''Here they were stronger''Ferrari boss Jean Todt was not surprised by McLaren's dominance at this weekend's Monaco Grand Prix. Spaniard
Fernando Alonso won the race with ease and British rookie Lewis Hamilton completed a one-two for McLaren.
Both drivers lapped
the entire field except the Ferrari of Brazilian Felipe Massa who was well over a minute behind in third place. Ferrari's other driver, Finn
Kimi Raikkonen, only managed to work his way to eighth place after problems in qualifying saw him starting 16th on the grid.
Despite the comfortable nature of the victory McLaren team principal Ron Dennis claimed that his drivers could have gone even faster but the team chose to protect their respective positions.
Todt, however, was magnanimous in defeat: "We knew from the beginning that they were very strong and here they were stronger, so it was no surprise to find that," he said. "So we just say congratulations, and we need to fight in the remaining races in the championship.”
"I must say that qualifying was very close for Felipe, because he finished less than one tenth behind Hamilton, 65/1000ths if I remember well, and Kimi had his qualifying problem and he could not go through and he ended up 16th,” Todt added. "But saying that, (McLaren) were quickest and basically there's nothing else to say.
"
When asked to explain the gulf between McLaren and his team in Monte Carlo, Todt pointed to the problems caused by slow traffic holding up faster cars on the tight twisting circuit.
"If you take it up to the first pit stop, Felipe was right behind Hamilton," he said. "Then we decided to put on softer tyres, the others stayed on the harder tyres. Then Felipe took over five laps, I don't know exactly, to pass one car and in those five laps he lost 15 seconds. We knew the best he could do was third unless the others in front had a problem. So he stayed in third position."
The traffic was also a major problem for Raikkonen, never allowing him to capitalise on his pace advantage and move up the field quickly. His eighth-place finish leaves him 15 points behind joint driver's championship leaders Hamilton and Alonso but he vowed to keep fighting.
"We knew we were facing an uphill battle and that's how things turned out," said the Finn. "I got a good start, quickly moving up to 12th, but from then on I was nearly always in traffic, never getting any chance to overtake,” he explained.
"I never had a clear track ahead of me and it was only thanks to the strategy that I was able to make up some more places and get into the points, but I couldn't do any better.”
"Obviously the situation in the classification is now a bit more complicated but there is still a long way to go in the championship and I am not the sort to give up," Raikkonen defiantly added.
Source AFP
