Overall assess 2021’s Sebastian Vettel it is not an easy feat. Everyone expected that the ‘new’ Aston Martin would inherit from the 2020 version Racing Point the speed necessary to compete permanently at the top of the grid, battling for podiums and third place in the constructors’ standings. However, very few races were enough to understand that this was not the case. The small aerodynamic changes imposed by the 2021 championship regulations have disintegrated the competitiveness of the car built at Silverstone, which has lost most of the qualities that had impressed everyone the previous year.
These problems, combined with the understandable adaptation difficulties found by the four-time world champion in his first races in the green suit, forced Vettel to struggle a lot during the start of the championship. When you drive a car that struggles to get into the points though, you have to be good at take advantage of favorable opportunities as soon as these arise. From this point of view the Heppenheim native was almost perfect. In fact, on the track he grabbed two podiums – in Baku and Budapest – managing to maximize the chaos that has generated around him in both cases. And not even the cancellation for a regulatory detail of the second Hungarian place can make this result disappear.
Vettel then has been able to shine on tracks where it is above all the driver’s ability to make the difference. This is the case with the fifth place collected in Monte-Carlo – probably his second best driving performance of the season after that of Azerbaijan – and also the similar result brought home in qualifying for the Belgian GP, under the flood. It is true that there were also colorless races and avoidable mistakes, but overall the first year of the German at Aston can be considered more than enough. The unknown about the future remains. Will the change in technical regulations be enough to bring the team back to the positions that matter, thus guaranteeing Vettel to be able to compete regularly for points and podiums?
Sebastian Vettel, 43 points. 12th place. Average: 1.95 points. In 2020: 13th place
Rating: 7- | Flashes of class
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