Ferrari team principal Maurizio Arrivabene insists his team remain in the fight for the title this season despite falling further behind Mercedes, after a disappointing Russian Grand Prix weekend saw just one red car finish.
The Italian outfit have drifted 81 points behind Mercedes in the Constructors' standings after just four rounds following problems in Bahrain when Sebastian Vettel suffered an engine failure on the formation lap, which was followed by contact between both Ferrari drivers at the next race in China.
In Russia, although Kimi Raikkonen finished on the podium, Vettel – who took a gearbox penalty – was taken out by Red Bull's Daniil Kvyat at Turn 3 whilst Mercedes went on to further their advantage with a 1-2 finish despite Lewis Hamilton starting tenth.
Arrivabene insists they're not giving up as they look to banish the mistakes and get back on track over the course of the remaining 17 races.
"What has happened is part of the DNA of racing," he is quoted by the official F1 website. "I don't think things can be explained as bad luck – there are mostly human mistakes behind the story. I prefer to have these kind of problems now instead later in the season.
"But of course we need to make sure that it doesn't happen again. Concerning the championship: we are not giving up! The team won't give up and we will put all our energy from now on into the next 17 races.
"There are still 425 points to be taken. So by only winning the next five races everything is wide open again. Nothing is lost and we're not giving up!"
The Italian maintains they're closer to Mercedes than it appears, ith mistakes costing them pace and points.
"We have to stop making any more mistakes from our side," he added. "I trust that our performance is much better than what we've shown until now.
"The characteristics of the tracks that are coming now – and because of the [engine] tokens that we've spent – will help us. Of course the others are not sleeping or waiting for us, so we have to fight."
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