Ferrari is less able to “cover our weakness” in race trim compared to qualifying, Sebastian Vettel admits.
For the second straight race, the Italian team was unable to convert a front-row lockout into victory, as Lewis Hamilton took the chequered flag in Mexico.
But speaking to Sky Italia afterwards, team boss Mattia Binotto played down their latest defeat.
“Today we were hoping for something better,” he admitted. “The rhythm was good, Mercedes tried something different, they were good and also lucky.
“I don’t think Mercedes was faster than us today but they made the right call and deserve to win.
“I think the fact that we are not happy today proves how much we have improved. I think now we are at the same level as Mercedes which is huge for us.”
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However, it is noticeable how Ferrari is much more vulnerable to Mercedes and sometimes Red Bull over a race distance than they are in qualifying.
“If you want to be just pure and honest, then I think our car is good in a straight line: one because we have an efficient car, so that’s credit to us, and two because I think we’ve done a really good job on the power unit front, so compliments to Maranello,” Vettel said.
“But we are lacking downforce which leads to maybe a weaker race pace and leads to struggling a bit more on Sundays when it’s about managing the tyres and successive laps, whereas in qualifying I think we can extract a bit more from our car, cover our weakness a bit more with fresh tyres on the car.
“With new tyres, you can mask a little bit the problems here and there. So that would be just the straightforward, technical answer.”
Vettel is confident though that going forward, Ferrari can close that gap.
“I think we have all the ingredients; we have the people; we have the intelligence, so I think we just need to make sure things fall into place and once they do, I think things will start to click,” he continued.
“Obviously Mercedes have proven in the last years that it is possible. I think they just got stronger and stronger throughout, which is a credit to them as a team. They have shown what is possible, they are the benchmark and it’s up to us to do a better job in the future.
“Easily said, not so easily done but yeah, I think you also have to give credit where credit is due and both Mercedes and Lewis have been too strong in the last couple of years.”