The double whammy that is defining Vettel’s F1 fate

It's been a tough start to Sebastian Vettel's Aston Martin F1 career, with a lack of pre-season testing mileage followed by an incident-packed Bahrain GP. But two key underlying factors mean a turnaround is no guarantee.

Jonathan Noble Apr 14, 2021, 2:35 PM

Upd: Apr 14, 2021, 7:08 PM

Sebastian Vettel needs no reminding that in Formula 1 you are only as good as your last race. Being labelled as grand prix racing’s biggest star, or its biggest chump, can so often happen based on just a single weekend’s performance.

So as the four-time world champion heads to Imola after a bruising outing in Bahrain, it’s no real surprise that he isn’t surrounded by the kind of mega hype that has accompanied Yuki Tsunoda after his stunning debut F1 weekend in Bahrain. Instead, Vettel is in need of a boost after a challenging first few weeks for Aston Martin that have left him firmly on the back foot.

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Author Jonathan Noble

Jonathan Noble is Motorsport.com’s Formula 1 editor. Having graduated from University of Sussex Jonathan worked for sports news agency Collings Sports reporting on F1, F3, touring cars and other sports, with articles appearing in The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, Reuters, Autosport and other publications. In 1999 he moved to Haymarket Publishing to become a senior editor at Autosport Special Projects, and one year later he became Autosport’s grand prix editor. In 2015 he moved to Motorsport Network, becoming the F1 editor for Motorsport.com. He is also a member of the Guild of Motoring Writers, and sits on the FIA Media Council.

Jonathan has won multiple awards for journalism - in 1991 he was the winner of the Guild of Motoring Writers’ Sir William Lyons’ Award for young journalists, in 2010 he was awarded the Outstanding Individual accolade for consumer journalism in the Haymarket wards, in 2011 he won Haymarket’s Scoop of the Year, and in 2018 he was awarded a prestigious Medaglia d’Oro at the Lorenzo Bandini Awards for his contribution to F1 journalism.