Ferrari confident it can avoid turbo penalties

Ferrari is confident it can avoid taking any grid penalties for using extra turbochargers during the rest of this season, according to chief technical officer Mattia Binotto.

Both Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen are already on their fourth turbo of the season, with a driver automatically receiving a grid penalty if a fifth of any power unit element is used. Vettel used his fourth turbo as early as the Spanish Grand Prix in May due to reliability concerns, leaving him with 15 races to complete using only those four already introduced. But Binotto says it is a realistic aim heading into the second half of the season.

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"Certainly it is somehow a concern in the fact that we had failure on the turbo at the start of the season and we have to replace them at the very start and you introduce very early in the season turbo number three and turbo number four," Binotto said.

"Having said that, we introduce as well in the following turbos some modifications for reliability. They are running well at the moment, so we've got all the pool at the moment that have been introduced but we've got all the mileage available on each turbo, so we are rotating them and, obviously it's our objective to conclude the season with the current pool of turbos."

Binotto, echoing recent comments from both drivers that there is no guarantee that either Ferrari or Mercedes will be more competitive than the other at certain tracks, placed the emphasis on car development.

"I think that each race is different to the others. There have been races at the start of the season where we have been competitive and others where Mercedes has been competitive," he said. "If you look, for example, Bahrain very early in the season, they have been very competitive in qualifying, we have been in the race.

"I don't think that there is a clear tendency and a clear trend on the competitiveness of the two teams. Certainly the development is very important. That has to be done race by race. There are still many races to go; we are just half of the season and I don't see any reasons why this should be one trend or another one."