Circuit Hockenheimring
Date 22.07.2018
Laps 67
Distance 306,458 km / 190,465 miles
No Driver Ferrari S/N Team Result
5 Sebastian Vettel SF71H Scuderia Ferrari retired / accident
           
7 Kimi Raikkonen SF71H Scuderia Ferrari 3.

 

German Grand Prix – Hockenheim 22 July

Posted: 22.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Maurizio Arrivabene: “In what was a particularly fraught weekend for the team, it would have been important for us to bring home the win and our car had shown it was up to the job. Unfortunately, things did not go as planned. Kimi drove a great race to make it to the podium. We now head off immediately for Hungary, determined to give it our best shot, just prior to the summer break.”

Kimi Raikkonen: “It was pretty difficult out there today. Surprisingly, in some corners there was decent grip and in some others there was none at all; we could feel the rain especially in Turns 2 and 6. It was hard to tell when to slow down and where the grip was. Obviously, you had to make your decision before the braking zone, knowing that if it happens to be wetter than you expected, there’s not much you can do. It was not easy but we tried to make the best calls and I think we got it right. The most tricky moments were before the safety car came in; it felt like it was raining a lot, somehow we had some decent grip and suddenly quite bad grip. At one point I had a moment with some back-markers and unfortunately I lost second place. In many ways it could have been better today, but this is what we got. I think that we made the most of it, considering the situation.”

Sebastian Vettel: “There’s not much to say: I made a small mistake which had a huge impact on the result. I braked just a tiny bit too late for the corner, locked the front tires and then the rear ones, so that I couldn’t turn the car anymore. I think I had managed everything right before that. We had the pace and we had been in control of the race up to that point. It was my mistake, so I am disappointed, but I don’t think we still have to show what we can do. We’ve shown everywhere that we are competitive, so I am looking forward to Hungary next weekend.”

 

German Grand Prix – A cold shower

Posted: 22.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Kimi 3rd but Seb goes off in the wet in an incredible race

Hockenheim, 22 July –A possible win became an open wound. Come the end of a mad race, Scuderia Ferrari brought home a third place courtesy of Kimi Raikkinen. Seb Vettel started from pole and, having been the only driver to score points in every race so far this season, suffered his first retirement of the season, when he made a mistake in the rain at turn 13. It’s been a particularly difficult weekend, following the news about President Marchionne and the final result was a long way off what had been expected. But that’s racing and now we just have to fight back immediately from this black Sunday.

STORY OF THE RACE: Seb got away well from pole, as did Kimi from third. The number 5 Ferrari had the slenderest of leads, while the 7 car fought with Verstappen. Already, there were a few tiny drops of rain appearing on visors. The ideal strategy involved the lead car having an advantage of around 4 seconds or so, but everyone was having to keep an eye on the degradation on the Ultrasofts.

At the end of lap 14, Kimi pitted as scheduled. The Softs were ready for him and a small change was made to his front wing angle. He managed to rejoin ahead of Hamilton, who was working his way up from 14th on the grid.

Raikkonen immediately set the race fastest lap and was ready for a remote battle with Bottas who was yet to pit. Seb had a lead of 5” over Bottas and around 22 on Hamilton, the aim of getting out ahead of the Mercedes. With the Softs fitted, he managed it.

Bottas opted for the same compound, while Ricciardo stopped out on track. Ahead of the Ferrari duo, Verstappen pitted. 30 laps went by and Kimi set the fastest lap. But another factor came into play, as rain was predicted shortly after 4.

On lap 36, Seb was within DRS distance of his team-mate who had blistering on his rear tyres. As they were running different strategies there was no  point in an inter-family duel and on lap 39, Seb got ahead of KImi at the hairpin.

With 24 laps remaining, Hamilton switched to the Ultrasofts, clearly gambling on dry conditions. A few drops began to fall at turn 2 and a light shower hit turn 6. Seb confirmed on the radio that he could still stay out, but a piece came off his front wing. At the time, the data did not show any accompanying loss of downforce.

It looked as though for those opting for rain tyres, the gamble had not paid off, but the rain went and came so that the pit lane was also wet. Some cars spun, others tiptoed around. Backmarker Magnussen pushed Kimi off track and Bottas made the most of it.

And then Seb planted it in the barriers at the entry to the Motodrom. But we still had one car on track and there was no let up. The Safety Car came out and Kimi took the opportunity to pit for Ultrasofts. He was now third on fresher rubber, prior to the restart on lap 58.

