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  • Hamilton, Vettel, Ricciardo attend season’s first press meet

    Hamilton, Vettel, Ricciardo attend season’s first press meet

    Melbourne, 12 March 2020: The FIA official press Conference, the first of the season took place here on Thursday ahead of the scheduled Formula 1 race, the first round of the season. Daniel Ricciardo, Lewis Hamilton, Nicholas Latifi and Sebastian Vettel attended the press conference. The transcript is given below:

    PRESS CONFERENCE
    Q: Now, it’s been a complicated build-up to this first race of the season, so I’d like to start just by asking you about your preparations. Daniel, what have you been up to and why is it so difficult for an Australian at home. It seems that this race track, there’s not much love between Australian drivers and Albert Park?
    Daniel RICCIARDO: I guess there haven’t been many Australians, so like the statistics… It’s a game of percentages, right? But anyway, I hope this one is good. I feel like one year’s good, one year’s not, but I think I’m due a good one. I’ve been preparing, been preparing well. I don’t know how to sit; everyone’s trying to sit away from each other. We’ll get cosy. What have I been doing? I don’t know, just the usual. Since testing: back in Europe, bit of simulator stuff, and then I was home for a few days. It’s good to be here.

    Q: How about the motor – the new car? What did you learn about it in testing? Do you feel you can make a step forward from last year?
    DR: Yes, I do. I think the test ended well for us. Day three of week two was a lot more promising and both my feedback and Esteban’s, you could see our expression when we got out of the car, it was certainly a lot more optimistic, so that was encouraging. I just look back at last year, the whole build-up and everything. I was watching some onboards before and I don’t know, I can just see me from the outside and I’m like, “yeah, I’m a lot more comfortable in this car now”, so I’m looking forward to seeing what I can do.

    From Left: Daniel Ricciardo, Sebastial Vettel, Lewis Hamilton and Nicholas Latifi attend the first press conference of the season in Melbourne on Thrusday. An FIA image

    Q: It’s your 10th season in Formula 1?
    DR: Yeah, someone reminded me…
    Lewis HAMILTON: Jeez!
    DR: I know, kinda old, huh!

    Q: It’s your 14th, Lewis.
    DR: I’m still a baby. Thanks guys.

    Q: Let’s move on to the baby, Nicholas Latifi, your first grand prix this weekend. Just describe how you feel? An emotional moment, I guess?
    Nicholas LATIFI: Yeah, definitely very exciting. When I was first announced as the race driver last year this weekend seemed so far away. But day by day, going through all the winter preparations and everything, just kind of closing in on this weekend. Yeah, a lot of anticipation from myself and from the team as well, but yeah, really just happy and grateful to be here and just can’t wait to get the weekend underway.

    Q: And more nerves than last year when you were in Formula 2?
    NL: Right now, no, I would say there are not really any nerves at the moment. I’ve kind of said that from already starting winter testing as the official race driver, for me it just felt like a continuation of the work I was doing with the team last year. I was already really comfortable in the team environment. To be honest, all the stuff that made it feel a bit more like I was the race driver was all the external – all the media, the fan interactions, it’s just at so much more of a higher level. Right now everything is still calm. Maybe once I’m waiting on the grid and the lights are about to go out, that’s probably when I’m going to notice…

    Q: You make a reference to the work you were doing with Williams last year, you did six FP1 sessions, so you knew about last year’s car, you drove it. How much of a step forward is this year’s car?
    NL: It’s definitely a step forward. It’s difficult to quantify how much, because it’s always the same in winter testing, you never really know what people are doing with engine modes and fuel levels, but just from my first feeling in the car it was definitely much nicer to drive, giving the driver much more confidence to push and attack the corners, which is what you want. We’re going to see come Saturday where we are in the pecking order. We’re optimistic it definitely is a step forward but we’re just going to have to wait and see just how much.

    Q: Well, good luck with that. Sebastian, talking about differences from last year to this year. From the outside winter testing back in Europe looked a little bit inconclusive for Ferrari. What can you tell us about it?
    Sebastian VETTEL: I think testing is always inconclusive. You never know where you are and that’s the good thing about coming here and [we can] finally get going and racing. I think testing has, not a lot, but it does have its nice sides, aspects, but really racing is what it’s about, so as I said, it’s nice to come here and finally know where you are.

    Q: But like Nicholas and Daniel, can you say that this year’s car is a clear step forward?
    SV: It is but I think that’s probably true for everyone. That’s the idea of having a new car, obviously learning from the experiences of the year before, so I think it’s true to say that everybody had got a better car this year, but it always depends on where you are relative to the others. So I think our car is doing what we expected. It is a step forward, it feels better, but ultimately it matters where you are next to all the others.

    Q: Well, you’ve always gone well here at Albert Park, you’re going for victory number four this weekend. What is it about your relationship with this track? Why do you go so well here?
    SV: I don’t know. I don’t know anybody who doesn’t like the track. I think it’s a fun track and generally it feels like the right place to kick it off, great atmosphere. Maybe my biggest advantage is that I’m not Australian. And Lewis as well. I think Lewis has done really well here as well. No, because you opened up by saying that Australians haven’t done really well here!
    DR: The irony is my best year was the year you had an Australian, but then that got taken away.

    Q: 2014, the year you finished second for a bit.
    DR: Yeah. Anyway, I’m still bitter.
    SV: I don’t know; I was trying to joke. I know, I’m German, so it’s probably not what you expect. I think everybody just loves the track and that’s myself included. I think it has a nice flow to it, a nice rhythm. It’s good that they didn’t resurface much of the track, keeping some of the bumps, some of the nature of the track. I think it’s quite fast, considering it’s a semi-street circuit. Yeah, I like it.

    Q: Thank you. Lewis, coming to you, before we talk about track stuff, I just wanted to ask you about your detour on the way here to New South Wales. Tell us what you were doing up there and what you found?
    LH: Yeah, I got here on Monday morning and went straight from the airport in Sydney out to the Blue Mountains and got to see… Through the winter I was watching the news and seeing the devastation out here and how it was affecting people but more so than anything how many animals that perished. That, for me, was too big a number to even comprehend. I wanted to get out here before that but it just wasn’t possible and I was like ‘when I first get here I want to go and see it first-hand for myself’. So, I landed, took a two-hour drive up to the Blue Mountains and slowly started to see a lot of the burnt trees, the forest, as far as the eye can see. A really beautiful place. There was already regrowth, but I went to visit an organisation, Wires, that was helping during the whole period, whilst the animals were suffering, while the fires were going on, and they are helping rehabilitate some of the animals. It’s all just people living in local homes around the area who volunteer and so it was really quite amazing, they are the heroes. It felt amazing to see it for myself and see all the hard work that has been done and it meant a lot to them, the people that I met, that we took the time to go out.

    Q: Daniel, were you here in the height of summer when the bush fires were at their worst?
    DR: I was. I was home, but home for me is Perth, so west coast. We weren’t affected, nothing to the extent of the east. For me to be at home but to see the engagement from the whole world, from all over, that was really nice. It was affecting our country, my country, and to see the generosity from everyone, from all parts of the globe, that was a really good touch.

    Q: And Lewis, just on the on-track stuff, you completed more laps than anybody else in winter testing, how confident are you coming into this race?
    LH: I don’t really ever use the word confidence. I think we just worked as hard as we could. The runs went well or the days went well in Barcelona. We did leave with reliability issues, which I know the guys have been trying to move mountains over the past couple of weeks so we arrive in the best shape possible. So I truly believe in all the hard work we’ve done. We’re hoping we start off on the right foot. I think we arrive here with two less days of testing compared to last year. I think we’ve got quite a good grip on the car and we arrive as best prepared as we can be. As Seb was saying, it’s going to be interesting to see where we all stand, but that’s the exciting part of coming to your first grand prix.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Question to Lewis: with the winter testing, is there some driver and some car you may see as your main rival for your title?
    LH: Force India, maybe?
    DR, NL: Racing Point.
    LH: I don’t call it Racing Point, because I don’t like the name! I prefer Force India. No, I think it’s the same – Ferrari and Red Bull. I think Red Bull have been particularly strong so I don’t really know where they stand between them, but Red Bull were realty strong particularly at the end of last year. Obviously Ferrari have taken a little bit of a step, it seems they may have… they have definitely taken a bit of a step back power-wise, but maybe the car is better, so we’ll see tomorrow when we get in the car over the next couple of days how that plays into effect.

