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Vettel hopes to pull off some Ferrari 'tricks' to end Mercedes F1 dominance

MONTREAL — Sebastian Vettel says Ferrari has a few tricks up its sleeves for this weekend's Canadian Grand Prix and will need to conjure up something special if it is to end Mercedes' magical run. Six races into the season, Vettel is not ready to wave the white flag and concede the title to Mercedes, which has racked up six straight wins, five of them with 1-2 finishes. But the German admits the battle had reached a critical juncture. "The next races will be really crucial for us to try and get back to the front and give a much harder time to Mercedes," said Vettel, who finished second in Monaco last month for Ferrari's best result so far this season. "It will be crucial to do it rather sooner than later, but at the moment I am not too fussed, I am not looking at, 'OK this is the date.' "Clearly we are behind, clearly there is a big margin between Mercedes and the rest and we have to lose that gap and get ahead otherwise it will be difficult to turn around. "That is as much realism as you can get."Vettel won from pole position in Canada last year and Mercedes has suggested the high-speed circuit could again favor Italian rivals whose season has yet to get into gear. But Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas will like their chances as well on the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. Hamilton was fastest in Friday's early practice, but damaged his car when he hit the wall in the afternoon. The five-time world champion sits 17 points clear of Bottas at the top of the standings and in his bid to equal Michael Schumacher's seven Canadian Grand Prix victories between 1994 and 2004. Not that Mercedes needed another boost, but Hamilton and Bottas will have new and upgraded engines in their cars for this weekend's race. Ferrari has already introduced its first upgraded powerplants of the season, but Vettel was optimistic tweaks to the car would benefit them on a circuit that plays to some of their strengths. "There is always little tricks you can do, the question is whether they make a difference," Vettel said. "But I am not sitting here trying to paint things black we haven't done a single lap this weekend so I am quite optimistic it was a strong track for us last year. "We have some tricks up our sleeves whether they work or not we will see.

Chris Harris reviews his personal, two-year-old Ferrari FF [w/video]

Here's the kind of take you don't get too often. In fact, it hardly ever happens. Fan favorite Chris Harris has wanted a Ferrari FF since he saw it for the first time, but he couldn't get his bank account to comply with his desires. So he waited a couple of years for the price to come down, and found a specimen he could talk himself - and Ferrari Finance - into: a 2012 in Tour de France Blue with tan leather and 6,000 miles for the 'What, me worry?" price of 160,000 pounds ($249K US). Harris said that after putting 45,000 pounds down, his monthly payment is 1,400 ($2,177 US) pounds per month. He also said, "Sometimes you just have to do stupid things because you want to do stupid things." Five months in, Harris has no regrets, and in the beginning of the review he gets to one of the primary points that makes us fall in love with cars that can never be exploited on public roads: They make you feel equal parts badass and beastly and baronial at every speed. Or as Harris puts it, it's a "frankly ridiculous motorcar." In the best way. Check out his always-compelling take in the video. Related Gallery 2013 Ferrari FF: Review View 35 Photos News Source: Chris Harris on Cars via YouTubeImage Credit: Copyright 2014 Drew Phillips / AOL Ferrari Hatchback Luxury Performance Videos chris harris ferrari ff

Ferrari 458 M spotted, is there a turbo under there?

While it's still absolutely beautiful and a performance marvel (especially in Speciale trim), the Ferrari 458 Italia has to keep up with the rapidly evolving world in supercars if it wants to continue its success. Ferrari seems to know that it can't sit back and relax, because we're now seeing a disguised 458 testing for the second time.
Since we first saw it, rumor has emerged that it updated 458, reportedly called 458 M, may follow the lead of the recently revised California by using its turbocharged 3.9-liter V8 engine. The mill makes 553 horsepower and 557 pound-feet in that application, but those numbers clearly won't be enough for the Prancing Horse, because the standard 458 already makes more. Instead, Ferrari is expected to turn things up significantly to produce around 670hp, even more than the already gutsy Speciale.
Of course, to make the big change work, the 458 M must be able to ingest huge quantities of cool air to feed those turbos, and the camouflage on this test car is likely hiding the body changes to make that possible. Ferrari does a great job here of disguising things up front on this prototype, making it frustratingly hard to spot any changes.