address.

“For sure, I’m disappointed by the performance of the car, no doubt,” Domenicali said today. “But on the other hand what I need to make sure is that at home we need to push on the development of the car, because we know what are the problems with this car from the other weekend.

“Nothing has changed on that. I am confident that our engineers will solve the issues we have as quickly as possible because in such a close field a little step makes a difference, and in such a close battle, when you are in a difficult moment, you need to score points because everything can happen.

“So that’s something, it is clear. Not happy as I said, but not to be happy doesn’t help, and I’ve asked my engineers to be focussed on the job because that is what they have to do.”

Regarding the unexpected return to Italy of Ferrari’s top management between Australia and Malaysia, Domenicali said: “What we did was to make sure that the focus on the programme has to be there at home with the engineers, mainly in the aerodynamic department. I’ve asked Pat [Fry] to be spot on, on the case, in order to make sure that now that there is a lot of meat on the fire, we need to make sure this meat will be delivered as quickly as possible, as there is no time to lose.”

Felipe Massa was much happier with his car today – built around the spare chassis – although the timing screens showed Fernando Alonso some way ahead in the second session, in which Massa was only 16^th.

“We had a programme today with some changes on the car to verify some different configurations and tomorrow we will have let’s say the best package, because in this moment I would say for him it’s important to feel the confidence around him. Not only him because the team has a lot of pressure, so that’s the status of the art we have done today.

“In terms of what we have seen today we were trying to work with different programmes on two different drivers, and tomorrow we will see the situation. Today there is nothing I can say that is going to one direction or the other. The work of today was done in order to make sure that tomorrow Felipe has the best car in the best condition. This is the thing we have to give to him.”

Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull Racing struggled to get the RB8 to his liking at Sepang today as once again it became clear that the World Champions do not enjoy the advantage that they had in 2011.

Vettel was second in the FP1 but in the slower FP2 session in the afternoon he was only ninth. At one stage, when using the medium tyres, he was heard to say “it’s all over the place” on the team radio.

Vettel admitted that it had not been an easy day.

“I’m not entirely happy,” said the German. “Obviously this afternoon I would have loved to have been a bit higher up, but it’s one lap you are looking at. I think all-in-all we had decent running today. We still have a lot to do. I’m not entirely happy yet, but it’s not as if we expected that all of our problems are solved within three hours today.

“Here it seems difficult for everyone, the tyres seem to drop off pretty quickly, so everyone starts to slide around fairly soon. So do we. But I think generally we are sliding a bit too much, and I would love the car to be a bit more predictable and stable from the beginning.”

Regarding his radio comment he said: “Obviously in the heat of the moment… The run was not perfect, otherwise we would have been higher up, but before then and after that it was quite OK. I think it was a one-off, so we didn’t use the tyre as much as we should have. As I said on the radio I’m not entirely happy yet.”

Vettel said he doesn’t know yet whether RBR can fight for pole.

“It’s hard to say I think. McLaren looked very strong today, no doubt, morning and afternoon. Haven’t seen the long runs, but I think we are again closer by the looks of it in long run pace, so we’ll see what we can do.

“What do we need now? A good analysis of what we did today so that we can improve the car for tomorrow.”

Felipe Massa hopes that he can overcome the problems he suffered in Australia after Ferrari built up its spare chassis for his use in an attempt to resolve the balance problems that afflicted him.

The Brazilian qualified a disastrous 16^th in Melbourne, and retired after clumsy contact with Bruno Senna’s Williams.

“We need to turn the page after Australia and start again from zero,” said the Brazilian in Malaysia today. “And that is what we are planning for this race, which I hope will get off to a good start.

“This is not the first time that I have had a difficult race, there have been many. But one always has to look to the next one and this weekend will be only the second of the championship, so there is still time. As for Melbourne, it’s true I have never had a weekend where the car has felt so bad right from the first day. The car was not working the way it should and after just a few laps, the tyres were gone, but this was not a problem with the tyres, it was caused by the car’s lack of balance.

“We are changing the chassis for this race and I think it is the right thing to do. Every time I drove this car during winter testing I never had any of the problems I had from the first day in Australia. The day after Fernando drove the same car in Barcelona for example, there was never anything strange or different in terms of lap times, race pace or tyre degradation.

“Then you arrive in Australia and see that everything is different, so changing the chassis is definitely the right thing to do. But it’s not just the chassis that is changed for here, as we are replacing many of the components.

“Even if we are changing the chassis and other parts, the car is still the same car in development terms that we had in Melbourne. We have to try this to get the most out of it, even if we are not where we ought to be in terms of performance compared to others. I hope this track will suit the car better.”

Massa said he was unconcerned about media criticism: “To be honest, I really don’t care. I never drove depending on what others think or say about me. I just do my job thinking about trying to do the best I can in the car. When I arrived here in 2008, people were saying I was out of Ferrari, because I did not finish in Australia and then I did not finish here and it went on to become my best season. Things can change very quickly from one day to the next. The only thing I care about is to have the car I know from winter testing.”

