F1 2016 unplayably difficult -- What am I missing?

I've enjoyed previous CodeMasters racing games, and imagine I'm decent at them, but I get lapped every race even playing on Very Easy with the damage model reduced. I'm not missing corners; the other cars are simply much faster than mine. It doesn't help that my pit crew is nagging me to change my fuel mixture and there's no indication as to how to do this.

I wanted to like this game. It's certainly pretty, and I have every reason to believe that it's a realistic simulation with lots of options. I'm no stranger to putting in time to gain skill with a game, but the floor effect is so brutal here that there's no enjoyable sense of progress.

There are lots of gushing reviews on, e.g., Metacritic. Am I missing something or are these reviewers all just much more experienced racers?