Kimi had a ringside seat for the duel between the two Mercedes. There were 7 laps to go and the threat of rain returned. As for Seb, he had returned to the paddock, went to see the guys, hugged Maurizio and spoke with Riccardo, his race engineer, being a team player, even when things do not go as planned.

 

German Grand Prix – P1 and P3 at Hockenheimring

Posted: 21.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Seb’s and Kimi’s comments on today’s qualifying session

Hockenheim, July 21 –  Scuderia Ferrari qualified in pole position for tomorrow’s German Grand Prix, courtesy of Sebastian Vettel. His team-mate Kimi Raikkonen will start the race from P3.

Seb: “You always try to do your best every day. Today has been one of those days, the car was fantastic. I could feel it in Q1 already and then in Q3 I knew I could get a good lap. Racing here in Germany means a lot to me and hopefully we can get first place tomorrow. We built a strong car and we know there’s still potential. Also, we know we can still improve race by race, because there’s still some weaknesses, but overall we are competitive and strong. So, it’s up to us to make good use of this potential everywhere we go”.

Kimi: “Today the car was working well and in qualifying I knew there was a lot of lap time in it. On my first try in Q3 I had a good feeling and the lap was looking good, but then I made a mistake and  got sideways. We had the speed to do better, but  I did not want to make any crazy mistake and risk throwing everything away, so on my last try  I took it a little bit easier. Third position is obviously not ideal, but in the end it is a pretty good position to start from. It’s difficult to say what will be the key to the race. So far our car has been good and I expect it to be the same tomorrow, but the conditions might change. As for every race we’ll try to do our maximum and see what it brings in the end. We need to do the best we can.

 

German Grand Prix – Pole position for Scuderia Ferrari

Posted: 21.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Sebastian fastest, Kimi third

Hockenheim, 21 July –Sebastian Vettel was fastest in qualifyting today at the Hockenheimring. A lap in 1’11”212 was good enough to secure his 55thpole position, the fifth this year. Team-mate Kimi Raikkonen will start tomorrow’s race from third on the grid having set a best time of 1’11”547. Both Scuderia Ferrari drivers ran the Ultrasoft tyres throughout the session. Tomorrow’s race gets underway at 15h10.

 

 

 

German Grand Prix – P3, all about the rain

Posted: 21.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Scuderia Ferrari only runs in final minutes

Hockenheim, 21 July – As forecast, the rain began to fall at the Hockenheimring this morning. During the final hour of free practice, visibility and grip were so poor that Scuderia Ferrari, like the majority of teams, only sent its cars out on track in the final minutes of the session, using Full Wet tyres. Sebastian Vettel was fourth fastest in 1’35”573 and Kimi Raikkonen was eighth in 1’37”755. Qualifying is due to start at 15h00 and, at the moment, the weather conditions are not expected to change much.

 

 

German Grand Prix – “The car is working well”

Posted: 20.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Seb and Kimi comment on a ‘normal hot Friday’

Hockenheim, July 20th – This region of Germany is not new to heatwaves, and today temperatures ranged just below and above the 30-degrees mark. In these hot conditions, Scuderia Ferrari drivers managed to progress through the respective run plans, which included using only the Soft tyre in the morning, before switching to different programmes for P2. Both ran on the Ultrasofts before Seb (4th fastest) tried a race simulation on the Mediums, while Kimi (5th) fitted the Softs. The SF71H car responded well through both sessions and now the night will be spent looking for improvements in view of tomorrow’s P3 and qualifying, which may be affected by a different kind of weather.

“The car has been working well today and it’s been a normal Friday”, was Seb’s comment after P2.” Today, we tried a little bit of everything. I think we got along quite well with the tyre selection that we used today. Now we have to find out how we’ve been working compared to the others, but I think that even if we can still improve our lap time, the car is fine. I think the high temperatures we had today could probably have an impact somehow, but we don’t know exactly what the weather will be like. Tomorrow it should rain, but on Sunday we expect it to be dry again. It was very nice to see a lot of Ferrari flags here today and it’s great to see a lot of people supporting us!”

“Friday is the only day that we can use as a test”, Kimi said “trying a lot of things and different solutions. It was a very normal day and later this evening we‘ll analyze what we have learned today and put  things together for qualifying. Tomorrow the conditions might be a bit different from today  and a bit more tricky. On Sunday  if the weather stays warm like it was today, for sure it will be challenging for the tires;  it’s going to  be more similar to Austria, with a limit on the tyres, and whoever makes the best job in managing them is going to have some advantage. So far we have been reasonably strong in most places, we’ll see how it goes here; it looks pretty close”.

