Ferrari is considering introducing an engine upgrade at the US Grand Prix, but Sebastian Vettel's slim chances in the title race means it is not a straightforward decision.
Ferrari has introduced two performance upgrades to its engine this year but still has four performance tokens tokens left to spend. Both drivers have already used their maximum allocation of four power units for the season, meaning an upgrade would result in at least a 10-place grid penalty.
Team principal Maurizio Arrivabene says Vettel's position in the drivers' championship complicates the matter as he is now Lewis Hamilton's closest rival and needs to finish within nine points of the Mercedes driver in Austin to keep the title battle alive for another round. A grid penalty would most likely kill off his slim chances of challenging for the title and so Ferrari remains undecided on whether to introduce the upgrade.
"We are thinking about [an engine upgrade] and we will tell you in Austin what we are going to do," Arrivabene said. "Of course, the situation with Seb being second in the championship has changed things a bit, but we have to do our correlation and look at what we have at home before taking any final decision."
At the last round in Russia, Vettel went wheel to wheel with team-mate Kimi Raikkonen in a fight for position that nearly ended in a collision at Turn 2. Arrivabene said the Ferrari pit wall did not consider implementing team orders at the time, but may change its approach at future races.
"We were not considering the championship at that part of the race and they swapped the position by themselves so there was no need. The time may come, of course, where we will consider the situation differently, but in Russia there was no need."