Ferrari will need Felipe Massa to perform better in 2013 – Formula 1
Ferrari lost some crucial points in the 2012 Formula 1 championship because their driver Felipe Massa lacked pace during the opening few races, therefore they earnestly need the Brazilian driver to perform better in the next season.
The Scarlet team struggled with the design of F2012 in all the three pre-season tests during this year. Furthermore, their technical director, Pat Fry even ruled out the probability of a podium finish in the first race and expected to face problems in the
opening few grands prix.
Nevertheless, Massa’s teammate, Fernando Alonso performed incredibly well right from the beginning of this season and scored points with admirable consistency.
The Spaniard performed well even with an incompetent car which impressed everyone. Moreover, he led the championship for quite a long time and was considered as the strongest title contender.
However, he was unfortunately retired in a couple of races because of which he lost some important points in the championship.
Although, he fought really hard but unluckily lost the title to Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull Racing who seemed unbeatable during the last few races with the fastest car in the field.
Additionally, it will be important to note that the two-time world champion lost the drivers’ title by only 3 points to Vettel.
On the other hand, Massa struggled very badly in the first few races and was surrounded by immense criticism over his poor form. Moreover, there were many speculations which stated that the Italian team might replace him with any other driver in the coming
year.
Contrarily, the team principal, Stefano Domenicali dismissed all the rumours and asserted that they would help their struggling driver in every kind of circumstances.
Fortunately, Ferrari successfully made some essential developments in their car during the Mugello test and came up with a more competent car with which Massa performed amazingly well during the last few races.
Considering the performance of the veteran driver in the final few grands prix, the Italian squad extended his contract for the next year.
It will be important to mention that the Brazilian seemed very worried during the first half of the season, but became very confident after getting one-year contract extension.
In addition, the 31-year-old said that he has learnt a lot from his mistakes during this season which will surely help him in improving his performance in the coming year.
Besides, he said that his aim is to attain promising results for his team in the next season on consistent basis in order to make his position stronger in the championship fight.
“In the first half of the year, I was worried about renewing my contract,” Massa said.
“At the start, I paid too much attention to these things, but then, in August, I told myself I should only think about racing and having fun and so I began to really drive, to have the right feeling with the car and to drive as quickly as I know how. Now
I feel very strong and the results were there to see in the last nine races: so I am optimistic for the future, mine and Ferrari’s,” he added.
At present, Ferrari are looking forward to make some necessary developments in their car during the winter testing to attain good results right from the start of the next season.
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