Ferrari’s attack on new teams such as Virgin, Campos, USF1 and Lotus is ‘sad’ according to Sir Richard Branson, the backer behind Virgin Racing.
“I think that it is a bit sad to see Ferrari carrying on with those kinds of words,” said Branson during a visit to testing at Barcelona on Saturday.”
Earlier this week Ferrari launched a scathing attack on departed FIA president Max Mosley, Stefan GP and the new teams, in which they said Virgin and Lotus had been circulating at a ‘much reduced pace’.
Branson attacked Ferrari’s criticism, insisting F1 needed new teams to inject excitement.
“F1 needs new teams, and Ferrari won the battle of making sure the new teams were shackled. For testing, we built a new car and we are going to have to have exactly the same amount of practice time as Brawn or Ferrari or the others, who have had years and years and years to get their cars to a certain stage.
“We are not complaining about it, and we are happy to go on with it, but Ferrari should be welcoming new teams because they [the new teams] make the sport much more exciting. And we will make them look better for a year or two until we catch them up. Ultimately, I think the new teams will give Ferrari a run for their money and I think they will make the sport more exciting, particularly as the budgets come down to more realistic levels.” Added Branson.
Branson is confident they can close the gap between the established teams, despite having spent less than 10% of Ferrari’s budget.
“We like a challenge. We’ve got the best people in the world to work with and it is going to be very, very exciting.
“By the start of the season I think the gap between the new teams and the old teams will be less. Give it a year or two – you cannot just build a new team from scratch and immediately start beating Ferrari that has spent £400 million on a car – whereas Virgin has spent less than £40 million.”
