Vettel warns Ferrari still has more potential to ‘unleash’

Sebastian Vettel says Ferrari has more pace yet to “unleash” as he targets putting pressure on Formula 1 rivals Mercedes in Bahrain. 

Ferrari bounced back from its disappointing performance in Australia to dominate the opening day of practice for this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix, with Vettel ending the second session 0.603s clear of Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes. 

He edged out new teammate Charles Leclerc by just 0.035s as the Italian team comfortably led the way in both sessions, though Vettel insisted he is not paying “too much attention” on Friday’s results. 

“We hope to be in better shape and much closer than Melbourne,” Vettel said. 

“Today the result was good and we were probably on a different strategy to other people so I wouldn’t put too much attention on that. I think for tomorrow we still need to improve, especially Mercedes looks very fast.

“Today was a better day for us overall but I think certainly we need to pick up pace for tomorrow. We started off in a better place, but still I feel that we have some more potential in the car that we have to unleash for tomorrow.

“I think if we unleash that then we should be in good shape tomorrow and hopefully we can be a lot closer and put Mercedes under pressure.”

Vettel admitted he is not yet back to having the same feeling as in Barcelona testing but is happy with the progress made. 

“It’s less bumpy, but that comes with the track and I think [I have] more trust in the rear, which was let’s say our achilles heel in Australia,” he added. 

“It was certainly better today. Obviously the track’s different but I think we still need to find something. I’m not entirely happy with today, I just don’t have the feeling yet that I want to have.”

Leclerc, who topped the opening session ahead of Vettel, said he had gained more confidence in his SF90 compared to Melbourne. 

“It’s a bit better, a bit closer,” Leclerc explained. “I think the confidence for us drivers driving the car is better than in Australia, that's for sure, on my side at least. 

“Then we'll obviously see tomorrow because it's in the end the only day that counts. So, hopefully we'll make the right choices with the changes we are going to do on the car, and hopefully I will put everything together in qualifying.”