Vettel gives Ferrari until summer break to turn title race around

Sebastian Vettel feels Ferrari must be in "very good shape" by the summer break if it is to stand any chance of turning the Formula 1 title race around after slipping far behind Mercedes in the early part of the season.

Mercedes has won all six races so far this year, with Ferrari only able to muster a handful of podiums despite being the pre-season favourite after impressive pace through winter testing.

Vettel is already over 50 points behind championship leader Lewis Hamilton in the drivers' standings, while Ferrari sits 118 points back from Mercedes in the constructors' championship.

Despite saying it was too early to write off Ferrari's season and shift focus to 2020 already, Vettel identified the summer break in five races' time as being a natural point where it could properly gauge its title chances.

"I don’t think you need to be a genius that by the latest summer – OK, we are already at summer now – but before the summer break, we need to be in very good shape to use that momentum in the second half to turn it around," Vettel said.

"But I am not too stressed. We will go step by step, and we have certain things in the pipeline and I think we have an understanding of what the car needs, some things that we can apply short-term, some things more long-term.

"Then we can quickly within these weeks find out where we are."

Ferrari has been working to resolve the issues with the SF90 car, but Vettel echoed team principal Mattia Binotto by saying there would be no immediate fix for the team.

"If you have an understanding and you think you know what you need to do, you don’t have a full answer until you put the car back on the track," Vettel said.

"The stopwatch is all that matters, and it tells you yes or no. So I think we have to wait for that.

"But there are some ideas to try and improve where we are, and they sound quite promising.

"I am optimistic at this point, but the only proof is and has always been the stopwatch."