    Q: Sebastian, do you feel like you have taken a step back power-wise?
    SV: Well, we’ll see. I don’t know if others… I think we’ve focused on all areas and also on the engine in the winter and as I said we will find out this weekend, probably in qualifying conditions when everybody is trying to get to their maximum, and we finally see where we are, not just on power but also on the car.

    Q: (Alex Kalinauckas – Autosport) Lewis, regarding the Coronavirus situation, are you comfortable having travelled all the way to Australia and are you satisfied with what Formula One and the FIA have done so far regarding that situation?
    LH: I felt OK travelling out here. Naturally, being on a flight with God knows how many people and then stopping in an airport full of so many people, I didn’t really think too hard on it. I was just trying to make sure I was taking all the precautions I could in terms of not touching things and always using hand sanitizer. I am really very, very surprised that we’re here. I think motorsport is… I think it’s great that we have races but for me it’s shocking that we’re all sitting in this room. So many fans are already here today and it seems like the rest of the world is reacting probably a little bit late but already this morning you’re seeing, with Trump shutting down the borders from Europe to the States, you’re seeing the NBA’s been suspended, yet Formula 1 continues to go on. I don’t know: I saw Jackie Stewart this morning, you know, looking fit and healthy and well in the lift. Some people, as I walked into the paddock, some elderly individuals. It’s a concern, I think, for the people here. It’s quite a big circus that’s come here. So it’s definitely concerning for me. So, no, is your answer.

    Sebastian, anything you’d like to add?
    SV: Not really. I think it’s very difficult to have a fair judgement. Of course, you realise that a lot of sport, competitions, big events get postponed and cancelled and, like Lewis said, it’s fair to ask the question: why are you here? Obviously we have to trust the FIA and FOM to take precautions as much as they can, but I think the answer that nobody can give you at the moment is how much you can control what is going on. As a matter of fact, we are here. You just try to take care as much as you can.

    Daniel, while we’re on the topic, anything you’d like to say?
    DR: …

    Nicholas?
    NL: Nothing really more to add. I think the guys summed it up quite well, just taking all necessary precautions and following the advice of the professionals.

    Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) Lewis, just as a follow-up to that. We’ve seen several team members have gone into isolation because they’re been tested for the Coronavirus. If any of those results come back positive do you think that the race should be postponed or called off on Sunday?
    LH: It’s not for me to make that decision – but I heard that result’s not going to come back for five day or something. Coincidentally. So… yeah. Unlikely.

    Q: (Matt Dixon – The Times) Lewis, you’ve been outspoken where others have maybe not dared to be about Corona. What do you think is the reason this race is still going on? Obviously there are… well, is it business interests? Why are we still here?

    LH: Cash is king. Honestly I don’t know. I can’t really add much more too it. I don’t feel like I should shy away from the fact of my opinion. The fact is we are here and I just urge everyone to be as careful as you can be. Touching doors and surfaces, and I hope everyone’s got hand sanitisers. And, really for the fans, I really hope they’re taking precautions. I was walking through and seeing just everything going ahead as normal, like it’s a normal day – but it’s… I really don’t think it is. I just hope all the fans stay safe. I really hope we go through this weekend and we don’t see any fatalities, or things that come along in the future.

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Lewis, thank you for having the balls to say your piece there and speak out. Everyone else seems to be hiding behind ‘we trust the FIA’, which seems pretty mad. I want to know – this is all four drivers – how you would respond if the FIA, F1 decided to take the decision to suspend the first couple of races of the season, maybe start in Europe. How would you take that? Would that be welcome? Sensible? What’s your opinions?

    Let’s start with Daniel.
    DR: You really want me to talk? Honestly, from my side, I have to put my trust in the FIA and also, I think, we may all have opinions but at the end of the day I’m here to compete and race cars. I’m not really much more than that in this situation. There’s people who are spending more time investing in it than I am and I’m kind of just following guidelines. I came here knowing we were going to compete so, to be honest… I don’t want to say selfishly… but I’ve just got my head down, focused on the race and I’ve been training and preparing and obviously getting a bunch of emails with guidelines and this and that but I honestly haven’t spent too much time digging into details. There are certainly people around me doing that, so yeah, it’s a tough one. I know it’s real but, as maybe Seb touched on, I don’t know who knows really, at least in this room, we don’t really know the extent of it or how quickly it can spread, or what level it’s at. It’s kind of left to the others for now. It’s mixed. The racer in me is happy that I’m here, for sure.

    Sebastian, if the first couple of races were suspended, postponed… what would your reaction be?
    SV: Well, one way or the other, I think you expect and you hope that we take the right decision, or the sensible decision. So, if that’s the case then there’s probably reason for it. If it’s not the case then you rely on the fact that maybe there’s not enough reason for it. As I said, I don’t think I’m the one to judge, and I think, to be completely straight, we are probably in a lucky situation, as in, obviously we are exposed to people, and so on, but I think we can largely control our own situation. Obviously in the car we don’t even have a passenger. What I mean is, you try to control the situation for yourself first, as much as you can. That’s selfish but I think everybody in this regard is selfish. You see some people being more relaxed about handshakes, others less. Now some laugh it off, some take it very serious. I think, as I said before, my stand on it is that it’s very difficult at the moment to really categorise and say that it is great, I don’t know, serious, or not serious – but that’s why you have to ultimately put yourself into other people’s hands and trust them. I think we all did getting down here. The flights weren’t cancelled, we were all allowed to travel, so we trusted whoever we flew with. We are sitting in this room. Within that, I think that you are within your own bubble and you try to control it as much as you can. I think that’s valid for us sitting here on the couch, that’s valid for people sitting opposite us and it’s valid for people outside and around the globe. I think it’s probably right to take care and take precaution. How much is necessary, and who’s responsible and whatever other questions, I think there are a lot of questions at the moment that are very difficult to answer.

    Nicholas?
    NL: Obviously for me, it being my first race in Formula One, it definitely is a bit of a strange feeling to have it all starting like this but, again, me, nor any of us are qualified to really make that decision on if the race goes ahead or not. I mean, if the coming races, including this one, don’t end up going ahead, then just have a bit of a holiday I guess. There’s not really much more influence that I’m going to have on the decision. And, again, just following the advice of the professionals really.

    And the debut would have to wait…
    NL: yeah.

    Q: (Giles Richards – The Guardian) To all drivers. We now understand that at least four team members have been tested for the Coronavirus and up to eight. Now, if one of these comes back with a positive result, given how close-knit, and how closely everyone works together in the paddock, is it not of concern to you that it will probably suggest that the Coronavirus has taken hold in the paddock already?
    SV: I don’t know. How can you answer that? You can’t. You don’t know. Maybe yes – and I think as far as, and I’m not an expert, but as far as I understand, some people will have it and you don’t see anything. They show no symptoms. You might have it.  Sorry, but who knows. Maybe to some degree you never know and to another degree you will. So, I think the precaution obviously, as far as I understood, that these people got checked. I don’t know how long it takes, if it takes five days or shorter, I have no idea. I think you will probably have to cross that bridge when it comes to it. Then, there’s always an argument that we should have seen this before, we shouldn’t… I think we are all here happy in a way to race because we all love racing. We want to race – but you can’t ignore the fact that something is going on and you have to be aware of the situation – but answering these questions, I think nobody can.

    Q: (Craig Slater – Sky Sports) Sebastian, the FIA have had this inquiry into your power unit. They haven’t found the team guilty of any specific wrong-doing. Are you disappointed then that they didn’t clear the team, could this have been handled better in terms of what’s been said in public? And to Lewis: it’s been a friendly rivalry between Mercedes and Ferrari; are the gloves off now?
    SV: I took the gloves out once to Lewis and it wasn’t the right thing to do so I said it afterwards. Remember Baku!
    DR: Well done Baku.
    SV: Everyone remembers that race so… who won the race? Anyways, what was the question, sorry?

    Q: (Craig Slater – Sky Sports) That the team wasn’t cleared, Sebastian, given that they couldn’t find a specific illegality with the engine.
    SV: Um, well, I don’t know. As far as I understand it was cleared so I think… For me it’s very simple. Obviously I trust my team to do the right things, within the regulations, at all time. I think we all trust, all drivers, the governing body as in the FIA, to do their job for all teams on the grid. I think that’s probably the answer, so there’s not much else to add. If you have further detailed questions and so on, then I’m not the one to answer because I think the cars are quite complex now so probably I’m not the best person to give you enough insight. I think the other one, that I would like to add, which I think from your second question, I can smell might be a hint, is that for me it doesn’t change anything in terms of the relationship that I have with other drivers and in this particular (instance) with Lewis. I think the respect that we share we’ve grown over the years is untouched and I don’t think is at threat.
    LH: What was the question?

