F1 | Azerbaijan GP | Sebastian Vettel on P6: "It's starting to pay off."
The Aston Martin driver missed out on a potential top 5 finish due to an accident while overtaking Ocon, but managed to recover to P6 for the team's seasonal best result.
The four times World Champion scored Aston Martin's best seasonal result in the same place where he had got the team's first and only podium in 2021.
Vettel had kept his starting P8 in the first laps completed in Baku, even gaining a position on Hamilton by having a great pit under the VSC. Unfortunately, he ran wide while trying to overtake Esteban Ocon, losing two positions. In the end, he managed to make the hard tyres he had pitted for at Lap 10 for 43 laps, and ended the race in P6.
Never. Give. Up.
— Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant F1 Team (@AstonMartinF1) June 12, 2022
From the escape road at T3 to P6 at the flag, Seb was on a mission today. 👊#F1 #AzerbaijanGP pic.twitter.com/YBruiVgZDs
The German driver was extremely satisfied with his second points finish in a row, as he stated in a race report published by Aston Martin: "Sixth position is really great – I think we can all be pleased with that result. We have been pushing the limits of this car, and it is starting to pay off for us now. "
He talked about the key factors that helped him to achieve such a result, the good race pace and a single, fast pit stop.
"Today, we were faster than Alfa Romeo and matched Alpine and Alpha Tauri, and that changes the game for us a little bit. The team did an amazing pit-stop, which enabled me to jump Lewis [Hamilton]."
His final result could have been better without that mistake, but it still was a great race, as he concluded:
"After that, I was sure I had got past Esteban [Ocon], but I thought he would battle more for the position, so I took to the escape road and lost some time. Without that incident, I think I could have battled for fifth position. Nevertheless, this is a great result."
He was then asked by Sky Sports whether he would have been able to fight with Mercedes's Lewis Hamilton for P4 if he hadn't went long while fighting with Ocon:
"I don't know, I think Lewis in fairness with race pace they were faster. In the beginning he was sort of stuck, we managed to jump them in the pit stops, which was really good for us."
"Maybe if I had jumped Esteban on the first go, because then I think I would have been able to pull off a gap because Lewis had worse straight line speed than us, and the Alpine was the fastest, so it took so long to get by them."
So, he conclueded, that was not probably going to happen, but Vettel could have had a shot at reaching P5.
"So maybe, but I think more fifth, and the fight with Pierre is probably more realistic but I think it's still a decent amount of points, so I'm really happy."
