Lewis Hamilton has endured a rather torrid start to the 2018 season - well, torrid by his standards.
Hamilton was forced to watch on as Vettel stole top spot in Australia before having to settle for third in Bahrain, as his German rival made it two out of two to seize the initiative in the early running.
Now, after just two races, Hamilton sits 17 points behind Vettel and has quite a task on his hands to overhaul the resurgent Ferrari number 1.
It seems now that Hamilton, who is used to getting off to a poor start and would normally be unphased by how Vettel has torn out of the blocks, is somewhat worried by what the Ferrari is producing on the track.
The Italian superpower wilted dreadfully in the second half of last season allowing Hamilton to surge to yet another championship, but it seems that the Brit feels they may just have what it takes to sustain their title march in 2018.
Speaking ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix this coming weekend, Hamilton expressed concern that Ferrari could be set to extend their early lead and outlined why the track in Shanghai could be ideally suited to the flying Vettel and his teammate Kimi Raikkonen.
“They are going to be hard to beat,” said the world champion.
“Their straight-line speed has been faster than ours and we have the longest straights here. So I anticipate they are going to be very fast.”
While Hamilton highlighted that the race for the title is only just beginning, he is also under no illusions that another Ferrari win would be very damaging to both his and his team’s pursuit of championship glory.
“The title is not won or lost in two races where you finish second and third,” he continued.
“I count those as relatively strong weekends.
“I know there will be potentially harder weekends to come but those two experiences just build strength. However, you definitely don’t want to fall any further behind than we have.”
Formula 1 has been yearning for someone to give Mercedes a proper go for years, and it looks like Ferrari may finally be set to do just that.
Shanghai awaits.