Formula One news

Engine penalty blow for Ferrari

Ferrari set a strong opening pace at Shanghai with Felipe Massa fourth quickest and Michael Schumacher fifth, ahead of championship rival Fernando Alonso. However, there was bad news for the team when Massa's engine needed changing. This means he'll lose ten places on the grid for Sunday's race.

"Today's work schedule, as usual on a Friday, centred on evaluating the Bridgestone tyres on finding the best set-up," said team boss Jean Todt. "We must very thoroughly study the data we have gathered to prepare firstly for qualifying and, above all, for the race. A bad start to our Shanghai weekend: unfortunately, a problem was discovered on the engine in Felipe Massa's car and now it will have to be changed. All in all, we should be competitive, partly thanks to the usual support from our partners, first and foremost, Bridgestone and Shell. China is fascinating and we are happy with the warm welcome we have had from our fans here over the past few days. Ferrari has great plans in this country and that is not just a reference to this weekend, but above all to our plans for commercial development."

Felipe Massa commented, "There is little to say as this was not a good day for me. I did not go out on track this morning and then in my second run this afternoon, I had a problem with the engine and had to come back to the pits, where our engineers realised the unit would have to be changed. It's a shame, as the car seemed to be well balanced right from the start and I had been able to do some good times. Of course, dropping ten places on the grid will make my race much tougher but I believe I can still put on a good performance."

Michael Schumacher added, "It's nice to be in China and I am particularly happy to see the enthusiasm the fans here seem to show for me. Compared to last year, we are much more competitive and we hope to be able to pay back the fans with a better result than back then. The fight with our closest rivals seems to be very tight, even if we have not yet had time to take a close look at all the data. It is difficult to make predictions on tyre performance given today's weather. I like driving at this track: it is very tough with a big variety of corner types."

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