- Brazilian Grand Prix - Red Bull
Vettel claims margin 'a big surprise'
Sebastian Vettel said it was "a big surprise" to qualify so far clear of the rest of the field for the Brazilian Grand Prix.
With wet conditions potentially making qualifying a lottery, Vettel ensured recent form was continued by taking his ninth pole position of the season at Interlagos. However, the biggest surprise was that he enjoyed a margin of over 0.6s over the rest of the field and he admitted it had been unexpected for him.
"It's a big surprise, I was so happy after the qualy," Vettel said. "Especially Q3 took a long time for us to get out; there was a lot of rain after Q2. When we went out I was surprised by how much of the water had gone and went straight on the intermediates and was able to get a very, very good lap in straight away. I tried again on the second lap to beat that and was very close so with both my laps I was very happy."
With a possibility of a dry race coming after every session so far has been wet, Vettel said it could come down to who has got the best baseline set-up.
"We would all have new tyres, so that helps, but obviously the track is very green because we didn't have dry conditions before so I think that would make it tricky. Then I think it's important whoever had the best guess coming here in terms of set-up to make sure that your car is fine not just for one lap in the wet conditions but also that the performance is there in the dry and you are able to look after the tyres."
However Vettel added that he doesn't expect anyone to be caught out massively if the race is dry.
"To be honest with you the typical wet set-up doesn't exist anymore, at least for us. In the past, the races that we've had there isn't that much difference. For sure we tried to go a little bit in a direction that helps us in wet conditions after the first and second practice yesterday but I wouldn't call it a wet set-up because usually in the wet you put more wing on, you lift the car, things like this but to be honest in the last couple of years it has been pretty frozen when you went from dry to wet conditions."
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
