Soft tires don't suit Ferrari

Indeed, Felipe Massa and Kimi Raïkkönen only finished the second session in 10th and 11th positions respectively. The least we can say is that this is obviously not a result that meets its expectations for the Team. But these poor performances have an explanation, which the men of the Italian team explain to us.

“After only three hours of free testing, I prefer not to draw hasty conclusions. », declared Stefano Domenicali, the team director. “The first indications, however, confirm what we had already observed during the private tests this winter, namely that the balance of power of recent years has been completely turned upside down and that we will now have to count on a greater number of adversaries. »

“The most important data of the day concerns the slick tires. This is a very tricky area to manage, as the soft tires seem to degrade considerably and very quickly over distance, while the hard compounds do not offer enough grip on this particular circuit. But we already knew all this and these free tests were precisely the opportunity to test several configurations, in order to understand how to improve the general performance of the F60. », added Domenicali.

As for the drivers, here too we prefer to remain cautious. Felipe Massa, for his part, considers that we should not judge everyone's performance too quickly, that it is better to wait until tomorrow until everyone has found the right settings and that the quantity of fuel on board is the same for everyone.

 » We are more or less there with the settings, although there is still a good margin to improve performance. I wasn't able to set a decent time on the soft tires this afternoon, the car was very oversteering. In addition, the wind picked up at the end of the session, which didn't really make our task easier. Tomorrow, everyone will have the same quantity of gasoline, at which point we will see what it really is. »

Kimi Raïkkönen is of the same opinion as his teammate, we will have to wait until the qualifying session to be able to truly judge everyone's performance.

“I was happy with my machine this morning, it behaved very well. But this afternoon, we tried several different settings, to try to adapt the car to the soft tires, which did not prove conclusive in the end. I know that we undoubtedly have the possibility of doing better, but on the other hand I don't know to what extent compared to the competition. It's hard to say after today, let's wait for tomorrow's qualifying. »