Ferrari confident of making 'good step' in Canada

Ferrari will be significantly faster in Canada than they were in Monaco as a result of a planned upgrade package, according to technical director James Allison.

Fernando Alonso finished fourth in Monte Carlo, while team mate Kimi Raikkonen was running a very strong third in the early stages, only for his podium hopes to be scuppered by contact with Max Chilton's Marussia while running behind the safety car - the first of a series of maladies which consigned the Finn to 12th at the finish.

Allison says such form is proof the team are developing well, and bolsters his conviction that the car's underlying pace will be markedly better when they travel to Montreal in a fortnight's time.

"In Monaco, we continued to analyse the areas in which the F14 T can be improved," Allison explained.

"Now we are looking ahead to the next race in Canada, where the package we will use is a good step faster than the car we raced last weekend."

He warned, however, that Ferrari's hopes of a scoring just a second podium of the 2014 season would also be contingent on what upgrades their rivals have lined up for the seventh round of the season.

"While our development programme has progressed well in recent weeks, it is hard to predict exactly what this will mean for the competitiveness of the F14-T, as we do not know what steps our competitors plan to bring to Montreal," he added.

"So any improvement has to be seen in relative terms, hoping that the track will deliver an answer worthy of all the efforts we have made so far."

Allison, who joined Ferrari in September 2013, said Ferrari are also working on a new technical approach intended to give their designers vital creative space.

"We must be able to make the most of the creativity and originality of our engineers," he commented.

"We know there is no magic wand, but there is a wealth of talent at Ferrari and we are working on an implementation and an approach to the work which allows it to emerge."

After six rounds of the 2014 season, Ferrari are third in the constructors' standings on 78 points, 21 behind Red Bull and 11 ahead of Force India. Alonso's third place in China is their best result of the year to date.