    Q: Are the gloves off?
    LH: Well, no.  Firstly I think I repeat what Seb has just said. Between us our respect has continued to grow over the years and that doesn’t change. I think that what goes on in the background between teams and the governing body, I think is a separate issue. I think it could have been handled better, for sure but again, that’s really something that should be directed to Toto. I think for us athletes, us drivers, we just want to arrive at the races. Naturally all the teams are different in their performance but you want to feel that you’re playing on fair grounds. That’s the approach that we have and I think… I don’t really know. I won’t add too much more to it because it will just cause more trouble.

    Q: (Roger Barne – Beyond the Racing Line) There’s a bit of talk about having some changes to the track in the next couple of years here in Melbourne. What’s the drivers take on what would you like to see at Albert Park track changed in the next couple of years? Nothing, Seb?
    SV: I haven’t heard anything.

    Q: (Roger Barne – Beyond the Racing Line) Possibly resurfacing, widening the track, possibly going on at 12 to lengthen that end to add another straight?
    DR: I’m aware of some of it so I guess I can talk on it a bit. As a driver, I think as Seb touched on earlier, we do enjoy this track. I don’t know any driver that doesn’t. It’s fast and flowing. In a way, it’s a bit like Monaco, like it’s a pleasure to drive by yourself but for overtaking come Sunday it’s not always the best track on the calendar. I think the overtaking average is certainly one of the lowest. We were asked our opinion –  I guess a few of us – if we thought the track could do with some changes and yeah, we were told there were some areas on the track they could widen or try and change the angle of the corner, to try and open it up and create maybe bigger braking zones or basically more chances for overtaking. I think this is what is trying to be achieved. So I’m definitely for that because we’ve also driven this layout for a while so with a few corners changed then if it did make the show on Sunday better I think we would all be OK with that.
    LH: Yeah, no, I agree with what Daniel said. I think it’s firstly, this is a fantastic place to come to every year, I think the best opening race in a country that probably Formula One’s ever had. It’s such an exciting place to come to and the track is fantastic but probably a bit like Monaco, a little bit more so on a single lap for us in qualifying, but in the race I think it’s the third or fourth most difficult track to overtake on so if they were to make some modifications, make it longer, particularly right now when we’re getting faster and faster, you’re probably going to see less overtaking I would imagine, potentially this year also being that we have more downforce, more drag which affects the car further behind even more so. So yeah, I’m definitely for them adding some really cool modifications. I just hope that we do stay, keep the race here. I don’t really know what they would have to do to the actual current layout; just extending that’s going to make a big difference. I don’t know the answer to that but I’m all for it.
    SV: I haven’t seen any suggestions. In a way it would be sad to change. I get the point but I don’t know, obviously next year it’s supposed to change a lot in terms of racing, so maybe it’s wise to wait for that before you rebuild the whole track, might also be the cheaper option, let us spend the money on the cars before you spend the money on the track. I think it’s probably best to wait and see what happens next year and then we’ll see. If they make the track even nicer then go ahead but usually with those things they end up doing it not so nice.
    Q: Nicholas, how was your track walk yesterday?
    NL: Yeah, I was going to say, I can’t really comment so much on that because I haven’t driven it. We have been around the track four times already; I did come out quite early. It looks like a great track to drive; I’ve heard many great things about it. I ran twice. I came on Saturday; I was here quite early. Yeah, walked it twice. I’m just going to have to wait and see.

    Q: (Inga Strake – Pole Position Reports) Lewis, your team press release said that at the beginning of the season you feel really fit, probably fitter or more ready than before. How much is that is down toward what you’ve been posting over the winter, your vegan nutrition and what did the change in nutrition mean for you? And is it more about food and eating, what you take in or also about sustainability and environment?
    LH: I think my health has just got better and better over the last couple of years as I’ve gone to the plant-based diet. It is not the easiest thing to straight away go to and you’re constantly learning about the foods and discovering more foods… things that you probably would never… no, things that I would have never really eaten before, to give you some variability. I focused on having consistent good solid meals; I had a chef during the winter so that was really why it was particularly a better period of time for me but I do feel a large part of the reason I have gone that way is because of the environment and for the animals. It’s a little bit difficult, sitting up here, because I know not all of us do… you know, vegan, not everyone continues but not for me, I’ve definitely felt the benefits from that on the health side of things and physically, it’s just enabled me to… you know people do think you’re going to lose muscle if you don’t have your protein, that’s… a lot of the time people say I need my protein but it’s absolute rubbish. You just need to do some reading on line. I’ve managed to… last year I bulked up, I put a lot more weight on. This winter I trimmed down, like cut but have more muscle and I’m able to lift more weight than I’ve ever done before and I haven’t been able to run further than I’ve ever been able to run before. That’s just enabled me to train better. But you’ve seen it in other sports, other sportsmen and women around the world are trying these things. Serena (Williams) has been working on it, Djokovic, you’ve got a bunch of people out there that are doing it. I think it’s a positive and important way to go for us all. I think there are lots of areas that need to… not just in food but there’s a lot of things that we all need to do better moving forward but one step at a time.
    Q: Have you ever tried a 40-hour fast, Lewis?
    LH: Why would you do that?
    DR: Why do you ask? He asked me in Abu Dhabi. What was my answer? I was bored, wasn’t I?
    Q: You said you’d done a 40-hour fast.
    DR: Yeah, so a bit of experimenting so I guess on the diet stuff so, lot of vegan stuff now you hear and fasting comes in. I guess I’ve stayed open-minded through it all so yeah, I tried a little bit of fasting over the last few years but yeah, I’m not going to go on a spiel and say I did it because of this reason, that reason. I just… a few people did it and said it was quite good so I thought I’d try it. Did you do it?

    Q: (Jon McEvoy – Daily Mail) Just to go back, obviously a serious subject, the coronavirus, would there be any circumstances if there were more incidence of people getting ill or, God forbid, someone involved in the sport, died, at which you guys would say we’d rather not race? You say we’re already here which we obviously are but there will be 100,000 in on Sunday and the day before and that could be alleviated if there were no race. Would any of you consider lobbying to go down that route?
    SV: My stand, and I think I probably… I hope others would agree, we hope it doesn’t get that far. If it were to get that far then for sure you pull the handbrake and I think we are a group of 20 guys and I think we’ve got together over the last years for various circumstances on various topics and I think we share common opinion on big decisions and that, I would qualify, is a very, very big decision and ultimately, as I said before, you look at yourself and we would, I think, be mature enough to look after ourselves and pull the handbrake in that case.

    Ends

  • Winning here is a perfect way to end the season, says Lewis Hamilton

    Yas Marina, 1 DEc 2019: Lewis Hamilton, the race winner and the two drivers who finished on the podium Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing) and Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) attended the FIA post-race Press Conference on Sunday.

    TRACK INTERVIEWS (Conducted by David Coulthard)
    Q: Lewis Hamilton, congratulations, your 11th victory of the season and that looked one of your most dominant. You must be very proud?
    Lewis HAMILTON: Honestly, I’m proud definitely but I’m just super grateful for this incredible team. To all at Mercedes, who have continued to push this year… who would have thought that at the end of the year we would have this strength in the race and even though we had the championships won we just really wanted to keep our heads down and try to see if we could learn and if we could extend and if we could extract more from this beautiful car that they’ve worked [on]. It’s a piece of art. And I’m also so grateful to team LH. I travel around the world to 21 different countries, probably even more, and I get to see people who continuously inspire me and send me messages and lift me up. So I want to send a big thank you to everyone that’s here, everyone that’s back home. Thank you for watching, thank you for supporting. I feel so happy with today, man.

    Q: Now it has been a great season and I know you’re in that moment, but you’ve got on the podium two young guys, two young chargers. They’ve thrown some big races at you this year, but this is a great way for you to end the season, with such a dominant victory. These guys have still got a lot of work to do?
    LH: These guys, there are a lot of youngsters coming through. If you look at the grid, for example, from second to like seventh or eighth was all super youngsters, so I’m really proud to be in a period of time where there are such great youngsters coming through. These guys have been doing a phenomenal job and I really privileged to be in the period of time where they’re here and I’m looking forward to hopefully more close battles with us in the future, so I hope it gets close for us next year.

    Q: Just before I move on, what have you got planned for the winter?
    LH: Oh, just family time, man.