 

German Grand Prix – Friday practice ends

Posted: 20.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Seb and Kimi ran different programmes 

Hockenheim, 20 July –Sebastian Vettel was fourth fastest in the second free practice session on the German track that’s hosting the eleventh round of this year’s World Championship. He posted a best time of 1’13”310 while team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was fifth in 1’13’427. Vettel used Medium and Ultrasoft tyres and Raikkonen opted for Soft and Ultrasoft. The final free practice session takes place tomorrow at 12h00, with qualifying following on at 15h00.

 

German Grand Prix – First practice at Hockenheim

Posted: 20.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Seb 4thand Kimi 6th

Hockenheim, 20 July– Formula 1 is back at the Hockenheimring after a one year break. It’s very hot (28°) and the track surface is still pretty dirty. At the end of the first free practice session, the Scuderia Ferrari drivers were fourth and sixth fastest, with Sebastian Vettel posting a 1’13”796 and Kimi Raikkonen’s best being a 1’14”267. Both drivers used Soft tyres for the whole session, thus saving their stock of Medium and Ultrasoft.

The second session gets underway at 15h00.

 

 

German Grand Prix – “it’s nice to be back here”

Posted: 19.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Homeland for Seb, “interesting” for Kimi: here’s what they think of Hockenheim

Hockenheim, July 19 – Formula 1 is back at the Hockenheimring, after a one year absence. It’s nearly home turf for Heppenheim-born Sebastian Vettel and the other Scuderia Ferrari driver, Kimi Raikkonen, is also looking forward to a good racing weekend.

“Hockenheim” Seb says “is about half an hour’s drive from where I was born. So it’s not exactly like racing in my backyard- I don’t have a backyard that big – but it’s probably the closest you can get! Obviously, we are keen to do well here. The last race in Silverstone was important for us, because we had not been very strong on that track before; but it’s a thing of the past now and we must focus on this one. This is not the easiest track to get everything right, there are many types of corner and long straights, and I think with this generation of cars we’ll be very fast here. Turn 6 looks like a good place to overtake, with the new DRS areas, and since there is another straight after the corner and another braking point at  the end of it, it could become a place for exciting moves. It’s nice to see so many red shirts here, the passion for Ferrari was born in Italy but it spread all over the world and it got to Germany for sure. We should be in fairly good shape here, but let’s see what happens”.

And here’s Kimi’s point of view on the track on which he still holds the race lap record: “We haven’t been to this circuit for a while, and things are a bit different, with the new rules and tires since the last time we came here. It’s hard to know how the Ultrasoft tyre will behave, but  if the conditions stay hot like they are today, I expect big challenges with the tires. It’s nice to be back here, for racing it will probably be a good circuit, where overtaking can be easier than in many other places. It will be an interesting weekend, I think.”

 

German Grand Prix – Quirky and traditional

Posted: 17.07.2018
Source: Ferrari

Back to historic Hockenheim, a track with many tales to tell

The weekend break is over and, during the next couple of days, the SF71H and part of the equipment is leaving Maranello and heading for Hockenheim. It’s the start of another back-to-back, as one week on from this weekend’s German GP, comes the race in Hungary. Part of the team will stay out until the end of the second of these two races.

Hockenheim is an historic track that has many tales to tell. Some of them are great, such as Berger’s win in ’94 and Irvine’s five years later, and the unbelievable 2000 race when Barrichello won after Schumacher crashed out. Others were tinged with sadness, such as the deaths of Clark and Depailler and Pironi’s career-ending crash. But that was all on the old, uncompromising circuit, of which very little remains. Speed down the straights was everything and, in the pits, even in the Nineties, inventiveness reigned supreme. Teams improvised solutions such as cutting down the pillars of the front laps, so that they ran lower to the ground, or even fitting (in free practice) four front tyres to reduce aerodynamic drag! Then it fell to the driver’s talent to make up for the lack of downforce in the Motodrom , the twistiest and most evocative section of track.
The track first used in 2002 has little of that left: the straights that tore through the forest have gone and today the circuit comes in at under five kilometres in length, but still offers a combination of slow, medium and high speed corners. The last sector is the one that can give the tyres a hard time, while the three DRS zones could make for some interesting data in terms of top speeds. There’s hope of a large crowd for this race, back on the calendar after skipping 2017 and maybe we might even see a return to the large queues of fans, who would wait at the circuit exit late into the night, hoping for a glimpse of the drivers. Legend has it that, back then, some drivers would hide in the boot of the car or wear fake wigs and beards to avoid being mobbed.

 

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