Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFerrari

Vettel buoyed by Ferrari pace

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Sebastian Vettel believes Ferrari has a good platform to work from after setting the pace on the opening two days of pre-season testing.

While Mercedes was able to complete over 240 laps during the first two days, Vettel set the fastest time on both Sunday and Monday at his first pre-season test as a Ferrari driver. With former team Red Bull enduring a tough start to the test, Vettel said there were no major concerns he had from his initial impressions of the SF15-T.

“Well it certainly could be worse,” Vettel said. “I think compared to last year at this stage it’s looking quite a bit better. We did a lot of laps, especially today. I think it’s normal in winter testing if you see anything running hot you take the time to stop and have a look which unfortunately takes time.

“I think overall it was a good day and in the end we got some running on the new inters which seemed to work even in these poor condition, so overall I think we can be fairly happy.”

And Vettel said he was pleased with the feeling he gets from the Ferrari despite having been unable to influence its development prior to the winter.

“It’s still very early to tell because in the end it always depends how you compare to other people. Some people didn’t show much, others, if you look at Mercedes, are running a slightly different approach with more longer runs and extreme long runs.

“In that regard it’s difficult, but speaking about the feeling inside the car, I’m quite happy and I think we definitely have a good platform to start working from and move on to, so that’s the target in the next couple of weeks.”

Click here for the gallery of the second day of testing at Jerez

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.