Sebastian Vettel didn’t hide his disappointment at starting sixth on the grid for the Australian GP, claiming the McLarens were ‘out of reach’.
The German starts behind his teammate Mark Webber with the pair almost seven tenths off the lead pace led by Lewis Hamilton.
However, whilst disappointed, Vettel wasn’t susprised by the below-par performance claiming it’s what the team expected.
“Obviously qualifying was more or less as we expected,” he said after Q3. “The cars have been close to each other and from Q1 to Q2 and Q2 to Q3, the order always changed slightly.
“I wasn’t happy with my final run in Q3, I made a small mistake, but McLaren was always out of reach.”
Vettel isn’t worried about the RB8’s pace but admitted it isn’t good enough.
“I made a mistake so I should have been a bit quicker,” he added. “Regarding the car, we’re not miles away, it’s not a disaster. We should have been in the fight for pole position but today we’re not good enough.
“We said coming into this weekend that Lotus had the potential to surprise. They did. Last year they were very quick in the first two races, so we’ll see how the season progresses. I don’t know what happened to Kimi [Räikkönen].
“We expected Mercedes to be closer [than they were last year], so I was a bit surprised Nico [Rosberg] wasn’t higher up, but I think he made a mistake.”
