Fernando Alonso's race engineer Andrea Stella is confident the Spaniard will once again be in the mix for the honours at this week's German Grand Prix.
Ferrari struggled at the start of the season but they have made steady progress in recent weeks with Alonso winning in Valencia before claiming a podium finish in Silverstone.
Alonso finds himself 13 points clear of Mark Webber at the top of the drivers' standings and with Hockenheim likely to suit the F2012, Stella believes the Spaniard can challenge for the race win in Germany.
"The car was good in Valencia, it was also good in Silverstone. And as Hockenheim is a mix of the slow speed of Valencia and high speed of Silverstone, I would expect Ferrari to be competitive in Germany," Stella told the Ferrari website.
Ferrari headed into pre-season testing confident the F2012 was capable of challenging for the world title, but poor results brought them back down to earth.
Fortunately luck appeared to be on Alonso's side and despite the obvious problems with the car he managed to stay in the hunt at the top of the standings.
Stella believes his current championship lead is down to the hard work of the team but he insists there is plenty of room for improvement.
"At the start of the season it would have required one to be extremely optimistic to imagine such a situation," he explained.
"But in this sport, things can change very quickly and we have always maintained a positive attitude. The current situation is the result of this attitude combined with a lot of hard work.
"You always want to get more and more top speed as it brings benefits in terms of reducing the lap time and it makes life easier during the race.
"But of course, top speed is the counterpart to downforce and in a way, if we are limited when it comes to top speed, that is partly because our car is performing well when it comes to downforce. However, it is definitely an area where we are trying to improve for the future."