Todt thought race was lost

Michael Schumacher's spin on the first lap and Rubens Barrichello's need for an early pit-stop left the two Ferrari cars languishing in ninth and 11th after the fifth lap - well behind the opposition. And Todt was adamant that at that moment he though the team was going to disappoint the 100,000 tifosi who had turned up to cheer the outfit on.

"At the beginning of the race I thought it might be our first race without scoring points," admitted Todt. "But then [after a few laps] I thought perhaps we would score two points and then slowly and slowly points were improving.

"We started to see how quick we could be with Michael but he was still quite far away and then the time when Rubens was very close to the three cars in front of him we thought that overtaking would be very difficult so it was a little risk to change the strategy from two to three.

"It was a guess and a good one - even when you see Michael's race I am not sure it did change a lot because when you see how the race ended we were due to finish first and second."

Ferrari technical director Ross Brawn still refused to get complacent about the team's overall pace despite the Monza form - especially considering how the team was backed into a corner over its choice of tyres for the damp track.

"We knew that if we have an Achilles Heel, it is our performance on a damp track," he said. "With hindsight, it is difficult to say whether Michael or Rubens made the best choice. In any case, after a few laps, things were looking very bad and we thought at that time the best we could hope for was a points finish or maybe a podium."