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Front wing behaviour puzzles Ferrari

Felipe Massa's front wing threw up sparks as it bounced off the track surface © Sutton Images

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• News:
• Ferrari finds fix for flexing front wing
  

• Race:
• Indian Grand Prix

• Championship:
• FIA Formula One World Championship

• Drivers:
• Stefano Domenicali
• |
• Felipe Massa

• Teams:
• Ferrari

Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali says that one of Felipe Massa's front wings kept displaying "strange behaviour" but that it was identical to other wings that the team took to India.

As early as Friday practice it was clear to see that Massa's wing was oscillating violently at high speed, with the end plates bouncing off the track and sparking along the long straight between turns three and four. The wing was changed before qualifying but Massa then broke the replacement in a crash at the end of Q3, forcing him to revert to the original.

The problem wasn't apparent during the race until after contact with Lewis Hamilton, and Massa then pitted to change the wing. Domenicali insisted that the wing was identical to that which Fernando Alonso was running, but that the team would have to analyse telemetry to understand why it was behaving differently.

"It was pretty clear that we had a little bit of strange behaviour of that specific wing in certain conditions; not every time, but it was really clear, you have seen it," Domenicali said. "We did a test just to make sure that everything was alright. It was alright from the data point of view, but for sure we will take home the data to understand what the problem was - not a problem but the strange behaviour of that wing, because it was that specific wing."

Domenicali also said that the wing was changed because Massa had been forced to pit early for the final time anyway, and Ferrari wanted to prevent any potential further problems arising.

"Why did we change it? It was because when there was contact [with Hamilton] we also had a deflation of the tyres, because we had to come in for a change of tyres because he had a puncture, and so because we were worried about having other problems the most obvious thing was to change also that, so that's the reason why we changed it."

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.