Vettel: Failed Ferrari upgrade successful in Austria

Sebastian Vettel hailed a "successful" Friday at the Austrian Grand Prix as Ferrari appeared to finally get to grips with the failed upgrade package brought to the French GP.

The Scuderia had hoped that their updates in Paul Ricard would close the gap to Mercedes, but Lewis Hamilton took a dominant win, while Vettel could only finish fifth on another dismal weekend for the Italian squad.

With the Red Bull Ring featuring long straights and quick corners, the SF90 should be better suited to Spielberg, and that played out as Charles Leclerc topped the timesheets in FP2, after Vettel had gotten within a tenth of Hamilton in FP1 despite using harder tyres.

Ferrari have again brought new parts to Austria although Leclerc claimed on Thursday that they would not provide extra pace. Nevertheless, Vettel said Ferrari were able to get to grips with their car better.

"We didn't actually try new updates, we ran the same parts as last weekend to be able to learn more about them and I think it was successful," Vettel said.

"Now we need time to understand what to address next.

"Our balance in the corners is not bad, we can still improve the car and we tried a few things in the afternoon.

"In terms of track layout it's probably true maybe it helps us a bit, but it's still a tricky track.

"It is very difficult to make much of a difference, it's very short, so crucial to have a good feel in the car and that's what we need to work on."

After Max Verstappen and Valtteri Bottas walloped the barriers in FP2, Vettel also had a scary moment as he spun out at the same spot that cost the Dutchman, although he was fortunate to come to rest before damaging his car too much.

He added: "My off-track excursion didn't have a big effect on our programme, other than that we couldn't do the long run on the softs. I was able to stop in time and did not damage the car."

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