Vettel ‘let the team down’ with Baku antics

While his Singapore crash may have cost him a World title, Sebastian Vettel says his collision with Lewis Hamilton in Baku was worse as he “let the team down.”

Believing that Hamilton had brake checked him at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Vettel pulled alongside Hamilton and deliberately swerved into him.

Vettel was slapped with a 10-second stop-go penalty but escaped further sanctions after admitting “full responsibility” and extending his “sincere apologies” for his actions.

And although that wasn’t the defining moment in his season, Vettel says it was his worst.

“I think Baku was worse [than Singapore],” he told Autosport in an exclusive interview. “I felt I let the team down, because something that I did obviously cost a race win potentially.

“So I think in Singapore, to be honest, the way I look at it, it’s racing and it happens. Obviously it is extremely unfortunate, but I don’t know how many start crashes there have been in the past and there will be in the future.

“If you happen to be inside them, it always sucks. There is no better way to describe. Did it come in a good time? No. Is there any ever a good time for this to happen? Probably not.

“So it doesn’t matter. It happened. We cannot control it. We need to focus on what we have in our hands and try to focus on things we can control.”