Tag Archives: Ferrari

November 25, 2013 · 2:02 pm

Stefano Domenicali: “We need to recover from the mistakes…”

Stefano Domenicali admits it was frustrating to lose second place in the constructors’ championship in Brazil after Felipe Massa’s drive through penalty cost vital points.

The team boss says there was much good to come out of the season, although he stressed that some areas have to be improved.

“We’re frustrated in a way,” said Domenicali when asked by this writer, “because retrospectively of course without the penalty, which was a little bit too hard to Felipe, it would have been a different position. So that’s unfortunate.

“I’m happy at least that we finished a championship that was tough this year in the second half of the season with this result, happy for the team has always acted very, very well at the race track, with the pit stops, the strategy, no blow-up of the engine, I think the only manufacturer that did that. So I’m pleased to hear that. There are positive signs in a season that was not really very good and positive for us. At the end of the day we need to recover from the mistakes and the problems we had this year. I told to my engineers, heads down in the work, not a lot of words to say.

“The changes that we’ve done are the right ones to make sure that next year we’re fighting not for second position but to fight for the first, as we were here last year. And don’t forget here last year we without events that were out of our control we would have been in a different position.”

Domenicali stressed that it’s not that long ago that Ferrari was at the front of the field.

“We have a very short memory, because we were winning in May, not three years ago. Last year we were fighting to be first in the championship, because without the hit out in Japan and Belgium we would have won the title last year, so we need to be thoughtful about it. And we are second once again with the drivers’ championship. So the situation has to be considered for sure not positive, but F1 is made by details, so if you are able to improve certain things…

“And I think we have taken the right action in terms of organisation, in terms of people, in terms of things that have to be improved. With the new regulations the situation hopefully will be better, but we don’t have to throw away the positive things that we have done during this year, because strategy wise, pit stop wise, I think we were the best, so we need to keep these things as a positive side, and grow in the areas, mainly in the development of the car and understanding of the tyres, that were the real problem this year.”

Leave a comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as ,

November 21, 2013 · 3:51 pm

Hockenheim 2010 my toughest Ferrari moment, says Massa

Felipe Massa is heading into his final race for Ferrari on home ground at Interlagos, and the weekend is bound to be full of emotion for the Brazilian.

Intriguingly when reviewing his Ferrari career he cited Hockenheim 2010 – the day of the infamous ‘Fernando is faster than you’ incident – as the low point, along of course with his accident in Hungary the previous year.

“It’s a fantastic place to race and to finish an incredible time with Ferrari,” he said. “It’s a very long time. It’s our eighth championship but I’ve been inside Ferrari even before Formula One, so it’s a long time and I need to say thank you to all of them – everyone who worked together in Ferrari. Stefano as well. You know that he is a big friend and he did a lot for me as well, Domenicali. Everybody, everybody I worked with together. I hope we can enjoy the last race here in Ferrari and having a lot of fun and having a good result as well to have even more emotion at the end.

“I think Ferrari is a dream for all the drivers. I remember, one of the first go-karts I had was red. My first overall was red, so I was always supporting Ferrari as a kid. So racing eight years for Ferrari is definitely a dream come true. So, getting old as well! But also it’s another re-start for my career. I’m really happy and looking forward to my future in Williams, a different team. So really, a lot to do still in Formula One.”

Massa said the highlight of his Ferrari career was his win home win seven years ago.

“I would say the happiest moment was, I think, the first time I won in Brazil, 2006, with the green and yellow overalls. I think that was definitely the best moment for me. You know how important it is for a Brazilian to win at home. If you remember well, Senna was more happy to win in Brazil than to win a championship so you can see how important it is for a Brazilian to win here.

“It was a very special moment, not just that time but even 2008 was a special moment. I won the race here, it was Sao Paulo, quickest lap. It was other championships, not here in Brazil, you know, before. I think the toughest moment was… definitely the accident was not a great moment, and maybe the race in Hockenheim, 2010.”

Looking ahead to next year he said: “First of all, I really believe I can do a lot with Williams. Everything is changing, brand new rules for the championship so I think it’s also a good time that we start something new, different. You never know, you’re doing a good job in a team that has also all the infrastructure to do – like Williams has – everything inside the company to do a good car. So everything is possible. They believe in me so I’m really happy and motivated to drive for them, to work and to do everything I can to help the team to be competitive again, which I’m sure everything is possible.”

