Formula 1's Latest Rumours and Talk: Sebastian Vettel, Lewis Hamilton and More
Less than 24 hours after finishing fifth in the German Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel was back behind the wheel of a Formula One car on Monday as Pirelli's preparations for 2017 began.
With wider tyres set to be introduced alongside major bodywork changes next year, Pirelli needs all the information it can get to prepare for F1's season of change, with Ferrari, Red Bull and Mercedes providing modified cars to aid the data-gathering process.
And Vettel became the first driver to sample the 2017-style tyres on Monday, when he completed a number of laps at Ferrari's Fiorano circuit.
While Vettel was trundling around the Italian track, Lewis Hamilton was probably still recovering from the celebrations of his victory in the German GP.
The three-time world champion's sixth win in seven races has seen him extend his points advantage over Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg to 19 with nine races remaining, but Hamilton has insisted he still doesn't feel he has full control of this year's title battle.
Having thrown away a 43-point lead, meanwhile, Rosberg won't exactly feel in control either, and his recent misery continued at Hockenheim, where he failed to finish on the podium despite starting from pole position.
A five-second time penalty for forcing Max Verstappen off track left Rosberg with no option but to settle for a fourth-place finish, and the German has questioned the FIA stewards' decision to punish him for what he felt was one of the best overtaking moves of 2016.
Verstappen held off a late challenge from Rosberg to secure his third podium finish in the last four races, with Red Bull praising the teenager and team-mate Daniel Ricciardo for working together to defeat the Mercedes driver.
Closing our post-German GP roundup is Fernando Alonso, who has aired his frustrations after McLaren-Honda's fuel-saving problems saw him miss out on a top-10 finish at Hockenheim.
Sebastian Vettel Debuts 2017 Pirelli Tyres in Fiorano Test
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Vettel has become the first Formula One driver to sample Pirelli's 2017-specification tyres in a test at Ferrari's Fiorano circuit near Maranello, Italy.
As part of the next season's major regulation changes, which will see cars lap several seconds faster than the current models, Pirelli will introduce wider tyres in an effort to increase mechanical grip.
With the new tyres set to have vastly different characteristics to the current rubber, Pirelli is set to hold 10 test sessions between August and November in preparation for next year, with Ferrari, Red Bull and Mercedes providing so-called "mule" cars to simulate 2017-style downforce levels.
According to Pirelli's official website, Ferrari have made a modified 2015 car—featuring a wider rear wing, skirts and a camera fitted to the nose—available for a two-day test at Fiorano.
Vettel spent Monday morning completing installation laps on the new slick tyres before focusing specifically on the development of the intermediate and wet-weather rubber on an "artificially dampened surface."
Haas driver Esteban Gutierrez, who held a reserve role with Ferrari last season, will take to the wheel of the car on Tuesday, with Red Bull set to complete the first serious slick-tyre running in a separate test at the Mugello circuit in Tuscany on Wednesday and Thursday.
Lewis Hamilton Still Doesn't Feel Like Championship Leader Despite German GP Win
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Hamilton has admitted he still doesn't feel like he is leading the championship despite extending his advantage over Rosberg to 19 points with victory in the German GP.
The three-time world champion trailed Mercedes team-mate Rosberg by 43 points little more than two months ago, but he took the lead of the drivers' standings for the first time in 2016 after winning the recent Hungarian GP.
Following that race, Hamilton insisted he was "still in the mentality of chasing," adding his six-point lead over the German was "not massive," per the Mirror's Byron Young.
The British driver secured his sixth win in seven races at Hockenheim on Sunday, when Rosberg could only recover to fourth after a poor start, to extend his lead to 19 points with nine races of the season remaining.
But with the No. 44 car set to suffer at least one engine-related grid-penalty in the second half of 2016, Hamilton has admitted he is still reluctant to think of himself as the championship leader at this stage.
Per Sky Sports F1's Pete Gill, he said:
"I feel like l am closer to leading it. We do have a penalty up ahead, this engine has done amazing to get to where we are and I'm super grateful for the life it has led and the laps we've led with it. It's as good a buffer as I could get with the circumstances.
[...]
It was a great race for me. I wasn't expecting to be as strong as l was. I'm just super happy.
I delivered the way l am supposed to. I had pace, l worked the tyres just right and l was never under pressure from the guys behind. And no mistakes—no offs, no lock-ups, which is great.
When the gap came down to six seconds l thought 'that's enough' and l turned it up. I was just making sure l kept them at bay.
"
Per the official F1 Twitter account, Hamilton added he spent the Hockenheim race trying to "look after" his current engine, admitting he "never would have thought" he would be leading the championship at this stage after his troubled start to 2016.
Nico Rosberg 'Surprised' to Receive Penalty for 'Awesome' Max Verstappen Pass
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Rosberg believes the FIA stewards were unreasonably harsh for handing him a five-second time penalty for pushing Verstappen off track during the German GP, insisting his pass on the Red Bull driver was "awesome."
The German claimed a second consecutive pole position at the Hockenheim circuit, but he fell to fourth at the first corner after a poor start.
