Ferrari set to miss out on world championships for ninth consecutive season; Arrivabene says "adjustment rather than revolution" needed to bring titles back to Maranello.
Monday 30 October 2017 12:34, UK
Maurizio Arrivabene says Ferrari have learnt lessons from their stuttering world championship bids and believes "adjustment rather than revolution" is needed to bring titles back to Maranello.
Ferrari's wait to win either world championship is set to enter a 10th year after Mercedes wrapped up the Constructors' Championship last weekend while Lewis Hamilton is poised to win the Drivers' Championship on Sunday.
Sebastian Vettel led the championship by 14 points at the summer break but his title bid will be over unless he outscores Hamilton by 17 points at the Mexican GP.
Ferrari's title bids imploded during the Asian flyaways with Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen colliding on the opening lap in Singapore before the Scuderia suffered four engine issues across the Malaysia and Japanese GP weekends.
"We lost the Constructors' Championship and some races for a small detail that was related to a supplier," Arrivabene told Sky F1's Ted Kravitz.
"It was not funny at all but it's a learning process. We need to put even more attention on all these elements to be sure that we can confirm next year the car is really strong as it was this year."
Arrivabene does not think big changes will be needed to end Ferrari's wait to win the championships again.
"Sometimes the devil is in the detail. It's another lesson learned and we're looking forward to the future to do better and better and better," he added in the team principals' press conference.
"It's a question sometimes of adjustment rather than revolution. This year we paid a heavy fee for detail and I said we need to be a bit more focused on the processes.
"We need to be more focused in other areas but the positive is this is a team that is not giving up, is learning from mistakes and is a team that is fully committed not just for next year but for the next three races.
"We would like to fight until the last turn on the last lap of the last race."
Vettel has won four Grands Prix this year, more than Ferrari had managed in the previous three seasons combined, and Arrivabene thinks the team can take plenty from their improved campaign.
"We have a lot of positives. I saw quite a young team working very, very well on the car here and in Maranello," he said.
"The guys are very united, they are exchanging information and are very focused.
"No one was expecting the performance that we had this year."
