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Sebastian Vettel described his first half-day of Formula 1 pre-season testing with Aston Martin as “very productive”.
Within 24 hours he was reflecting on the opposite experience.
A gearbox problem on the second morning in Bahrain left Vettel confined to the garage and limited to just 10 laps either side of a gearbox change. The four-time F1 world champion now has only half a day left of on-track running to get used to his new team and its 2021 car, with only 61 laps in the books so far.
Team-mate Lance Stroll has been faring slightly better, though he had his own time loss on Friday with a small electrical issue. Now the rebranded team that won a race last year, finished fourth in the constructors’ championship, and has built up to the start of its new era with such optimism, is vying with Mercedes… but for the lowest mileage tally of any team in testing so far.
“The two days were markedly different for us,” Aston Martin team boss Otmar Szafnauer says.
“We had a decent first day, trying to learn a little bit about the car, no set-up work but getting Seb acclimated to the team and the car in the morning and then Lance running through some aero work in the afternoon.
“But unfortunately, this morning we had a gearbox issue so we sat out for almost all of it.”
So how worried should Aston Martin and its Ferrari convert Vettel be?
As this car, like all others, is primarily a carry-over from last year, Aston Martin understands it well. What it needs to confirm is the impact of its upgraded Mercedes rear end, having switched to a 2020-spec gearbox and revised suspension layout, as well as its floor changes to adapt to new aerodynamic rules for this season. Plus, there are new 2021 tyres to understand.
That is quite a big workload to take on over just three days, so losing one-sixth of the available running for the team is a blow. It will not transform Aston Martin’s prospects for the season but it could send it into the opening race, also in Bahrain in two weeks’ time, with a less-optimised package and more unanswered questions.
Aston Martin’s priority in the wake of the gearbox problem was to rejig the run plan so it could get as much of its important work done as possible and tick off the major items in understanding the car. It started immediately with Stroll’s work in the second half of the day.
So the big loser, for now, is Vettel.
“It will have an impact on Seb because he’ll have less time in the car before the first race,” admits Szafnauer.
“And what he really needs now is his seat time in our car, because we are a different team it’s a different car, a different powertrain than he’s been used to.
“But we’ll do the best we can with the time that we have remaining.”
Vettel’s simple assessment that his Friday morning “was not of great use in terms of track time” is underselling it. As of the lunchbreak, he was left in the bottom half of the table for laps completed so far in this test. But by the end of the second day he will likely be behind everyone except Mick Schumacher (struck by a gearbox problem as well on the opening day), Valtteri Bottas (ditto) and George Russell (who hasn’t driven in this test so far).
So, it’s fair to say only Schumacher, as a rookie, is in a worse position than Vettel. Because the workload that comes with a change of teams should not be underestimated.
There is a lot to get used to, and until that is maximised a new driver will be leaving performance on the table. Vettel has already alluded to this.
“It’s a different car, it’s a different way of running the car, so naturally you would expect it to feel different as well,” he says.
“I haven’t had that much time yet, but I think I still need a bit of time to adapt to all the little things. It’s never one thing that you need to get on top of is a lot of small things that ultimately make the difference.
“So, that’s where I stand. I obviously wanted to have more laps this morning. I think we all wanted more laps! Hopefully we have a good afternoon now and a good day, a strong day, tomorrow to make up some of the lost running.”
How Aston Martin will handle that will only become apparent on Sunday.
It might be that leaving Vettel more performance evaluation work on the final day will let him fast-track his understanding of the car at the limit while Stroll deals with the bulk of the team’s more focused preparation.
“He [Vettel] had a good day yesterday, his feedback is very detailed and very precise,” says Szafnauer.
“The engineers get very good feedback from him. He’s got a great work ethic, and he pursues every little bit of performance that we can go after. For that reason, it’s evident why he’s won all those races and championships.
“He hasn’t really pushed the car, we haven’t really done any performance runs with him yet. I can’t speak to any major concerns yet.
“We’re going to do that [more performance runs] today and a little bit more tomorrow.”
Why does this matter so much? Because to borrow a phrase from his successor at Ferrari, Carlos Sainz Jr, Vettel will only have mastered the basics at Aston Martin so far, and needs to get a handle on its tricks.
Vettel started work at Aston Martin on January 1, as soon as his Ferrari contract had expired. He met with his new team, drove the simulator, and conducted brief shakedowns of the AMR21.
He says the car feels “very promising” but stresses there’s still a lot to get used to. Losing one-third of his personal running from the test has removed a huge chunk of the small window Vettel had to do that.
Adjusting to a new team has never been this difficult thanks to the condensed testing schedule, so there is an argument that Vettel was always likely to go into the season undercooked. But the process of reducing the disadvantage has become even harder.
“It’s a new environment, there’s new people, a new way of doing things,” Vettel says when asked by The Race about going into the new season still learning the ropes at Aston Martin.
“I need to adapt and learn so that will take some time. The more time you get, the better it is. That’s why obviously the one and a half days that I think each of us get, some even less, are very, very crucial.
“But then I think it’s also fair to say that we didn’t get any running since the end of last year and I think it’s quite normal that it takes more than one and a half days to get back into a rhythm and into everything. So I think we have a long year ahead of us.
“Obviously, it’s crucial to settle in quickly. But eventually I think we will all improve with more time on the track. That’s the case for all of us.”
On Vettel’s side, at least, is a ton of experience and plenty of ability. It’s clear his positive first impression on his new team has carried into the test and he will know that mileage for the team and its car is still valuable for his learning process even if he isn’t behind the wheel.
Any worries are also, at least for now, only for the short-term. This isn’t the ideal start by any means, but it is also only the beginning.
