Tyres key to Ferrari hopes
Ferrari's technical director Ross Brawn has said that his team's true chances of taking this year's Formula 1 World Championship title depend on whether its Bridgestone tyres work better at Ferrari's bogey tracks than they did last year
Despite a clean sweep of the season's first three races, Brawn is still not admitting that the team has the season as good as in the bag.
"While there will be some races where our package will be exceptionally good," Brawn said, "I'm still concerned about some of the races we struggled at last year because we don't know yet whether we've improved that situation. We're still very concerned about Hungary and Hockenheim and we're still anxious about making sure the tyre works on those type of tracks. We've got a lot of work to make sure they do.
"I don't think we've found the real solution yet," he added. "We saw a little bit of that towards the end of Sunday's race, where the drivers didn't have the grip they had at the beginning, and conversely the Michelin guys had more grip. That's something we're very anxious about."
When Ferrari driver Michael Schumacher demonstrated such dominance in 2002, he had the title sewn up by the French Grand Prix at Magny Cours in July, so that the Hungarian and German races were irrelevant anyway.
Brawn, however, cautioned: "In a tyre war it would be optimistic to think we could have the best combination at every track because it's a black art. You do use the science and engineering available to you but there are certain elements that are difficult to understand or solve.
"We know that the Michelin works differently to how a Bridgestone works and that when a Bridgestone works well it's fantastic. But there are some circumstances where the philosophy of a Michelin and the nature of the compound give them an advantage. We've got to try and fix that.
"What you see now is when we have a little bit of rain, we've got a problem to fix and I think where tracks are very smooth and you rely on the adhesive grip of the tyre, we're not in such good shape. That's an area we've got to improve."
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