Ferrari thoughts begin to move to 2012

Understandably Ferrari are not willing to completing throw in the towel on the 2011 season.

Their passionate fans across the world and particularly in Italy, will not allow them to simply give up on the remainder of this season, even though it is highly doubtful that Alonso can pull back a 89-point deficit on championship leader Sebastian Vettel.

So with that in mind, in a similar strategy to McLaren, Ferrari are taking it one race at a time, aiming for the race win.

'Our realistic goal for the remaining eight grands prix is to win races, to score as many points as possible, I am sure we can achieve good results, but we should avoid looking at the classification, because we know the championship will be very difficult given the current gap, but let's see where it is in a few races. We have the potential to do well and we have to believe in ourselves.' Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali old the official Ferrari website.

Domenicali revealed that there were now few developments planned for the 2011 F1 car, the team would continue to work on improvements for this season, but thoughts for the new 2012 car were beginning to take over.

In fact the Ferrari team principal seems to already be very excited about what Ferrari will bring to the grid in 2012 and historically, teams who have focussed on the new season have done better than those who have continued to battle up until the very end of a championship season.

Domenicali continued: 'As far as next year's regulations are concerned, apart from rules regarding the exhaust system, there are not many changes; therefore the new cars can be described as a development of the 2011 car. However, what I can say, having seen the model in the wind tunnel and the work going on in the drawing office, is that it will be a very innovative machine.

'In fact, this is to be expected, this is necessary given that our first goal is that, in 2012, we must be competitive right from the very start of the season.'

Last season McLaren were also excited about their innovative design, only to be hugely disappointed during winter testing and left playing catch-up, which ultimately cost them any chance of competing for this seasons championship.

Will Ferrari make the same mistakes? Or will they be a force from race one next season?