Stefano Domenicali has ruled out responding to Ferrari’s latest crisis with the old ‘rolling heads’ technique.

One perception in the paddock is that the fabled Italian team, under intense pressure from the Tifosi and president Luca di Montezemolo, often reacts by emotionally shedding staff, with Aldo Costa and Chris Dyer the obvious recent examples.

So, having installed new faces including Pat Fry but still struggling with the latest F2012 project, will boss Domenicali set heads rolling again?

“Firing people is the work of two minutes,” he is quoted by Germany’s Auto Bild, “but this would not solve our problem.

“Instead I need to find new people who can improve the organisation and push the engineers to improve the car,” added the Italian.

In the meantime, there is no silver bullet.

“I am not happy with the F2012 project,” he acknowledged.

“But if you want to see the glass half full rather than half empty, then Fernando has done a great damage control and, with an improved car, he at least has the possibility to continue to fight for the championship.

“We have to improve,” Domenicali insisted. “I have asked my people to wake up and respond, and I will no longer hear excuses.”

Ferrari’s title tilt could hinge on the competitiveness of the updated F2012 this weekend in Barcelona.

“What I want is to have a competitive car in Barcelona,” insisted the famous Italian marque’s president Luca di Montezemolo on Tuesday.

“That’s what I’ve asked for,” he is quoted as saying by Brazil’s O Estado de S.Paulo newspaper.

Ferrari had congregated at its Fiorano test track, to watch Jacques Villeneuve drive the 1979 single seater to mark the 30th anniversary of his father Gilles’ fatal crash.

But Montezemolo’s disappointment is with the latest Ferrari, which has been heavily updated since the Bahrain grand prix three weeks ago.

“Our technicians are confident, but we will have to see how our opponents have advanced too,” he added.

O Estado de S.Paulo correspondent Livio Oricchio claimed “Montezemolo knows” that anything other than a big step forward in Barcelona will mean Ferrari has to “start thinking about” its 2013 project instead.

“Now we have to make a quantum leap, to have a car that is more competitive, less difficult to drive, and gives confidence to the fans,” Montezemolo is quoted by La Stampa newspaper.

“Let’s see how it goes in Spain,” he told Rai television.

“I have asked for an extraordinary response from our engineers,” Montezemolo is also quoted as saying by Italy’s Sky Sport 24.

La Gazzetta dello Sport, meanwhile, quoted lead driver Fernando Alonso as saying: “Our goal is to be world champions in November, and if we are to succeed then we must do better than we have done so far.”

Team boss Stefano Domenicali agreed: “We expect a significant evolution that will bring us closer to the step we need.

“The Spanish grand prix is definitely open, as is the championship. I say this because we believe.”

Luca di Montezemolo has offered Felipe Massa some cautious backing.

The struggling driver was summoned to Ferrari’s Maranello headquarters this week rather than travel home to Brazil to see his young family.

But team boss Stefano Domenicali said the 30-year-old retains Ferrari’s full backing, despite two sub-standard performances in Australia and Malaysia and widespread calls within the media for his dismissal.

Germany’s SID news agency quotes Ferrari president Montezemolo as saying: “We have great confidence in Massa.

“And at the moment I don’t see many outstanding drivers out there,” he added.

The implication could be that an “outstanding” driver might be a candidate to replace Massa either now or in the future.

The cream of Ferrari’s own driver development academy, Sergio Perez, sensationally finished second behind Fernando Alonso last weekend in Malaysia, with Massa fifteenth.

Brazilian former driver and now commentator Luciano Burti traces Massa’s decline all the way back to Hockenheim 2010, when on the one-year anniversary of his near-fatal crash he was told by his engineer: “Fernando is faster than you”.

“When that order came, his house fell around him,” Burti told Brazil’s Globo.

Soon after that, Alonso was – and still is – the darling of Ferrari, while one of Massa’s strongest supporters, the O Estado de S.Paulo correspondent Livio Oricchio, now believes the Brazilian is little more than the “test driver” for new components.

Amid speculation regarding Felipe Massa’s immediate future, Sergio Perez’s father has revealed that Ferrari approached Sauber.

Earlier, Sauber driver Perez played down the rumours about Massa’s future, including the suggestion he was at the very top of Ferrari’s replacement list.

“Sergio is focused one hundred per cent on (performing in) Malaysia,” the 22-year-old Mexican’s father Antonio is quoted by the Spanish-language Medio Tiempo.

Perez snr’s son is the cream of Ferrari’s development driver ‘academy’ programme.

“Since last year, Ferrari has had three drivers: Alonso, Massa and Perez,” he said.

