Formula One news

A Bahrain GP to forget for Massa

Felipe Massa suffered from a lack of pace and string of incidents in the Bahrain Grand Prix on his way to fourteenth place, one lap down on the leaders. Having won the race at Sakhir in both 2007 and 2008, this year's did nothing but confirm the Brazilian's failure to score points from any of the first four races of the season.

During the race, the Ferrari problem was made public as TV viewers received news via team radio that the car's KERS unit had failed, meaning the car was over 30 kilogrammes (over four and a half stone) heavier than its normal weight and without the benefit of KERS power boosts.

"I had a big problem for the whole race," Massa explained to the BBC. "My telemetry was not working for the guys in the pits and my KERS was not working very well either, so I lost the KERS for the start. I didn't have a great start and had a big sandwich in the first corner between Rubens and Kimi - I lost my front wing there, but I couldn't see it. I just had a big difference in the car behaviour, so I thought the front wing was broken and it was."

It was a disappointing result for the Brazilian after qualifying eighth on Saturday; "I came in and changed the front wing, but my race was pretty damaged by coming into the pits after two laps," he continued. "I was then behind traffic so couldn't do so much, to be honest."

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