This article was written by Tom Cary and first appeared on Website. The Barcelona test concluded today with the Virgin VR01 slowest, some 5½ seconds off the pace....

"Sir Richard Branson has branded Ferrari "foolish" for resisting a budget cap in Formula One and described as "sad" comments made by the Italian marque criticising the sport's governing body and belittling the new teams entering this year.

Branson, on a flying visit to the Circuit de Catalunya for the penultimate day of winter testing on Saturday, was in typically forthright mood ahead of the season-opening grand prix in Bahrain two weeks on Sunday.

The billionaire entrepreneur, who has switched from sponsoring Brawn GP to launching his own Virgin Racing team, was in town to run the rule over the VR-01 and could not resist having a pop back at Ferrari after a scathing editorial appeared on the Scuderia's website on Tuesday.

"I think that it's a bit sad to see Ferrari carrying on with those kinds of words," he said. "Formula One needs new teams. Ferrari already won the battle to make sure that new teams are shackled. I mean we have built a new car from scratch and are going to have exactly the same practice time as Brawn, Ferrari or any of the other teams who have had years and years and years to get it right. But we're not complaining about it – we're happy to go along with it."

Ferrari, who last year threatened to quit the sport over the FIA's planned introduction of a £40 million budget cap, claiming it would reduce F1 to little more than GP3, said the current uncertainty swirling around the new teams was the "legacy" of former FIA president Max Mosley's "holy war" to batter big car manufacturers.

"The cause in question was to allow smaller teams to get into Formula One," Ferrari said. "This is the outcome: two teams [Lotus and Virgin] will limp into the start of the championship, a third [Campos] is being pushed into the ring by an invisible hand and, as for the fourth [USF1], well, you would do better to call on Missing Persons to locate it.

"In the meantime, we have lost two constructors along the way, in the shape of BMW and Toyota, while at Renault, there's not much left other than the name. Was it all worth it?"

It prompted Mosley to remark that Ferrari were like "a frumpy old woman at a dance who sees a couple of pretty young girls come in and they resent it".

Branson agreed with Mosley, describing Ferrari's comments as "sad" and adding that it was a bit rich the Italian team belittling the efforts of others when they wouldn't allow the new teams a level playing field.

He said: "I think it was a pity that they [Ferrari] were resistant to the budget cap and I think it is foolish actually. I think the one thing the Virgin team will prove is that you can have a really good racing team, running very fast, within a very tight budget.

"There is no need to do massively expensive wind tunnel testing, or all the other things that they do to get the extra second or two."

Ever the headline-grabber, Branson added that he fully expected his team to catch up Ferrari within a year or two, despite hydraulic problems and a wing failure blighting the early running of the first F1 car designed exclusively on a computer rather than in a wind tunnel.

"[Our presence] will make them look better for a year or two until we catch them up," he said. "But ultimately I think that new teams will give Ferrari a run for their money. And I think it will make the sport more exciting, particularly as budgets come down to more realistic levels.""