The 2008 Formula One pre-season phoney war kicked off in earnest yesterday with Ferrari stealing a march on McLaren Mercedes by sneaking their car launch in a day ahead of their Anglo-German rivals.

As McLaren prepared to present their new challenger in Germany today, their Italian opponents led by Kimi Raikkonen, the world champion, were already looking forward to a second successive season finishing at the top.

“The fact that I won the drivers’ world title last year gives me the confidence that I can do it again, but I don’t feel any stronger,” Raikkonen said at the Ferrari factory at Maranello where the new car, the F2008, was unveiled.

Raikkonen, who stole the championship from Lewis Hamilton, of McLaren, in a dramatic season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix in October, seemed happy with the progress on the new car that he will drive in public for the first time today at Ferrari’s Fiorano test track.

“The cockpit is a bit straighter, there’s lots of innovations,” Raikkonen, who will again be partnered by Felipe Massa, the Brazilian driver, said. “Above all we’ve lost traction control and it will be a bit difficult in the wet — there are still changes to be made but that’s the same with every new car. We’re ready and with Felipe we have a good atmosphere in the team and we’ll try to keep that and fight to retain our titles.”

While the “Iceman” will be able to bask in the glory due to him in car No 1, Hamilton, who was pipped by only one point at the end of a title race he had led for months, will be driving the new McLaren MP4-23 with No 22 on its nose, a stark reminder of his team’s ejection from last year’s constructors’ championship for cheating.

This will not be the only hangover from a traumatic first season in Formula One for the Briton, who turns 23 tomorrow. As the “wooden spoon” winner in the constructors’ table — a title McLaren would have won by 14 points from Ferrari had they not been ejected — Hamilton will find himself operating from the end of the pitlane and paddock at every circuit, with half the garaging and motorhome space the team have become accustomed to.

On the track, the British star has a new team-mate in Heikki Kovalainen who will appear alongside him for the first time in Germany today after his move from Renault and after the departure of Fernando Alonso, the troubled former world champion.

While some of these changes are purely cosmetic, the critical issue is likely to be how much the new McLaren has been “scarred” by the investigation of its design process in recent months for traces of Ferrari intellectual property. In several areas the team have agreed to restrict development on the car as part of its bargain with the FIA, the sport’s governing body, to bring the Ferrari-McLaren spy scandal to a close.

One respected analyst told The Times yesterday that he believed Ferrari should have an advantage when all these factors are taken into account as the Scuderia incrementally develops a good car from last year, unhindered by outside interferance. “My worry is that McLaren may have gone for a conservative car and in Formula One ‘conservative’ always means slow,” he said.

After a short rest between his hectic pre-Christmas schedule of television and award-ceremony appearances and the start of the build-up to the new season, Hamilton is looking forward to a slightly less stressful second year in Formula One than the first.

“Politics-wise it [2007] was a disaster but that is the business, there is nothing you can do about it,” he said. “You won’t see a season like it again but I hope next season is just as exciting without the politics. For me it’s great, I’m almost seen as the leader of the team and hopefully I can do the job.”

Back in Italy, the boys in red, who are pressing ahead with criminal and civil proceedings in connection with the spy scandal, are determined to thwart Hamilton again. Speaking before the car launch, Piero Ferrari, son of Enzo, the company founder, said he had no doubts that Raikkonen is favourite to win a second successive world title.

“Yes, definitely,” he said. “In the first season he broke the ice, found confidence and belief in the team. He will have a car that better suits his driving style because I think that was the problem at one time last year: his style did not suit the F2007 and vice versa. The F2007 wasn’t always the fastest car nor the most reliable, but the team did a perfect job in the last race and that’s how we won.”