Massa: "Incredible support from Ferrari"

Madonna di Campiglio, 15 January 2010 – The ‘veteran’ driver concluded the media section of the 20th edition of Wrooom. Felipe Massa is in his fifth season as an official Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro driver, while his relationship with Maranello and the world of Ferrari is even older. "It’s great to be back here year after year. This is the best possible way to start the season, absolutely unique, working and having fun.”

Felipe said he’s fit and ready for a new chapter in his career in red, confident in a better year than last season and in a more competitive car. “After the accident I never thought I had to stop racing. I was convinced that I could be back on the track already in Valencia," the Brazilian driver said. “The accident hasn’t changed anything in my work approach and in my way of thinking. Because I had to cope with so many difficulties in my life, I always learned a lot. I always had lots of support from Ferrari, since when I started racing for this team, but the strength and the availability they showed after my accident was really incredible: I knew that I could count on them, but what they gave me was really exceptional. Perspectives for the Championship? Although it’s still early to say, because I don’t know the new car’s performance and we don’t know where we stand compared to the other teams, I think that it was the right decision to start developing the car mid-season last year."

Asked if his life has changed, now that he is a dad, Felipe said: “The arrival of my son made my life very special, but I haven’t changed the way I’m living the races. When I sit behind the wheel I don’t think about my family, only when I come back to the garage I remember that I’m a dad now. They say that you loose one second per lap for every child? A champion like Schumacher has won a lot and he has two children….”

For the Brazilian driver Michael’s decision to come back to racing with Mercedes will not influence their relationship: "Michael is a friend and he was an important teammate for me to grow and improve. We’re still friends in life, but on the track he’ll be a competitor I have to beat, just like all the others. It’s difficult to say if he made the right choice, because I don’t know what you feel when you stop racing after a whole life on the track. I think that his comeback will help this sport; he’s a great talent and I think that he can be competitive immediately. It will be weird seeing him racing with another team after all the years with Ferrari, although there weren’t the possibilities for his return.”

Regarding the new rules Massa said: “The races without refuelling are an important change. We are working very hard with Shell to improve the consumption as much as possible, without penalising the performance. The race strategy will depend a lot on the position on the starting grid. In certain situations it will be important to be aggressive over the first five laps to gain positions, in others we might need to apply a calmer strategy: obviously it will depend on the circumstances.”

As far as his new teammate is concerned, Felipe is convinced that it was the right choice made by Ferrari: "During my career I’ve always had extraordinary teammates. This is what enabled me to learn and to improve, because you can learn a lot from a different driving style, from the way he sets up the car, how he goes into corners and how he brakes. I’m sure that we’ll work together very well, because this will help us both and also the team regarding the car’s development. Naturally we’ll both fight to stay ahead, because that’s our sport. Fernando is an extremely talented driver and I’ll try to help him with my experience in Ferrari. We had a discussion in 2007, after the Nürburgring race, because he accused me of unsporting behaviour: we cleared that, he apologised and that was it. Over the last days we spoke about our ideas regarding the car’s development. Differences to his predecessor? Although I’ve always worked very well with Kimi I’ve spoken more to Fernando over the last three days than with him in three years.”