Sebastian Vettel has played down his time-topping laps on both the first and second day of testing in Jerez, claiming Mercedes are still favourite.
The German says Mercedes have yet to chase an actual competitive lap time, instead focusing on longer runs and insists they would still be favourites even if they hadn’t completed any running here.
“I think generally we had a different approach today than Mercedes,” he explained. “They didn’t do as many laps as yesterday, but even without any running here they would still go in as the favourites.
“It’s still very early to tell [how competitive we are] because in the end it always depends how you compare to other people. Some people didn’t show much, others, if you look at Mercedes, are running a slightly different approach with more longer runs and extreme long runs. In that regard it’s difficult, but speaking about the feeling inside the car, I’m quite happy and I think we definitely have a good platform to start working from and move on to, so that’s the target in the next couple of weeks.”
Lewis Hamilton meanwhile has described the Mercedes W06 as a step forward despite completing fewer laps than Nico Rosberg thanks to a water leak.
“It feels pretty much the same, feels like we’ve got more downforce, so I think we have taken a step,” he said. “How big? I can’t say. We weren’t out there trying to do fast lap times. It’s good we’ve had such good running over the first two days, good reliability. But we will continue to work on that which is the foundation we want to improve on.
“As for the water leak, I can’t tell you too much about it. The team will work on it overnight and the car will be fine for tomorrow.”
