Felipe Massa says that Formula 1 has not worsened since he made his debut in 2002 despite the category coming in for widespread criticism during his career.

Massa argues that F1 was subject to the same complaints then as it is now and that there is no significant difference despite suggestions that the spectacle has diminished.

“In the moment that I started, overtaking was very difficult, we didn’t have DRS and everyone was complaining about the same thing,” said Massa.

“They said ‘ah, we need to overtake’, ‘ah, we cannot follow the cars’, ‘ah, the top teams have more than the other teams’, ‘ah it’s too expensive’…

“What is different? I don’t really see a big change.

“Maybe in that time, teams spent even more money than they are now but the gap between the best and the worst was huge, like it is now.

“This is F1. Hopefully it will change in the future, but I didn’t see a big change.”

The 36-year-old added that the challenge for drivers has not fundamentally changed.

“They are different cars but the mentality – the way you are driving, what you put into the car, how you try to get the best out of the car – is no different,” said Massa.

“It’s just different types of cars, different rules, different tyres, different engines.

“To be an F1 driver, you need to be the best and you need to take the best out of the car.

“It was always like that in F1, it hasn’t been anything different from when I started to now. How things work is not so different.”

Massa also believes that the experience gained by drivers of his generation before the introduction of draconian testing restrictions in 2009, which initially banned all in-season testing, remains valuable.

The Brazilian, who debuted with Sauber, first tested in 2001 with the Swiss outfit.

From that period until the end of 2008, Massa completed 260 official days of testing.

In the nine-and-a-half years since, he has had only 66 days.

“The experience, the respect you have (for the car), I would say you have more and sometimes you see things before they happen,” said the now-Williams driver.

“(But the younger drivers) have their opportunities and they learn and they do many races and they are still doing a good job.

“So I may have more experience, but I don’t think it’s so different. A good driver is a good driver.”

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