Heart of the Massa

Bahrain was one of those career-defining moments for Felipe Massa, and he knew it. "I will dedicate this win to my girlfriend Raffaela, who has had to be very patient with me this week..." a relieved Massa said after the race.

He had come in for cascades of media flak after taking the pole in Malaysia and then reversing his Ferrari into fifth place, courtesy of his botched attempted pass of Lewis Hamilton.

There were three accusations. First, he'd left the door wide open for Fernando Alonso's McLaren into turn one. Second, and compounding the error, he'd allowed the opportunist Hamilton to go around the outside of him in turn two, where there shouldn't have been grip. Third, he'd been suckered into a Formula Fordster's error by Hamilton which had temporarily put him off the road, crucially ceding a place to Nick Heidfeld's BMW.

They are the kind of errors committed up and down the grid every fortnight - but by drivers who are not in the spotlight. Massa's problem is that for years Ferrari had Michael Schumacher. And so perfection is Felipe's yardstick.

He also has Kimi Raikkonen, a man with an enormous reputation, in the other red car. And, through no fault of his own, he'd been taken out of the equation in Australia. He needed to prove his credentials quickly, to make a point.

He desperately didn't want to fail in Malaysia. But he did.

All this was going through Felipe's mind in the couple of days he spent in Dubai after Sepang before heading on to Bahrain. It was probably just as well that he didn't have another week to dwell on it, as he admitted. Another flop at Sakhir and he was in big trouble. Raikkonen, unquestionably, would be Ferrari's main man. And the media; well, the media... He'd already had a taste of what he could expect.

And so the pressure was properly on. Felipe's response: pole position, 10 points. It was one of those Sliding Doors moments. His life, his career, is on track again, on the up, heading in the right direction. It could so easily have gone the other way, and that doesn't bear thinking about. The momentum is back with him. Now it's Raikkonen facing the questions. The tension, the anxiety had no doubt given Raffaela a difficult few days. But now it's okay. Such is life in the Formula 1 goldfish bowl.

Part of Massa's problem is perception. He first appeared in F1 before truly figuring on anyone's radar. He was only 20 when he made his debut for Sauber at Melbourne in 2002. There were comedy moments. Peter Sauber became exasperated, dropped him and that, you suspected, was probably that.

But the next minute he's in a Ferrari, driving for the most hallowed team in grand prix history, alongside a god of the sport like Michael Schumacher. Without, apparently, earning it. There were questions, certainly. Jealousies, definitely. How could it be?

Felipe's raw talent is strong and his timing even better. That's how it happened. Sauber had hit the jackpot with Raikkonen but, in the summer of '01, sold him to Ron Dennis. Easy money, they thought, and were of a mind to do it again.

Exactly a year after Raikkonen had astonished Sauber with his first-time handling of an F1 car at Mugello, the team went to the same track with Massa. Jacky Eeckelaert, now Honda's engineering director, was in charge of the test, as he had been with Kimi.

"We were looking for another driver and Peter Sauber spoke to me about Felipe," says Eeckelaert. "I knew his name because when I was watching Kimi in Formula Renault, Felipe was also there. Then he did a year in Italian F3000 and was at the front. People said he had exceptional talent and was worth testing."

Eeckelaert's usual safety net was not there, however. Usually he'd ring his contacts in European karting for feedback on the top guys. Pace wasn't enough. He'd want to know about personality, sharpness, commitment.

"Felipe had been racing in Brazil so I couldn't do that," he says, "but his pedigree wasn't bad and so we went for it. I think there was also a connection with Jean Todt at Ferrari by this stage." Massa was given a two-day test, a 'try-out'. But, after the experience with Raikkonen, Sauber was not averse to putting Massa straight into the race team if he looked strong enough. Felipe, it seems, had guessed as much.

"Straight out of the box he was very quick but sometimes a bit too excitable," Eeckelaert recalls. "He spun and touched a tyre barrier early on but the damage was nothing bad. He really wanted to show how good he was. I calmed him down a bit, told him to take his time.

"Kimi was not at the test but Nick Heidfeld was and Felipe was impressive. Straight away he was very quick in the high-speed stuff but was losing time in low-speed corners. Not because he was braking too early but because he was too late.

"He was over-driving the car, trying too hard. But largely he was keeping it on the track. You could see the guy had the raw speed and car control; he just needed to tone it down. It's a lot easier to calm a quick driver than to make a slow driver quick."

Now it was crunch time. What should Sauber do? He already had Heidfeld, who was quick but a tad demotivated by Raikkonen's elevation to a McLaren team that he himself had been hoping to join. The youngster would keep Nick on his toes and seemed to have potential. So Sauber signed Felipe to a two-week option there and then. Within six months he was on the grid in Melbourne.