1 Comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

November 19, 2013 · 5:27 pm

Fernando Alonso: “I’m World Champion of the rest…”

It was a case of mixed fortunes for Fernando Alonso in Austin as he secured second place in the drivers’ championship but saw Ferrari lose ground to Mercedes in the battle for second in the constructors’ version.

Alonso had a typically feisty race in Austin, eventually finishing fifth.

“The main goal of the weekend was to beat Mercedes, to fight for the constructors’ championship,” said Alonso. It was not a good weekend from that aspect, we lost some points again. Lotus is getting closer, and for whatever reason we are losing a little bit of pace in the last Grands Prix. We need to find something for Brazil, because I think it’s going to be a tough weekend again.

“Entering Q3 is difficult, entering the points is difficult, so we need to improve for the next race. But in a way I secured second place in the drivers’ World Championship today, which I think with the actual car we have is World Champion of the rest.”

Alonso just managed to hold off Nico Hulkenberg in the closing laps.

“It was difficult I think, a very difficult race for us. From the start we knew that we could lose one position with Perez, starting on the wrong side of the grid. Unfortunately we lost it. I wasn’t able to run so close in the first stint, because I was damaging the tyres, I stepped back a little bit and then I recovered a little bit of pace around the pit stop time.

“With the hard tyre we were maybe a little bit more competitive, we were able to attack Perez, we were able to attack Hulkenberg. But I finished the tyres in the last two or three laps, so Nico was coming back, attacking again. I was lucky, one more lap and I would lose the position with Nico.

“When you are in free air you can manage the tyres a little bit, and control the wear of the tyres and control the pace, but when you are in traffic you never know how much you need to push. You would like to overtake, but you stress more the tyres, and it was a difficult race.”

7 Comments

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

November 16, 2013 · 8:16 pm

Fernando Alonso: “The nights were very difficult…”

Fernando Alonso says he suffered with headaches in the days after his off-track incident in Abu Dhabi, but he no longer has a problem.

Alonso went to hospital for a check-up before being allowed to fly home. Since then he has been allowed by the team to avoid media activities in order to rest.

“After Abu Dhabi I was fine, especially three or four hours after the race I was fine,” he explained when asked about it by this writer. “Then I finally passed the anti-doping, because I waited four hours to pass it. They said we need to check you because we had the alarm of the chassis, and when they did a normal control they saw some problem maybe, some lack of [sensitivity] in my left arm and my left leg, and because of that they were a little bit worried and they put in this thing and I went to the hospital for the MRI or I don’t know what we did.

“And after that all week I had a big headache, because the nerve I think is compressed, and I didn’t have enough blood pressure in the head. I was often in a lot of headache, and the nights were very difficult. Slowly the inflammation was coming normal, and I recovered the feelings.”

Alonso said he wasn’t having any issues in the car this weekend.

“No, not a problem. A little bit of pain yesterday night, and this morning when I woke up, but driving with all the adrenaline and warm-up is good, so maybe tonight again still some pain. But in the race when you are in the car, you forget everything.”

Meanwhile he was happy to qualify as high as sixth today after what looked like being a tricky weekend for Ferrari.

“I think the car was working better in qualifying. We keep struggling in the first sessions in the early morning with the cold track, we are not making the tyre work mainly, we’re struggling to put temperature in the tyre. In the afternoons yesterday and today the things improved a little bit.

“It was very windy this afternoon, and it was time also to interpret a little bit also the wind direction and drive differently corner-by-corner depending on the wind intensity. It was a tricky qualifying and maybe we had a good one, but obviously this doesn’t mask the problem of the weekend, which has been not enough pace.”

Leave a comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

November 6, 2013 · 12:18 pm

Felipe Massa: “I know how to be competitive…”

Felipe Massa says he’s been a lot more relaxed since it was confirmed that he would be leaving Ferrari at the end of the season.

Massa has outqualified Fernando Alonso five times in the past six races, although to be fair the Spaniard chose the prime tyre in India.

“I feel very relaxed, very relaxed to be honest,” he said when asked by this writer how it had affected his approach. “And I think that’s the best for me as well. You know, I can get inside the car to enjoy myself, to take the best out of the car, but enjoying and relaxing.”

Despite his good recent form relative to Alonso Massa says that 2013 hasn’t been a great season.

“For sure it’s not the best season for me, I can do much better than what I did this year, the last years. I think what is important to know is that I have the speed. I have the speed, I know how to win, I know how to be competitive, and we just need to try to put things together, and that’s what I’m trying. This season we had some very good races, but we had some very difficult races. Anyway, I’m looking pretty optimistic for the last races.”

