- Ferrari
Mattiacci motivated by Tifosi passion at Monza
Ferrari team boss Marco Mattiacci says the support of the Tifosi at the Italian Grand Prix has motivated him further to bring about improvements at his team.
Mattiacci took over the role of team principal from Stefano Domenicali in April and Sunday's race was his first trip to Monza as Ferrari boss. It was another disappointing result for the team, with Kimi Raikkonen picking up just two points and Fernando Alonso suffering an ERS failure, but Mattiacci said he had drawn added motivation from seeing the fanatical Tifosi out in force.
"First of all, for me it was important for me to experience the passion and love there is around Ferrari and understand the relevance that Ferrari is much more than a racing team, it is an institution and has an obligation to our fans," he said. "This gave me a lot of motivation towards the team to make sure this frustration is going to end.
"I still believe that we have good pace; the car confirmed we had an improvement. But we definitely have a deficit in qualifying and if you start lower down on the grid it is going to be difficult on a track like Monza than if you had a greater power unit. I think we had the same pace as Red Bull and some of the others so we could have done better but we started too far behind."
Mattiacci said Ferrari has not forgotten how to win.
"The drivers, the brand, the company, the heritage, the culture, the people that work every day from 7am until 12pm. There are many assets to start from. There is also the tradition of winning, we know how to win and we are obsessed with getting back to the top. There is a huge motivation and hunger to get back to the top because we belong there.
"My role is to shorten as much we can that curve and making sure that between the cycle of making it back to the top, there must be execution, discipline and a clear understanding. That's my goal, to create a very strong team."
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
