Ferrari say more development needed

That is the view of Ferrari sporting director Jean Todt, who believes that only a major push from his team to improve the 248 F1 over the course of the season will be enough to put his team in true contention for the crown.

"What is true today, considering the input of the teams, may not be true in five Grands Prix's time, because we know how important it is to develop the car during the season," said Todt after seeing Schumacher claim his second consecutive victory in the European Grand Prix.

"It will be very important to make a significant development possibly for each Grand Prix. We know how important the tyres are, so there's a big competition among the teams, there's a big competition among the tyre manufacturers.

"I don't know what can happen when it will be hotter or when the situation will be different. We don't know what can happen. But there's no reason why we shouldn't be competitive."

Todt also believes that the championship fight will be more than just a straight battle between his team and Renault.

"McLaren are very strong," he explained. "When you see that Raikkonen made his first pit stop on lap 23, he had between 10 and 15 kilos more than the others, the cars in front, which means he did a very good lap time in qualifying.

"And then he finished the race four seconds behind the winner, so this time it went not so much in their favour but next time it could be in their favour. And Honda is very strong as well. As I said before, they can make some strong development and be strong contenders as well."

Despite his cautiousness about the future, Todt has claimed he is not surprised at the form Ferrari have shown in the last two races.

"I knew, since the beginning of the season, that we have a very strong car. Coming to Germany, it was important to be competitive, to be a potential winner. But it's so tight, there's so little difference from being on one side or the other.

"So I knew that we were going to be competitive like I knew from the beginning of the season that we had the potential to do a good season.

"Unfortunately, in mainly the second and the third Grand Prix, we did not do a very good job, so we paid the price for it, but in a way it was our mistake, not the others if they did a better job than we did."