by Matt Youson on Jun 26, 2011Few drivers have ever looked as secure as Sebastian Vettel after seven races of the F1 World Champion. Nevertheless, after snatching defeat from the jaws of victory in Canada, and with a potentially unhelpful tweak to the technical regulations coming in for the European Grand Prix, questions are being asked about how robust Vettel’s position really is.
Seb, as usual, seemed to find the whole thing very amusing as he sat down with the press before securing yet another pole position as Red Bull Racing locked out the front row of the grid in Valencia.
So Seb, are you worried about the new regulation that bans a change of engine map between qualifying the race on Sunday?
SV: Not worried at all. I think it’s something everyone was playing around with. Yes, I think it makes a difference to everyone but I don’t think it makes a bigger difference to us than other people. I think it will be the same for all the teams.
Even if it doesn’t affect your pace in the race, might it affect your pace in qualifying?
SV: We had some phases last year where people thought we have a lever in the car and it turned out we didn’t. I was asking myself whether we did, only nobody told me! So maybe I should ask myself whether we have something special again this year – but from what I know, I can assure you there’s nothing special changing between Saturday and Sunday.
Why are McLaren closer to you in the race than in qualifying?
SV: Hmmmm… I don’t know – maybe they have a reason why they are over-performing in the race compared to qualifying. We’ve had some races that have been very straightforward for us with good race pace, and others where we felt we had underperformed. It’s difficult to rate our true race pace because it depends a lot on the track, the conditions and how the race unfolds.
Business as usual this weekend?
SV: Ah, we’ll have to wait and see. It’s a long way to the finish. We can’t afford to simply do our jobs and expect everything to be fine, we have to push as hard as we can. As I’ve said before, there are going to be races where you really struggle and the most important thing is to not forget why we’re here.
This track is usually difficult for us, but we’ve had a very competitive car everywhere so far – so that makes us reasonably confident. Canada shouldn’t have suited us, but we were very good in the dry conditions there too.
A few races ago you said a moment would arrive where Red Bull Racing needed to have the KERS working because other teams would be getting closer. Has that moment arrived?
SV: Yes. If you look at the last three races, I haven’t been cruising around, quite the opposite. I’ve been leading but have been attacked all the time: it’s no secret that I haven’t always had KERS available. Just by looking at the projected lap time benefit, you’re talking about three to five tenths – that makes a big difference.
Will we see a bit more overtaking in Valencia this year?
SV: Yeah, I think so. In some places we’ve seen the DRS can be very powerful. Arguably at some places it was too easy to overtake. It depends largely on the track, how many zones you have and how long the zone is.
At tracks like Monaco, I think the difference was fairly small, whereas in Canada or Turkey, we had a lower speed corner and then a very long straight and arguably overtaking was too easy. Of course we are still playing around with all the new systems we have, especially the rear wing. But I think here it will be a big help.
With a bit of time to reflect, how do you feel about the result in Canada?
SV: I can see people were very excited, but it was pretty straightforward! The race presented plenty of opportunities to make a mistake or to get something wrong. In hindsight I think we did a very good job and I made one mistake half a lap from the end.
I think you could see that I was a little bit disappointed and angry – because when the win is so close it’s always going to be like that. It’s never easy to win races and I felt I could have done it there.
But my only chance was to push as hard as I could on that last lap to make sure I had enough cushion going onto the back straight. Otherwise I faced the same destiny as Michael [Schumacher] had against Jenson, where there is no chance to defend – but I didn’t get that far. We finished second and it’s very good points. So my feeling now is it could have been worse!
Source: Red Bull
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