Ferrari boosted by progress with KERS

The Maranello-based team openly admitted at the end of last year that they felt they were behind with the progress of their system compared to their rivals - especially BMW Sauber, who are believed to be most advanced with the new technology.

But following some encouraging progress with the device during testing at Mugello in Italy this week, the indications are that the team could be further down the road with it than originally thought.

Speaking to Gazzetta dello Sport about the progress of the new F60, Ferrari's chief engineer Chris Dyer said that the biggest concern at the moment was their lack of running on slick tyres rather than anything on the car - especially KERS.

"At the moment it's difficult to say how it will be," said Dyer, who has moved into his new role after two years as Kimi Raikkonen's race engineer.

"As you know, the main new things are essentially three things: aerodynamics, KERS, and slick tyres.

"Regarding the first two everything is going in the best possible way, but unfortunately the latter we haven't been able to verify yet. Surely we can't wait to fit the slick tyres on, because only with them we'll know how quick we can be."

Talking more specifically about how the work on KERS was going, Dyer said: "I'm not saying every lap, as the drivers maybe want, but we make use of it fairly often to study its safety. It's an interesting thing, a challenge from a technical point of view."

When asked whether he felt the development of the F60 was progressing well, Dyer said: "Yes, without a doubt. In this third day we've just done more than 500 kilometres and everything went positively. There really has been nothing to worry about."