3 Comments

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

November 4, 2013 · 10:03 am

Fernando Alonso: “With Felipe it was not a fight…”

Fernando Alonso says that fifth place was the best he could have achieved in Abu Dhabi, and the result was good damage limitation given Ferrari’s lack of pace during the weekend.

“I think I did my maximum,” he said on Sunday night. “The car in front was 20 seconds ahead. It’s true that I lost a little bit of time with the traffic, but 20 seconds is a lot of time, but we didn’t have the pace to be in the top four. And top five is the maximum. We have one Mercedes in front, one behind.

“We have one Lotus in front and one behind, obviously, with the DNF of Kimi. So I think my job is done after a very, very tough weekend, very difficult, not having the pace, we still finished in front of one Lotus, one Mercedes. We need to do better in Austin, but this time I think we minimised the damage.

“With Mercedes it’s true that we need to do better. There have been some weekends now that it’s not only Mercedes that worry us. It’s Lotus, Hulkenberg, Toro Rosso, McLaren, so are dropping a little bit too much, and we need to do better. Obviously the car will be the same in Austin and Brazil, so we need to do better here at the track, in the set-up every weekend, optimise circuit-by-circuit, the drivers must do better, doing perfect laps all weekend, because we need to beat Mercedes.”

Alonso made some interesting observations about his battle for position with Felipe Massa.

“With Felipe it was not a fight, I followed what the team tell me to do. The first stint the team told me to back off, to have a little bit of free air in front of me, to cool down the brakes, that they were too hot. In the second they told me to close the gap to Felipe, maybe we go for one or we go for two stops. I closed the gap, and then told not to attack, Felipe will pit soon. Then Felipe pitted and I had the opportunity to do some laps and overtake Felipe and the Toro Rosso in those laps. Then at the end with the soft tyre I had a shorter stint which was very good in terms of pace. It was the best part of the race.”

In that final stint Alonso set a series of fastest laps despite having no chance of catching the car ahead. Asked by this writer if he was just having fun, he said: “I was having fun. It was the first laps that I had no traffic in front, and the team told me to push. In other parts of the race they told me to cool the brakes. Now that I had the brakes in condition I could finally push.”

Alonso was keen to play down the incident with Jean-Eric Vergne, which resulted in no action from the stewards after they accepted that the French driver hadn’t seen the Ferrari and had given Alonso no choice but to go off track.

“I was going out of the pit, I was alongside the Toro Rosso, and we didn’t have the space to both go on the track. At that point you are invisible or you are going to be forced to be out of the track. The rules say that when you have a car alongside you you cannot use the full width of the track. I was forced to go out, and I think it’s clear. I think he didn’t see me, that’s what he said now, so that’s it. I think it’s very clear. I think it’s a minor thing of the fantastic race we did.”

Leave a comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

November 4, 2013 · 9:17 am

Massa frustrated by Ferrari’s tyre strategy “mistake”

Felipe Massa was left frustrated at the end of the Abu Dhabi GP after Ferrari put him onto medium rather than soft tyres, costing him pace and the chance to beat team mate Fernando Alonso to fifth place.

Massa had run 18 laps from the start on soft tyres, and Ferrari made the call to put him on mediums for the final stint despite the fact that there were only 17 laps left to run, the car was lighter, and the temperature had dropped dramatically. Massa eventually finished eighth while Alonso, who stopped 11 laps from  home for softs, was fifth.

“We made a mistake,” he said. “I didn’t expect to use the medium in the last stint as well, I expected to use the soft. I did 19 laps [sic] at the beginning, and I was the best car on the soft, and then we decide to stop in the last moment the second time, and I expected to see the soft tyres on the car, and I saw the other ones, so it was a problem.

“That was the mistake of my race. Without this problem I would have finished easily in the top five, I would have got completely behind [Vergne], passed him in two corners. We were behind Hamilton, I would have passed him easily on different tyres, maybe one second quicker, and we’d have a free track in front. That was a mistake.”

Massa said he hadn’t asked for softs because he thought the choice was obvious.

“I didn’t discuss because for me it was clear that it was going to be the soft, and also they called me at the end of the lap and said stopping now is better, and then there was no time to speak about the tyres. For me it was clear.

“I think it was a little bit too conservative. For if my first stint was 12 laps or 13 laps it’s pretty acceptable, 17 laps at the end with a quick pace, maybe you’re not going to have tyres any more. But I did 19 laps, in the sun. It was still hot, it was colder at the end with more grip, for sure. That was the problem.

