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Vettel not "driving my best" with "unnatural" responding F1 Ferrari

Sebastian Vettel is aware he is not "driving at my best" at the start of the 2019 Formula 1 season because the way his Ferrari is responding on-track feels "unnatural".

Ferrari has struggled to translate its pre-season pace into results and in the races where it has been more competitive, Bahrain and Azerbaijan, Vettel has not been as fast as new team-mate Charles Leclerc.

Vettel has two third-place finishes in the last two grands prix and is ahead of Leclerc in the championship, but believes Ferrari must find more performance to fight Mercedes and unlock more pace in himself.

"We need stronger pace, simple as that," said Vettel. "We need to be faster.

"It seems that for us it's more of a conscious effort to get the car in the right window, whereas maybe for them it seems to click a little bit easier.

"Especially a place like [Baku], you need the confidence in the car.

"I'm not there yet. I can feel that I'm not driving at my best because simply the car does not answer or does not respond the way I like.

"And then I think it's unnatural. I think everybody's been there."

Vettel's peaks are not as impressive as Leclerc's so far this season.

The five-point gap in the championship is partly explained by Leclerc being restricted by team orders in Australia and China.

Leclerc has also claimed Ferrari's only pole of the season, in Bahrain, where Vettel qualified only second and spun in the race while Leclerc was denied a commanding win by an electronics problem.

"At the moment I'm not so unhappy with the car," said Leclerc when asked by Autosport if he shared his team-mate's discomfort with the SF90.

"We maybe need to work a little bit on our race. I think in qualifying the car felt amazing, in the race I have a little bit more balance problems.

"But these are small issues and I'm pretty sure if we work on it we'll get over it."

Despite his happiness in qualifying, Leclerc only has a qualifying average of 4.75 after his crash in Q2 in Baku.

Vettel has started third at the other races, giving him an average of 2.75, and his greater consistency also gives him the edge in Autosport's supertime comparison.

Taking each driver's fastest individual lap over a grand prix weekend and expressing it as a percentage of the outright quickest puts Vettel at 100.460%, with Leclerc behind at 100.615%.

Vettel argued his peak is lower because he is driving more cautiously while unhappy with the SF90's handling.

"When it's not there [the performance], then your judgement is normally right, to not go there because you end-up losing the car," said Vettel.

"I seem to be more sensitive at the first races than at the test. The test was really good but that's a long time ago now.

"We need to look forward and improve the way we handle things, the way we work, to just get faster."

Zdroj: autosport.com