Domenicali: having the quickest car won’t be enough

Having the quickest car on the track shouldn’t be enough to win the F1 world title this year, according to Ferrari boss Stefano Domenicali. The Italian believes that in 2011 the strategy will be “absolutely vital”.

"From what we have seen in winter testing, these tyres are very different to those we used in the past," said Domenicali ahead of the Australian Grand Prix.

Scuderia’s boss thinks all teams will have a new approach at the races and that there will be more pitstops in order to complete a race distance competitively.

"This is significant in terms of teamwork at the races, because more pitstops means the role of team members becomes even more important in terms of deciding the final outcome of the races. A further impact of having more pitstops is that possibly qualifying and therefore grid position will be less important than in 2010,” previews Domenicali.

Ferrari’s team leader thinks that in order to win a race teams will have to choose the right strategy and that in 2011 it will be “more likely that a car that has not set the fastest time and taken pole position can still go on to win the race.”

According to Domenicali Ferrari will be arrinving to Melbourne very well prepared after a strong winter of testing. Still, he is remaining cautious about how will his team perform in the season opener.

"The atmosphere in the team is good and everyone is keen to get to work in Melbourne, to see where we are compared to the other teams," Domenicali added. "So far, we have done a lot of testing through four test sessions in Spain in February and early March but this will be the chance to see where our base line puts us.”

"There were fifteen days of winter testing in total. I am by nature very cautious so in assessing how we went during these days, I have to take into account how we worked through our programme, as well as looking at what the other teams did and because we do not know exactly what the others were doing in testing, I have to remain cautious in rating our own work," continued Domenicali.

About the team’s goals, Ferrari’s boss thinks he doesn’t have to repeat himself, as the team always go to the track with the same one: to win.