We can't repeat certain mistakes - Massa
It has been a very disappointed Hungarian Grand Prix for Felipe Massa on Sunday. The Brazilian Ferrari driver was leading the race when 3 laps before the finish, his engine gave in. At the moment, Massa is at Sao Paulo for the summer break to spend some time with his family and to get ready for the next race at Valencia.
Felipe Massa said: "A couple of days ago I came back to Sao Paulo: I tried to forget the race at Budapest, but that's quite difficult! Although I don't want to forget the Hungarian GP, because in a certain way it was one of the best races I ever had in Formula 1, but it didn't end as the others, with a win. It was a shame, because I really think that me and the Team deserved the success: we had a perfect race at a very important moment of the Championship. Unfortunately we couldn't bring home the ten points we already had in our hands: it was really frustrating, but these things sometimes happen in motor sports.
"The start was the crucial moment. I spoke about it a lot with my engineers before the race. I knew that I could have a good start, thanks to the starting system of the car; I expected to pass Kovalainen, because on the clean side of the track I had an advantage. I was confident and I was right. Before the start we also thought about overtaking Hamilton and the only way to do it was by having a good start. So when I had passed Kovalainen I knew that I had to put my car behind the other McLaren, to make the most out of it. When he saw me coming, he immediately moved to the inside to defend himself, but I had a good pace and I knew that this was the decisive moment to try to overtake. I was very determined and I braked right at the limit and I even blocked the wheels: I thought that I might not make it, but then the wheels unlocked and I could take the corner. Then I had much better acceleration than Hamilton and I was able to stay ahead. For the first three or four laps my tyres vibrated slightly, but when it stopped I thought "Ok, the tyres are alright."
"Form then on I drove with very good rhythm: I think you can count the laps Lewis was faster than me on one hand. I managed to gain an advantage before the first pit stop and then a bigger one before the second stop. When Lewis had his problem I slowed down, because I had an advantage of 23 seconds on Heikki. I wasn't worried at all, because I could keep the pace I wanted. Even with the supersoft tyres I didn't have any problems, because I didn't go to the limit.
"But in the end it was not my day. When the engine failed I had a strange feeling. It was like a nightmare and I wanted to wake up, but I couldn't, because I was already awake! It was an incredible disappointment. This sport can be really cruel.
"Looking at the standigs at least I can stay calm, because not even Lewis won, but we can't throw away points like that. We lost ten, but the positive aspect is, that we've demonstrated that we're strong. The Team has done some great work over the whole weekend, in terms of strategy and eliminating the problems we had in England and Germany.
"We've worked hard to make the car competitive again and this is a good thing for the upcoming races. But we've got to resolve the remaining problems: we have to be as competitive as at Budapest, but we need to raise our reliability. We can't repeat certain mistakes: we don't have any more excuses."
