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had an incredibly successful race at the Circuit of the Americas that looked relatively mediocre before the race began. The team gained 27 points in the Constructors' Championship in the race, and Alonso kept Sebastian Vettel's lead to 13 points. 

Just after qualifying ended, Alonso had already benefited from Romain Grosjean changing his transmission that boosted Alonso from eighth to seventh. Ferrari had an audacious move before the race to improve Fernando Alonso's starting position. It removed the FIA seal from Felipe Massa's transmission to move him back five grid positions. That moved Alonso up one position on the grid to seventh place and moved him to the clean side of the track. 

"First and foremost, I want to congratulate Felipe, not just for his great drive in the race, but above for all for the way he went along with our decision to knowingly take a penalty so as to maximize our potential at the start, especially for his team-mate. It was definitely a tough decision, but he took it with the same spirit he has always demonstrated, in that the interests of the team come before those of the individual," said Stefano Domenicali, Ferrari team principal. 

Alonso and Massa both did well from their starting positions, and Alonso went from seventh to fourth on the first corner. He benefitted from Mark Webber's faulty alternator and moved up one position to third. Massa fought his way up from eleventh to fourth over the course of the race. 

The team admits that Alonso did the most with a poor car at the race, and that the team has to put everything it can into the car to improve it for the Brazilian Grand Prix next weekend. 

"We did not have the pace to match Red Bull and McLaren, so to only lose three points to Vettel is in fact a nice present. It could have been much worse, but now we will arrive in Sao Paolo in Brazil in with a chance right to the last. Maybe on paper that chance is not so big, maybe 25%, but deep down, I feel it’s much more than that," said Alonso. 

Alonso also said that the team would be perfecting its pit stops during the next week to prevent any problems like at the Circuit of the Americas. 

“For me, this result is a bit like a win, definitely the best race of my season: now I can say I’m happy to have started eleventh! This morning, when I was told I was dropping five places, I can’t say I was jumping for joy, but I accepted it to help the team and my team-mate," said Massa.