Vettel taking nothing for granted

Vettel currently heads the world championship standings - having won two of the first three races of the year - and is once again many people's favourite to battle for victory in next week's Istanbul event.

However, despite the promise of the RB7 and its huge advantage in qualifying, Red Bull's rivals have been closing down on the team and Vettel is well aware that his outfit needs to keep pushing.

"Turkey is a hard track on tyres and it's usually quite hot there - but I especially like the place as it's where I had my first F1 test drive," Vettel said in a team preview on Thursday.

"Our car should be strong there, but of course we have to respect our competitors and can never take anything for granted. People are pushing hard, but we are pushing very hard too to maintain our strengths."

The Turkish Grand Prix weekend is likely to be dominated by talk of tyres - with Pirelli's rubber likely to face major punishment from the challenging Turn 8 corner.

Vettel admitted the turn was 'awesome' - and a proper step into the unknown for drivers.

"It's an awesome corner, we try to take it flat year by year," he said. "It's fast and extremely bumpy, so you can hardly see where you're going - you turn in and hope for the best."