Celebration amid frustration for Massa and Ferrari. (LAT photo)
Felipe Massa lost the 2008 by the slenderest of margins in Brazil, but the local hero won a lot of respect with his dignified approach after the race. It’s been a great year for Massa who made a few mistakes and benefited at times from FIA decisions, but he also put in a lot of great qualifying laps and scored some impressive wins. This is what he had to say to the media after the race.
Q: Felipe, tell us your feelings about the race?
“It was such difficult weather in the beginning and then the rain came at the end. I am so proud about that race, I am so proud about the team and so proud about the people around who supported me more than ever, more than 100 percent. Much more than I expected. It’s really an emotional day for me because you get here and you have almost done everything perfectly even with the championship at the end but then we saw Lewis passing Glock again and that’s really mixed a lot of my emotions. But that’s racing. The race finishes with the checkered flag. We finished in the front and we have to be very proud about that and unfortunately we missed one point but that’s racing. We need to be proud of our job and our race and our championship and that’s why I am here. I know how to win and I know how to lose. It is one more day of my life and we are going to learn a lot from this day. That’s the way it is but for sure I am very emotional.”
Q: Felipe, reflect on the season in your own words given your emotions today?
“Well, I think as Kimi said, we did everything perfect today and unfortunately it was not enough. I think we did a great championship, we had some up and downs and we paid for that and we are also paying now a little bit but racing is like that. Sometimes you just have a perfect year with so many victories, a very reliable car, and sometimes you have some ups and downs and that’s racing. From one year to the other things change. That was our championship but even if we had some ups and downs I think everybody did a great job. Everybody worked really hard to achieve our goals with the heart and sometimes things don’t happen in the way we want. But that’s racing. That’s the sport, sometimes it is a little bit different than we expect.
“We need to be happy with our Constructors' championship. It is very important and I am sure our President, everybody inside the team is very, very proud and very happy like me as we need to be. The second thing is we need to congratulate Lewis because he did a great championship and he scored more points than us, so he deserves to be champion. I know how to lose and I know how to win and as I said before it is another day of my life from which I am going to learn a lot. Hopefully we come back here with the title but anyway I think it is part of our experience, part of our life. I am sure everybody here, me, Fernando, Kimi, knows how tough it is to be a driver. Sometimes things are very easy and something happens you don’t expect. Sometimes things are very difficult and you win without expecting, so we know a lot about that and that is another day. But as I said I am very happy and I am leaving the track with my head completely up as I think we did everything we could.”
Q: What a rollercoaster of emotions you must have gone through. You’d done everything you had to do, what was happening on that last lap, even after you’d taken the checkered flag?
“I had completely mixed emotions because when I crossed the line, I was still the champion and then suddenly my engineer was telling me everything on the radio and then when I was in Turn Three, he told me that Lewis had passed Glock. It was a completely mixed emotion because I was still waiting to hear the confirmation and then we didn’t have [what we wanted], we had the opposite of the confirmation.
“I’m still proud, I’m still happy. I think we did a great job today. It’s not every day you can win your home grand prix. It’s the second time that I won and I’m very proud of the job done today, of my team. We won the Constructors’ championship and for me that’s a big, big achievement. That’s racing. The race finished at the checkered flag, today was big proof of that. When you cannot win (the championship) and you win the race, it’s still a big show that you can be proud of. That’s why I’m very happy. I would have been much, much happier if it had been true when I crossed the line but God knows what to do and in life you always have explanations. So if these things happened today, it’s because it has to be like that. We need to learn from this and we need to grow because of this moment. That’s why I think we need to lift our heads and be very, very proud today when we leave the track. We’ve had some ups and downs but that’s racing. Sometimes we try to do everything perfectly and things go in the other direction. Some days things look very, very difficult but then you win the race and you don’t know why. That’s racing and we need to learn about that and it’s not the first time that these things have happened to me. I had a lot of experience in other categories, even positive experiences as well and today is another day and we need to learn. But I was really, really happy to see the support I had here today.”
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