• Chinese Grand Prix

Vettel plays down Red Bull advantage

Sebastian Vettel ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix © Getty Images

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• Ferrari, Williams, Mercedes to use F-duct in China
  
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• Race:
• Chinese Grand Prix

• Championship:
• FIA Formula One World Championship

• Drivers:
• Sebastian Vettel

• Teams:
• McLaren
• |
• Red Bull

Sebastian Vettel has played down the advantage Red Bull has over its competitors, ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix.

Red Bull took an easy one-two victory at the last race in Malaysia after McLaren and Ferrari qualified well down the order. However, Vettel believes his competitors will put up a much stronger fight in China.

"I don't think there is too big a gap between us and the others," he said. "If you take Malaysia, obviously we were in a bit of a luxury position because some of the other top teams failed in qualifying and were not near the top. I think the race would've probably been a bit different if we had all started at the front. McLaren looked very competitive in Malaysia and were probably similar to us.

"It's not like we have a massive advantage like some teams had four or five years ago. If you look at the world championship ranking, there's no gap - we are behind. We have to catch up, so I hope we keep going as we did at the last race."

Vettel also said he felt McLaren would be quick this weekend thanks to its F-duct, which stalls the rear wing and improves top speed. He added that all teams will end up running a similar device at some point this year but said Red Bull was in no rush to introduce its version.

"Even if you're in a midfield car it's something you have to have, because it's worth quite a bit," he said. "It's probably up to half-a-second at each circuit. You need to find a lot of new parts that work well to give you half-a-second advantage per lap in any conditions and no matter what fuel load. So everyone is under pressure to copy and come up with something similar, which is very difficult because McLaren has been planning this for a long time and it's not that easy, even if you have it, to make it work. Right now we don't have a fixed date yet, but we are working on it like everyone else."

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