Vettel explains dismal France qualifying

Sebastian Vettel made few excuses for his performance in qualifying for the French Grand Prix after he could only muster seventh place on the grid at Paul Ricard. With Mercedes in a league of their own, Lewis Hamilton leading Valtteri Bottas on the front row, Vettel once again erred under the pressure.

Vettel was more than 1.4 seconds down on Hamilton's pole time, with the McLaren pair of Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz also outqualifying the German.

Vettel reported a missed upshift on his first Q3 run, which he bailed out of, but admitted that there was nothing stopping him from delivering when he had a clean lap.

"I don't know what happened, I lost so much momentum there was no point finishing that lap," Vettel told Sky Sports of his first flying effort.

"Up and down. Some laps I felt good, others I didn't. In the end I didn't get the best out of the car which is not satisfying.

"It was difficult for me because some laps it was really good and it was coming and some laps I don't know why I didn't have the grip as before, shame it happened in q3, it would have been better to be slower in the other segments but that's what it is."

Vettel revealed that Ferrari have removed many of the updates that were brought to Le Castellet, and he expects the McLarens to provide little resistance come the race, despite their strong weekend so far.

"We reverted on most of them [upgrades] so obviously not the step we expected," he expected. "But I think we have good pace to have a good race, Mercedes is far away but we should be in the mix with Red Bull."

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