Lotus F1 Team
Lotus deputy team principal Federico Gastaldi says that Ferrari's victory at the Malaysian Grand Prix proves that calls to equalise teams following Mercedes' dominant performance in Australia were premature.
Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg eased away from their rivals in Melbourne to register a 1-2 finish, leading to calls from some rivals that Mercedes should be pegged back.
But Ferrari fought back in Malaysia as Sebastian Vettel outfoxed Mercedes to end his and the team's drought.
"We heard these [equalisation] calls after the first race of the season which was maybe a little early to be making such noise," said Gastaldi, whose Lotus team is powered by Mercedes.
"Now after two races there have been two different teams who have taken race wins, so the idea that Mercedes will have it all their own way this year was a little premature.
"Formula 1 is always very competitive and it doesn’t matter which year you’re in or the circumstances of a team in any given year: we all want to win and will do everything we can to become as competitive as possible.
"Of course, we have a promoter and a regulatory body which are both very attuned to the various needs of the sport, so every aspect is always very closely scrutinised."
Lotus has yet to score points in 2015, a statistic which Gastaldi is hoping to address at next weekend's Chinese Grand Prix.
"At the top of the list is, of course, points," he said. "We have the pace so we just need to be there in the correct position when the chequered flag falls.
"Both Pastor [Maldonado] and Romain [Grosjean] are operating at the top of their games so it’s just a question of having a race without any issues or contact from other cars. We’ve had a couple of reliability issues which we’re addressing so we expect to be out there and scoring very soon."
