Maurizio Arrivabene admitted to media after the Chinese Grand Prix that Ferrari president Sergio Marchionne was not happy witnessing his two drivers nearly eliminating one another from the race in a first corner incident.
The Maranello outfit were upbeat all weekend, in Shanghai, confident that they could upset Mercedes dominance, with Nico Rosberg on pole but Lewis Hamilton last on the grid the opportunity was there for them to seize.
But it all went wrong as the field hurtled through Turn 1, Sebastian Vettel swerving into Kimi Raikkonen alongside him which damaged his own wing end-plates while totally snapping off the Finn's front wing - all this while Marchionne watched from the Ferrari pit garage.
But it was not all gloom for the Italian team and their tifosi, as Vettel and Raikkonen recovered well to finish the race in second and fifth respectively.
Afterwards Arrivabene told media, "[Marchionne] knows motor racing, so of course he was not happy. As I was not happy. He saw the race but in certain circumstances, what can you do? You can say, many, many things."
"There is nothing you can do, not the team nor with the car. When things happen like this you have to accept it, but of course he was not happy. By the way if he was happy, I would be asking to myself: is this a real president or what?"
The team principal was clearly frustrated as he was forced to watch Mercedes and Rosberg notch up their third consecutive win, "We touch all the different stairs of the podium – and now I have had enough. It is better to touch the highest position of the podium."
"Is it bad luck? Of course it is frustrating when things happen and you know you have a good car. But most probably we need to continue to persist and sooner or later – I hope sooner – the top step of the podium will come."
"The car is good actually and today we demonstrated that the car was quite strong, and the strategy was perfect I have to say. So we turn the page and look forward to the future, being a bit more positive. But we are not there. We need to be there," added Arrivabene.
Vettel summed up the incident, "What happened at the first lap, in the end, is a racing incident. From my side I didn’t really know where to go, I was sandwiched between Kimi and Daniil."
"Obviously I am terribly sorry for what has happened, I mean touching the car with the same colors is not right. It was a shame, because it destroyed both of our races, Kimi’s and mine. At the end of the day we’ve been lucky because we were still able to continue," added the German.
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