Domenicali: Crucial weeks

It’s not yet time to take stock in Maranello. Even if the original goal of winning both titles came to an end yesterday, there is still something worthwhile left to achieve, namely second place in the Constructors’ Championship, which is important not just from a financial point of view, but also from a sporting one Coming second is never really that satisfactory, but it is an achievement nevertheless as it clearly underlines that, yet again, Scuderia Ferrari and Fernando Alonso were the last to capitulate to their rivals, Red Bull and Sebastian Vettel, who yesterday took their fourth consecutive victories in both title races.

“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,” Stefano Domenicali told www.ferrari.com, when he returned to Maranello from India. “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,” continued the Scuderia Team Principal. “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.”

The result of the Indian Grand Prix did not match the team’s potential on the day. In terms of outright performance, the F138 is back in the fight for the podium places after a hiatus in Korea and Japan and only the incident in the opening moments prevented Fernando from getting a hat trick of top three finishes at the Greater Noida track. Already, as from this weekend in Abu Dhabi, it will be necessary to build on this progress so that Fernando and Felipe can fight for the podium, thus bringing home the points required to finish second in the championship. As usual, reliability will be a vital element, as will team work, both in terms of its preparation for the race and in the management of all the operational side, on the pit wall and in the garage. It is down to this work that we have equaled the outright record for the number of points finishes (64,) even if this is relatively insignificant: the important thing is to return to getting our drivers onto the podium and maybe even on its very top step.