The boss of Ferrari Mattia Binotto has reportedly written to the Scuderia’s workers informing them that they are resigned to the fact the SF1000 doesn’t have the capabilities to win in Melbourne next weekend.
Their season is set to start the way they wouldn’t have wanted, with the Italian team having to contend with the under-performance of its car for the forthcoming campaign.
Also, they have to deal with the majority of their rivals, not on the track, but with them fuming about the recent investigation done by the FIA.
It seems that the House of Maranello is at the centre of a full-blown crisis in the upcoming F1 season, and it is highly unlikely they will find any solution come the Australian GP next week.
A report from the Motorsport.com Italy claims that Binotto has warned his fellow team members to not be hopeful in their first three races of the season, especially next week.
However, the Scuderia boss believes that the SF1000’s level of performance will improve, but they will have to wait to see those improvements in early May at the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort.
Binotto admitted last week in Barcelona that Ferrari’s performance in pre-season testing had not lived up to the expectations that they were hoping for.
Many believe that Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc had perhaps sandbagged at the Circuit de Catalunya, but Binotto reiterated Ferrari were not playing any games, even though the Swiss engineer admitted the pace of its SF1000 was better than its speed over a single lap.
"If you look at the picture of the winter testing I think we have got relative to the others a better, but doesn't mean the best, race pace compared to the qualifying pace," Binotto said, quoted by Motorsport.com.
"I think we're suffering a bit more on qualifying simulation compared to the race simulations, and that is something on which we need again to understand, analyse and eventually address it."
The Italian team has been working over the winter period on achieving downforce gains relative to last year’s car. This was to optimise the car for straight-line speed. But, the improvements and subsequent trade-off have damaged the SF1000’s velocity.
"We worked very hard over winter, and I think our car is a step forward," commented Vettel last week.
"Currently it does come with some more drag, but I think we are aware.
"We are pushing as hard as we can to get rid of the drag and make it more efficient. But we also believe that come race day, it gives us an advantage the way it is set up now, so we will see."