Ferrari must keep it simple - Irvine

Eddie Irvine yesterday stressed that Ferrari "must keep things simple" if the team is to triumph in its pursuit of the Formula One drivers' championship.

The Irishman, who currently leads the race for the title by eight points, ahead of Finland's Mika Hakkinen, admitted that in the past the team had made too many mistakes and now had to shore up the opportunities being presented to them - starting with this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix.

"We made a lot of mistakes in the run-up to Michael's accident and thankfully since then we have eliminated them," he said.

"But that can all change around this weekend. We just have to keep things simple. We have to take the race to McLaren and just go for the maximum number of points available. I'd be very disappointed if Mika won the race by over 30 seconds, but if I'm right up on his gearbox then that won't be so bad."

Irvine, though, will be buoyed by his chief rival's admission that the events of the last three races - a lost wheel at Silverstone, a first-corner collision with team-mate David Coulthard in Austria and a spectacular blow out at Hockenheim a fortnight ago - have taken their toll mentally on the defending champion.

"It has obviously been very hard," Hakkinen said. "The things that have happened in our last three grands prix have made it extremely difficult, and very challenging psychologically. But, I still feel very strong and the team's trying harder than ever and I can see also all the possibilities and still give the maximum for the championship and the rest of the races.

"But last year, when I was racing here, things looked extremely good until I got mechanical failure in the car and lost all performance and lost all the places. Let's hope this year is different."

The sinuous Hungaroring circuit, which offers minimal downforce and little grip through its sequence of tight corners, should suit Ferrari better than the pure power requirements of Hockenheim, and its low speed and forecasted high temperatures should reward the Scuderia's unvanquished reliability compared to their chief rivals.

But the circuit has been unkind to Irvine in the past, with a best place of ninth in Budapest amid three retirements, including last year, and a 13th place finish in his last season at Jordan in 1995. "It hasn't been lucky," he admitted, "but it's a circuit I enjoy driving on because there are no real big braking areas. It's left and right, left and right, sliding the car the whole way round. It's a fun circuit to drive on. I've always run well, even last year. I was going really well until a really weird electrical problem hit, but then again up until this year I'd never won a race and this year I've won three so the times they are a changin'."

What is clear is that the Hungaroring remains the Irishman's chief focus. Asked once again about his plans for next season, Irvine was initially evasive, before insisting that it was still too early to think about it.

"When that story came out, my sister rang me up and she said `you want to have a look at this week's Autosport (magazine)' and so she brought me it down and I thought `nice picture'," Irvine said.

"Seriously, that's all there is. I'm just really focused on what's going on this weekend. Next year is a long way away and I don't see any rush. This race is the most important thing to me at the minute, it's the one thing I'm concentrating on.

"If Irvine is concentrating on securing Ferrari's first drivers' championship since 1979, Jordan's Heinz-Harald Frentzen's focus remains on securing third place for himself and the his team. With David Coulthard sneaking back into the frame via his Silverstone win, an undistinguished second in Austria and a fifth in Germany, Frenzten will soon be checking the Scot in his rearview mirrors, but the thought is not one the German is dwelling on.

"David is in the better car at the moment and I think that over the next few races the bad luck he has had should stop," he said.

"And then he'll be a strong contender for nicking my third place in the championship. But really my target is third. We want to achieve that by the end of this year and we're right on target."

Hungary has been one of Damon Hill's lucky charms, giving the Jordan driver his first grand prix win as well as a hugely-impressive drive to second with Arrows in 1997. "Hungary has always been good to me," he said. "I really like it. All the corners are good."