Abu Dhabi: Sebastian Vettel has hailed his resurgent Ferrari’s form as “a miracle” after winning three races in his debut season with the Prancing Horse to finish third in the drivers’ championship.
The four-time world champion was the only driver other than the outstanding Mercedes duo of world champion Lewis Hamilton and runner-up Nico Rosberg this season to win a race, helping Ferrari finish second in the constructors’ championship.
Vettel came fourth at the Formula One Etihad Airways Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Sunday, a place behind teammate Kimi Raikkonen, and said his team’s progress after a winless 2014 had amazed him.
“If we look at how were at testing compared to now, it is a miracle,” said Vettel, after the race at Yas Marina Circuit.
“It is a miracle where we started off in the winter, setting fastest times.
“Going into Australia we were obviously way behind [Mercedes] and I haven’t seen any other team making that much progress in a season so we are closer. We are not close enough yet but we can really fight them and put them under pressure.
“We had a lot of smiles this year so if we can increase the number of smiles then it is good news.
“Now I look forward to saying ‘cheers’ for the great season that we’ve had and enjoying that moment.”
Vettel had started in 16th for Sunday’s season finale after Ferrari miscalculated the cut-off time required to make it through to the second qualifying session.
“Yesterday we did a mistake and we made it right in the race, but in the end Kimi had a clean race for P3,” he said.
“The best result one way or another would be P3 and P4 so we can be very happy with today. You always want to be closer to the guy in front but we’ve had a lot of races where we have finished third and fourth behind Mercedes.
“I don’t have any regrets. Considering where we started, it was the best we could do.”
