Massa Leaves Hospital, Flies Home To Brazil

The 28-year-old fracturing his skull in an accident during qualifying at last month`s Hungarian Grand Prix.

Injured Ferrari driver Felipe Massa left a Budapest hospital after nine days of treatment on Monday and said he hoped to make a swift return to Formula One.

The 28-year-old fracturing his skull in an accident during qualifying at last month's Hungarian Grand Prix.

Massa boarded a private jet home to Brazil on his own feet on Monday and doctors expect him to make a full recovery.

"I'm feeling much better now and I want to recover as soon as possible to get back behind the wheel of a Ferrari," Massa told the Italian Formula One team's website (www.ferrari.com).

He said he does not remember the accident on July 25, in which he was hit just above his left eye by a bouncing spring from fellow Brazilian Rubens Barrichello's Brawn car.

"It is sort of a strange feeling," he said. "I know exactly what happened, that a spring came off Rubens' car and hit me on the helmet, but I didn't feel anything when it happened.

"They told me that I lost consciousness at the moment of the spring's impact on my helmet and I ran into the barriers, then I woke up in hospital two days later. I don't remember anything and that's why what the doctors did had to be explained to me.

"The last thing I remembered was when I was behind him (Barrichello) at the end of my fast lap in Q2 and then it's blank."

Massa, last year's championship runner-up, spent several days in an induced coma and on a respirator before being released from an intensive care unit last Wednesday.

Germany's seven-time Formula One world champion Michael Schumacher, who retired in 2006, is set to replace the Brazilian at Ferrari while he recovers.

Massa is confident his former team mate will do a fine job.

"He knows how to win, he knows how to drive and he's great," he said. "It was the best choice, handing over the car to such a fantastic person."

No timetable has been given yet for Massa's return to Formula One.