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Ferrari budget beginning to show - Massa

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Felipe Massa says Ferrari’s superior budget to Williams is beginning to show this season after his former team made major strides forward.

Ferrari endured a tough 2014 season which saw Williams beat it to third place in the constructors’ championship. Following a winter of change which has seen Sebastian Vettel join and a new team principal installed, Ferrari has made an impressive recovery to be able to challenge Mercedes on a regular basis, winning the Malaysian Grand Prix.

With Williams operating on a budget around half the size of Ferrari, Massa says the difference in resource is beginning to show now his former team is operating effectively.

“I think if you have two teams that are working in the right way, but one team has also double the budget it makes a difference,” Massa said. “If you have a team that is struggling for different reason, then the money makes less of a difference, but if you have both working in a good way with an understanding then it’s good to have the more and more you can. It’s clear.”

However, Massa agrees with team-mate Valtteri Bottas, believing Williams can still cut the gap to the leaders this year.

“I hope [Williams can improve], we have to keep working. We will not give up before we understand there is nothing we can do, there is still a long way to go and we need to believe everything can be possible.”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.