    Q: Enjoy your family time. Max Verstappen, it’s been a pretty good season for you – three victories, third in the Drivers’ Championship. Today that was the best you could hope for. You had some issues though didn’t you? We heard you on the radio; you were having to manage some issues.
    Max VERSTAPPEN: Yeah, a few little things. At the end of the day it wouldn’t have made a difference in terms of position. Yeah, we had to do a bit of a different strategy to Ferrari of course, they pitted quite early and we went long, because they overtook us on the first lap. After that our pace was quite decent, just Mercedes and Lewis today, they were just a bit too quick. As a whole I think it’s been a positive season and of course to be P3 in the championship is a nice ending.

    Q: Lewis said he’s going to be spending family time in the winter but I guess you’ve got your sights on the world championship, so you’ll be at the factory, you’ll be on the simulator, you’ll be working hard?
    MV: I think we are all working hard but it’s also good to take some time off, be with family and friend and be fully recharged for next year and come back stronger.

    Q: Congratulations. We’ve got Charles and Lewis sharing notes here. What are you discussing? They way the race played out?
    Charles LECLERC: Yeah, just overall how quick he was during the race. With the hard I think he did a 39.2, so yeah, I was just saying congratulations to him.

    Q: Now, third place; it’s another podium. It’s been a great year, first year for you at Ferrari. I know you guys all want to win but you have to be satisfied. You are the first team-mate to have finished in front of Sebastian in the world championship in his time at Ferrari, so it’s been very positive for you.
    CL: Yeah, I’m extremely about this year. I’ve learned a huge amount thanks to Seb. Yeah, it’s been a great year. For me a realisation of a dream since childhood. I’ve always dreamed to be in Formula 1 but especially with Ferrari. To be now with this team is unbelievable and now it’s up to me to work, to get better, and hopefully give them the success they deserve.
    PRESS CONFERENCE
    Q: Lewis, many congratulations, as emphatic a victory as we have seen from you, and in your 250th race as well?
    LH: Jeez! That’s a lot of races.
    MV: You didn’t celebrate that – 250? No pit board? Two-hundred-and-fifty grands prix, they didn’t celebrate that for you? You didn’t care.
    LH: No!
    MV: Three hundred? Three-fifty?
    LH: No, I don’t want to reminded of the age! No, what an incredible year it has been. What an incredible stretch it’s been with this team. Yeah, after winning the Constructors’ and the Drivers’ Championship I think it was really important for us as a team to continue to push. You know, we hadn’t got absolutely everything from the overall perfect package. So we were just trying to push the limits and push the boundaries and yeah, I think this is the perfect way to end the season, on the right foot. I think it was a great weekend in the sense that there was a Ferrari and a Red Bull and a Mercedes in the top three, obviously in the finishing order but also on the grid, and then a lot of young drivers behind me, making me feel young, which is great. I’m really just grateful to my team who have continued to push all year long and just have never lost sight of the objective. We’ve all had a common goal and inspired each other to continue to push and strive for perfection. So, incredibly grateful to everyone and I hope that everyone at Mercedes and our partners. I’m sure they are pretty happy.

    Q: Were you surprised by your dominance today, because you were 13 seconds ahead of Max after 20 laps?
    LH: Yeah, I definitely wasn’t expecting to haver the pace advantage to that extent. Our long run pace was quite good and I was told that we might be a tenth or two ahead but then in the race we had a bit more of an advantage in that respect. And once I got out in the clear I was able to manage my pace pretty well in that first stint and manage the tyres. I just had to go as long, basically, as Max was going. Then we got onto that next set of tyres and for this track the tyre was good. The hard tyres is quite resilient to any abrasion and that. It goes a long, long way. I think it can do the whole race stint. I think towards the end of the race I was like ‘I want to have some… I’ve got to push and see if I can extract any more performance from the car’. I do wish that we had some battles. I saw on TV you guys battling…
    MV: You could have slowed down!
    LH: You guys are too quick on the straights.
    MV: Just give it a chance.
    LH: I’m sure we are going to have some great races. We had some great races this year, Max and I, so congratulations to them for continuing to rise and I’m excited to be amongst those guys and fight with them next year.

    Q: Max, your second consecutive podium here in Abu Dhabi and your ninth podium finish of the season. You didn’t seem happy with the car after your pit stop. Can you just talk us through what the problems were?
    MV: Yeah, I just had some torque holes on throttle. There were delays and stuff, so it was not great, and we couldn’t fix it, so we drove around the problem. At the end of the day, it wouldn’t have made a difference in terms of the result.

    Q: What does a torque hole mean? In the olden days would we have been talking about a misfire?
    MV: No, just when I go on throttle it’s not doing what I want.

    Q: Did it cost you lap time?
    MV: It did cost me lap-time – but like I said, it wouldn’t have given me the win today.

    Q: Apart from that, race was fine?
    MV: Yeah, race was fine. Little bit of a shame about the first lap but then I think we had a good first stint, to go long and yeah, I think once we then put the hard tyres on, the pace was decent. I could get by Charles and then I could just do my own race. I mean, Lewis was too quick, so I was just focussing on my own race and lap-times.

    Q: And you’ve sealed third in the Championship today. Just how will you reflect on 2019?
    MV: Yeah, pretty good. Few victories, poles, so that’s pretty good. I think we improved quite a bit throughout the season. Also, from Honda side. Of course, very happy about that. Now we just need to keep that momentum into the winter break as well and try to improve the car even further, together with the engine and be there from the first race, not from the middle of the season or towards the end. But we know that, so we are working on it.

    Q: Charles, it was pretty tight with Valtteri in those closing laps. How worried were you?
    CL: Well, Valtteri was very quick towards the end of the race, so yeah, I was pretty worried at one point when he started to catch and I was starting to struggle a little bit – but then, in the last four or five laps, I think he came back a little bit slower: I think he slowed down too, so then I was a bit more hopeful and then I had some traffic, so it was very close towards the end. But yeah, it was a bit of a strange race because in the first stint I was very hopeful, I was behind Lewis. OK, we weren’t as quick as Lewis but I still thought the pace was there – but then we tried to pit pretty early to try to force them to stop early but yeah, then basically I understood I would see Lewis at the end of the race because we were just not quick enough and we never put a challenge to them in front. Yeah, it’s like this. We weren’t quick enough – but overall, I think during the season it’s been more or less the same picture when qualifying, we manage more or less to be there but then in the race we seem to struggle. So we need to work on that for 2020.

    Q: So you were trying to force Mercedes into making another pit stop. How early in the race – if indeed you did – were you regretting that two-stop strategy?
    CL: I was not. Because it was pretty clear for me that to get this third place, if I wanted it, it was all about winning because Max was still in the race, so we had to do something. I didn’t want to stay there and that’s it. So, I just tried but to be honest with not much hope but yeah, at least we tried.

    Q: And Charles, final thoughts. Are you worried about the fuel discrepancy that was discovered by the FIA prior to the race?
    CL: To be honest, I’ve got no idea and no details whatsoever of what’s going on, for now. So, yeah. I’ll speak to the team to understand that better.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Jake Boxall-Legge – Autosport) Question for Max. We’ve heard you over the year discussing over the year that you’ve had a little bit of lag sensitivity with the car. It doesn’t always respond to your throttle inputs. Is the problem today related to that – and how did it feel from your perspective in the car?
    MV: Most of the time it’s fine-tuning. Today, I’m not sure yet what happened exactly, because they didn’t want to tell me on the radio, they just said there was nothing they could do from their side, so then it also doesn’t matter what it is, so I’ll have to find out.

    Q: (Giovanni Messi – NewsF1.it) Max, do you think Red Bull is now in front of Ferrari and ready to catch Mercedes next year for a World Championship? And for Charles, I want to ask your opinion about the strategy today: why did you stop so early in the first laps?
    MV: I think it’s pretty close. It just depends a little bit on the track layout but I think from our side, throughout the season, we made good improvements so we could actually take the fight a bit more forward and win a few races and yet for next year there is still a lot of work to do of course, to catch up to Mercedes. At the end of the day, they were the dominant team over the year, or at least, the most consistent. Yeah, we will of course try everything to close that gap but of course it’s not going to be easy.
    CL: No. At the end, as I said, to be third in the championship we had to win the race, considering where Max was in the race so we gave it all for that and yeah, I just didn’t want to stay there in second place and follow the others’ strategy because it made no sense so we went for a gamble, it didn’t pay off but it’s OK.

