Sebastian Vettel was only 15th and eighth in the two sessions in Hungary today, and like many other drivers he didn’t to sample soft tyres because of the rain.
While the true picture isn’t clear Vettel did concede that the team still has some work to do to get the car to his liking.
“It’s difficult to judge as we didn’t get out on the soft tyres, so it’s difficult to compare our competitiveness,” said Vettel. “It was a normal Friday, and I think there’s still a lot of room for improvement for us, things that we need to do a little bit better for the rest of the weekend, and then we’ll see where we are. Unfortunately the weather caught us out like everyone in the end. We’ll see what we get tomorrow.
“I don’t think it’s a big handicap, because some people did their runs, some people did not. On the other hand I think we got a decent run on the primes, two proper runs, which was important. I think we found a little bit there. All in all we still need to find another little bit for tomorrow.
“It looks to be quite tight, it’s a short lap, so I think it will be extremely tight in qualifying if it’s dry. In case of damp or wet, it’s difficult. Right now the conditions we had a very unlikely because it’s a bit of everything, so it was not so smart for us to go out.”
Inevitably much interest surrounds the FIA clampdown on RBR’s engine mapping, but Vettel continues to downplay it.
“A lot of talk, but if you would know what is going on in the background, you wouldn’t be too interested in the talking and the stuff that gets printed the last couple of days. Fortunately tomorrow there’s a new paper, and the day after tomorrow again, and especially on Monday. We focus on the race here, and then try to make some good news for Monday’s paper.
“Surely if we had the choice we would go back to what we had in Hockenheim, but it’s difficult for us as well to measure, like I said yesterday.”
Adam Cooper F1 