After failing to pass Verstappen during the second round of pit stops, the German launched a late-braking move on the teenager at the Turn 6 hairpin on Lap 29, with Rosberg running his rival out of road as he tried to slow his own car down for the tight right-hander.
Verstappen was heard complaining over the Mercedes driver's manoeuvre shortly after the incident, with Rosberg later receiving a time penalty.
Rosberg, who ultimately finished a matter of seconds behind third-placed Verstappen, has argued the pass was a racing incident.
Per Autosport's Edd Straw and Ian Parkes, he said:
"It took me by surprise, definitely. I didn't expect a penalty for that.
It was racing. I was really ecstatic at the time because I thought 'wow, that was awesome, I came from miles behind.'
And I was very happy to get the position because that meant I would have got second place at least—it was damage limitation.
I was very surprised to get a penalty for it.
"
According to Sky Sports' Simeon Gholam, Verstappen suggested Rosberg made no attempt to "turn in" to the hairpin, likening the incident to the Mercedes driver's collision with team-mate Hamilton on the final lap of the recent Austrian GP.
He told Sky Sports News HQ: "He did a good move into the corner but it was already very deep. But he just doesn't turn in or give space on the exit—and that's not fair. I race hard and on the limit but I always give space on the exit—that's the difference."
Rosberg lost even more time when he eventually served his five-second penalty in the pits, with the team losing around three extra seconds after suffering what Mercedes boss Toto Wolff revealed was a "stopwatch failure," per Straw and Parkes.
Wolff explained "The stopwatch didn't start properly and once we realised, we had to take it safe, and this is why it took longer than normal."
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Red Bull Pay Tribute to Daniel Ricciardo, Max Verstappen Teamwork After Podium
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Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has paid tribute to Ricciardo and Verstappen after the pair worked "in harmony" to secure the team's first double-podium finish in more than a year in the German GP.
After claiming podium finishes in Austria, Britain and Hungary, Red Bull were again the closest challengers to Mercedes at Hockenheim, where Ricciardo and Verstappen locked out the second row of the grid for the third successive weekend.
Rosberg's sloppy start from pole position allowed both drivers to move into podium contention at the first corner, with the pair both switching to three-stop strategies but on different compounds as the race progressed.
The difference in tyre plans led to Verstappen swapping positions with Ricciardo on Lap 40 of 67 as the drivers sought to evade the threat of fourth-placed Rosberg, who was recovering from his five-second time penalty.
Verstappen later told Sky Sports F1's Gholam how he "definitely took one for the team" but admitted his "good relationship" with Ricciardo made it "alright."
And Horner has praised the spirit shown by both drivers, telling the same source:
"We set off with the objective of at least trying to do one on the two-stop, but then the tyre degradation was a little higher than we wanted. So at the first stop we put the drivers on different tyres, Max went onto the supersofts and Daniel onto the soft, so then they were running slightly different races.
The way they worked together as a team to ensure we got both cars ahead of Nico when he had that penalty was fantastic, they co-operated as well as you could expect.
They worked exactly as a team should, in harmony with the pit wall and did everything that could have been done.
"
Per Gholam, Ricciardo outlined how he and Verstappen are "pushing each other to another level," with the team "feeling that" and "finding a bit more [performance] out of it."
Fernando Alonso Frustrated by McLaren-Honda Fuel-Consumption Issues
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Alonso has admitted he is frustrated with McLaren-Honda's large emphasis on fuel-saving after missing out on a top-10 finish in the German GP.
After starting 13th on the grid, Alonso was running as high as 10th place in the closing stages at Hockenheim when the Spaniard and team-mate Jenson Button were instructed to save fuel.
While Button was able to manage the issue to finish eighth, securing his fifth points finish of 2016, Alonso—forced to lift and coast in order to save fuel—slipped to 12th after being passed by Force India's Sergio Perez and Gutierrez.
After May's Russian GP, McLaren racing director Eric Boullier suggested the team lost as much as 50 seconds through fuel-saving alone, per MailOnline's Dan Ripley.
And Alonso has admitted the team's fuel-saving requirements—on an afternoon the flow of the race was not disrupted by safety-car periods—left him reflecting on one of his most miserable races of 2016, but he hinted the situation could improve with an upgrade at the upcoming Belgian GP at Spa.
Per Autosport's Mitchell Adam, he said:
"We were 10th so hoping for this last point but in the end it wasn't possible.
We did not have the pace and in the race we had to save a lot of fuel in the last stint.
It was one of the worst races of the year, this one.
We knew before coming here and in the race it was no different.
With no safety cars, no incidents we would have too much consumption and we were too slow on the straights.
Obviously we have to do more fuel saving than the other cars so that's penalising us a little bit.
At Spa we have an update and hopefully that will give us some extra power and some extra performance.
"
Per the same source, Button suggested he judged his fuel consumption "to perfection," acknowledging McLaren "struggled more than [they] expected" at Hockenheim.
Yusuke Hasegawa, the head of Honda's F1 operation, has vowed to bring further improvements to the RA616H power unit over the remaining nine races after a promising first half of 2016.
He told McLaren's official website: "Looking back at the last few races, we are now confident that our progress is definitely heading in the right direction, and are now aiming to make another step forward in the early part of the second half of the season."
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