Massa expects more competitiveness than in Turkey
Having announced his two year contract extension with the famous Scuderia from Maranallo, Felipe Massa heads to Montreal full of even more confidence in that his team will claw back the performance lost in the last few GP's. With his F10 in a new low downforce configuration, Massa is hoping to improve upon his best ever result in Canada, a fourth place from his Sauber days.
"As you have possibly heard already, I will be racing for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro until the end of the 2012 season. I am delighted that we have reached this agreement, as I really feel as though everyone in Maranello is part of my other family, with our relationship going much further than just a working partnership," is how Massa began his blog entry at Ferrari.com. "From a purely professional point of view it is great to know what I am doing so early on in the current season, which means I can now concentrate a hundred percent on the rest of this year’s races.
"I have arrived in Montreal, ready for this weekend’s Grand Prix and I have to say it’s nice to be back after Formula 1’s year away, because this is one of the nicest race’s of the year, with the whole city making all of us feel very welcome. After the race in Istanbul, I went back home to spend a few days in Sao Paolo and I have taken a few days to get here, as I had to attend some events for Ferrari team partners along the way. Thanks to Shell, I made my first ever visit to an off-shore oil rig, just over a hundred kilometres away from the Brazilian coast line. It was a very interesting experience and it was incredible to see how complicated is the extraction process and management of the crude oil on the platform. When I was at the control desk, it reminded me of looking at the telemetry from our cars when we are on track: every parameter can be studied in real time 24 hours a day. Here too, teamwork is the key and each individual has to work in harmony with everyone else to get the job done as well as possible. They are together almost all the time for at least two weeks at a time and it’s vital that every member of the group feels responsible for what they do and is ready to help those around them. It’s the very same in a Formula 1 team.
"Instead of flying north to Canada after this unusual day, I had another stop over to make, this time in Quito, the capital of Ecuador, for a promotional appearance with our partner Philip Morris and from there, I finally took another long flight to Montreal.
"Even though I like the circuit here, with the challenge of running in low downforce configuration on a narrow track that is an unusual mix of a race track and street circuit, I have not had much luck in Canada. In fact, my best result dates back to my final year with Sauber in 2005, when I finished fourth. The last two races here were particularly tough for me: in 2007, I was penalised for leaving pit lane when the red light was on and the last time we were here, in 2008, there was a problem with the refuelling at my pit stop, which cost me at least a podium finish, but my car was really working well and I managed to move up from the back of the pack to finish fifth at the flag.
"This year, I hope we have a better time and that should be possible, because I expect our F10 to be more competitive than in Turkey. A good race should be on the cards, as the track has some similarities to Melbourne and Sakhir, where we were front runners. But as usual, we won’t really know where we stand until the end of Friday’s two practice sessions."
