Vettel remains a good sport and congratulates Hamilton on his title

Sebastian Vettel approached his Mexican Grand Prix weekend with a tiny hope of being crowned champion at the end of the season. His masterful pole position on Saturday had reinforced his optimistic view of a race that could have delayed the inevitable.

But that was without counting on the missile Max Verstappen at the wheel of Red Bull, who came to assert himself strongly at the first corner, creating a mess in the subsequent turns and forcing the two championship contenders, Vettel and Lewis Hamilton, to make an early pit stop after a collision between them: « I am not afraid of him and I love fighting against him, and I would have liked that to happen a bit more often this season. » the German quickly stated about this racing incident.

The Ferrari driver acknowledges, however, the superiority of his rival and the Mercedes team throughout the season, even though the German led a large part of the drivers’ championship this year: « Overall, Mercedes has been the best team. He [Hamilton] did a great job all year and therefore deserves to win the title. So, I congratulate him. It’s all about him today, it’s his day! »

Vettel nevertheless wishes to remain positive and already sets a date for the next race in Brazil to aim for victory: « Tomorrow will be another day. The team is growing, and there are many positive aspects. Overall, I think we are on the right track. »

A championship lost but not during this last race, quite strange for Vettel and Ferrari: « I know the team worked hard, did their best, but we didn’t achieve what we wanted. It’s difficult to cross the line knowing you’re no longer in the fight. I fought until the end, giving everything I had. So obviously in the last laps, when I had a big gap with Kimi, it would have been difficult for me to close it without something happening, like a safety car, but I was still believing. But in the end, it didn’t happen. Obviously, it’s not a great day for us ». concludes Vettel.