    Q: (Christian Menath – motorsportmagazin.com) Lewis, yesterday you said you had to re-centre a bit after Friday. You were a bit behind Valtteri, I don’t know if it was because of the engine, he had a fresh engine, but can you explain how you re-centre yourself? Is that something driving-wise you look completely differently into or is it more personal?
    LH: It’s really just about… I don’t know, on Friday, I just had a bit of… I guess, maybe it was slightly erratic, just the balance of…sometimes you over-drive, you under-drive, just not comfortable with the balance of the car and not reacting, there wasn’t synergy between myself and the car. But I would say more so perhaps from my personal side so I don’t know, it’s just about stepping back, taking a breather and kind of realigning your focus, realising what you need to do. As I said, get your heart under control and came back the next day, there was nothing erratic, smooth, calm and collected, so I had my own ways of doing that naturally but I think it’s just the experience over the years, understanding on some days, emotions are heightened and other days it’s more mellow and that was just one of those days.

    Q: (Lawrence Edmonson – ESPN) Lewis, I don’t know if you’re aware but there’s been a lot of talk this weekend about you potentially going to Ferrari in 2021. I may as well ask a straight question: is it a consideration and have you met with Ferrari’s president John Elkann?
    LH: Well, naturally everything that happens behind closed doors is obviously always private with whoever it is you end up sitting with but I think for many, many years I’ve never ever sat down and considered other options, because we’ve been on a… just driving straight ahead into the path that we’ve been on and the journey that we’ve been on and to be honest, I still think we’re on that path and I think there’s very little that’s going to shift it from that but I think there’s no harm in… I know Toto is also looking at his options in terms of his future and only he will know what is the best thing for him and his family. So I’m waiting to see what he’s doing with that. I love where I am so it’s definitely not a quick decision to do something else, but of course I think it’s only smart and wise for me to sit and think of what I want… if it is the last period or stage in my career. Actually I want to keep winning so I think that’s… I want to keep being able to fight with these guys as well. I can’t really tell you what else is going to happen moving forwards.

    Q: Charles, can I just throw that to you as well. If you’re still wearing red in 2021, would you welcome Lewis as a team-mate?
    CL: Well of course. At the end, we are in Formula One and we want to fight against the best. I’ve had a big opportunity this year to have Seb next to me who is a four time World Champion and I’ve learned a lot from him and you can always learn from this type of champion so yeah, of course.

    Ends

  • I get a lot of lover here in Abu Dhabi, says Lewis Hamilton after taking pole

    I get a lot of lover here in Abu Dhabi, says Lewis Hamilton after taking pole

    Hamilton, centre, at the Saturday Press Conference after taking Abu Dhabi pole. An FIA image

    DRIVERS

    1 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
    2 – Valtteri BOTTAS (Mercedes)
    3 – Max VERSTAPPEN (Red Bull Racing)

    TRACK INTERVIEWS
    (Conducted by Paul Di Resta)

    Q: Lewis you can see it’s a pretty good reaction you’ve got. I guess it’s the best way you could sign off this season on a Saturday – pole position, the first time since Germany as well.
    Lewis HAMILTON: Yeah, it’s been such a long slog trying to get this pole position in, but we just kept our heads down and just continuing to try… the guys have been doing a great job around me, the other drivers, so it was really just trying to focus on continuing to do my job. Yesterday was quite wobbly, so I had to really recompose myself last night and come back today focused and managed to really dial in the car with great work from the engineers, mechanics continuing to do a great job and yeah, what a crowd. Every time I come here I seem to get a lot of love here in Abu Dhabi, and also there are a lot of Brits here as well, so a big thank you to everyone.

    Q: And how nice is it to get a car that you fully focus on? It’s looked in shape all weekend and I think that’s credit to the team. You do never give up do you?
    LH: We never give up. There’s always room to improve. There has been a lot of growth in this whole year, I think for so many people within the team. I can obviously speak for myself, there’s been a lot of growth but also these last couple of races there’s been a lot of growth, from a driver’s perspective, and just constantly looking for those small milliseconds. You know, Valtteri 2.0 has been rapid also this weekend, so I’m glad that we’re in this position. Of course to end the qualifying season with a pole, which has been a while, you know we’ve only had four earlier on this year, so… It’s been a special car and it’s the last time I’ll get to qualify with it so I’m glad I did it proud today.

    Q: And Max is obviously lining up alongside you; continue on that battle that you had in Brazil that kept us on the edge of our seat?
    LH: Absolutely, yeah. I think we’re in a slightly better position this weekend. Obviously, Max is continuing to drive well, but I’m looking forward to battling with him for sure.

    Q: Valtteri, it’s a front row but at the same time you obviously take a grid penalty. I guess nice to be out there and show what Mercedes are capable of but just feel short at the end?
    Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah, as a team it’s been a really strong day and we saw yesterday in the qualifying [simulations] that we have a good pace. Didn’t feel quite as good today as it did yesterday with my car, struggling a bit more with sliding, but I think Lewis made some good improvements since yesterday and he put some good laps together in the qualifying, so he was quicker. In any case, I’m going to start last with my 40-place grid penalty or whatever, so we’ll find the fighting spirit for tomorrow.

    Q: Surely you must relish that challenge. You’re going to be a nuisance in some people’s mirrors, and you’ll be pushing all the way, you got a little bit of insight yesterday, do you believe that you can come through and get on the podium?
    VB: I believe. Anything is possible. We do have a good car and normally Sunday is better than Saturday for us so we’ll give it all I have for sure.

    Q: Max, front row start. I know you just came short today, it wasn’t quite there at the end, Mercedes have looked supreme, but a good start and you’re already in the battle with this guy that you were battling with in Brazil.
    Max VERSTAPPEN: Yeah, I think today was the best that we could do. I think we all know that. Mercedes is quite dominant here. We tried everything we could. I think overall pretty happy. Still good to start on the front row. Of course I would have like to actually qualify there. I think still a lot of chances for tomorrow, so we’ll see what happens.

    Q: How did the car feel yesterday on the long runs? Do you think you are competitive enough to race them?
    MV: From our side it felt alright, but we always know that Mercedes are very quick on the long runs. We’ll just wait and see what happens tomorrow.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Lewis, an emphatic performance by you, the car seemed to be performing well, how good was the lap?
    LH: Thank you. It definitely was a very good qualifying session for us. It’s not been the easiest in terms of qualifying for us throughout the year. It’s been something we’ve just been chipping away at. Considering we’re not developing the car currently I think we just really tried to see what we could pull out of the car this weekend and it’s well suit to the track and it’s been feeling good. Yesterday was a little bit difficult. I had to re-centre myself for today. Yeah, I think the best thing is when you get to Q3 and you pull out two good laps. I think my first lap it felt special and then the second one obviously was an improvement, so I can’t complain. Just a big thank you to all the team for their continued efforts and even though we have both titles won they continue to push and strive for better and that’s inspiring for me, so I’ve been doing the same thing.

    Q: It’s been a while for you, since the German GP your last pole. How much satisfaction does this give you?
    LH: Yeah, of course. It feels longer than the German Grand Prix. If I’m really honest I don’t even understand how I got the German Grand Prix pole. But yeah, it’s been really hard, particularly since we have come back from the break. The competition has been spectacular; all drivers have been doing an amazing job. I don’t think my qualifying has been terrible but it’s just not been at my usual standard perhaps, so of course it’s incredibly satisfying to know that we have put the work and to end my last qualifying session with this car, which has been a real incredible journey with this car this year, so to finish it off on the front row, there’s not a better feeling really. Obviously that’s not even half the job done. Tomorrow we’ve got to battle with the Ferraris and the Red Bulls but I think we put ourselves in the best position possible so incredibly happy. Honestly, it’s really strange, you say it’s 88 [poles] but it honestly feels like the first, I don’t know why. It feels super-fresh. Maybe because it’s been so long since earlier on in the season and I’m glad to finish on five poles in the year.

    Q: Valtteri, great lap. The car seemed to improve as the session went on.
    VB: Yeah, the lap was OK. I think still it felt like Lewis was a bit too quick and I think we were slightly different with set-up as well by the end of the qualifying. Honestly, I felt a bit more comfortable yesterday with the car overall. But obviously for me, anything I was trying to keep in my mind was for the race because, in any case, whatever happens today I knew I’m going to be starting last with my, I don’t know how many place, grid penalty, 40, or something. So, I mean, I tried, obviously, as hard as I could. In Q2 I did only one run to save a new tyre set for the race, one set of Softs, if needed. But yeah, Lewis did a very good job, so congrats for the 88th – it’s a big number. Massive respect for that. But yeah, I’m just really already looking forward for tomorrow, because it is going to be compromised.

    Q: Valtteri, what is the plan for tomorrow. Can you plan your race, or are you going to have to react to what’s going on around you?
    VB: For sure, we’ve tried to make a plan and the whole weekend, trying to optimise for the race because, like I said, qualifying result doesn’t really matter for me today. So, everything we’ve done with the tyre choices, and everything we’ve tried to optimise that. We’ve had many ideas for the strategy, and obviously it’s going to be a challenge, coming up from there – but I do look forward to it. I’m sure it can be fun trying to come up.

