NEW STRATEGY

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Ferrari driver Felipe Massa has said that he had to go on a different strategy in the Bahrain Grand Prix since he was not quick enough in the qualifying sessions. Ferrari adopted to go down the hard tyres route for the Brazilian in the race, while much of the front-runners on the grid adopted soft tyres. This proved to be a boon in disguise because Massa had a good race. Massa went into the final qualifying sessions with the hard tyres, and ended up qualifying sixth on the grid. However, he was promoted into the fourth position as a result of penalties for Jenson Button and Mark Webber.

Massa said after the qualifying session that he was not entirely happy with the car during the session, and he was not confident about fighting for the top three positions. He has said that the team was aware that both Mark Webber and Jenson Button were facing penalties. Hence, it was a matter of waiting for the right moment and putting in a good lap time. He has said that the hard tyres certainly helped him achieve a decent qualifying position, which has been improved as a result of the penalties to the McLaren and Red Bull drivers.

He is hoping that the hard tyres will help him in the race as well.

“I was not 100 per cent happy with the lap times and [the chance] of fighting for pole. We were looking at two cars that would lose position [Hamilton and Webber] so one option was to watch and not go out. The other was to go out on the hard. I hope this is the right tyre for the race tomorrow. The long run on the hard [in practice] was more consistent. The degradation’s a bit better,” said Massa.

MASSA HOPES FOR VICTORY

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The Brazilian driver Felipe Massa was regarded as the next big thing in the sport when he moved to Ferrari to be under the wings of Michael Schumacher. He progressed to great lengths in recent years, but the driver has been struggling to rediscover his form since suffering a fatal crash a few years ago. Due to several reasons, the 31-year-old driver has been unable to win a F1 race since 2008. His last success in the sport came at the 2008 Monaco Grand Prix. However, he feels that he is closer than ever before to ending this drought of victories.

Massa has been overshadowed by the Spaniard Fernando Alonso at Ferrari for the last few years, while the 31-year-old came extremely close to losing his seat at the Italian team only to sign a new contract at the last moment. The new season, though, has started in a promising manner for Massa. He has been able to outshine Alonso in the first two races of the season – Australian and Malaysia. Massa’s fifth-place finish in the recent Malaysian Grand Prix has also put him as one of the leading drivers at Ferrari in the table this season. Ferrari are expected to bring in more improvements to the car over the next few races.

“Yes, for sure. We need to be confident [to win], and I am very confident. I don’t think we had the car to win [in Malaysia], but I think we have a competitive car for fighting for the podium. We need to keep our feet on the ground as well. We did great work on the car from last year to this year, but there’s a lot to do to get the evolution right and make it more competitive. I think if we carry on in this direction, the chance for winning races and fighting for the championship is there,” said Massa.

MASSA WORTHY OF NEW DEAL

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The Ferrari driver Felipe Massa has showed that he is worthy of a new contract offered by the Italian team after he finished the fastest amongst the F1 drivers on the third day of the pre-season testing. Pre-season testing is currently under way at Jerez, and Ferrari have shown that they have not let off steam from the end of last season. In order to challenge Red Bull, Ferrari adopted an aggressive strategy towards the end of last season. Massa, whose future was under a cloud of debate only a few months ago, set the fastest time by almost a second over the Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg.

He was also faster than the current world champion Sebastian Vettel. The third day of testing was extremely beneficial for Mercedes after Rosberg was able to complete almost 140 laps compared to the 20 odd laps he did in the previous day. Mercedes were played by mechanical problems in the first two days of testing. The former Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen, who finished in the fourth position of the driver’s championship last season, came in a close fourth place just below Vettel. This third day testing also marked the debut of the 2013 car for Kimi Raikkonen.

“I have no idea how fast we are, but if look at what Ferrari have done I’m not worried about their time. We made up a lot of what we lost in the last two days and I’m sure will be the same tomorrow. We’ve just been unfortunate the last two days. They were problems that could easily have been avoided. Just unlucky and today showed we had a very reliable car,” said the Mercedes driver Rosberg. “It’s always nice to see your name in first position but it doesn’t count for anything. I’m sure there are a lot of very quick cars on the track and I’m not sure if we are in that position,” said Massa.