GreenBkk.com Formula 1 | Stefano Domenicali: “On race pace we were there”

Stefano Domenicali: “On race pace we were there”

JUNE 26, 2011 · 7:11 PM

Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali says that he doesn’t know how the rule clarification for Silverstone will impact the status quo between the top teams.

In Valencia Fernando Alonso finished second, having kept Red Bull on its toes all day.

“Congratulations to Sebastian because he has won the race, he has won six out of eight or something like that,” said Domenicali. “But I think without looking at the classification, we need to make sure that race by race we improve our performance, and if we are able to put him under pressure, we will see.

“I don’t know what is going to happen at Silverstone in terms of what is the effect on the performance of our car and what is the effect on the performance of Red Bull and all the others. We will see, that will be very interesting. Of course Silverstone is a race where normally Red Bull is very strong, it’s a high speed corner track. So we need to wait and see.”

Regarding the Valencia result, he said: “I think that Fernando’s race was really good. It was a great race, pushing lap by lap, a lot of backmarkers in the middle, so that was not really an easy job for anyone, unfortunately also for him too.

“I’m very pleased, because we saw that on race pace we were there. We beat one of the two Red Bulls on the track. The strategy applied was the right one to jump Mark on the track. So really, a positive outcome of the day.”

Ferrari has been competitive at the last three tracks, and when asked if the circuits or car development had given the team a boost, Domenicali said: “I think it’s both. For sure the track suits better our car, but we improved the car everywhere, I would say.

“For sure now we need to see the package that we are preparing to arrive in the high downforce tracks, and in the tracks where the high speed corners are very relevant, and we will see where we will be. I think that Silverstone will be important because that will be a line to see where the performance will be considering the changes there will be.”

The problem for Ferrari is that Pirelli has not confirmed its tyre selection for the British GP, and the team clearly prefers the softest products in the range.

Credit: Adam Cooper's F1 Blog (adamcooperf1.com)