    Q: Final thought Valtteri. How are you feeling? You’re not sounding great.
    VB: Feeling better already than a couple of days ago. I’ve been quite ill this week, I think since Monday night, so when I travelled here it got worse – but in the car it doesn’t matter. The adrenaline kicks in and you feel normal.

    Q: Max, at one stage during the session you reported suspension trouble. Was there any problem with the car?
    MV: No, it was just to check. Because I hit one of the orange inside – the high ones. So they would have a look at it, not that it would catch us by surprise, or anything.

    Q: And just tell us about your Q3 session. How good was the lap? How was the car performing?
    MV: I think the lap was really decent. There was not much I could do better, I think. I mean, there is never a perfect lap. It was good. I mean, I was just driving to the limits. We just seemed to lack a bit of grip, compared to them. Especially, they are very quick in the last sector. And there are a lot of off-camber corners. They are always very dominant here on this track, and we tried to be as close as we could and unfortunately we were just lacking a bit too much in that last sector. But overall, I think I’m pretty pleased. To be third in qualifying, second on the grid. Of course, I would have preferred to be there on pure pace but for us I think it was a pretty positive weekend.

    Podium here last year. Do you fancy your chances of getting on the top step tomorrow?
    MV: I guess you will always try but you also have to be realistic and I think Mercedes is very quick – but we’ll give it everything we have, tomorrow in the race.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Lewis, you said that it felt like it’d been longer that Germany since you were on pole. Just wondered if it’s a weight off in any way? If it’s something you’ve thought about through the season, or is it a case of you get the pole now and only then you realise, ‘damn, it’s been however many races’?
    LH: No, there wasn’t a worry through the season. Of course, I’m well aware that you can’t win them all. I’ve been extremely fortunate and done a relatively decent job over the years – but yeah, I think just with understanding the car and ultimately just squeezing out the best: not over-driving; not under-driving; trying to find the right balance throughout the year. And plus, obviously we’ve had some great opposition. Opponents that are doing a great job – but yeah, I think Austin was probably the last time the car was able to be on the front row, which Valtteri did but I just wasn’t there, so it’s frustrating when you miss those sessions. I think it was the same in Japan. But, it’s great, as I said, these last two races particularly, I’ve done a lot of experimenting. With my driving style and with the car. Just trying to see if I can eke out a little bit more. And I think I’m closer to it. Not 100 per cent but I’ll apply what I’m like this year into next.

    Q: (Christian Menath – motorsport-magazin.com) Question for you Max. You said you have to be realistic tomorrow. So, you’re starting on the Medium tyre. The gap on the Medium seemed to be a bit bigger than on the soft to Mercedes. It’s probably going to be a one-stop race. The track is not fantastic for overtaking. Do you see any chance of getting first tomorrow?
    MV: Sounds positive! No, my lap was not fantastic on the Medium. In Q3 it was almost half a second and on the Medium it was sixth-tenths. So, its not a big deal. It’s going to be hard. I’m not going to lie but like I said, we’ll try everything we can as a team and we’ll see where we end up.

    Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Valtteri, with this car in this circuit, is it possible to be in the top three tomorrow as well?
    VB: Everything is always possible. There’s no point for me to set any limit really for tomorrow. So for sure, we’ll have a good fighting spirit. Take every opportunity there will be tomorrow and for sure there will be some. We’ve seen crazy races this year – look back two weeks in Brazil. So anything is possible. Look forward to coming up and taking those opportunities and most important having fun in the car.

    Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) Lewis, yesterday Mattia Binotto said that you were an outstanding driver and the fact that you might be available in 2021 to sign can only make him happy, so just your reaction to that, and whether that might give you something to think about over the winter?
    LH: Well, this is the first time I’ve heard of that. I think that’s the first compliment I’ve had from Ferrari in these thirteen years.
    MV: It’s because you’re beating them.
    LH: I honestly don’t remember them ever mentioning me ever so thank you, I’ll take it, doesn’t really mean anything, it’s all talk but yeah, it’s nice that finally… it’s taken all these years for him to recognise maybe but I’m grateful.

    Q: (Andreas Haupt – Auto, Moto und Sport) Lewis and Max, from what you’ve seen so far this weekend, do you see Ferrari as a potential threat or are they just too weak here this weekend and is it all between you tomorrow?
    LH: Yeah, I think their long run was good, huh? I think their long run was strong. I don’t actually know where they are.
    MV: Charles will start third.
    LH: His Q2 run was good on the mediums, wasn’t it, so they’ve obviously got pace. I think it’s going to be close between us all. Not to be negative, but I just wonder if… this track is awesome and this event is awesome but I wonder if it’s time they did a subtle adjustment to it to make it a bit easier for us to overtake, maybe. I don’t know. It’s a hard place for us to follow. We’ve got these great long straights which are good.
    MV: Yeah, the atmosphere is great…
    LH: I don’t know what they have to change but…
    MV: Less off-camber corners.
    LH: Yeah, maybe. Banked corners would be good.
    MV: Yeah.
    Q: Your thoughts on Ferrari, Max. Leclerc fastest in Q2 on the medium tyre?
    MV: Yeah, of course he also went for a second go at it but yeah, they will be there. I don’t worry about it too much, you just find out during the race. Go to bed, sleep well and have fun tomorrow.

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Just following up on Phil’s question to Lewis: it’s all very nice,  compliments, but are they wasting their time being nice to you? Are you going to turn them down or are you listening to anything that they have to say, positive, negative? Would you be interested in talking to them about your future with regards to Ferrari?
    LH: No, it’s positive. What was the first part, sorry? I think it’s never a waste of time to ever being nice to someone. As I said, it has been a long, long time and a team that I’ve always appreciated over the years, so to earn their respect from someone from there who’s obviously very high up is obviously not a bad thing. I think they’ve got two great drivers as is so who knows what the driver market’s going to be doing over the next year. But if I’m really honest, I’m not really focused on that right this second: trying to make sure I finish off strong. I’ve got this incredible group of people who hire me where I am and I feel like I just continue to owe it to them to give my heart to them and my energy 100 per cent to them, particularly as I’m still in contract and negotiations haven’t started yet. I honestly don’t know how the next phase of the months is going to go when it comes to contract. It’s very odd that you have to do it almost a year before it ends and it can’t be done towards the end but that’s just the way it goes but we shall see.

    Q: (Beatrice Zamuner – Motorlat) Fernando Alonso earlier said that he’s going to keep the door open for 2021, so what would your reaction be to a comeback of a driver of his calibre?
    LH: I’d be more just happy that I won’t be the oldest here! So welcome an older dude, he can come along. Fernando’s obviously a well-accomplished driver. It’s interesting to see in the past, obviously, with drivers wanting to come back, like Michael, and it’s something you’ve done your whole life so… I haven’t spoken to Fernando so I don’t know how he’s been feeling or how much he’s missed it, but I don’t think it would be bad for the sport. Ultimately, there’s a lot of young kids on their way up and there’s only 20 seats, so he has also had his period of time there, but if there’s no other good youngsters coming through then… there definitely is space for some that are currently here that probably could be replaced. So I would welcome it.
    VB: Agree with Lewis, nothing really to add. Same thoughts.
    MV: Yeah, absolutely, I mean Fernando’s a great driver but you should only come back…
    LH: You said something about him coming back.
    MV: Me?
    LH: Yeah. You said that… come back… with me.
    MV: Is that so?
    LH: You know, in my first season.
    MV: You were equal on points, wasn’t it?
    LH: In my first season.
    MV: Yeah, that’s right. You did a great job. No, but he’s a great driver, I think you can agree on that, right?
    LH: Of course.
    MV: And it would be good to see him… if he could come back but only in a competitive car otherwise I think it’s just a waste of time for him. But I think he knows that himself so…

    Ends

  • The season has been intense and it will make us learn: Mattia Binotto of Ferrari

    The season has been intense and it will make us learn: Mattia Binotto of Ferrari

    FIA Friday Press Conference in progress. An FIA pic

    Yas Marina, 29 Nov 2019: The following team representatives attended the final Friday FIA press conference here as F1 comes to its last stop in the calendar: Claire Williams (Williams), Toto Wolff (Mercedes), Mattia Binotto (Ferrari), Zak Brown (McLaren), Cyril Abiteboul (Renault).

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Mattia, I’d like to take you back to the last race to start with. You’ve no doubt studied the footage of the crash between your two drivers. What’s your verdict?

