Ferrari leave Canada utterly disappointed
Only eight points in the bank for Scuderia Ferrari at the end of the Canadian Grand Prix, thanks to a sixth place for Felipe Massa. Fernando Alonso had to retire on lap 37, after a collision with Button, who would go on to win the race.
The collision therefore put an end to a run of points finishes for the Spaniard which dates back to last year’s Belgian Grand Prix. After seven races, Fernando and Felipe are fifth and sixth respectively in the Drivers’ classification, while the Scuderia is still third in the one for Constructors.
Stefano Domenicali:
“Regret is the feeling affecting all of us at the end of a chaotic Canadian Grand Prix. Today we had the potential to fight for the win, but everything that could go wrong did go wrong. In the end, Felipe’s sixth place is definitely a result that is hard to swallow given how the race ended. Two incidents in particular – the collision between Fernando and Button and the passing move on Karthikeyan that caused Felipe to go of the track – leave a bitter taste in the mouth."
"Now we must put this Sunday behind us, while retaining the fact that our performance level was a match for the situation, just as we had seen two weeks ago in Monaco. We must do it again starting in Valencia and then improve for those races – I’m thinking above all of Silverstone – where aerodynamic efficiency will count for more and maybe the new interpretation of the regulations concerning the exhausts could change the pecking order in the field.”
Felipe Massa:
“I can’t draw much satisfaction from this sixth place, given the potential we had here. My chances of finishing on the podium and also of fighting for the win given how things went, just evaporated when I was passing Karthikeyan. He was going very slowly on the dry line but then, as I was passing him on the wet, he accelerated and I lost control of the car ending up in the wall."
"Thanks to the next Safety Car, I was able to catch up to the pack and then, in the end, I passed a few cars to get as high as sixth. I am angry, there is no point denying it. We qualified well and we were in the top three up until the red flag. Then what happened happened and it was all over. I am pleased with how the car performed, both on the extreme wets and on the slicks, but with the intermediates, I was struggling a bit. Now we go to Valencia, a track where we can be competitive, given its characteristics are fairly similar to here. We will have the medium tyres, that we tested here on Friday: we will see what sort of grip levels they give us.”
Fernando Alonso:
“Everything went wrong, right from this morning when we saw it was raining. We had our best qualifying of the year and we found ourselves starting behind the safety car, when I felt that for me, the intermediates were the best tyre. When we fitted them, the downpour came, along with the red flag which meant those who had not changed tyres could now do it practically for nothing. Finally there was the coming together with Button, which as a final insult left my car beached on a kerb and I was unable to get going again."
"It’s a real shame because today we really had a good race pace but we were unlucky: that’s not a feeling I have, it’s a fact. When you don’t score points then you must immediately turn the page and look to the next race. I think that in Valencia we can do well, because it is another circuit which should suit our car well, as was also the case here. The championship is not finished yet, but we must now hope for errors from others to have some hope. Our performance level here was good, especially because of the characteristics of the circuit, but also thanks to the updates we brought here. We must keep our heads up, have confidence in our ability and work hard.”
Pat Fry:
“You could say that was a pretty chaotic race, from which we did not come away with what was within our capabilities. Events definitely did not do us any favours, starting with the weather: today, also given what we had seen in qualifying, we could have fought for the win even in dry conditions In the first part of the race, the drivers were getting a different feel from their cars: for Fernando the intermediates were quicker and that is what led to the decision to bring him in to fit them. Then it began raining harder and the red flag followed. It was a lottery and our numbers did not come up, that’s for sure."
"Now we must look ahead and put this race behind us as quickly as possible, without letting it get us down. The team worked well in what were very difficult conditions. From a performance point of view, this weekend we saw that the gap to the quickest seems to have been reduced. Unfortunately, we did not reap the benefits of that on today’s results sheet. We must look ahead and try to continue down this route of improving the car: sooner or later the results will come.”
