On the first day of activities after announcing he will leave Formula 1, Sebastian Vettel said he hoped for rain and was torn between the good pace of Aston Martin and the difficulty of driving the car
The big star of the Formula 1 weekend in Hungary is undoubtedly Sebastian Vettel. The four-time world champion drew all the spotlight on himself when he announced he will leave the category at the end of the season - on the track, however, Aston Martin continues to draw no attention. The German even managed to get into the top-10 and closed TL2 at the Hungaroring in seventh place, but admitted that he still has difficulties driving the AMR21.
"Looking at it from the front, our pace today looked pretty good - our long journeys were pretty competitive, and I think we did a solid job as a team," said the 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013 champion, who expressed a desire to spend more time with his family when announcing his departure from F1. "But the car is still quite complicated to drive," he acknowledged.
Vettel set a best lap of 1min20s383 in the first free practice session, which gave him 11th place - one position and 0s034 ahead of teammate Lance Stroll. In the second session of the day, the German clocked 1min19s253 in seventh place, seven places ahead of the Canadian and leaving behind the two Mercedes, as well as the two Alfa Romeos and Esteban Ocon's Alpine.
▶️ Get to know the GRAND PRIME channel on Twitch by clicking here!
Despite the good placing, Vettel is aware that free practice has meant little to Aston Martin compared to Saturdays, which have been the team's real weak point in 2022. The German admitted the British team's difficulty in qualifying pace and said he hopes the rain forecast for the weekend actually falls, shuffling the grid and possibly bringing an opportunity to be more competitive.
"Recently, we have suffered in qualifying on a dry track. So I'm optimistic that the heavy rain expected for tomorrow could bring us an opportunity," he explained. "I love driving at this circuit and I really hope that the weather doesn't prevent us from putting on a great show for the fans tomorrow," he finished.
GRANDE PRÊMIO follows LIVE and IN REAL TIME all the activities of the Hungarian GP weekend. On Saturday, TL3 is scheduled for 8am (GMT-3), while qualifying starts at 11am.