Meanwhile Massa’s former team mate Michael Schumacher was keen to offer some moral support today.

“If I look at all the winter testing I think it was very clear that the two drivers were very close together,” said Schumacher. “If you look at the optimum lap time achieved in the Barcelona tests, it’s again very close. So to see the big difference that we saw in Melbourne, I can only assume there must have been something not right for him.

“He’s been around for so long. He’s been fighting for the championship in 2008, he’s always been up front so I don’t see any reason why he should not be capable of doing so in the future. I trust he will do so, and that the team will do their utmost to give him the support that he needs.”

Jenson Button arrived in Malaysia in a chilled mood on Wednesday morning after an overnight flight from Melbourne, enjoying the fact that as in 2009 he left the first race as World Championship leader.

Button has had a relaxing few days and says that he’s a looking forward to the second race.

“I think we’re pretty focused on this weekend,” he said today. “It was pretty important to relax after the race because it was a great victory for us. I had a nice evening with friends and family as we all know that’s the best way to celebrate a great event.

“And then Monday/Tuesday I spent a couple of days in Melbourne just relaxing and then arrived here yesterday. It’s actually been quite a nice few days. Got here yesterday and thought it was quite important to get used to the humidity, because it’s quite different to Melbourne.

“Yeah, it’s been nice, it always is after winning a grand prix and you’re always very excited about the next grand prix and obviously your aim is to do exactly the same again.”

Button stressed that the two circuits are very different so it’s not easy to make any predictions about what all the drivers regard as a challenging venue.

“It’s so different to last weekend, it’s very fast and flowing, very smooth compared to a street circuit and the tyres. It’s always more difficult for the tyres around here. But obviously we have the hard and the medium compound and they’re both pretty hard compounds, so it shouldn’t be too much of an issue.

“I think it’s just the temperature and the humidity that will be the biggest issue for them. And it’s one of those places where you really don’t know what the weather’s going to do. When I previously won here it was cut short, the race, because of a red flag. That’s the thing here, normally it doesn’t just rain, it chucks it down. So, if it does rain this weekend we hope we can continue racing because it’s a great circuit.”

Button showed a good understanding of the 2012 tyres in Melbourne, particular in his ability to get them up to working temperature, although he played down any advantage.

“I think we all try to do the best job we can with the tyres but personally I don’t feel the tyres were a big issue for anyone in Melbourne. They seemed to be very consistent and we didn’t have degradation like we do at other circuits, like here, so I feel that I had a good balance with the car, I had a lot of confidence in the car and yeah, I think the consistency was pretty good throughout the race.

“Obviously we had the scare with the safety car for us – it’s always tough when you’re leading by ten or eleven seconds, to suddenly find a car right up behind you again. But I think we made good use of the safety car in the end and were able to come home and get a very important victory for the whole team.”

Michael Schumacher conceded today that Mercedes is still lacking in race pace after the team’s Sunday performance in Melbourne failed to live up to qualifying.

Schumacher held on to third before his early gearbox problem put him out of the race, but he couldn’t match the McLarens ahead and was under a lot of pressure from those behind, especially Sebastian Vettel. More important was the fact that Nico Rosberg, who did the full race distance, struggled for speed.

“We certainly understood in Melbourne that we have to do a better job in terms of race pace,” said Schumacher. “I don’t think we would have been able to achieve a podium in Melbourne, despite going all the way through. Probably a fifth place would have been the max that we could have had. Nevertheless, we have good ideas how to improve on what we learned from Melbourne.

“Whether that means we’re going to be on the podium or not, that’s another story because you obviously have at least four cars which are very strong, with two McLarens, two Red Bulls and then you have quite a big group of cars which are very close to each other. So it’s going to be a challenge for all of us.

“The basic positive is that we definitely have a much-improved car compared to last year. Still we have to learn it and understand it in all circumstances to take the benefit and the full performance from it, as we have seen in the race with Nico, so there is still something to learn, but we’re positive that we can improve quite a bit, in race pace in particular.”

He said he was not concerned about a repeat of the gearbox failure that stopped him in Australia: “Well, it is a one-off. We did quite a few thousand kilometres in winter testing and never had this issue. We understood it though, and fixed it.”

He also played down the potential advantage of the team’s controversial F-Duct, which many people see as being a huge boost to Mercedes in qualifying on Sepang’s long straights.

“There is no doubt that we have an innovation that gives us some performance, but I don’t think that it is a huge performance, and that we only live from this. We’ll find out. I can’t really quantify this.”

Fernando Alonso said at Sepang today that while he was hoping for improved form for Ferrari in Malaysia, there was no logical reason why the car would be better, given that it will essentially be unchanged.

