Sebastian Vettel has compared his first outing in a Ferrari F1 car with a fairytale after holding a desire to race for the Italian team since he was a small child.
The German will race for Ferrari next season following his switch from Red Bull where he won four championships.
Over the space of four days, he’s tested an F2012 at their Fiorano test track, met with chairman Sergio Marchionne and new team principal Maurizio Arrivabene before analysing his data with chief engineer James Allison.
Alongside that, Vettel has also driven the team’s simulator to get a feel for the F14-T, gaining confidence with its procedures, commands and the new power unit.
Speaking about the experience, he said: “Obviously it’s been a fantastic day to come here. “I remember I’ve been here a long time ago as a little child, driving through Maranello and trying to look over the fence, so to be here officially as part of the team felt fantastic.
“The possibility to drive the car and get to know the team was a unique experience. Obviously it’s a very different color for me, everybody is dressed in red, everything is red, but it’s really something special and I’m very much looking forward to the challenge that we took on for the next years.”
He completed 100 laps in the F2012, which he described as a very special experience.
“Obviously, its already winter time so it was quite cold doing some laps but it was a great feeling, it is always enjoyable to be in the car and, again, looking back to the years when I was 11 or 12, trying to look over the fence and trying to see a glimpse of Michael running on the track, well, today I was the one running and saw the tifosi around.
“You know there are a lot of fairytales about Ferrari and how it feels to drive a red car and in the end I can only confirm these fairytales, it’s not just a story, it’s a true legend that exists and it feels really, really special to become part of that and to be inside the car, to see the people coming, running to the track and trying to climb the walls to see the car, so there is definitely something very magic and something that happened today which I will never forget.”
