Ahead of a weekend which could well see the 2018 title decided, Sebastian Vettel, refuses to look at the negatives of recent races, instead insisting that the fight is not over.

"I believe that the last race weekend in Suzuka helped us to understand some aspects," the German told reporters at COTA today, "obviously, at the last couple of Grands Prix we didn't have the right speed, so let's see what the other races bring, also in terms of performance.

"Unfortunately, some races didn't go smoothly for us this season, so that the others were able to benefit from that," he admitted. "From our side, this hasn't been ideal, but now we mustn't look at the past as we can't change it.

"We need to focus and look forward to the next four races," he continued. "We will still try to do our best and then we'll see what happens. We hear that it could be raining this weekend. Well, sometimes this year that didn't help us, but obviously it is part of the game and you can't blame the weather; plus. I am not afraid of the rain as our car is quick, whether it's dry or not.

"Now we focus on winning, we have to be quick and then obviously everything depends on what the others can do too."

"Through the years we've had mixed weather conditions here," added teammate Kimi Raikkonen, "last year it was good and on previous years it was pretty wet. For sure that will play a big part over the weekend, and today it appears to be 'winter style' again.

"Generally we have not been very strong in the rain, but lately it has been better for us; if you take Hungary for example we were quite happy. Then obviously it depends on many other factors, the tarmac, the conditions, and whether you can make the tires work or not.

"Obviously we want to do well in the last races of the season. Lately, we have not performed as well as we wanted, it hasn't been easy for us. But I'm sure we can come back and do some good things. The speed should be there, let's try to put everything in the right place and qualify well."

Check out our Thursday gallery from COTA, here.