Fernando Alonso on Thursday did not back Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo’s latest attack on the new teams.

Montezemolo insists that the grid should be filled by bigger teams fielding three cars, while struggling outfits like Lotus, Virgin and HRT “are supposed to race on Sunday mornings” in GP2.

The Italian also said Alonso’s push for victory in Canada two weeks ago was ruined by the lapping of backmarkers.

Ferrari driver Alonso, 28, was asked by reporters about the comments at Valencia, but said he would have “nothing to say” about the slow teams in Friday’s briefing with Charlie Whiting of the FIA.

“Next year I don’t think we will see the difference that we’ve seen this year,” he answered, referring to the difference in pace between the established and new teams.

“I think the three new teams arrived very late this year and I think next year they will be better prepared and the gap will be closer,” added Alonso.

(GMM)

Jun.18 (GMM) Luca di Montezemolo has continued his sustained attack on formula one’s new teams.

The Ferrari president thinks the grid should be filled by the bigger teams fielding three cars, rather than by opening the doors to newcomers including Lotus, Virgin and HRT.

Next year, another small team is likely to make its debut.

Spain’s El Mundo newspaper this week claims that the budget of the new Spanish outfit HRT is ten times smaller than Ferrari’s.

“In modern F1 races cars with GP2 levels of performance shouldn’t be allowed to participate — they are supposed to race on Sunday mornings,” Montezemolo is quoted by Italy’s La Gazzetta dello Sport.

Montezemolo argues that Fernando Alonso’s push for Montreal victory was ruined by the lapping of backmarkers, an apparent reference to his delays behind Jarno Trulli’s Lotus and the HRT of Karun Chandhok.

But while it is true that, earlier this year, the small teams were vastly off the pace, all of the six cars were faster by multiple seconds than the entire GP2 field in Turkey recently.

And in Canada last weekend, Heikki Kovalainen’s Lotus qualified just two tenths behind the Ferrari-powered Sauber of Kamui Kobayashi, while Virgin and HRT runners were also easily within 107 per cent of the pole time.

The new teams’ laptime deficit in Canada was between 3 and 4 seconds, compared with Giancarlo Fisichella’s 2.2 second qualifying deficit in a Ferrari-powered Force India at the same circuit two years ago.

A report at Italiaracing said: “It should be noted that the only complaints this season about the smaller teams have come from Ferrari.”