Felipe Massa admitted on Saturday that he had expected to be higher up the grid after he topped the practice times on Friday.
The Brazilian will line up fifth – alongside Romain Grosjean – and says his position is down to Ferrari’s rivals improving more than he had expected.
“For sure I expected a little bit better, maybe the top three,” he said. “Looking at the lap time we did yesterday and the lap time we did this morning, I think the other cars improved more than we expected and maybe they were running a little bit heavier than we thought as well.
“A one minute 34 second from Lewis was a very good time and the lap time from Kimi [Raikkonen] was very good as well.”
Massa is hoping the race will play out differently and he believes Ferrari has the pace and tyre preservation required to compete with those ahead.
“It’s still good and I think the strategy tomorrow could be worth maybe two or three positions, so I think the race will be difficult and strategy will be very important.
“Even though the soft degradation is high, it was good [in practice] compared to other cars and I hope we have the same tomorrow.
“If we do, the chance to fight with the guys in front is good.”
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