“‘Checo’ has a great relationship with the team but I can say today that Perez is signed only with Peter Sauber.”

Nonetheless, it has been suggested Ferrari made an approach to Sauber recently, amid Massa’s performance slump.

“Yes, Monisha (Kaltenborn), who is the chief executive of Sauber, confirmed that Ferrari people approached her to talk about Sergio,” said his father Antonio.

At the very least, Perez is a candidate for Massa’s seat next year.

“That would be a good package,” the Mexican answered when asked about the potential pairing of his son with Fernando Alonso.

“I see it only as a matter of time. We have to wait and be patient rather than distract Checo from what he is doing now.

“Sergio was not even aware of the statements made by Ferrari: he was training and focused on his fitness,” added Perez snr.

Luca di Montezemolo, Ferrari’s president, urged calm over the famous team’s current situation, including the calls for Massa’s scalp.

“I understand that the fans are disappointed,” he is quoted by Stuttgarter Nachrichten newspaper, “but I ask them to remain calm.

“We must remain calm and focused.”

Still, the rumour mill waits for nobody, and even Ferrari’s official ‘Tweet’ about the “reasonable job” done by Massa on Saturday did not go unnoticed.

“I take that to mean, ‘You’re useless!’ German RTL commentator Christian Danner joked.

 Red Bull has been isolated from F1′s other teams, as the FIA is asked to step in and police their cost-cutting efforts.
Last year, there remained suspicions the energy drink owned team – the winner of the past two world championships – flouted the ‘resource restriction agreement’ (RRA).

But the agreement was only an initiative of the teams’ trade union FOTA, which has now essentially collapsed.

Moreover, the agreement includes only financial sanctions for breaches, and Red Bull was never penalised anyway — Ferrari’s Luca di Montezemolo said recently he didn’t push the issue “Because I didn’t want it to be an excuse for our performance”.

A letter has now been addressed to FIA president Jean Todt requesting that the governing body step in and make the RRA an official sporting regulation.

Breaches would therefore carry a sporting sanction, such as the loss of points, or race bans.

“Yes, it (the letter) was unanimous. Most of the teams have signed it,” said Lotus team boss Eric Boullier.

He would not, however, confirm the identity of the teams that did not sign.

But a report in the Kolner Express newspaper claims “only two teams did not sign: Red Bull and the sister team Toro Rosso”.

 Vitaly Petrov has hit out again at his ‘pay-driver’ label, insisting even the highest paid driver on the grid has a similar arrangement with his team.
“I see no difference between myself and Alonso,” said the Russian, who has moved his lucrative backing from Renault (now Lotus) to the Caterham team for 2012.

His new appointment is controversial, given he has ousted the experienced veteran and former Monaco winner Jarno Trulli, who was the last Italian in F1.

Comparing himself with Alonso, Petrov told La Stampa newspaper: “Everyone knows that he is funded by the money from (Ferrari sponsor) Banco Santander.

“Anyway, you only get to F1 because of talent.”

And Petrov, 27, insists he does not feel sorry for Trulli.

“Life is hard,” the Italian newspaper quotes him as saying.

He admitted that having friends in F1 is impossible, whilst making some comments that will also not endear him to the sport’s Italian followers.

Asked to explain the rare absence of Italians on the grid, Petrov criticised the country’s junior categories and added: “Your drivers lack the passion.”

And as for Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo’s complaints about the dramatic role being played by aerodynamics in F1 at present, he answered: “When you’re not winning, it’s easy to complain.”

Petrov, however, lived in Italy in his past, revealing that his favourite elements of Italian life are “the food and the girls”.

But on the latter, he does not expect to be wheel-to-wheel with the opposite sex any time soon.

“They do not have the physical ability and also are not prepared for the high speeds. But everything in life is possible,” said Petrov.

 Luca di Montezemolo insists heads will not roll, as Ferrari looks set to race into the 2012 season without the chance of a podium.
The famous team wrote off last year’s championship early to focus on 2012 with an aggressive project, with new British technical chief Pat Fry in the spotlight.

But also feeling the pressure is team boss Stefano Domenicali, who said at the weekend that he has “the support of president Montezemolo”.

“I am not the one who designs the car: my task is to give my people everything they need in terms of organisation and structure,” said the Italian.

But Montezemolo denied that Ferrari will react in arguably typical fashion by making sweeping changes.

“I’ve always given my staff time and trust,” he told La Gazzetta dello Sport. “We have not even begun and already you’re putting the people in doubt?

“Let’s not have that talk,” insisted the Ferrari president.

