Vettel thinks having no tow on straight cost him pole position

The Scuderia were tipped to be dominant for the weekend and they were during the practice sessions, but a big shunt from teammate Charles Leclerc in Q2 of qualifying took one of the two out of the equation already.

During the shoot-out in Q3, Vettel had a good first and second sector, but eventually lost out in the final sector, which mainly consists of a long straight. Vettel had no tow there, and he thinks that could've cost him the pole position.

"I don't know if they stole it, I think they were a bit quicker than us today," Vettel told Paul Di Resta when asked if Mercedes stole pole position from Ferrari.

"For me, it started a bit slow, towards the end it was getting better but it was quite tricky, the session was very long, the sun was going down. It was difficult to find the right balance of pushing in the out lap and playing with tow.

"I had a good lap but I had no tow to close the lap and that cost a bit.

"I think we got sort of the maximum out but we were expecting to have a better session with Charles and myself being closer to the front."