F1 News
Vettel “too chicken” during FP2
- Bevan Youl
Sebastian Vettel has said that he might have been “too chicken” during the wet weather in FP2 at the Hungarian Grand Prix.
As Red Bull topped the times for the afternoon session while Mercedes weren’t too far off, Ferrari were nowhere to be seen near the top of the times.
Vettel ended up P14 at the end while teammate Charles Leclerc was in P7 for Ferrari, who Pierre Gasly feels are hiding their true pace.
But the German was more focused on getting information for the car rather than setting the fastest lap possible during the weather.
Vettel said: “Maybe I was too chicken.
“You know you have a long session ahead of you, so I wasn’t quite sure how much it was raining, because there were quite a few big drops, but the track was absolutely fine.
“It was the first run, we were also on the hard tyres so a bit slow to come up to [temperature].
“The red flag [after Alex Albon’s crash] didn't help, but all in all it was okay.
“I had plenty of margin; I think in these conditions it's more important I get the answer for the car than the ultimate lap time.”
Leclerc brushed off the suggestion that his crash in Germany affected his performance in the rain, but that it was due to struggling with the balance of his car.
“I was not so down after Germany even though it was a mistake from my side,” Leclerc added.
“[But] overall it has not been a very good day today.
“We've been struggling a lot with the balance. We need to work a lot for tomorrow to try and find a solution, and then hopefully we'll be closer to the top.
“On my side I'm not very happy at the moment with balance of the car, so I need to work quite a lot on that.
“I think [in the] wet I was in a better shape.”