25/07/2011
NEWS STORY
Having gone two races without a win, but maintaining a 77 point lead in the championship, Sebastian Vettel has warned his team that it must raise its game.
Even the German admits that it was a poor weekend, certainly by his standards, culminating in a race in which he never posed a serious threat. However, looking ahead to next weekend's race in Hungary, which is followed by a compulsory shut-down for all the teams, Sebastian Vettel has warned his team that it cannot rest on its laurels, that its rivals are catching up.
"Generally I think fourth was probably our maximum today which is not satisfying," the German admitted to reporters, "but you know we have to accept it and go from there.
"Next week is the next race," he continued, "and it looks like McLaren and Ferrari are getting quicker and quicker so we need to work harder on our car to try and improve it.
"Of course it's not satisfying," he admitted, "but we have to accept that today other people were quicker than us."
Teammate Mark Webber, who scored his fourth successive third-place, was as forthright as ever. "I did everything I could and I'm happy with the way I drove," he said, "but these guys had a bit of an extra margin, especially in the back part of the stints. That made us a little bit exposed on strategy.
"We know what we have got to improve on and we couldn't give much more than we did today," he added. "I'm disappointed not to get a win, we had a good fight around the stops, so it's mixed emotions. You need to perform at a good level to get these. We keep learning and making progress, but we need to improve."