Kimi Raikkonen is predicting a difficult British GP for Ferrari while Felipe Massa reckons they could be competitive this weekend.
Kimi Raikkonen: "There's always lots of wind at Silverstone and it often rains, even in the summer. The track conditions are changing extremely quickly so that it's difficult to find the right set up for the car. Usually, when you're leading in the Championship, you hope for stable weather conditions, but this year it's different and we try to consider this variable part of the fun of racing in England. For the first time we're racing at Silverstone without any prior test sessions. The Team prepared some new solutions, which we will test on Friday morning: as never before this year it's fundamental to exploit the three free practice sessions as much as possible. At Silverstone the performance in the fast corners is very important, where you need a high aero downforce. We hope that the new solutions will help us to improve in an area, which brought us into difficulties in Turkey. As I've said several times before we need to be patient: we're improving thanks to the hard development work, but we're still not able to fight for a win against the Brawns. I'm extremely confident and I'm convinced that after another couple of races we'll have closed the gap between the leaders and us. I know that this is what our fans want from us and we're giving it our all to succeed.
"It will be a difficult British GP: a place on the podium would be a great result. Form me this is really significant track. This was almost the starting point of my international career in the minor Formula series and I always loved to race here. That's why it's a bit sad that this should be the last edition of the race, but I have to admit that I also really like Donington: I've won there too already...."
Felipe Massa: "I had an unusual experience on Monday - driving a Formula 1 car away from a race weekend! With the ban on in-season testing, the time between races will usually involve quite a lot of talk with the engineers in Maranello about what is planned for the car for the following races, but no actual driving. This time however, with our test driver Marc Gene having just finished competing in and winning the Le Mans 24 Hours, I was given the job of sitting behind the wheel for an aerodynamic test at Fiorano. I say "sitting behind the wheel" rather than driving, because to be honest, it's not the most interesting thing for a driver and you are a more like a robot, simply driving the car up and down in straight lines. But, it's very important for the team and the development of the car, so I was more than happy to do it. Just driving up and down a straight means you cannot give the engineers much feedback as to how the car feels, but by changing front wings for example and looking at the telemetry data, you can compare it to data gathered in the wind tunnel and see if the numbers match, which means you are on the right track.
"On paper, this weekend's British Grand Prix takes place at a track with some similarities to the last race in Istanbul, where we were not so competitive: this weekend's track also features fast corners, flowing sections and a final slow sector and we will have the same two types of tyre from Bridgestone, but that doesn't mean I think we will struggle as much as we did a fortnight ago. For a start, the new components we have on the car this weekend, including a front wing and a lighter chassis, should make us more competitive. But, more importantly, in Turkey we went backwards over the course of the weekend, after being very competitive on Friday and on Saturday morning. We now know why that happened, which is the most important thing: we believe that with the very high track temperatures, we ran too low on the downforce and should have run with more rear wing, because as the temperature rises, the grip from the tyres went down and we needed to compensate for that. As the temperature gradually got higher, our cars were running slower and slower in the first sector of the track; the one where you need the most downforce. In other words, the problem we had was related to the way we worked, rather than any specific fault on the car.
"So I think we can be more competitive this weekend, with these changes to the car. Apparently this is the last time we will race at Silverstone and I have to say that I have always enjoyed racing here, even if my track record is nothing special, especially in the wet and if you think back to last year, I had a terrible afternoon in the rain. All the same, it is a nice track and I hope that where we go next for the British Grand Prix will be as good as Silverstone in terms of its layout and the pleasure it provides in terms of driving. I'm heading to the UK today Tuesday, straight from Maranello, as I am attending an event in London for Shell, which is fine for me, as I enjoy spending time in London and then I will head up to Silverstone on Thursday.
"Whatever happens on the race track this weekend, the current political situation in the sport is bound to be making the headlines again. When I am driving the car, I never think about it and simply concentrate on my job of driving as quickly as possible, but outside the cockpit, I think about these problems, as they do affect me, as the relate to my future and the future of Formula 1. We are all very concerned about the situation and I follow the developments closely, as it affects my professional life, even if I can have no real influence over how the situation evolves: that's down to the people who govern the sport and those in charge of the teams. We need our sport to be in better shape, because over the past few months there have been some very stupid fights. Everyone needs to work hard to make the sport what it should be for the fans, the teams, the sponsors and the drivers. We don't need this fighting. The situation looks bad at the moment, but if agreement can be reached then it can have a healthy future. If not, then we need to look seriously at what is the best option: as the teams appear to be united, then maybe it is time to look at doing something different that could be better for the sport."
