Vettel Ends Ferrari Hopes by Colliding with Verstappen

From what could only be labelled as a bad situation going worse, Sebastian Vettel collided with Max Verstappen while trying to overtake him for third position on lap 8th. The overtake seemed unnecessary considering Max already had a 5s time penalty.

He spun, took some damage and ended up finishing at the back of the field. Now he has a monumental task of overtaking the cars ahead in a hope of finishing the race in points. Lewis Hamilton on the other side (at the time of writing) is comfortably ahead and looks good to extend his championship lead by a massive difference.

https://twitter.com/Insidef1/status/1048809123108646912

The move was a desperate one. It sure proves that Vettel is high on pressure at the moment from the Ferrari team. Vettel has always been known to handle pressure well, but the latest string of errors from the German proves otherwise.

He’s been constantly called out for making mistakes and giving away the championship. Even Dr. Helmut Marko of Red Bull admitted that Vettel lost the championship because of his own blunders. “I considered Vettel to be the favourite for the title, but he made a lot of mistakes which upsets me,” Marko told Austria’s Laola1.

Mika Hakkinen went on to say that Vettel has lost faith in Ferrari altogether.

“I have seen that he has said he wishes he had Michael Schumacher available to ask for advice, and I can understand why.

“Working very closely with the management and senior technical staff, Michael knew how to help get the most out of the Ferrari team, and it looks like Vettel has lost some faith in the team to provide him with the necessary support.” – Hakkinen was reported saying.

The championship looks as good as over for the moment, with 4 races still to go. Hamilton will become a 5 times world champion and Vettel and Ferrari will have till March,2019 to figure out what went wrong. With Charles Leclerc, a new driver coming in, someone who seems hungry to win races and championships, it’ll be difficult for Ferrari to satisfy him with this mindset. They need a drastically different approach and certainly a way to be competitive next season.

Update: Stewards have decided that there will be no penalty awarded to either drivers for the collision. Fans on Twitter don’t seem to agree with FIA:

https://twitter.com/PatQ1969/status/1048815663995924480