Ferrari are wary of the possible threat Lotus could pose in the second half of the season after the team proved they had the fastest car in Hungary.
Kimi Raikkonen came from fifth on the grid to finish second, but pressured eventual race winner Lewis Hamilton for some 30 laps, but the lack of overtaking opportunities thwarted his attempts to pass for the lead.
Meanwhile team-mate Romain Grosjean finished third having qualified second.
Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali expects Lotus will make up lost ground in the coming races after a few missed opportunities at the beginning of the year.
“I think that Lotus did not collect the points that they were able to collect because they always had a very good car since the beginning of the season,” he said.
“So I think they could have scored more points… they will be a very good team in the second half of the season.”
Lotus are a cause for concern with many in the paddock suggesting the could dominate the next couple of races as they’re set to race their passive F-duct for the first time in Belgium, a track which favours high top-speed, as does the race after that in Italy.
Domenicali admitted it would be difficult to maintain their current lead if they can’t introduce further developments to the F2012.
“Very difficult, because we’ve seen that at the moment there are cars that are faster than us,” he added.
“We need to keep improving the level of performance; we need to be cool on that because last weekend [Germany] we were the quickest in all conditions, this time we weren’t so there is the right balance to find. But we know that we need to keep finding a step of development because otherwise the others will improve and it will be more difficult to always be first or on pole. So I think that the key for the season is to keep pushing as we did in the first half of the season.”