He admitted the F2012 has untapped potential.

“There are too few tests and unfortunately they are in public. But I would still wait before drawing conclusions about the title fight.

“According to the drivers, the F2012 has some negative elements, but also some positive. The problems have been identified and I hope they can be fixed quickly,” he added.

Ferrari has set to work to fix a problem at the rear of its troubled F2012 car, Italy’s Autosprint reports.
The report said initial winter testing highlighted problems with the car’s exhaust solution, prompting Pat Fry to order the outlets be moved inwards.

This, however, left the homologated portion of the chassis that housed the original exhausts intact, with modification to require a new FIA crash test.

“I want to understand what is happening, and how many seconds it will take to be fixed,” president Luca di Montezemolo is quoted as having said.

Triple world champion Niki Lauda is alarmed.

“I have never heard comments like this from within a team — this is dramatic,” the great Austrian told Blick newspaper.

However, the Swiss newspaper also said some of Ferrari’s rivals are making similar modifications to their cars that will require new FIA crash tests.

Even so, “nobody at Maranello expected this”, wrote the famous Italian sports daily La Gazzetta dello Sport.

Corriere dello Sport, meanwhile, said the fact Ferrari gagged its drivers for the first time ever recently is “more worrying than the testing results”.

Test driver Marc Gene told Spanish television Antena 3: “This will be a very long world championship, and we will fight to win.

“At the moment we are not at the level we wanted to be.”

It is faintly possible Ferrari is playing an extreme hand of bluff, but Lauda insists that theory is now believed by “only a few”.

“They’ve got a great team,” Red Bull team boss Christian Horner told Sky Sports, “they haven’t fully shown their hand yet. I think they’re more competitive than people believe they are.

“I’m sure the car looks a handful but sometimes a difficult car can be a quick car so it would be foolish to write off Fernando (Alonso) going into Melbourne,” he added.

Ferrari is already working on a major chassis modification that could require the F2012 to undergo a new FIA crash test.
That is the claim on Wednesday of Italy’s La Gazzetta dello Sport.

The report follows Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo’s alarm at the team’s current situation, with Fernando Alonso expecting Ferrari will have to “suffer” early this season based on recent track testing results.

“I would like to understand why and above all understand how we can very quickly make the necessary changes,” said Montezemolo at the Geneva Motor Show.

Gazzetta said the modification is to the 2012 car’s sidepod area.

Meanwhile, Red Bull team boss Christian Horner told BBC radio on Wednesday that the team will take its updated car to Melbourne, despite its reliability and apparent handling problems at the final Barcelona test.

Team advisor Helmut Marko bluntly described the final day of pre-season testing, when Sebastian Vettel did a paltry 23 laps and was dead-last, as “shit”, but said “sufficient” data was collected the day earlier by Mark Webber.

Luca di Montezemolo has reacted with alarm as Ferrari concedes it will not be a podium contender at the start of the 2012 season.
Despite a media ban, Fernando Alonso warned that he expects to “suffer” initially this year due to the famous Maranello based team needing to better understand its complex new F2012 car.

It is that comment that has raised the alarm of Ferrari’s charismatic president Montezemolo.

“I hope that it is not true that we are going to suffer at the beginning, although Alonso is always very objective.

“I would like to understand why and above all understand how we can very quickly make the necessary changes,” he reportedly said at the Geneva Motor Show.

According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, he pointed his finger at the current regulations.

“I don’t like this F1,” said the 64-year-old. “The aerodynamics count for 90 per cent and only the Kers makes developments possible that can be used in the production of road cars.”

F1 chief executive Bernie Ecclestone, meanwhile, is backing Ferrari to recover.

“I am convinced they will rise again soon and that a preliminary assessment can only be made after the first two or three (races),” he reportedly told Sky.

“I similarly think that McLaren will fight for the title. They could be the real surprise and it is already clear from the tests that they are very competitive,” added the sport’s chief executive.

 Part of what makes the 2012 Ferrari “not pretty” is a conspicuous bump on its nose, it is believed.
The famous team’s bosses Stefano Domenicali and Luca di Montezemolo used descriptions including “not pretty” and “lousy” when describing the physical appearance of the unlaunched new machine, codenamed 663.

“It’s not that pretty, because the shape defined by the technical regulations does not leave much scope”, admitted Domenicali.

It is believed he is referring to regulation tweaks for 2012 that will reduce the height of the noses, to improve driver safety in the event of crashes.

But the maximum height of the dash bulkhead remains the same, meaning that Ferrari’s low nose tapers sharply where it meets the front of the monocoque.

