Sebastian Vettel admits his final year at Ferrari has been “not ideal” so far.
The German has only scored nine points in the first three races with a best finish of sixth two weeks ago in Hungary, contrast that to teammate Charles Leclerc who has 18 thanks to his P2 in the first Grand Prix in Austria.
Much of that is down to the Italian team’s lack of performance, which has chairman John Elkann ruling out any further victories until 2022 at the earliest.
But amid another difficult weekend at Silverstone, which was been dogged by mechanical woes and saw Vettel only qualify 10th on Saturday, he accepts this is not how he wanted his final season in red to go.
“[It’s] not ideal,” he was quoted by Autosport. “I mean, not an easy year so far and obviously now the races come very quick. So that can be a pain but can also be a blessing.
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“Obviously the last two days haven’t been good and therefore we lost a little bit of momentum.
“Other than that, the first weekend was trouble, the second weekend didn’t really happen.
“The third weekend was sort of the first smooth weekend and now we’re in trouble again.
“So it’s been a bit of a rough start, but you know, there’s not much choice.”
Even so, Vettel believes he and Ferrari remain on the same page and the four-time world champion promises to continue looking for improvement.
“I’m determined to hang in there and I think the guys are pushing as much as they can. I don’t think there’s any bad intentions by anyone,” he said.
“So we obviously had some issues yesterday and this morning, but we have to, I guess, at this stage pull through and we’ll come out on the other side.”
