Ferrari driver Sebastian Vettel was furious with Formula 1 tyre supplier Pirelli following a 200mph failure at the Belgian Grand Prix.
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To cap a miserable day for the scarlet scuderia, Raikkonen was given a reprimand for his driving during Saturday morning’s final free practice session when he forced Frenchman Romain Grosjean of Lotus to take evasive action.
Suggested to Hembery Ferrari took a gamble that did not pay off, he said: “That’s probably the easy way to say it at the end of the race, but that’s with hindsight”.
The circumstance of Vettel’s tyre failure is focused on the fact he had completed 28 laps on the medium compound after adopting an alternative one-stop strategy in an effort to play himself into contention.
“How many laps was I missing?”
“The last race doesn’t matter now, but it’s always disappointing [to finish so far down in qualifying] when you consider I had a good feeling throughout”, said Vettel.
“Things like that are not allowed to happen”.
With Ferrari still investigating exactly what happened, Raikkonen said: “We lost drive and obviously I had to stop”.
“Nico said on Friday he didn’t go off track, I didn’t go off track, so there is no explanation for what happened”.
“He’s a driver, he’s been out there and frustrated that he’s only one lap away from getting a result”.
“Nineteen auto sets out on a two-three stop strategy and there is a reason for that – they were following a different approach – if the race was one lap less everyone would have said what a genius approach because they would have been in the podium”. “If this had happened earlier I’m f**ked”.
“(Tyres are) a theme that keeps coming around, that nobody is mentioning, but it is unacceptable”.
Vettel, though, firmly believes he can make up positions in the race.
Pirelli’s motorsport director, Paul Hembery, said the failure was due to running the tyre for too long.
“Any tyre in the world, when it gets to the end of its wear-life, you’re going to have a problem”.
“Wear-life was indicated at around 40 laps, but it’s an indication and race conditions can change that and some factors involved in racing mean that sometimes it’s not a precise datum”. “The exploding tyres is poor”, he said.
“I’m not going to criticise him for that”. “They need to figure out something how to make it safer”.
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“For example we have those rear view cameras, at least make that live viewing for everyone so they can keep an eye on it (the tyres). It was an aggressive strategy but we shouldn’t see that – that’s clear”.
