Mattia Binotto on the 2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Ferrari's chief technical director focuses on the positive aspects from the race in Azerbaijan.

Scuderia Ferrari’s chief technical director Mattia Binotto is confident the Maranello team will be able to improve after two races in which Ferrari did not manage to finish on the podium and as a result lost ground to Mercedes in the Formula 1 Constructor Standings, ahead of the 2017 Austran Grand Prix, the ninth round of the 2017 Formula One season. Both Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen were involved in unfortunate incidents at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, which led to the German driver finishing just off the podium in fourth place and Kimi having to retire the car with no prospects of scoring any points in Baku. However, Mattia Binotto prefers to focus on the positive aspects from the race in Azerbaijan:

“The most important thing is that our race pace was very good, we were close to Mercedes, which unfortunately was not the case in qualifying and we have to carefully analyze the data in order to identify the cause for the big gap on Saturday. As far as the race in cornered, there were a lot of events that didn’t go our way. Kimi was close to being second after the first corner, but instead his race was compromised due to the incident with Bottas. However, we have to give credit to the entire team for the outstanding work they did this weekend: from having to change Sebastian’s power unit on Saturday ahead of qualifying, to the way in which they were able to fix Kimi’s car in the short time the race was stopped, it was a remarkable team effort and we are all very proud. Now we are already focused on our next challenge and we will be working hard to come back even stronger in Austria.” – Mattia Binotto said, as reported by the Italian media.

The promotion of Mattia Binotto from engine director to chief technical director has marked the beginning of a shake-up within the Ferrari ranks in an attempt to change the Italian team’s fortunes this season. And the move seems to be brought the expected results, as the Maranello team is involved in the fight for the Formula One titles for the first time after several disappointing championships.