Felipe Massa’s race engineer Rob Smedley admits that Ferrari were at fault for the Brazilian’s pit lane disaster in Singapore.

Massa’s hopes of winning the historic Marina bay race were dashed when Ferrari’s controversial pit-release system gave him the green light to leave his pit box before the refuelling hose had been detached.

Felipe Massa: P1
“I did a fantastic lap in a fantastic car and it was possibly my best qualifying of the season. Given my margin over the others, with hindsight it’s easy to say maybe I could have run with slightly more fuel, but we firmly believe we have a very competitive strategy. At every corner, at every braking point I tried to get the most out of the car and I think I managed it.

Felipe Massa conceded that qualifying for the inaugural Singapore Grand Prix couldn’t have gone much better after he clinched pole by over half a second to Lewis Hamilton.

The Brazilian is only a single point behind Hamilton in the world championship after the Briton’s appeal against his Belgian GP penalty was thrown out by the FIA.

Sensational Massa obliterates Lewis to seal first ever Singapore ‘night’ pole

The lights shone in Singapore, and so did Felipe Massa – to devastating effect. The Brazilian set a searing pace around the city’s spectacular Marina Bay to clinch pole position for the maiden race by a colossal margin of over half a second to his championship protagonist Lewis Hamilton.

Massa sees the light as championship battle heats up in Singapore

Felipe Massa can smell opportunity in Singapore having seen Lewis Hamilton’s appeal hearing thrown out by the FIA.

Conspiracists might put the Paris no-show down to entertainment-mongering: a single point difference between the two championship protagonists makes for a mouth-watering backdrop to the historic inaugural Singapore Grand Prix under the night sky.

Ferrari driver Felipe Massa believes that qualifying will be critical to this weekend’s racing as he does not believe the Singapore track is conducive to overtaking.

“Saturday will be very important, for sure,” he told the Straits Times. “I’ve never driven on the Singapore track but it will be even more difficult to overtake compared to Valencia because the straights are even shorter.”

I can do it on my on terms, affirms the Brazilian ace

Felipe Massa insists he can realise his dream of winning the world championship on merit, and is not expecting support from Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen.

Ferrari are not taking any risks in Monza and have decided to change Felipe Massa’s engine ahead of the Italian Grand Prix.

The Italian squad carried out overnight checks on the Brazilian’s power plant and made the decision to replace it on Sunday morning, a team spokesman confirmed, according to autosport.com.

Belgian Grand Prix stewards have handed a retrospective 25 second time penalty to McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton for cutting the chicane whilst fighting over the lead with Kimi Raikkonen. The penalty means that Ferrari’s Felipe Massa is now the race winner, BMW Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld is promoted to second, with Hamilton now demoted to third.

Felipe Massa has conceded that McLaren have the advantage around the sweeping Spa-Francorchamps circuit after being pipped by Lewis Hamilton to pole position in qualifying.