NOT FAST ENOUGH
Ferrari head into Formula One’s
annual break facing a tall order to turn
things around in time for the second
half of a season that promised much
but has so far delivered little.
Formula One’s most successful
team went into the season with
ambitions of challenging dominant
Mercedes for race wins and the
championship, after rebounding from
their first winless campaign in more
than two decades with three wins last
year.
The Italian squad, led by new
management and arrival of four-time
champion Sebastian Vettel, was the only
team to break Mercedes’ stranglehold on
the top of the podium in 2015.
But they head into the summer
break, just past the halfway stage of
a record 21-race season, still without
a win and having dropped to third in
the standings behind rivals Red Bull
following Sunday’s German Grand Prix.
“I have to say that they improved
quite well,” team principal Maurizio
Arrivabene told reporters following the
race in Hockenheim. “It doesn’t mean
we are going to surrender. During this
period we have to think and to react.”
Ferrari started the year strongly,
challenging for the win in the seasonopener in Australia. But a serious
title-tilt never materialised and as the
season has worn on even the podiums,
of which Ferrari scored eight in the first
nine races, have dried up.