Sebastian Vettel believes Red Bull's rivals are closer than in previous races following Friday's practice for the Hungarian Grand Prix.
Vettel and teammate Mark Webber dominated the last two races in Britain and Germany and arrived in Hungary as hot favorites thanks to their car's competitive form. But Vettel finished down in sixth position today after struggling with his car's balance, and the German reckons the competition will be tougher this weekend.
"A hot, hot Friday, obviously the sun is out in Hungary, which makes it hot in the car, but it's OK," said Vettel. "Overall I think we are still struggling to find the balance – I'm not yet 100% happy, so we need to look into it carefully overnight to see where we are.
"Hopefully. we can make a step forward tomorrow and then it will be all about qualifying as usual. I think it's much closer here than at previous races, other teams are very competitive, so we will see!"
German Grand Prix winner Webber was fourth quickest, his running coming to a halt earlier than expected after suffering a problem in the afternoon.
"We've had a good day so far. It's normal for Budapest to be pretty warm, so we've experienced the normal characteristics and the problems that Budapest throws at the engineers and drivers," he said. "The car seems to be going OK at the moment – we'll see what fuel loads people are running as usual tomorrow and on Sunday. We've got a bit of work to do with our car but, in general, it's been a reasonably positive day, with the exception of stopping towards the end of the second session with a hydraulic problem."