Felipe Massa's future at Ferrari

Felipe Massa’s Ferrari future

Felipe Massa is used to having his seat at Ferrari called into question. Up until his championship charge in 2008 he was under constant pressure to justify his place in Formula One’s biggest team, and is now facing similar questions about his future in the shadow of Fernando Alonso.

However, Massa isn’t used to responding to pressure building from within his own team.

Last week, Luca Di Montezemolo delivered a scathing assessment of Massa’s performance in 2010. The Ferrari president said “At a certain point in the season Felipe was fed up and sent his brother. For this Felipe gets seven minus”. Following on from those comments, Di Montezemolo later told Italian reporters “If I think one of my drivers is not in the condition to win the championship, I will change them. I want two drivers in a condition to win.”

Felipe Massa may well find that his time at Ferrari is coming to an end.

Massa’s place in the Ferrari family

There has always been a very strong bond between Ferrari management and Felipe Massa. The Scuderia significantly reshuffled their engineering staff partway through 2006 to make Felipe more comfortable in the team, and they stuck by him a year later despite a season littered with amateur mistakes. Even when it was not clear that Felipe would return to a racing car following his Hungarian Grand Prix accident, Ferrari sacked Kimi Raikkonen to ensure Massa still had a place in the team. He has always been an important and much loved member of the Ferrari family.

This year that bond was irreparably broken. Ferrari’s bosses ordered Felipe to sacrifice his championship campaign to benefit their new hero, Fernando Alonso, and their relationship became purely professional instead of emotional.

Felipe’s discontent

Massa’s demeanour after the German Grand Prix was clear evidence that he was exasperated with the team’s decision to favour Alonso. This is backed up by the claim that Felipe was given the instruction to cede position to his team-mate early in the race, but delayed the switch in order to prove a point. With that in mind, Massa is likely to be frustrated with Di Montezemolo’s comments that relieve the team of any blame for his poor results.

Felipe might not be unhappy at Ferrari, but he certainly isn’t 100% pleased.

Even without the politics associated with team orders, Felipe Massa can’t be comfortable with Alonso joining the team and stealing all of his thunder, both on the track and off it. It’s hard to imagine Massa wanting to stay at Ferrari if he knows he will get regularly beaten by his team-mate.

Unfortunately for Felipe, he doesn’t have a lot of alternatives.

Massa’s future options

Ferrari is still Massa’s best option should he wish to stay in a frontline Grand Prix outfit. There is no space for him at McLaren, and Red Bull are likely to promote one of their own younger drivers when Mark Webber eventually retires. Mercedes also have their hands full of talent (possibly to be joined by Nico Hulkenburg) which leaves a direct swap with Robert Kubica as the only competitive possibility.

Massa could follow a similar path to Rubens Barrichello and join a midfield team like Force India or Williams, but he would be doing so in the knowledge that his race winning days are over.

Ferrari’s future options

In the same way that it seemed certain Ferrari would eventually sign Fernando Alonso, it would appear that Robert Kubica will also be dressed in red one day as well. There are some rumours suggesting the Polish driver has already signed a contract with Ferrari and is simply waiting for 2012 for it to take effect.

There is no doubting that Kubica is one of the very best drivers in Formula One, but would he be a better option than Massa for Ferrari? Felipe is the perfect number two driver for the team. He is quick enough to win races – and even challenge for the championship – but not so quick that he steals points off Alonso on a regular basis. He is also a proven team player so may be Ferrari’s best ticket for future World Championships if they can work together in harmony.

The situation in 2011

Next year will be a massive test for Felipe Massa. If he is beaten by Alonso he will have even less motivation to stay with the team and Ferrari will likely start looking elsewhere for Alonso’s partner. He will very much be driving to save his career.

Massa was under huge pressure at the start of the 2007 and 2008 seasons after poor performances in the early races, and on both occasions he responded with Grand Prix victories. It could be true that Massa is at his best when his career hangs in the balance, and he will certainly have plenty of that pressure on his shoulders in 2011.

Posted by Martin Porter. - Follow him on twitter @mpondaweb.

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