Some sources claim to have seen drawings or images of Ferrari’s unnamed 2012 car, but Fernando Alonso on Thursday insisted the car “is quite similar” in physical appearance to last year’s contender.

“The rules have been clarified a bit in the last two years with the result that all the cars look more and more alike,” Spanish reporters quote him as saying.

Ferrari’s 2012 car is not attractive, bosses of the famous Italian team hinted this week at the Madonna di Campiglio winter media event.
Having failed to win the championship since 2007 and finishing a distant third behind Red Bull and McLaren last season, Ferrari has taken an aggressive approach to the development of this year’s machine, codenamed 663.

“It’s definitely different,” team boss Stefano Domenicali told journalists on Wednesday when asked about the car that will be unveiled next month.

“It’s not that pretty, because the shape defined by the technical regulations does not leave much scope, but – and this is what counts really – our hopes are that it is at the very least quick.”

Depending on the weather, the car will make its track debut during a short shakedown on 3 or 4 February at Ferrari’s own Fiorano test track.

Asked about Domenicali’s news about the physical appearance of the single seater, Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo replied: “I’d like it to look lousy.

“I say that provocatively because I want it to be a winner, reliable but also ‘simpatico’ in the sense that it knows how to win with a smile.”

 Luca di Montezemolo has defended Felipe Massa whilst conceding that a number of drivers at rival teams impressed him in 2011.
The Ferrari president is honouring Brazilian Massa’s 2012 contract but making no secret that the Maranello based team is keeping its mind open as to the identity of Fernando Alonso’s next teammate.

“2012 is the crucial season for Felipe. We were not satisfied with his past season and neither was he,” Montezemolo is quoted by Corriere dello Sport newspaper.

“What I cannot forget is the fact that Felipe was often faster than Michael Schumacher and Kimi Raikkonen. He helped Kimi to his championship and a year later was a hair short of being champion himself.

“If the tyres warm up for him better next season, we believe Felipe can cope much better.”

Naturally, however, Massa’s seat is highly coveted within the F1 paddock, while Montezemolo admitted Ferrari is also keeping an eye on its options.

“Jenson Button was just excellent,” said the Italian, referring to the 2011 championship runner-up who currently drives for McLaren.

“Mark Webber is a good second driver, and Nico Rosberg has done well with a car that has not been competitive.

“It is also good to develop drivers within yourself, so while Sergio Perez is a Sauber driver, in fact he has developed in Ferrari’s academy.

“(And) Jules Bianchi could develop further if he can test,” added Montezemolo, a staunch advocate for more testing in formula one.

Montezemolo did not mention the recovering Polish driver Robert Kubica.

For Adrian Sutil, the cloud of his exit at Force India could have a scarlet lining.
Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo has admitted that, with Felipe Massa’s position to be evaluated during the course of 2012, the fabled Italian marque already has an eye on a couple of German drivers.

Before Montezemolo’s comments, reports had linked German Sutil, 28, with Ferrari, either for a switch after a single season with Williams, or off the back of a year on the reserve bench.

“Clearly we are planning for the future,” Bild newspaper quotes the Ferrari president as saying.

The newspaper thinks Sutil is a candidate, but Montezemolo also mentioned another of the former Force India driver’s countrymen by name.

“I like Rosberg, as a clear-headed man and someone who is getting better and better.”

Auto Motor und Sport – presuming Montezemolo was referring to Sutil as well as Nico Hulkenberg – quotes the 64-year-old adding: “There are two other good, young Germans.”

And what about Robert Kubica?

“He is also a possibility,” admitted Montezemolo. “We’ll have to see how he comes back from his accident.”

But despite setting the rumour-mill alight with talk of a driver change, Montezemolo also backed beleaguered Brazilian Massa.

“Our problem is not the driver as in that area we have the best; we need a competitive car,” he insisted.

Luca di Montezemolo insists Ferrari can live without F1′s new back to back world champion.
Asked about the young German – who has dominated the 2011 season – during the La Politica nel Pallone radio programme, president Montezemolo insisted Fernando Alonso is better than the Red Bull driver.

“We have Fernando with a long and stable contract as we did with Michael Schumacher and, with all due respect to all the other drivers, Alonso is the best in the world,” he said.

Notwithstanding his affection for the Spaniard, Montezemolo acknowledged that Felipe Massa’s contract runs out at the end of next season.

“We expect a big season from him next year and then we will evaluate what to do. Let’s say he is playing for reappointment,” said the Italian, amid rumours Ferrari has eyes for the recovering Pole Robert Kubica.