    Mattia BINOTTO: Hmm… what’s the verdict? I think there may be different versions. If you listen to the drivers, they may have their own version. I think at the end there is one true version, which is that they damaged the interest of the Scuderia Ferrari, and by doing that, damaging themselves. We discussed altogether, we looked again at the video. I think what’s always important when that type of thing happens, there is always something which is triggering it. And more important is to understand what’s triggering it. It’s the only way to make sure that in the future it’s not happening again. And that’s something that certainly we discussed – between us.

    Q: Charles spoke yesterday, when he was summing up 2019, saying it’s been a weird season. How would you describe it?

    MB: Should I clarify what he said? I don’t know. Weird… I would say it has been an intense season. Many things happened. If I look from the team perspective or the technical point of view, I think it has been a linear season, somehow. If anything’s weird, I think it’s we were expecting a better performance after the winter testing, and I think that we never really understood what happened from Barcelona to Australia. If anything, those guys certainly made a jump ahead. I think that from our perspective, then we had performance weaknesses in the car that we improved all through the season, as I said, in a linear way – and I think the car in the second half of the season was certainly better, compared to the first part. We are still not the best car in the race. I think that other cars are still faster in the race. We are not certainly the best car in cornering and at least we know our weaknesses, working on it and from that respect it has been a bit linear. Weird, I think, from Charles’ perspective, very first year for him in Ferrari, a lot of emotions, a lot of things, he is the driver that has started most of the time on pole position this season, which is a great achievement. Two victories. Up and down, as well in his performance relative to his team-mate, not always so consistent, if you look from the start to the end. But I think it has been a season where an entire team, the drivers, we learnt and I’m pretty sure it will make us even stronger in the future.

    Q: Toto, you miss a race, look what happens! How difficult was it to watch events at Interlagos from afar, and how did you stay in touch with what was going on?

    Toto WOLFF: Yeah, it was weird, because it was the first race that I missed since Williams times – Barcelona 2012. I did it because there’s just so much business going on at the moment and I had a Formula E weekend the following weekend and obviously Abu Dhabi and things needed to be done. Normal office work. It was also for me an experiment to see how I would take it. I know the team is perfectly capable in doing that without me. There were voices that it would actually be beneficial for me not distracting anybody around the racetrack. So, what happened, would have happened with me there. I was hoping that it would be a perfect weekend and that I could miss some of the bad ones next year – but at the moment I am off that plan.

    Q: It’s been a cracking end to the season with three teams battling for wins. Does that make you nervous for next year? Do you expect it to be the closest battle in the hybrid era?

    TW: Yes, I think so. We have always defended the standpoint that by letting the regulations alone, performance convergence would happen – at least there’s a high probability that convergence happens rather than throwing the dice and introducing something new and I think we have seen that. It’s fair to say that there are three teams capable of winning races today and probably winning championships if things are being put together. McLaren has massively caught up, probably the steepest performance slope of all teams and will be there or thereabouts, in my opinion. So, yeah, I see this very much as being a much tougher season. I don’t think we are going to see the kind of 10 race wins or 12 race wins per team for next year any more – but obviously we will be trying everything to optimise our weaknesses and continue to perform well.

    Q: Zak, the team has sealed fourth in the Constructors’ Championship. Given where it was a year ago, in P6, and then P9 the year before that. How much of an achievement is that?

    Zak BROWN: I think it’s been a big achievement, given where we’ve been the last couple of years. I think the team’s done an excellent job, both at the factory and at the race track. Everyone is contributing. Renault has played a big part in us getting more competitive again. They’ve been a fantastic partner. Drivers are doing a very good job, bringing the car home and in the points often, so it’s certainly been a pleasure racing this year, when I look back to Abu Dhabi last year.

    Q: If the past 12 months have been fruitful, can you just tell us a little bit about the next 12 months – because you’ve got a harder split programme than most teams: preparing a Renault-powered 2020 car and then a Mercedes-powered 2021 car.

    ZB: Yeah, everyone’s going to be in the same boat, in the sense of the ’21 is going to be such a change from 2020 that everyone’s going to be starting from a clean sheet of paper – but we’re up for it. It’s one of the reasons we made an early decision, to give ourselves as much time as possible. I think ‘21’s going to be exciting for Formula 1 and for the fans because when there’s a big change like that, someone’s going to get it right; someone’s going to get it wrong and, as Toto said, tends to converge over time but I’m excited for the ’21 season – but also excited for ’20, of course.

    Q: Claire, if we could talk a little more about that 2020-2021 split from Williams’ point of view. How difficult a juggling act is it when there’s such a huge opportunity in 2021?

    Claire WILLIAMS: It’s clearly not easy. I think we’ve all talked about the challenges that we’re all going to face next year. I think everyone in the pit lane is going to have a challenge on their hands. I think it will be slightly easier for the top three teams with bigger budgets. For us, it is a real challenge back at the factory, trying to run those two programmes, for next year, for ’21 – but obviously we’ve been trying to run this year’s programme, when we haven’t let development slide. We’ve got to continue to bring upgrades to the car over the course of this season, which we’ve been doing, and really we’re looking at ’19 and ’20 as one long campaign. So, it is difficult – but we wanted the ’21 regulations to come in. We lobbied hard for them, so we’ve just go to deal with the problem head on and do the best job that we can.

    Q: News yesterday on the driver front. Just a word on Nicholas Latifi. Why have you chosen him to partner George Russell next year?

    CW: I think it was probably a fairly obvious choice. We’re pleased that we’re able to make an announcement. It’s been a long time coming and probably an obvious choice for us. Nicholas has been with us now this year, as our reserve driver. He’s done six FP1s for us and some test sessions. He’ll run next week at the Abu Dhabi test, and he’s just become a really great part of the team. He’s got a great personality – and from a track performance perspective, he’s done a good job in the F2 campaign this year. He’s obviously hoping to close out P2 this weekend, and I think he’ll be instrumental in driving the team forward. He’s got a very similar personality to George, and George has proved how motivating for everybody in the team, and I think Nicholas will fully mirror that next year.

    Q: Cyril, Renault is involved in a very tight battle with Toro Rosso for fifth place in the Constructors’ Championship. Just eight points the difference. Given the nature of this circuit, how confident are you in your car’s performance?

    Cyril ABITEBOUL: If you really ask me for this circuit, I’m very confident. We were competitive last year. FP1 is not much to say because FP1 is very particular here, given the conditions but no, I think that indeed Toro Rosso with different circumstance that they’ve benefited, and that also managed to make happen in the close fight but I think it’s also fair to say that, on average, we are a clear P5. The target was to be P4 so we have not reached that target but average we deserve that P5. We didn’t benefit of any particular result that have helped in that respect. No podium when it could have been possible again. It’s our own fault, so I’m not blaming anyone in particular. But no, I think we will have a good fight tomorrow and Sunday, but I believe our chances… I want to believe our chances are high to finish P5.

    Q: Now, overall it’s been a difficult season for you guys. What have you learnt from the really tough moments – and when were they?

    CA: There’s been many tough moments. There’s been good moments also. I think it’s important to take a bit of distance, so if you ask me, it’s really to manage, to learn about the resilience that you need in that sport. Sometimes people believe how difficult it is as a sport, as a business also, given the difficulty and the way that the world is changing. We are on a ramp up. Zak has just mentioned a good trend that they have: P9, P6, P4. It’s exactly the trend that we had also: P9, P6, P4. I think all of that is possible, but the difficulty first is to maintain that P4 position now that McLaren has been able to come back from where they were before and the main difficult will be not to stay P5 or P4 because we should not be content with that, and I’m sure Zak is not content with that – but also to bridge the gap with the top teams. That will be the next difficulty and still the target for us. It’s a target for 2021. Everything in our programme has been built around that long-term target of 2021 because, in accordance to our strategy, that’s really the first opportunity to make that happen. But before 2021, there is ’19, there is ’20. And there is a short-term result and a short term pressure that everyone is putting on all of us. And that’s fine. Again, that’s part of the sport.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Andrew Benson – BBC Sport) Mattia, what guidelines or rules or instructions have you given the drivers in terms of racing going forward from this point to stop what happened in Brazil happening again, if indeed they are allowed to race?

    MB: There are no answers here; it’s something we discussed internally. They are both very good drivers, they know exactly what to do. I think it has been somehow unfortunate what happened but it will not happen anymore.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines/Racefans.net) Zak, you’re obviously delighted at finishing fourth in the championship, but if you look at it Red Bull finished third with the engine you people rejected. How do you feel about that? Is there any regret? Equally, Cyril, how do you feel about being beaten by your engine customer, given the fact that you both have similar resources?

