Villeneuve: Vettel 'accepts he cannot win'
Former world champions Jacques Villeneuve and Mika Hakkinen disagree about the fatal mistake committed by Sebastian Vettel at Suzuka.
Some think the Ferrari driver collided with Max Verstappen at exactly the wrong moment, as it might now be seen as the final nail in the coffin of his title assault.
But others think the German needed to take the risk in a full-on attack to close up on Lewis Hamilton.
1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve hit out at Vettel.
"He was too far behind when he overtook. Max couldn't just say 'Please go past me'. Vettel tried something and didn't play dirty, but it was too risky," he told Sky Italia.
"He could write a book about his season called 'How to lose a world championship'," Villeneuve added.
"The key difference between him and Hamilton this year is that Lewis first thinks about the situation before making an aggressive attack."
1998 and 1999 champion Hakkinen, however, thinks Vettel really did need to take that high risk.
"In his position he had to try everything to maximise his result," the Finn told Bild. "He knew how much stronger the Mercedes is.
"Without going full attack, he wins nothing. Yes he risked a lot, but that's just part of the game in formula one."
No matter the right or wrong, Villeneuve says Suzuka means Vettel and Ferrari's titles hopes are definitely now over.
"Already at the last race we could see that he has accepted he cannot win," said the French Canadian.
"You can see that he is more relaxed already."
As for Ferrari's mistakes and dwindling performance, Villeneuve admits to being left scratching his head.
"It's not easy to understand Ferrari, and not just because they lost some races. After some mistakes they never returned to the right path and that's impossible to understand from the outside," he said.
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"..."The key difference between him and Hamilton this year is that Lewis first thinks about the situation before making an aggressive attack."..." What does this mean? Lewis's all but one victory this season came from a pole, or similarly advantaged, position. He did not have to make any aggressive moves. To the contrary he just had to defend his position, and substantial help was available in the person of a wing-man Bottas.
I think the quality of Lewis’s overtaking skills can easily be judged by looking at the many he has done over recent years. Especially when he comes through from the back after an incident.
Seb is a very good driver and yes he has made more mistakes this year but something changed on that Ferrari after the second FIA sensor was fitted.
Sooner or later the FIA needs to take more serious action against Max. There will be more accidents and someone will be injured. He is a very fast driver but when he defends he does not care about the consequences. What’s worse, even when it is a “slam dunk” penalty he still thinks he has done nothing wrong. Maybe his dad can talk some sense into him. I think he is the only one who’s opinion he values.
Spot on assessment. Cars are an awful lot safer now than back in the day but a friend of mine always used to say the same about Ayrton Senna. Perhaps because they are so relatively safe it gives Max a little too much confidence but even with all the advancements that have been made these are still potentially dangerous incidents. The one between Max and Daniel in Azerbaijan in particular was just so lucky that both walked away from it.
Doubt that his dad will be a source of good sense,after this is the man who tried to kill his girlfriend by running her over with a car.
And what about the times Hamilton (just like Vettel) wasn't on pole and didn't win the race? You seem to be suggesting that only Seb has any overtaking to consider and then only consider the times that Hamilton was on pole and Seb wasn't. We all have favourites that's true but if you have a car that's at least as good as any other car on the grid and has had wonderful drivability for the large part of that time then first you need to secure pole. After that you need to pick your battles and I'm afraid that is where Seb and Max are a long way behind Lewis. Everyone who drives an F1 car makes mistakes but great drivers make fewer. Max in particular but also Seb take more chances than Lewis or Fernando (when the latter was in a top team) would do and pay a price for it.
I actually understand Sebs viewpoint on Sunday and have some sympathy with it because he knew the championship was slipping and needed to make something happen. If he'd have got past Max he could just have undercut Bottas and made a race of it with Hamilton and you never know what could have happened from there. However, the move on Sunday wasn't the issue. It's the number of errors he's made during the season which has put him in the position of a 67 point deficit rather than a 20-30 point lead that he probably should have had.
And if we are both being completely fair, yes Bottas's position in the team has changed recently and he is now a wing-man but this is a team sport and both he and Raikonen will have clauses in their contracts which enable the team to make such orders. Neither Kimmi nor Bottas are the equal of their team mate over a season but they are after all paid many millions for the privilege of driving those machines. And if Kimmi wasn't told on the morning of the Italian Grands Prix that he was being sacked I'm sure he wouldn't have behaved the way he did and would have been as sub-serviant as he had always been in the past. I'm genuinely concerned that Leclerc will frighten the life out of Seb next year with his speed. The one big advantage that Seb should have is experience but if he continues to make silly mistakes he will not see another world championship and will be relegated from the top teams.
Believe me that Seb might not be the champion this year but he will bounce back next year. Besides there r going to be more candidates for the title fight as hopefully more teams improve their performance incl. Red Bull with Max. Ferrari needs to put passion and renew the spirit in the team so they all pull the Prancing horse in the same direction rather then pulling it apart just as it is running at its best.I haven't seen Seb meditating and listening to tunes that might help "retune"his brainwaves and keep his mind at ease and then he can once more be at the top and not be concerned with anyone else's opinions. After all he does not have to achieve any more than he has already done but I am sure he wants to be the one to do it for Ferrari so they better rethink their approach to next season and inject far more enthusiasm into whole of the team.
For the sake of the sport Jadra I do hope that he does make a big come back and that Ferrari bin Arrivabene and install Ross Brawn but place your hand on your heart and tell me that you didn’t say the same thing in 2017. The saddest thing for Ferrari fans is that he’s had a championship challenging car for two years now and has seemingly bottled it towards the end of both seasons. I’m not for a second suggesting that most drivers on the grid wouldn’t succumb to this huge pressure (particularly at Ferrari) but you need everything there working together. Ferrari have produced a great car, which is fast, drivable on almost all circuits and is the most reliable on the grid. They have one very good driver, who is fantastic on his day but he needs a team around him. If you take the time to listen to a lot of his commas with the pit lane he is effectively managing the team. He should be allowed a clear head to concentrate on one thing only and if he gets that, sure he will make mistakes because they all do but just not such costly ones or with the same frequency as then of seasons 2017 and 2018.