Monday 6 April 2009

Formula one: Ferrari and McLaren are paying for success, says Ross Brawn

Brawn expects rivals to improve over course of the season
• 'We didn't have a very good car so why waste time on it?'
Lewis Hamilton's McLaren team and the reigning formula one champions Ferrari are paying the price for last year's success, according to Ross Brawn. The Brawn GP owner, whose team have won both this season's races, feels his rivals' difficulties are a direct result of last year's title battle.
"It is a reflection of what has gone on in the last year or two," said Brawn, who guided Michael Schumacher to seven titles with Benetton and Ferrari. "McLaren and Ferrari had a championship to fight over and I can understand that it was very difficult for them to say 'Look, we'll stop pushing this year and put our effort into next year'."
In contrast, Brawn have benefitted from starting work on a car for the 2009 season much earlier than last year's frontrunners. "For us it was a very easy decision," said Brawn. "It wasn't a clever one, just a very easy one. We didn't have a very good car so why waste time on it?"
But Brawn, along with Jenson Button, who led the team to victory at Sepang yesterday after his triumph in the season opener in Melbourne the week before, expects McLaren and Ferrari to fight back strongly. "They are both very strong and fantastic engineering companies so they will sort it out," he said.

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