Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFerrari

Rosberg expected closer Ferrari challenge

Nico Rosberg says he expected Ferrari to get closer to Mercedes this season after its strong start to the year.

While Mercedes dominated in Australia, Sebastian Vettel won the second race in Malaysia as Ferrari emerged as a real threat. While Kimi Raikkonen came close to winning in Bahrain, Mercedes has pulled away at the front since then and Rosberg admits he expected Ferrari to be more competitive.

"I did think they would be closer, because it’s always easier to chase than lead the way," Rosberg said at an event for technical partner Petronas last week.

While Mercedes' dominance has been seen as boring from some quarters, Rosberg is confident the team gets the acknowledgement it deserves.

"I don’t know if they underestimated; I think everybody does understand what an awesome job our team has done. OK, some focus has been on what needs to be done differently, but I’m sure everybody really respects – even if they maybe don’t say it – the job that we’ve done.

"Because it is an awesome job, from where we were three years ago – we were nowhere! I was finishing 16^th; and the year after winning races; and the year after dominating the whole sport in a manner never seen before."

Ferrari team principal Maurizio Arrivabene says he is confident in the team's car development despite the gap to Mercedes.

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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.