Ferrari rule out podium for season opener – Formula 1 news
Pat Fry, the technical director of Ferrari has expressed that the team will not be able to challenge for the podium for the season opener at Melbourne, Australia on March 18, 2012.
Fry said that performance of the team during the pre-season testing was not up to the mark and he stated that the team may struggle to fight for the podium at the first Grand Prix. Moreover, at the end of the test, the team drivers were also forbidden to
speak anything negative about the team to the press.
After struggling with the problems of the new car’s aerodynamics, their run in the pre-season tests did not prove out to be good for them and was no match with the pace of Red Bull and McLaren, the major contenders of Ferrari. Furthermore, Fry conveyed that
the team would keep itself out from the fight for podium during the first race.
“I am disappointed by our performance level at the moment; I think we've got a lot of work to do. So we've just got to kick on. The change we made last week to the exhaust position has put us a little bit on the back foot we're just trying to optimise for
that, we've still got obviously a lot of work going on at the factory and we'll have new bits to test in Melbourne,” said Fry.
Moreover, Fry said that there is a significant need for improvements in the team before the first grand prix of the 2012 season, when he was asked about the position of the team at the end of the all the three tests. However, he said that testing did not
provide the true estimate of the performance but they still had a lot of work to do.
Fry stated that the team has failed after making efforts to attempt something alike Red Bull which after the ban from FIA, have somewhat redesigned their blown diffuser by changing the angle of their exhaust exits.
Moreover, he said that the change the team made during the last week to the position of the exhaust had taken them a step behind.
Let’s see how they recover from this and prepare themselves for the season opener in Melbourne in about two weeks’ time.
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