British GP: Felipe Massa preview

Massa: "things can change in the next few races" Silverstone, 8 July -- As Felipe Massa faced the media this afternoon in the Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro media hospitality, it was clear that some of the press has confused lack of results with a lack ...

Massa: "things can change in the next few races"

Silverstone, 8 July -- As Felipe Massa faced the media this afternoon in the Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro media hospitality, it was clear that some of the press has confused lack of results with a lack of competitiveness from the Prancing Horse, suggesting that updates introduced at the European Grand Prix "had not worked." "That was definitely not the case," said the Brazilian, putting them right. "For sure we were not first and second on the grid, but we were not far away and the car was reasonably competitive in Valencia, even if Red Bull was still a bit better. In fact, I think, but for the situation that we all saw, we would have had a very close race between Lewis (Hamilton) Fernando and me. The important thing is to keep improving race by race. Setting up the car with the new diffuser was not so different and reliability was good given that we had completely changed the exhaust system and I think it will be a useful aid at this track also."

On the subject of the modified Silverstone circuit, Felipe delivered a mixed verdict: "The track looks nice to drive, but in my opinion, if you want to improve the show, you need to modify the circuit in a way that increases the chance of overtaking and from what I have seen today, I don't think the changes to the final part of the lap will do that. The quick corners look good and even some of the tighter ones seem interesting, but you still have a very fast corner after the main straight and that never encourages overtaking. So, as usual, Saturday afternoon will be vital to have a good Sunday, In fact, qualifying is even more important this year for us, because last year, to some extent we could compensate for not qualifying so well by using the KERS to make up places immediately after the start, whereas this year, there is no KERS."

As for the title fight, the Ferrari man believes the next few races hold the key. "We can see we are a little bit behind the top two teams in terms of points, but there are still many races and things can change quickly, so we need to concentrate and work hard to produce that change. The next four or five races will be the key to the championship and if our competitors score more points than us over that period it will be difficult, but if we score more points than them, we can still fight for the championship."