- Ferrari
Ferrari faces 'huge amount of work'
Ferrari boss Marco Mattiacci says his team is facing "a huge amount of work" to make it competitive again next season.
During pre-season testing it quickly became clear that Ferrari was not on the pace of Mercedes at the front of the field and was lacking power and aerodynamic performance compared to its rivals. Mattiacci was named as the new team principal ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix after Stefano Domenicali stepped down and has started making changes at the team, with Ferrari confirming the departure of engine boss Luca Marmorini on Thursday.
Mattiacci says the team needs to improve in all areas and will be met with a "huge" work load to make its car competitive next year.
"We need to improve the car at 360 degrees," he said. "It's not just the power unit, it's not just aerodynamics, it's not just the chassis. It's the team and the car and there is a huge amount of work that needs to be done. I'm confident about the team spirit we are building, the quality of the people and their strength and I'm confident about the plan that we had."
Ferrari went into the summer break with its strongest result of the year after Fernando Alonso finished second and Kimi Raikkonen sixth at the Hungarian Grand Prix. But Mattiacci does not view the race as a true indicator of form.
"It's encouraging but at the same time we need to properly weight this second and sixth place. The values the strengths over the other teams was a little bit diluted because of the weather conditions and the specifics of the track. I would be very careful and we need to manage very carefully the enthusiasm for this result.
"I'm happy Kimi is back with a fantastic race and Fernando did a fantastic race, but we have to be careful to give the right importance to this second place. We still have a gap compared to the leaders."
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