Vettel set the fastest lap to "flatter his ego"
Despite ten victories this season, Sebastian Vettel has rarely set the fastest lap in a Grand Prix. But that was the case in South Korea, the recent double world champion wanted to enjoy himself by setting his second fastest lap of the season - after the European Grand Prix.
Vettel has often tended to get upset during certain races where the outcome wasn’t in his favor, and this was particularly the case in 2009 during the Turkish Grand Prix. The Red Bull driver was on pole ahead of Jenson Button’s Brawn GP, but the British driver managed to overtake the young German in the first lap, which irritated Vettel.
And to let off some steam, in a way, he had decided to push his engine at the end of the race in order to set the fastest lap—which he ultimately didn’t manage to achieve. But now Vettel has matured, as evidenced by his two world championship titles. He is now a keen calculator and strategist, understanding the importance of engines—with the quota of eight new engines per season.
But now that the driver and constructor titles are secured, Vettel decided to make an exception today in South Korea. He had so much fun that he did everything to set the fastest lap today and he succeeded. He explained that he simply did it to flatter his ego.
I think they’re going to kill me now (his engineers). On the radio, they told me ‘you didn’t set the fastest lap’ which obviously wasn’t true, and they talked to me again on the radio and said ‘idiot, you did set it’. It was really stupid. I think in other races, it wouldn’t have made sense but in the last lap, I had a good feeling and yes, I pushed a bit more to set the fastest lap. It’s a small thing; it’s probably more to flatter my ego because there’s no point (to gain with the fastest lap) so it was really stupid of me but I managed to do it, so I’m happy, Vettel confided during the post-race press conference.
This is also proof that the young German is not yet jaded by his tremendous success; he is still hungry for victories and achievements, and he proved it magnificently today and since the start of the season. It’s highly likely he’ll prove it more than once in the future.
Vettel is not the specialist of the fastest laps in the race – Räikkönen was in his time. This season, it is rather his teammate, Mark Webber, who is focused on setting the fastest lap most often. Here are the names of the drivers who have set the most fastest laps this season:
- Mark Webber: Malaysia, China, Turkey, Monaco, and Belgium;
- Lewis Hamilton: Spain, Germany, and Italy;
- Jenson Button: Canada, Singapore and Japan;
- Felipe Massa: Australia and Hungary
- Sebastian Vettel: Europe and South Korea
- Fernando Alonso: Great Britain
