No advantage for V10s, says Berger

Midland F1's managing director Colin Kolles said last week he was furious that Toro Rosso were running a V10 engine - and said there would be a 'problem' if the Red Bull junior team outqualified his outfit in Bahrain.

But despite continued doubts about whether the FIA's 'equivalency' restrictions on the V10 engine have gone far enough, Berger has said that he thinks the current level of performance for his team's engines is about right.

When asked for his thoughts on other teams' concerns about the V10 engine situation, Berger told autosport.com: "For other teams, you mean basically Midland.

"I think this is the regulation. I do not see any advantage at the moment and all the lap times are where they should be. We have a good car but we are not doing the quickest times. You know, okay, we are quicker than Midland but so what?

"I think when they decided on the equivalency there were a lot of thoughts behind it and lots of calculations must have been done. We know we are definitely not having an advantage over the V8 Cosworth engine and, although we may have an advantage over another engine, for me at the moment this figure is a fair solution."

Berger has said that he does not expect a swift improvement of form over Minardi's pace for Toro Rosso this year, and claims he is looking at up to three years for the outfit to be competitive.

"You have to see the reality," he said. "It is not reasonable to say that we can go first and second. We will have to see over the first three years. Within three years we have to establish a good pace, put good people together - but knowing that the resources are limited.

"Still, I believe with the right people we can do something together and of course we have direct competitors - Midland and Suzuki. That is the first stage of direct competition. Then let's try to see the next step."