By: Crash.Net, 08 November 2013.
Sebastian Vettel says he has huge respect for Mark Webber as the Australian heads towards the end of his F1 career StumbleUpon
Sebastian Vettel says he retains ‘enormous respect’ for Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber despite the challenging nature of the relationship between the pair. Webber will leave F1 at the end of the season to move to sportscars, so ending a partnership with Vettel dating back to the start of 2009 when the German made the move from Toro Rosso.While the duo have combined to help Red Bull lift the constructors’ championship for the past four seasons, a series of incidents on track have led to a difficult personal relationship between the two drivers – which came to a head in Malaysia this year when Vettel ignored team orders and overtook Webber for victory.However, despite that, Vettel insisted that his time alongside Webber would end with him having huge respect for the 37-year-old and said the battle between the pair on track had been closer than it may have appeared for people looking in.”I think we always shared respect, especially on the track,” he said. “Obviously when we’ve been fighting each other I don’t think it’s been lacking respect, each one of us respected the other guy inside the car and his abilities. As team-mates for the last five years we’ve got to know each other very, very well, meaning that I know his strengths and maybe the corners where I have a little bit of an advantage, and visa-versa.
“It has always been very, very close, maybe closer than what people remember. So I appreciated that and therefore I have enormous respect. You’ve got to be honest as well; we didn’t have the best relationship on a personal level if you look back, but in the end of the day we were very, very successful for the team as well winning four constructors’ in a row. So we’ve made sure together that we’ve scored enough points for the team.”
via Vettel: Enormous respect for Webber | F1 News | Nov 2013 | Crash.Net.