Sports / Motor Racing |
Ferrari president unhappy with Formula One season(Reuters)Updated: 2007-06-22 09:48 MARANELLO, Italy, June 21 - Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo, whose team are 35 points behind McLaren, said on Thursday that he was not enjoying Formula One this season because of rule changes. "I don't like it much, I don't like it for many reasons," he told reporters at an event celebrating the 60th anniversary of the car maker. "They need to change the rules on overtaking, I don't like the rules on the safety car that seemed to play roulette in Monte Carlo," he added. "I don't like it because it does not seem that races are truly fought for aerodynamical reasons and it is much more difficult to overtake. "I believe that Formula One, that is enjoying great international success with new countries and new fans, must quickly face the problems and Ferrari will push very hard," said Montezemolo. He said there was little between the two top teams despite McLaren's lead over Ferrari, who are still adjusting to life without retired seven times world champion Michael Schumacher. British rookie Lewis Hamilton leads the championship for McLaren after finishing on the podium in all seven of his starts and winning the last two races from pole position in Canada and the United States. The Briton is 10 points clear of team mate and double world champion Fernando Alonso, with Ferrari's Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen well back in third and fourth. Massa was disqualified in Canada this month for ignoring a red light on leaving the pit lane while the safety car was deployed. "We are talking about two or three fractions of a second," said Montezemolo of Ferrari's gap with McLaren. "We have to improve on these milliseconds here and there in order to be competitive. "Now we have to recover the competitiveness that we have lost in the last two months." He pointed to Raikkonen's victory in this season's first grand prix in Australia and Massa's back-to-back wins in Bahrain and Spain. "We have two strong drivers and we have very good competitors and we must not forget in the first four races we were strong," he said at Ferrari's head offices in Maranello.
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