Flavio Briatore reflects on Ferrari’s 2019 prospects: “Australia is atypical but if you are strong, you are strong everywhere”. Briatore reflects on Ferrari's 2019 prospects.

Italian businessman and ex-Formula 1 team principal Flavio Briatore thinks it will be very difficult for Scuderia Ferrari to successfully challenge Mercedes in the fight for the 2019 Formula One championship.

Many are tipping the Maranello team to bounce back in the next race, the Bahrain Grand Prix, believing that after dominating winter testing, Ferrari still have a car capable of taking on Mercedes in 2019, but former Renault boss Briatore is not so sure: “It will be very hard for them,” he told Radio Capital – “Nothing seems to have changed since last year. They had three months of winter to prepare the cars and Ferrari did not even close the gap to Mercedes.”

So Flavio Briatore thinks Mercedes is once again the clear favourite: “With Mercedes so strong, the only competition is between Hamilton and Bottas,” said the Italian – “To beat them, Ferrari needs to recover 8-9 tenths. I think Mercedes will continue to dominate. Yes Australia is atypical but if you are strong, you are strong everywhere,” he added. “When the apologies begin at the first race, it will be very hard.” – he explained, as reported by the Italian media.

When asked where he thinks Ferrari is lacking, Flavio Briatore said: “Everything must work, but what we have now is a tyre championship rather than a driver championship. The race is so technological that you only hear the commentators speaking about tyres, tyres, tyres, rather than the gladiators fighting,” he concluded.