Massa: No miracles in Formula 1

“Every Sunday, the fans expect a miracle from Ferrari.” With these words, a journalist began Felipe Massa’s regular Thursday media session here in England for the British Grand Prix, asking the Scuderia Ferrari driver how he deals with the expectations of the general fans who perhaps do not have a great interest in the technical side of the sport and just want a Prancing Horse victory. “We are working on it,” said the Brazilian. “But there are no miracles in Formula 1 and we must continue with our efforts to improve the car. Last week for example, I went through the usual round of meetings with engineers and work on the simulator, as part of the process to be always improving, always moving forward race after race. Our aim is to get ahead of not just the Red Bull but also McLaren.”

Tyres are always a topic in these sessions and with suggestions that Ferrari’s improved performance in recent races had something to do with the Pirelli specifying the Soft and Supersoft compounds, Felipe was asked for his views on this weekend’s choice. “We will be running the Soft and the Hard and, it doesn’t matter which tyres you have, you must always work on making the car work with the tyres available,” he said. “But in general terms I am happier with this choice of tyre than the combination that had been suggested at one point for this weekend, of Medium and Hard.”

Still on the technical front, this race is the first where teams can no longer use a device with the complicated name of an off-throttle blown diffuser, a system which allows exhaust gasses to add downforce to the rear of the car, even when the driver is not applying any pressure on the accelerator pedal. “We are going to lose performance but so will all the big teams who use this,” confirmed Felipe. “At the moment, it is impossible to say which teams will lose how much. But clearly, all cars will lose downforce under braking. It will change the balance of the car, but only when you brake and more obviously, at hard braking points, like when you come to the end of the main straight here at high speed and change down to second gear.”