Hamilton: Vettel and Red Bull have “a fantastic car”
After his victory in Malaysia, Lewis Hamilton reflected on Red Bull's performance, stating that they will soon pose a threat to Mercedes.
Winner at Sepang during the second round of the 2014 Formula 1 World Championship, Lewis Hamilton outpaced his teammate, Nico Rosberg, who himself had won in Melbourne, and Sebastian Vettel. The Red Bull driver, whose team experienced significant challenges in getting his car to perform during winter testing, secured a podium finish with ease, even enjoying a brief tussle with the German’s Mercedes.
Red Bull: “A Fantastic Car”
This certainly did not go unnoticed by the 2008 World Champion: « Sebastian was extremely fast here. He was putting pressure on Nico, » he said before adding: « They still have a fantastic car. »
For him, the RB10 only suffers from a top speed deficit: « Looking at their pace, their car is just as fast as ours in the corners. They are only slower on the straight. » In the race, the best top speeds recorded for the three men who finished on the podium were 312.7 km/h for Rosberg, 307.7 km/h for Vettel, and 305.9 km/h for Hamilton. « I have no doubt that Renault will solve this, and when they do, you’re going to see a great race between us and the Bulls, » he promises. « And Ferrari isn’t too far off either. It’s going to get heated during the year. »
« The car was fantastic this weekend. I felt like I was getting everything I needed from it, » he added, before explaining that Mercedes was not going to rest on its freshly earned laurels: « I will keep pushing my team to continue development and improvement of the car. There are plenty of areas we can improve, and I’m sure everyone else is doing the same. »
Free practice sessions were the key.
Hamilton explained that his race performance was the result of lessons learned during free practice, particularly during the Friday afternoon session with long runs: « In terms of pace […], you could see our long runs during FP2. Nico did one lap more and was generally on the same pace, so I expected that in the race. »
« But from this practice, I learned a lot about the areas where I could improve. It’s one thing to learn them, but being able to apply them doesn’t always work, » he admitted, as reported by our British colleagues at Autosport. « Here it worked, and that’s why I pulled away. »
