Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFerrari

I simply wasn’t good enough in 2014 - Vettel

Sebastian Vettel says his ability to get the most out of this year’s Ferrari comes from him learning about the current generation of F1 cars after struggling last season.

The four-time world champion’s final season with Red Bull was a disappointing one, with the team unable to seriously challenge Mercedes and team-mate Daniel Ricciardo taking Red Bull’s only three victories of the year. Having already secured two wins this year and taken his first pole position for Ferrari in Singapore, Vettel says he had to learn from the struggles he faced in 2014 to become a better driver.

“Last year for sure I didn’t have a great year and all in all Daniel had a very good year and beat me fair and square, many times,” Vettel said. “Other times I was in front but overall it was not the best year for myself.

“A lot of stuff that I learned … I obviously didn’t have a good start to the season, didn’t drive the car very often. I think I did about one day of testing, one proper day of testing, before the season, and then we had lots of issues – but still, I think I’m experienced enough to know what to do to go quick but yeah, simply wasn’t good enough.

“Daniel showed that he could go quicker with the car on occasions. I think I’ve learned a couple of bits about this generation of cars, let’s say and probably the way the season went last year has helped me for this year.”

Vettel currently sits 74 points behind championship leader Lewis Hamilton and 21 points adrift of Nico Rosberg having taken two wins and six further podiums from the 12 rounds so far.

REPORT: Vettel storms to Singapore pole as Mercedes dominance ends

AS IT HAPPENED: Singapore Grand Prix qualifying

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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.