Massa: Ferrari can't match Brawn's pace Friday 13th March 2009 - PlanetF1.com A stunned Felipe Massa has admitted that Ferrari are behind Brawn GP and that the rebranded Honda team are now the fastest car on the grid. While it remains to be seen if Brawn GP will enjoy the reliability required to turn their incredible pace at the Barcelona test into race wins once the season starts, Massa has acknowledged that Ferrari are currently unable to keep up with Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello regardless of fuel levels. Asked point-blank if Ferrari could match the lap times that saw Brawn GP on top in Spain, Massa told the Formula1.com website: "No. And I think nobody can do. "Many people were running on a low fuel load, not just them. I think their lap time is just much quicker than everybody else can do." Brawn GP are currently running without the KERS device and one theory - perhaps made optimistically by teams shocked to find the Brawn GP car so fast straight out of the box - is that they may be running without ballast. Massa, though, believes that is unlikely. "First of all I am not an engineer, secondly I never saw the Brawn car, so I cannot say if they have ballast or not. I believe they have because there's no point coming here and being quick and then going to the first race and being slow. But I would say that even if they have no ballast on board and they put ballast on in Melbourne they will be quick anyway. They are really surprising - and I can say for us, that if you take away the Brawn, we are very competitive." There is, however, one consolation for Ferrari fans shocked to find the team apparently trumped by a car that has undergone just a handful of days of testing. "To be honest, we have never seen McLaren so far back," observed Massa. "In many years I have never seen that."
Wow this just keeps getting better, to think Honda last year was a standing Joke and now!!! amazing... Just a pity I didn't have the balls to put my money where my mouth is.
Lack of ballast or KERS, this car seems to be real and very competitive. Many, many teams have their work cut out for them. I dont doubt the reliability either. It has Honda and Mercedes equipment and that bodes well in general, especially the engine. Mercedes were THE reliable power-plant last year. Again F1 does not lack for suprise!!! I love this sport
To me it is amazing what a GOOD CAR brings out in drivers who have been put down or basically written off. The car matters as I posted in the thread asking if LH would win another crown. IN a good car he will. JB could win this year and / or Rubens. These boys do have what it takes and this car(Brawn), just might be the ticket.
There IS a point: attracting sponsorship. I might be proven wrong but I think there's a bit of Winter Champion going on. We've seen it before, especially with back marker teams.
What amazes me is they were all but shut down because of the Honda announcement. Then they throw a decent engine into the car and bang its a winning combination. Kudos to Jenson , Rubin and all of Brawn GP.
Its not a winning car yet, wait until the end of the coming season and we will see if it is or is not.
I said a "winning combination" not winning car. a "winning combination" has the potential of winning. A winning car means it has won races.
I'm not convinced, testing is testing and what reason do McLaren and Ferrari have to come out and say "Oh look at how fast Honda is, Honda Honda Honda" other than to draw them in sponsorship money. Seems a little fishy to me. We'll see though once we get to Q1 in Australia of who the fast teams are.
Of course, there is something as a winterchampionship going on. What new is, is that McLaren is admitting they lack the pace and that Massa admits he can´t reach Brawn GP. Besides, this is a major rule-change, so it is a lot more believable that Brawn GP/Honda just made a better design out of it than the rest. We´ll see in Melbourne. I don´t expect Brawn GP to be up there. Perhaps in qualifying, but the race is a different matter. Chances that they´ll be more succesful than Honda are very big however!
+1 Yes, it's the "winter-championship", None of it matters, blah blah. BUT: - Day 3, JB at the top. - Day 4 Rubens is the *only* guy in the '18's. - They both ran complete race distances on these days as well - This sucker *seems* to be both reliable & quick..... [They're certainly not admitting a "performance shortfall" like Mclaren ] So, at least on days 3 & 4, *nobody* could summon a qualifying run to match 'em.... Are/were they running light? - Not IMHO - These things are so "sensitive" I reckon running light could throw the data way off and render it useless - And we *know* Ross loves his data.... I'm really hoping these guys are for real. My 02c, cheers, Ian
Yes I agree, whilst on one hand it seems to be to good to be true, it certainly is looking that way. I always figured Brawn's car had to better than the Honda, but certainly not as good as it seemingly is.
After all, it IS a Honda. They started development very early last summer (which also contributes to their performance now), when the financial crisis was far away and Honda had no plans to leave F1. If Honda didn't pull out, we'd possibly see their name top the timesheets now.
Yes, they apparently did more development than most of the others, but if Honda hadn't pulled out the car would have had a Honda engine this week and they might not have been where they are now.
Valid point! While they might not be the best of all with a Honda engine, their performance increase should have been remarkable as well.
I just don't understand how the Brawn GP cars can be that fast in such a short period of time. Perhaps they're cars are 100% legit now? Maybe Massa is only trying to lure mclaren into some false hope that their lack of pace really isn't as bad as they think?
It's not a short period of time - they've been working on producing this car (engine aside) for longer than most of the other teams.
I'm not so sure. It now costs them nothing, but I suspect some people will still be calling the car a Honda for some time to come, as demonstrated on this site.
