22 March 2010 / REUTERS , LONDON
Mark Webber has had his hopes of becoming the first Australian to win his home Formula One grand prix this weekend pumped up by McLaren rival Lewis Hamilton.
Britain’s 2008 world champion said before heading to Melbourne that Red Bull’s Webber and German teammate Sebastian Vettel undoubtedly had the quickest cars on the track. “The Red Bull is ridiculously faster than anyone else’s car,” he told reporters. “It’s insane. The downforce they had on their car last year was at some points just about double what we had. Even at the end of the year they had so much more than us, even though we had won a couple of grands prix.” Vettel qualified on pole at this month’s season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, more than a second a lap faster than Hamilton, and then led for more than two thirds of the race before being slowed by a faulty spark plug. Hamilton ended up third while Vettel finished fourth. Webber, winner of two races last year, made an error in qualifying and ended the race in eighth place.