The 2002 season seemed to prove it was too much, too soon. Even the phlegmatic Sauber became exasperated with Massa's exuberance and matters came to a head after Silverstone, where Felipe spent much of the race on the grass and spun more often than Alastair Campbell.

The truth is, Sauber had hoped Massa would become a more adult driver in a shorter time. It was Felipe's good fortune that Peter Sauber is a decent sort and, accepting responsibility for throwing him in at the deep end, was keen to ensure that Felipe was not put out to pasture. Both Sauber and Todt thought it would do Felipe good to spend a year testing with Ferrari.

To many so-called paddock experts, that was the end of Massa. He'd had his chance, hadn't hacked it and now his point of reference would be Michael Schumacher. We wouldn't hear from him again.

In fact, the season as Ferrari's test driver was the making of Massa. "It boosted his confidence a lot," Eeckelaert says. "Being at Ferrari, in the same car at the same track on the same day as the world champion, with the same tyres and all the data overlays, was fantastically valuable. If he qualified a Sauber 12th, a second from pole, he didn't know how much of that time was in him and there'd be a bit of a panic.

"But now he could see directly that the missing second had not been him, it was probably 0.8 or 0.9sec in the car. And he could compare himself directly with the best and see how quick he was. And exactly where he was losing out. He came back to Sauber in '04 a much more mature and confident driver.

"If he was a second off there was no panic. He'd work on the car logically and resist the temptation to overdrive. That testing year did him a lot of good and I'm delighted that he found that bit extra and wasn't lost to F1."

Importantly, it also gave Ferrari the opportunity to have a decent look at Massa. Obviously, they liked what they saw. Barrichello had done a good enough job for them over six seasons, but Michael wouldn't go on for ever and Ferrari could see the value in giving Felipe a proper season alongside him.

Partnering a superstar can go one of two ways. It can destroy you, as in Michael Andretti alongside Ayrton Senna in 1993, or it can make you, as Massa's '06 season alongside Schumacher seems to have done. The circumstances were hugely different. Andretti's timing was as bad as Felipe's was good. The regulations at the time allowed precious little track time, Andretti did not embrace F1 as deeply as he could have done, and Senna was Senna.

At Ferrari, Massa was already part of the family. Schumacher, in the twilight years of his career, was fond of the little Brazilian. Michael, probably knowing that ultimately he wasn't threatened by Felipe, became almost paternal at times. And for Massa, the opportunity to extend his learning process alongside Schumacher to the circuits on the F1 schedule was simply an opportunity he couldn't miss. There was no real pressure either. He wasn't expected to blow Michael away and if he got close he would exceed expectations.

"Going in with Michael was perfect," Eeckelaert says, "because there's no test that can replace the race. If you can race with the world champion you can learn an awful lot."

It was a sentiment also expressed by Damon Hill when he drove alongside Alain Prost. Hill would take the telemetry data back to the hotel on Friday night, study it and go much quicker on Saturday. With Michael gone, Raikkonen's arrival at Ferrari is the acid test for Massa. And it was crucial to the equilibrium that Massa did not get buried at the start of the year. Hence the disappointment in Melbourne and, perhaps, a return to the old panic in Malaysia. You have to remember that Massa only turned 26 last week.

Eeckelaert, in the unique position of having extended engineering relationships with both Kimi and Felipe, says: "Felipe has speed enough to be a top, quick F1 driver, but whether he has the mental stamina not to give up when things go badly - that's another story. We'll see this year. He's a bit calmer now and he's a very nice chap, maybe too nice...

"You have to admire what Michael did, but being 36 or 37 you start to lose a bit of speed, for sure. It's inevitable. Maybe on a qualifying lap Felipe is as fast as Kimi and he will do him sometimes, as he's already shown.

"In terms of average pace, though, Kimi will be difficult to beat; in the race, when the car is more difficult to drive, the tyres are overheating, it's heading into oversteer and the traction and braking are bad. That's where Kimi has this ability to lose the minimum of lap time, just like Michael. But Kimi is 10 years younger [than Michael] and he's an animal. An absolute animal!

So, Raikkonen. That's the final verdict?

"Probably," Eeckelaert says, smiling. "But don't underestimate Felipe. He's also not afraid of oversteer, for sure! Not at all. And he's very quick in high-speed turns. He has a lot of balls, honestly. In that respect I think they are both equal. I think one day when they both start from the front row and have a race together, it will be interesting to watch..."

That day looks like coming sooner rather than later.

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- The Autosport.com Team

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