Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg of Germany leads Ferrari driver Felipe Massa of Brazil during the Formula One Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai on Sunday. Philippe Lopez / Agence France-Presse

Ferrari driver Felipe Massa has called on his team to improve their qualifying performance if they are to start challenging for victories this season.

Massa finished sixth, one place ahead of his teammate Fernando Alonso, in the Chinese Grand Prix on Sunday, following on from seventh and fifth places in the opening two races in Malaysia and Australia.

But if the Italian manufacturer is to challenge Red Bull and McLaren this season, it is on Saturday qualifying that it needs to take a step forward, said the Brazilian.

"For sure, we need to qualify better so we can start further forward on the grid which helps in the race, even with the talk of grid position being less important this year," Massa said in his official diary on the Ferrari website.

"In China actually my grid position, sixth, was not too bad and then I gained one place immediately after the start which moved me up to fifth.

"Most importantly though, if you look at the pace of the car, it was good enough to allow us to fight with the leaders.

"That meant I had a very interesting race, being able to make up several places because effectively, the car we had in the race was completely different to the one we had the day before in qualifying.

"It definitely worked well, because I even led the race for a short while at one point and I held a genuine second place for quite some time.

"Unfortunately, those who were stopping for tyre changes caught us up much faster than we had expected in the closing stages and, on tyres that were in much better shape than mine, they were able to get past."