Vettel in a “better place” after Friday F1 practice in Spain

Sebastian Vettel feels he is in a “better place” after Friday practice for the Spanish Grand Prix.

Vettel struggled considerably across both races at Silverstone, picking up a single point across the two weekends.

Ahead of this weekend, Ferrari confirmed it would be giving Vettel a new chassis after it found a crack in it - potentially allowing Vettel to find more performance.

The German fared well in FP1, ending the session in fifth - less than a tenth behind Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc.

Second practice wasn’t as strong for Vettel as he ended the day down in 12th but despite this, the four-time world champion was more encouraged going into the rest of the weekend.

“Yeah, bit of a mixed day. I think it was generally a bit better in terms of one-lap pace today. in the afternoon I was struggling a little bit more to put the laps together but yeah we should be in a better place let’s see what we get tomorrow. We’ve tried a couple of things and I think as I said we know a little bit more for tomorrow.

“Yeah providing I put the laps together. In the afternoon I struggled a little bit to do that. It should be ok then, managing the race will be a key point to address with the temperatures we have, it will be difficult but the same for everyone.”

Leclerc felt Ferrari’s pace at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya was better than expected and he was confident going into rest of the weekend of securing a big haul of points.

“Yes quite a good day, better than we expected, again, so it’s better to have good surprises compared to bad! The quali pace was quite good, I think there’s still a bit here and there where we need to work and find some pace, especially in FP2 the wind changed a little bit but for now it’s quite positive.

“It feels quite good this weekend, so I’m pretty sure that we can extract the maximum out of the car in quali and if we manage to have the balance where I want it to then I think we can do quite a good result.”