The Spaniard also made it clear that his hard-won fifth place in Australia was helped by problems for the likes of Michael Schumacher and Romain Grosjean.

“Hopefully yes but I don’t think so, to be honest,” said Alonso. “We have been testing at different circuits – Jerez, Barcelona and then in Australia with more or less the same car, with the same problems on it. The cars are nearly identical for everybody compared with Australia, I guess, so I don’t think there will be big surprises here.

“Let’s wait and see, and try to adapt the car to the circuit, the conditions, the heat. Then, yes, the qualifying. We saw the true performance, we are not as competitive as we want, probably, but then in the race anything can happen. In Australia with a good start and the stops and the strategy you can put yourself in a decent place. We will try to do a similar race here and try to defend as many points as possible.”

He conceded that the team had been playing catch up in all three seasons since he joined.

“We need to work hard every day and night to normally catch up people in these three years. But anyway, you know, the experience has been fantastic. As you all know, fighting for the World Championship in the first year, and then last year with one win and 10 podiums. Obviously, the target is always to win the world championship, but it was not possible the last two years.

“This year we are convinced that we will fight for it. We need to stay focused and work more than the others, knowing that we are a little bit behind now. But the championship is long. We stay calm, we stay focused, because we see a lot of determination in the team. We see the team with a very good atmosphere, [we] trust each other in the team, we are very united, so the time will come to us very soon.

“Obviously, knowing we need to work, we need to catch up the guys in front. We are not in the situation we wanted to start the 2012 championship but after 11 years in Formula One I think you understand how long the championship is, what you need when you have the best and what you need when you don’t have the best car – which is sometimes more points or less points.

“But as for as our targets and our goals, we need to score as many points as possible in these couple of races and in a very short period of time try to be on the podium and win races. If we manage to do that we have plenty of races to recover the gap. If we don’t manage to do that it’s because someone else did a better job than us. We just need to wait and see, but I have 100 per cent trust in the team.”

Alonso was making no predictions about the speed of Ferrari’s recovery.

“I don’t think it will be one race in which we change the car. I think at every race we will try to make improvements as we did over the last few years, and it won’t be just for us; I think everyone will make updates at every race. We just need to make ours work a little bit more.

“Obviously we have a little advantage from that, because our car needs more speed, and maybe it’s easier for us to find than for some others whose cars are maybe more developed than ours. New parts will slowly come at every race and hopefully they work, but there’s not one magic race or one magic moment when we think things can change. I think we will work day and night and as I said before, the team is very focused on that, and I see great reaction from everybody, so I expect a strong Ferrari soon.”

Nico Rosberg endured a frustrating Australian GP as the Mercedes W03 failed to fulfil the expectations that the car’s one-lap pace had generated.

The German struggled for pace in race conditions, but after plugging away he was still set for sixth place when he had contact with Sergio Perez on the last lap. The subsequent puncture dropped him to 12^th place.

“It was a bit difficult and a bit unexpected,” said Rosberg. “We were just struggling a bit more than we thought, and we need to analyse why. The car didn’t feel good in the long runs, we were not fast and we were struggling. But yes of course we had some good straightline speed.

“It was a good fight and everything was looking very good actually, we would have been sixth which would have been OK, given the circumstances. And then it’s just a very unnecessary thing that we touched on the straight, so Sergio touched my rear wheel and I got a puncture.”

“Unfortunately for us it was not such a good day so a bit of a setback from all the positives from yesterday when we were very quick.”

Rosberg was surprised when told that Perez had blamed him.

“He complained about me? So maybe it’s nobody’s fault, because I also thought he was crazy! Maybe it’s just a racing incident, and we have to see on the video. It’s a very unfortunate incident.”

Rosberg is confident that things will get better: “I’m confident that we can learn from here and definitely move forward and improve for the next race. For sure it should be much better.”

Kimi Raikkonen had something of a mixed weekend on his return to F1 with Lotus, but in the end he earned some useful points with seventh place, having gained three places on the last lap.

Kimi qualified 18^th after just failing to beat the flag and start his last lap, and then a good start was spoiled by the accident ahead.

“It was much harder than it should be, but I think we did pretty well to get back to seventh,” said the Finn. “It was far from the ideal race or weekend, but at least we got something out of it.

“I had a good start off the line and got quite a few places, but then the first corner I had to almost stop because there was an accident and I had to go on the grass to avoid them, so I lost a few places and it put us in a bit of a bad position with the traffic.

“We had the speed to get past the people very quickly, but without that we could have done even better. But I guess it could have been much worse.”

Summing up his comeback event, he said: “It was OK. Overall the weekend wasn’t what I was looking for, we did mistakes, and we had the situation in qualifying where we ended up not really getting a lap. It put us in a difficult position, but I think we did OK out of it. We got seventh place, not the ideal start, but it was better than nothing.”