Ferrari: Brazilian GP proved F1 gap to Mercedes has shrunk

Sebastian Vettel finished 14.244 seconds behind race winner Nico Rosberg in third while his fastest lap was 0.216s adrift of the benchmark set by Lewis Hamilton.

That compares to the season-opening grand prix in Australia where Vettel crossed the line third behind the two Mercedes, 34.523s adrift of winner Hamilton.

Vettel said after the race that Ferrari, which was the only team not to be lapped by Mercedes in Brazil, is "closer compared to Australia" and Arrivabene agreed.

"It's not an invention if you look at the numbers, it's absolutely real like this," he said.

"Without safety cars and everything, somehow it was the race where we were closer to them than any other.

"We finished the race only us and them, Mercedes, completing all of the laps.

"Certain laps we were near them, other laps the same time and just a few laps even better.

"The result, with the conditions, is OK. Good is when you win. Sunday, it's OK."

Arrivabene added the performance was particularly pleasing because he felt Mercedes was not holding anything back at Interlagos.

"They were pushing," he said. "At certain points they were pushing very, very hard.

"I'm quite sure that Sunday was one of the days that they were [pushing] apart from the last three or four laps.

"Maybe on other occasions they were not. Only Mercedes know, but from our data, I think that they were pushing."