Ferrari boss Maurizio Arrivabene has defended the tyre decision that turned Sebastian Vettel’s lead into the Australian GP into a third place.
When teams had a free choice of tires at the red flag the Ferraris stuck with supersofts, while the two Mercedes drivers restarted with mediums. They didn’t need to stop again, and when Vettel pitted, he dropped back. He was unable to recover to higher than third.
“On the wall we were confident, in all honesty,” said Arrivabene. “So we were looking at the race. We looked at the gap we were gaining and at that time the radio was to go with our strategy and to keep going. Then, I don’t want to take any excuses. The red flag – the last one was in 2009 if I am not wrong, but it is part of the race so you have to accept it and that is it.
“At that stage of the race we have to be a bit more aggressive. It could be right, could be wrong. Sebastian was talking about that. In the end we were pushing like hell and Sebastian also had the chance to be able to overtake Hamilton, that was in our strategy. If you want to look at the glass not half empty – we were there. But this is the news. Of course after that, you cannot be happy after this but this is racing.”
Nevertheless he admitted it was a race lost: “Yeah. We lost… the race if you look, it is in front of everybody that we were showing a very, very good pace. We were quite comfortable and after the red flag, we took a decision. A certain decision that can be right or wrong. But…”
He remains optimistic about the season.
“The pace in the race is very good. The car is very good. So, this is what I have to say. But we don’t have to give up. We need to continue to push because every race has their own story. You have to turn the page and look forward and think about the next one thinking to do not what you have done today but to do even better for Bahrain.
“The start was super. I have to say both of the drivers, they start like two rockets and after that they were able to take an advantage, and that was good for us. This is the reason why at a certain point we were looking at the gap, looking at our strategy prediction and looking quite comfortable. But at the end of the day you have to look at the result of the race, not the provision. We have to be realistic.”
Adam Cooper's F1 Blog 
Understand the guy behind trying to mix it up, and in particular Hamilton. But it makes no sense that Vettel in the lead didn’t just cover Rosberg’s tyre strategy. Ferrari threw away a win no matter what Arrivabene says. Too bad, but after qualy disaster race was excellent.
I don’t know – I kind of take it at face value… seems like Ferrari knew they couldn’t get the performance out of the Mediums, so they had to try something else?
Maybe. Hindsight is twenty-twenty, which my comment benefits from…
If Mercedes had made this blunder with Lewis in the lead, the howling would have been amazing to hear. Having said that, Lewis was totally cool in his post race remarks and comments, I expected the sullen, poor me attitude we saw last year when he didn’t win.
And all credit to Seb for not burying the team for the messed up decision to stay on the super softs. An obvious mistake, even without 20-20 hindsight. They had to use a second compound anyways, why not go back out on the softs or mediums? And they had plenty of time to think it through.
Vettel is a class act. Sadly that was lost to some extent in the noise of Red Bull dominance.
What I find really interesting vis a vis your Hamilton comment is that generally in the media and fandom you don’t see similar cries to “it is all Mercedes AMG and not Hamilton that won the championships”, which was what you heard a lot with Vettel. In other words, put Hamilton in a different car than Mercedes he wouldn’t have two extra WDC.
That is not to takeaway from Hamilton, but to add to Vettel if you follow me.
I like the Ferrari Seb a whole lot more than the Red Bull Seb. A lot of the “noise” during Seb’s 4 consecutive titles was due to him, just ask Mark Webber.
Regarding having the best car on the grid, I think that is 90% of the fight, or pick a high percentage of your choosing. If you take all of the current experienced drivers, the talent differentiation from best to worst might be only 5%-10%. And a lot of that differential, I think, is down to experience and having the confidence in knowing you have the best car on the grid.
Wonder if Sergio has Marco on standby now?
Come back Marco, all is forgiven……….
The strategy wouldve probably worked on a track with better overtaking opportunities.