Ferrari must make better start to 2013 – Domenicali

2013 F1 season

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Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali says his team must make a better start to this season than they did in 2012 and 2011.

The F2012 was 1.26% off the pace of the fastest car in the first four races of last season. Both drivers failed to reach Q3 in the opening race and Felipe Massa didn’t reach the top ten in the next three rounds as well.

Domenicali said: “In order to make sure that we deliver a good car for our drivers I said to my engineers ‘Let’s face the reality: What was the gap on the technical side that we had at the end of the season?’

“We need to prepare a target in order to be sure that we deliver the fact that the car will be competitive. Because the objective for us this year is to make sure we start in a competitive way.

“We have to make sure we avoid the start of the season at last year and even the year before. Because then it puts us in a situation where we spend a lot of resources and effort to catch up.”

Domenicali expects he won’t have to wait long to discover if they’ve been successful: “As always in this moment I prefer to say not too many things. I want to see facts on the track and this is where I would see something already in the first days of testing in February.”

Speaking at Ferrari’s annual media event in Italy Domenicali deflected questions about whether there will be personnel changes at the team following their disappointing 2012 campaign: “My dream is to make sure that we are able to win with the people we have in-house. I would be very proud. They will be very proud.”

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Image © Ferrari/Ercole Colombo

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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2 comments on “Ferrari must make better start to 2013 – Domenicali”

  1. jimscreechy (@)
    17th January 2013, 10:19

    What Dominicalli says is true, but the problem is that all teams clearly have this intention. Though not exactly ‘luck of the draw’ certainly how great a job you have done in your winter preparations is ultimately determined by how you perform against the pace of your rivals. We saw the Mclaren appear last year at testing wth a slouch of a car that was hampered by exhaust problems and nowhere compared to their stronger opponents. They quickly set about damage limitation by reverting to a less complex system and suddenly they were on par with the performanc of the front runners. I have no doubt they put an emense about of work into ther original exhaust but ultimately the work you do or the expectations you have are only valid with track times.

  2. It’s such a difficult one to call with Ferrari. It’s not often at all that they do something outside the box (a la R31 frontward exhaust or MP4-26 U-shaped sidepods) so when they’re off the pace it’s not because of any outrageous idea that’s back fired. Get the exhaust right and they’ll be there.

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