Not even the presence of their former team chief Jean Todt in the pit-lane could inspire Ferrari on Sunday to overcome their worst start to a season since 1981.

Todt, who combined with Ross Brawn to guide Michael Schumacher to five successive world titles with the Italian team, could only watch in dismay as they failed again to score a point.

After three races, Ferrari are pointless for the first time in an opening spell since failing to score in Long Beach, California, Rio De Janeiro, Brazil, and then Buenos Aires, Argentina, at the start of the 1981 season.

In that year, they recovered when Frenchman Didier Pironi finished fifth on home turf at the San Marino Grand Prix held at Imola.

This year, unfortunately for Ferrari, the F1 circus does not return to Europe for another three weeks when Barcelona hosts the Spanish Grand Prix on May 10 so another pointless weekend in Bahrain next week is in prospect.

The team has blamed its failure on the absence of a controversial "double decker" diffuser, but this defence was blown away when they were outperformed easily by the victorious Red Bull team - another without that equipment.

Brawn GP won the opening two races, thanks to Briton Jenson Button and an excellent car fitted with the double diffuser.

On Sunday, Button was third and his Brawn team-mate Brazilian Rubens Barrichello fourth in a rain-swept race that saw Brazilian Felipe Massa retire and Finn Kimi Raikkonen finish 12th for Ferrari.

But team boss Stefano Domenicali stressed that Ferrari were not giving up.

"The great shame is that at a time when technically we are not at our best, once again we failed to capitalise on circumstances," he said.

"Now we look towards next weekend's race in Bahrain in a realistic frame of mind: the car will be the same as here, even though we will look at running the KERS again.

"In the meantime, we have to work intensively on getting the new aerodynamic components to the race track, when the European part of the season gets underway in Barcelona."

In Sunday's race, Massa lost power when he was in a promising position.

"Obviously, I'm very disappointed and a bit upset but my motivation is still intact. All of us must work together to get out of this situation," he said.

Raikkonen, who has already hinted that he believes Ferrari's hopes of mounting a world title challenge are over, said: "Clearly the championship situation looks very difficult.

"We have made mistakes and we are not quick enough.

"I am sure we can be competitive enough to win again, but this work will take time."

AFP

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