Sebastian Vettel hopes to tick as many boxes as possible on the opening day of practice for the European Grand Prix.
The Scuderia Ferrari driver finished the Canadian Grand Prix on the podium in second behind the Mercedes AMG PETRONAS of Lewis Hamilton. After a great getaway at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve where Vettel led from third into the first corner, he was unable to keep Hamilton behind.
The German believes the Maranello based outfit needs to unleash the pace in all sessions at the Baku City Circuit this weekend to make sure they position themselves where they deserve to be in qualifying.
“It looks spectacular around here,” said Vettel. “The circuit seems nice, with a lot of uphill downhill sections.
“It should be exciting, really interesting, getting into the car tomorrow and see how it feels. It’s a completely new place, it would be a bit foolish to have any expectations. There is a lot of talk about the long straight, but it would also be worth mentioning that here the weather will be hot, which is really different from the races we had so far because it has always been colder than we expected.
“Of course we expect to be strong but we have to wait and see. Generally we found out that our car is working everywhere, but we need to make sure that we unleash the pace in all sessions, in particular on Saturday, to make sure that we get where we deserve to be in qualifying. It’s a long race here , it’s the first race ever, there will be a lot of things unknown and hopefully tomorrow we can tick as many boxes as possible.”