Vettel happy with debut Ferrari F1 season

Vettel, Raikkonen and Gutierrez were welcomed by Jesse Vargas, General Manager at Ferrari World Abu Dhabi, and were invited on stage for the cutting of the commemorative cake which will initiate a full year of celebrations at the park.

Force India’s form in practice for Formula 1’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix caught Ferrari and Red Bull by surprise, Sebastian Vettel and Daniel Ricciardo admitted.

“It doesn’t change at all if it’s Kimi or someone else I’m fighting with for that position”, he added with the corporate perfection of a professional and a deadpan expression that was at odds with recent feelings between the two men. “With what we have, the vehicle we have and what we are doing as a team, I want to always get the maximum out of it and the maximum ranking in the championship”.

De-coded by most F1 paddock observers, this translated into a personal feud that both men prefer to ignore.

Vettel, the four-time world champion, will start only 16th at the Yas Marina Circuit after Ferrari miscalculated the cut-off time required to make it through to Q2.

“I think we started better this season but it has not been ideal but that’s how it goes”, said the 36-year-old.

Raikkonen said he had been “better than last year”, when he was trounced by ex-team-mate Fernando Alonso, but “still far away from what it should be”.

“And next year we try again”.

“We improved a lot from past year but we’re still not happy and when I don’t finish five races it’s quite a big [disadvantage]”.

“I think it is a not too bad track for us but Ferrari has been very quick on Sundays lately so we need to see if we have enough pace to challenge them”, he said.

“We have to keep our heads down – we know we can improve the vehicle and the power unit, and on the drivers side we can do better”.

“We worked closer than ever with our colleagues in Maranello where we fully integrated our development plans to optimise the fuel-engine package and it was great to see that our hard work paid off”, said Shell motorsport innovation manager Guy Lovett.