Webber: Vettel 'will have the year off' in 2021

Mark Webber thinks his former Red Bull teammate Sebastian Vettel will take a year away from Formula 1 in 2021.

Sebastian Vettel is out of contract at Ferrari and faces an ever decreasing number of options if he is to secure a seat for the 2021 season. A Mercedes seat alongside Lewis Hamilton remains an option, but Webber believes the German needs a break.

"I think he will have a year off," Webber told the F1 Nation Podcast. "I hope for all of us he can rejuvenate himself back into the spirit of wanting to be competing at the front again.

"He can reinvent himself, but he has got to have the atmosphere. I think he really misses the English way about going racing, I think he really enjoyed that."

Webber believes Vettel's withdrawn nature has a role to play in his future, the Australian also likening the outgoing-Ferrari driver to MotoGP rider Valentino Rossi.

"Lap time is a big driver," continued Webber. "Lap time and risk. For me, it just got a bit hard. In your late thirties, that tenth is just like, it just takes a bit longer to get a bit more confidence in certain positions, certain scenarios. It just gets that little bit more difficult.

"We are seeing with Valentino Rossi now, he is a MotoGP legend, but his one-lap pace performances, they are virtually over now. It's a huge departure on what Rossi could do ten years ago."

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