“Definitely, I’m not happy, because today I was doing a great race, all the time fighting and overtaking cars, a very good race all the time, a good pace, and then suddenly I didn’t finish in the position I was supposed to finish, so this is a bit frustrating. Anyway I think I showed a good pace, and this is important, to show a good pace, a good race.”

However he denied that there had been any attempt by the team to hamper him and favour Alonso.

“For sure not. The team needs points, the team needs to score as many points as possible, the team will never do that to me. It’s not really even close to my mind that the team is doing something. I believe in the team and I will believe until the last moment. But today as I said it was a mistake. We could have scored more points today.”

Meanwhile Massa said he had no view on the  Vergne/Alonso incident: “I don’t know. I didn’t see it so well.”

6 Comments

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , , ,

November 3, 2013 · 6:03 pm

Hospital check for Alonso after heavy bump over kerbs

Fernando Alonso has gone for a hospital check-up after bouncing over the kerbs while battling with Jean-Eric Vergne in Abu Dhabi.

The jolt was hard enough to set off the FIA-mandated g-force alarm, which means a compulsory medical check-up for the driver.

Alonso admitted afterwards that he felt some back pain, and after a check at the circuit medical centre he went for further investigations at the local hospital.

“I still have all the teeth after the bump,” he joked after the race. “And the back is obviously in pain a little bit now. It was a big hit. We have the alarm on the chassis, after a minimum of g-forces there is this alarm on the chassis for big crashes, for the medical car etc. And the chassis has this alarm now in parc ferme, so for sure it was a big hit. Hopefully I’m OK for Austin and Brazil.”

Meanwhile following an FIA investigation no action was taken on the incident.

Update: Alonso left the hospital at around 11pm local time, and Ferrari says he is OK.

1 Comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

October 28, 2013 · 2:07 pm

Stefano Domenicali: “These are crucial weeks that we have ahead of us”

Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali admits that the team hasn’t done a good enough job – and says that the coming weeks will be crucial as everyone prepares for 2014.

It he also acknowledged that only Fernando Alonso’s “amazing talent” had kept Ferrari in the fight this year.

“We are well aware what it’s like to rack up win after win, season after season, because only a few years back, we did just that and we know how much confidence comes from winning,” Domenicali said on the Ferrari website.

“Taking a world title is very satisfying, doing it several times is an achievement, but it’s also a good thing to always be up there, fighting for the very top places, as Ferrari has done pretty much all the time for over fifteen years, barring a handful of exceptions.

“This year, we were unable to give our drivers a car good enough to fight with Vettel on equal terms, apart from at the very beginning of the season. Thanks to Fernando and his amazing talent, we managed to worry the world champion elect more than the others, but unfortunately, our efforts were not enough to fight all the way to the very end. Now, it’s important to try and end this season in the best way possible.

“These are crucial weeks that we have ahead of us to the end of the year, because the work we are doing in preparation for 2014 is vital if we want to be the team that puts an end to this Red Bull dominance, just as we and Fernando have been their main rivals over the past four seasons.”

Leave a comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , ,

October 28, 2013 · 1:06 pm

Fernando Alonso: “The race was uphill from that moment…”

Fernando Alonso’s hopes of a decent result in the Indian GP were over at the first corner after he hit the rear of Mark Webber – ironically the other frontrunning driver who took a gamble on qualifying on the medium tyre.

Alonso also hit Jenson Button on the first lap and a second lap stop for a new nose ruined his strategy and left him struggling to catch up. He eventually finished 11th.

“Obviously not a clear start,” said the Spaniard. “I was a bit unlucky because I think Mark also was having a contact with someone, and the third part was me in that equation. And with Button as well in corner four, it was a little bit of a mixed start, and the race was uphill from that moment. We were last with one stop more compared to the others already done. So a difficult race, and not enough pace.”

Matters were not helped by the car not behaving well after the contact: “It was damaged, I think the front toe or something, because the steering wheel was very heavy to the right corners, and very light to the left, so there was something going on there. It was not only that problem. The overall weekend was not good enough, and in Abu Dhabi we need to improve if we want to pass Mercedes in the constructors’ championship.”

Meanwhile Alonso had some nice words to say about Sebastian Vettel.

“Very, very good, I congratulate him. They’ve been very strong, very dominant, especially in the second part of the season, so they deserve to be be champions, so congratulations. Obviously we need to start thinking for next year and hopefully try to make things a little bit more difficult for him.”

Leave a comment

Filed under F1 News, Grand Prix News

Tagged as , , ,