Felipe Massa

Felipe Massa marked his official return to contemporary Formula 1 machinery with the fastest time on the first morning of pre-season testing at Valencia in Spain on Monday.

Having seen early shakedown plans for his new Ferrari F10 abandoned because of bad weather in Italy over the weekend, Massa gave an early indication about the promise of his team’s 2010 challenger with a strong run early on.

Although testing times are not necessarily truly representative of form, Ferrari will at least be encouraged by the fact that the car has appeared to hit the ground running on the opening day of this three-day test.

Less than two-tenths behind Massa’s best lap of 1m13.088s was Pedro de la Rosa in the BMW Sauber C29, showing that his team’s lack of sponsors and BMW works involvement have not been a hindrance to the efforts made over the winter to produce the new car.

Third fastest Nico Rosberg Read the rest of this entry »

Ferrari is confident that its all-new F10 design is a big step forward over last year’s car, as it eyes a full-scale world championship assault this season.

The team’s 2010 challenger was unveiled in Maranello on Thursday morning, with the Italian squad hoping that its early focus on the new car will see a return to form after the difficulties of last season.

Technical director Aldo Costa said: “We think this new car is a good step forward in aero development, car settings and also engine – and we are pretty much convinced we have taken a big step forward.

“We cannot know what our competitors have done, and only during the first race will we realise that. But it carries all our passion and the determination of a group that wants to forget what happened last year and go back to being competitive from the very first race.”

Ferrari began work on the F10 as early as Read the rest of this entry »

Ferrari’s engine chief Luca Marmorini is confident the Italian squad will benefit from its close relationship with fuel supplier Shell this year.

Formula 1 has banned refuelling from the start this season and saving fuel will be a critical point in achieving good results.

Marmorini, speaking during the launch of the new F10 car, believes Ferrari’s close ties with partner Shell will help the Maranello outfit extract the maximum performance of the car while saving as much fuel as possible.

“The 2010 season is most interesting,” said Marmorini. “It’s a new challenge, new if you consider the last 15 years. The ban on refuelling has made the fuel consumption parameter very important in performance terms. If you consume less it means the car is more lightweight – so the laptime performance is better.

“We’ve worked hard on that, not only in our team, and Read the rest of this entry »

Ferrari became the first Formula 1 outfit to unveil its new challenger for the 2010 season on Thursday, as the wraps came off the Italian squad’s F10 machine.

The car, with which the team hopes to return to the top after a difficult 2009 season, is the result of several months of design work, after Ferrari decided to switch its focus to 2010 early during last year’s campaign.

Ferrari won just one race in 2009, finishing a distant fourth in the constructors’ championship.

The Maranello-based outfit, however, has high hopes for the new car, with two-time champion Fernando Alonso having joined Felipe Massa for this year’s championship assault.

“This championship Read the rest of this entry »

Stefano Domenicali has admitted that the Ferrari team feels a massive sense of responsibility going into 2010 following its difficult 2009 campaign.

Ferrari only won one race last year, and since taking Michael Schumacher to five straight world championships from 2000 to 2004, it has only managed one further drivers’ title – with Kimi Raikkonen in 2007.

Team principal Domenicali said his squad was determined to address its problems this season.

“Clearly the main goal is to go back to the highest levels of competitiveness because this is our destiny. It is right for us to do so,” he said.

“Our first goal is to be reliable. Too often over the last few years, we started the championship with problems of reliability which then had an impact on our season, so we laid out our work on the test bench and with simulators to solve this problem that we’ve had.

“Second we are focusing on having a car which in Read the rest of this entry »

Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali is confident that new signing Fernando Alonso can defeat the squad’s former talisman Michael Schumacher – provided Ferrari delivers a car good enough to beat Mercedes.

Alonso was seen as the major challenger to Schumacher’s status as Formula 1′s finest driver in the German’s final years before retirement, and his comeback will allow their battle to resume.

Domenicali has no doubt about how strong Schumacher will be in 2010, but thinks Alonso is ready for the challenge.

“Everyone will look at Michael as very strong of course,” said Domenicali during Ferrari’s traditional winter ski event. “As Michael decided to address this challenge he is convinced he will have a car which can give him the possibility to show once again the driver that he is.

“Last year when we tackled the issue of substituting Felipe [Massa] we thought about him because we are convinced that Michael is an extraordinary, very strong driver. From this point of view, Fernando has all that is necessary to defeat him.

“But a driver can be the best in the world but without the best tools, even Read the rest of this entry »