Vettel explains reason for 2018 spins

Sebastian Vettel has speculated that a downforce "hole" might be the root cause of his recent spins in contact with rivals and says he will rethink on-track battles. Vettel was forced to fight through the field in Italy, Japan and the USA as a result of costly collisions.

The dropped points, allied with Lewis Hamilton's surge in form over the same period of time, leaves Vettel needing a miracle to beat the Mercedes man to the title in 2018.

A seventh-placed finish this weekend in Mexico will crown Hamilton, with Vettel left wondering what might have been, having had the quicker car underneath him at several races this season.

COTA was one such example, but a spin after hitting Daniel Ricciardo left Vettel fighting from 15th while teammate Kimi Raikkonen took victory.

"Maybe I need to try the outside next time, maybe I don't spin," Vettel said.

"Obviously you want to have the inside to the corner, that doesn't change. But I don't know. The closer you are to another car, you lose some downforce, and obviously the spins I had were all quite weird because there was not much I could have done [differently].

"It is not like I had gone in too fast or would have spun on my own at that speed, not at all.

"So I guess there must be some sort of hole or something being on the inside of a car in that position. Obviously on all three occasions I wasn't clearly ahead, at best side-by-side, so as I said, maybe next time I try the outside.

"The main thing is that fundamentally I didn't try to do anything silly or stupid. I wasn't hard-headed trying to do something that would never work.

"Obviously now it has happened a couple of times, too much. So next time there will be a gap, I am sure I will go for a gap, but surely it is in the back of your head trying to keep the car facing the right direction."

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