The Formula 1 season makes its European debut at the Spanish Grand Prix this weekend and the buzzword at Ferrari is 'keep focused'.
This amid undisguised rivalry between drivers Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen, who won the title last year in his first year with the Italian team.
After failing to finish the first and second races of the season, Massa dominated the Bahrain Grand Prix last month for his second victory at the desert track while Raikkonen, who had won the previous race, was right behind him to give Ferrari its 77th one-two.
Raikkonen is currently on top of the drivers' standings but Massa has made it clear he believes this will he 'his' year and no effort is being spared to keep the peace between the teammate-rivals.
Speaking on Wednesday, Ferrari Chairman Luca Cordero di Montezemolo said: ''All I'm interested in is that Ferrari wins. If they want to race for themselves, they'd better have their own team. But as long as they're at Ferrari they will be driving for Ferrari. And so far they have been very correct about this''.
Looking ahead to Sunday, the Fiat chief said that ''Sunday will be a very important race. My boys seem to be very focused and the car is competitive''.
''With Kimi we're on top of the standings and we want to stay there. But this is going to be a very difficult season, against some formidable rivals,'' he observed.
''We're running against some of the world's biggest automakers which have been in Formula 1 for years now, have never won a title and want to do so now. But we want to win, too,'' Montezemolo added.
During the three-week break since the last race, Ferrari conducted tests at Barcelona which were centered on three key points: development of the car, specific preparation for the Spanish Grand Prix and overall reliability.
''We want to bring something new to every race. Even if it's small it's important. The championship is wide open and Spain is only the fourth race in a very long season,'' team principal Stefano Domenicali said during the tests.
The Spanish Grand Prix will see the first outing of Ferrari's latest aerodynamic innovation, a slotted nose, which the media has hyped up to be the team's 'secret weapon'.
However, technicians at Ferrari have played this down and defined the reports as ''press exaggeration''.
''The influence of the slotted nose on the car's performance has been greatly over emphasised. You cannot measure the effect of one component and the nose is just one part of a bigger package. In fact, its effect is not that big,'' said chief designer Nikolas Tombazis.
''Overall, we expect the new aero package to produce some improvement in performance, but it would be wrong to call it a race winning item,'' he added.
