Barrichello Up for Fight with Schumacher

The two Ferrari teammates nearly clashed at the US Grand Prix last week, when Schumacher exited the pitlane after his second and final stop, taking the lead from Barrichello. Previously, the German made a bold move on his teammate at Monaco, overtaking Barrichello for seventh on the final lap, leading Barrichello to warn Schumacher that he will no longer play nice.

"Between teammates you always have to be prudent," he said when asked how free he is to race Schumacher now. "But you know, it's just a little Brazilian against a very big world, so it's a very big fight.

"I'm happy because we reached a great level within Formula One. I'm driving the car well, but I'm having to put up with a lot of things I don't like. But those are things that are slowly getting into place and I think we're still going to have the possibility to win races without any bitter taste."

Barrichello claims that at Indianapolis he was allowed to race Schumacher until the pair were ordered to lower their revs and preserve their engine for the next race after the final pitstop.

And, with Ferrari's high-scoring points haul from the Canadian and United States Grands Prix having put them back in the hunt for Championship honours, Barrichello is upbeat about the team's chances of further good results.

When asked whether Ferrari will be strong in this weekend's French Grand Prix, he said: "I believe we will, but we need to win races with the others racing.

"I believe we would have been strong in Indianapolis even with a full field on the track, because our tyres withstood the race very well. We saw our competitors had problems at the start of the weekend and we were prepared to put on a strong showing."

Schumacher himself is equally upbeat about Ferrari's form, especially after an encouraging test of latest developments at Barcelona in Spain last week.

"We are now ahead in our development, but I don't think you will see a giant step forward in performance all of a sudden," he said on Monday. "We should nevertheless perform a little better from now on.

"We will try to make Magny Cours the turning point for us. But we need to see everyone's times to know where we stand."