Sebastian Vettel had already announced it after his exit in Q1 and starting position 16 on Saturday: he wanted to do something different than the competition in the race, said the Heppenheimer there. On Sunday, the Aston Martin star does the same on the track, staying on the track the longest of all the drivers with the starting tires. And the late stop on lap 22 actually brings Vettel back into play.
“Most drivers changed tires fairly early, so we tried something and decided on a two-stop strategy,” says Vettel, who stops a second time on lap 44 and finally gets medium tires after two soft ones . “In the end it didn’t really make that big of a difference, unfortunately we just lacked the pace to really attack for the points.”
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Vettel notices this especially in the duel with his former World Cup rival Fernando Alonso: Although the Spaniard starts last, Vettel has to let him go for several laps after a duel. Alonso ended up ninth, and the German also lost out against Yuki Tsunoda in the end, resulting in eleventh place at the finish.
The overhauled Aston Martin can not deliver any points at the debut. “Eleventh place isn’t really a reward, of course, but our race was good. We knew that the new package wouldn’t be a huge step for us right away, but we believe it’s a better direction for the future. We’re making progress and that really counts,” explains Vettel, who has to smile: “I’ve had worse races and was right at the front.”
For Mick Schumacher, who started tenth on Sunday, unlike Vettel, things are going further and further down the course of the race.
There is still a small victory for the four-time world champion on Sunday: he still wins the German duel with Mick Schumacher despite the significantly worse starting position in the final rounds – this time without contact between the two buddies, like two weeks ago in Miami .
For Schumacher, on the other hand, who started tenth on Sunday, unlike Vettel, things went further and further down the course of the race. The young Haas driver was able to stay out of all the skirmishes in the starting phase, and after the collision between his team-mate Kevin Magnussen and Lewis Hamilton he was temporarily in sixth position.
“After the first lap, hopes were high,” says Schumacher, who then quickly felt the performance limits of his car. “A little later, the feeling was more that it could be difficult,” explains Schumi Jr., who is overtaken on lap five by Alfa driver Valtteri Bottas and only one lap later by Esteban Ocon in the Alpine.
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Shortly thereafter, Schumacher fell out of the top 10 entirely, and in the end he was 14. “The strategy was a little different than planned. Now we have to see why we came up with such a strategy. Of course, you’re always smarter in hindsight “, the German is annoyed: “It was a bit unfortunate. We knew that it would be tight with two stops and in the end it didn’t quite work out to stay outside. But we will learn from that.”
With the first Q3 entry in qualifying, the 23-year-old still takes something positive with him from Barcelona. “We had a clean Friday and a great Saturday, we will benefit from that,” believes Schumi junior. On Sunday, despite once again missing out on the first World Championship points, it is a consolation that teammate Magnussen sees no land at all after his contact at the start in the further course of the race and ends up far behind him as 17th and penultimate.
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