Sebastian Vettel declared himself happy with Red Bull’s pace on Friday after he topped the final practice session in Abu Dhabi.
However the German is wary of McLaren’s pace as Lewis Hamilton finished just +0.168s behind following a competitive session in which the pair traded fastest laps.
“I think we can be happy with today,” Vettel said afterwards. “Overall we got a good lap on the soft tyres, but in general pace the McLaren’s were quick and seem competitive, so they’re the ones we need to look out for and beat.
“We need to improve the car overnight to qualify as high as we can tomorrow.”
The winner of the previous four races is determined to make it five, but says the team must improve overnight if they’re to beat Hamilton, whom he believes is narrowly ahead.
“Today the battle was with [Hamilton] and he was very quick on the medium tyre. We need to do a little bit of catching up to make sure we are very close to them if not ahead of them tomorrow.
“The pace wasn’t bad but it was quite slippery today for all the drivers and we saw many cars going off the track here and there. We tried to explore the limits as much as possible for a Friday, but as I said we need to make sure we improve the car for tomorrow.”
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