    TW: Such a nice fellow.

    ZB: Look, I think, first of all, congratulations to Honda, it’s great that they’re going to be staying in the sport. I think that’s positive for the sport. I think you’ve got to give credit to Helmut Marko for making a good strategic decision to first put Honda into his B team and that works our well, so he puts it into his A team and he’s got two good lieutenants in Christian and Franz running those teams and you know, they’re winning races now and good on them and good for the sport.

    CA: Well, you know, we were beaten by our customer, OK, but when I’m not beaten by my customer I’m beaten by McLaren, and McLaren is a great team. McLaren has had its difficulty but I think maybe something that Zak has not mentioned, but he could have mentioned, is the fact that sometimes you need to change some stuff to really understand where you’re at and what needs to be changed and what needs to be made stronger and I think the fact that when they came to Renault we were a benchmark. Not a benchmark in the sense that we were the best but at least McLaren knew what was the Renault engine capable of doing with Red Bull at the time. I think that really put a light on what needed to be changed in their organization and they have done that. They have taken action, based on that information. I think we are doing the same, in fairness, a bit later, but we are still doing the same. We know what our engine is capable of doing. In my opinion it is the engine that most progressed over the winter, right there, probably at the top in race conditions. So that’s good, but obviously it’s not enough. So we had to take action and we have reacted with exactly what we’ve done. We restructured the aerodynamic department. We recruited someone who actually is no stranger to probably the resurrection of McLaren – Pat Fry – and that will not stop there. I think that what matters is being able to constantly assess where we are strong and where we are weak. That’s what McLaren has done and that’s what also we have done and react, that’s also what we are doing.

    Q: (Lawrence Edmonson – ESPN) A question for the whole panel: F1 is planning to become carbon neutral by 2030 but when you consider that entire countries have got a similar plan in place, is F1 being ambitious enough and is the whole sport going to face a losing battle over the next 10 years?

    CW: I think the very fact that F1 have come out and launched a proposal in this area is the best starting block. I don’t think we have talked about what we do already do. I think there is a lot more that we could communicate in order to demonstrate the very fact that our sport is probably a whole lot more sustainable than the generic perception of it out there at the moment. These new hybrid engines being the perfect example. We have never talked about them being as relevant as there are. But I think that the sport does need to become a whole lot more sustainable. It’s a wider conversation in the rest of the world and it’s a very relevant and important one at the moment and this sport needs to be doing what it should be doing to tackle a whole lot of issues that we haven’t been tackling and there probably is an enormous amount of low-hanging fruit that we can all contribute to as a collective. I think as individual teams we have started down this pathway many, many years ago, but again it’s something that we don’t necessarily talk or shout about. At Williams we have a whole business division, about 350 people, that tackles or that takes some of those issues and uses battery technology in order to address them and again we should probably be doing a better job to talk about it. But I think the very fact that F1 have started this pathway and it is only the very beginning, but I think a 10-year plan is probably the right amount of time in order to tackle it.

    TW: Yeah, what Claire said about the engines, we are having the most efficient hybrid power units and we need to, I think, talk more about it. This is a hybrid race series already and how we can see the future going in the automotive world going, hybrid is definitely the next defining step over the next few years. Having said that, Formula 1 was always the pinnacle of motor racing in terms of the engineering and innovation and lots of the things we do have found their way into road cars and continue to find their way into road cars. A big part of that is efficiency of course. I think we have a role to play in order to facilitate innovation at Formula 1 and at the same time be part of that climate movement that is absolutely necessary. We are all living in the same world and we see the air and the oceans getting more polluted every day and I think the more we support the movement, the more we tackle it with the small steps – banning plastic bottles, like the one you have next to your chair, from our hospitality – changing the way we fuel our dynos, not with diesel anymore but with something more sustainable, we are going to better the world. I’ve read something that I liked a lot, which was: ‘what difference does one plastic bottle make to the world said 8 million people’, and this is the kind of mindset we need to embrace.

    MB: Nothing more left I would say, as they touch all the points. We are all on the same page. It is certainly a key topic. It is a challenging objective. I think as F1 we have to be, and we can be, an important platform for developing in that respect, on sustainability. I think we have a lot engineering background that we can use as well to somehow develop and improve that situation. I think that is an overall global effort of all the teams, F1, FIA, all together, but it is good. Great, at least, that we set the objectives and I’m pretty sure that for the future of F1 that will be key and important.

    ZB: I think as everyone has said before me it’s a very big topic, it’s a very important topic. I think it’s a journey with a never-ending road. You know, all of us are tackling it in different ways, in similar ways, not only as a grand prix team but in our businesses. It’s great to see Formula 1 put such importance on it and I think it will be something that many of us are already doing today and will continue to do and improve upon because it’s an important topic for everybody.

    CA: Yeah, not much to add, apart maybe from the fact that if Formula 1, or cars in general, are seen as part of the problem, Formula 1 can also be part of the solution. I’m not aware of any other sport that can contribute in any shape or form to the solution and I think that’s really important to mention. We created lots of expectation with that collective announcement, so we will have to deliver against those expectations. One figure I would mention. We are talking about this engine but to put things in perspective the average increase in power of the F1 engine is 3% per year. If you put that in perspective to UN target figures of CO2 emission in order to reach the COP21 target would be 2.5%, so on the basis that we have stable fuel consumption, it means that we have actually exceeded what the UN is commanding from the world industry in general. I think it’s a good benchmark. Obviously it comes at a huge cost and lots of technology. It can’t be transferred to all cars on the planet but still I think it does represent and element of an answer to the problem.

    Q: (Jonathan McEvoy – Daily Mail) To Mattia Binotto. So far there hasn’t been a great deal light shed on the incident with your drivers at the last race. There have been a lot of words but not much light. I was wondering whether you fined them, whether you thought one driver was more to blame than the other and a) I’d like a straight answer to that and b) if I don’t, why do you bother showing up at these events?

    MB: Is there one driver more to blame than the other? I think it’s even not important, because maybe that time it could have been maybe Seb, next time maybe Charles. They are two drivers, they are fighting, they can both of them make mistakes. I think that at the end what’s important is to make sure that whoever he is, the one in Brazil, or the next time, it’s not happening again. And again, I don’t think there is much to discuss. That’s something that is something that is in between our factory, between us, something we discussed and I’m happy to keep it between us.

    Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) Toto, Lewis in Brazil suggested that his future at Mercedes would depend on your future at Mercedes. I just wondered if he has had sought any assurances from you and if whether you have been able to offer those to him? And to Mattia, if Lewis Hamilton is available to sign in 2021 as it stands, would you like to sign him for Ferrari?

    TW: Lewis and I have grown close over the last seven years. We ended up in Mercedes at the same time in 2013 and I think we have built up a lot of trust. At the same time, the two of us are part of a wider organization where everybody is playing in their relative field of competence. I think for him to say that is nice. I’d also like to know where he goes or if he stays in the future. And we are having those discussions about the future and I think it is very important between the two of us, like between many others that have played an important role within that team. Can I shed more light? No, for me it was important to finish the season in Abu Dhabi. There are many things to be decided on and we will see over the winter.

    MB: Lewis is certainly an outstanding driver, a fantastic driver. Knowing that he’s available in 2021 can make us only happy, but honestly it’s too early for any decision, so we are happy with the driver’s we’ve got at the moment and I think certainly at one stage next season we will start discussing and understanding what to do.

    Q: (Joost Nederpelt – NU.NL) What was your favourite moment or anecdote of the season?

    CA: I guess my favourite moment has been qualifying in Montreal with Daniel in P4, I think it was, something like that. That was, let’s be honest, unexpected, not totally deserved. I think Valtteri had a problem in qualifying so I think it was one position better than what we would have had but clearly finally the demonstration that what we were seeing – I was personally also claiming since a while which was that the engine had made huge steps – and was actually true. So it’s not an anecdote, it’s a story and a very high moment of this season.

    ZB: Well, it would have to be Brazil, wouldn’t it, with it being our first podium and clinching fourth in the championship so that and Lando qualifying in Q3 in his first race in Australia and us coming out and being in Q3. You only asked me for one, but I gave you two!

    MB: Many moments. Obviously this season we have been celebrating our 90 years of Scuderia Ferrari so I would say at first the event where we celebrated in Milan, Piazza del Duomo, with all our fans and tifosi. And in the same week, let’s say the first row on the grid in Monza.

    TW: For me the… I don’t want to talk about the best moment because the overshadowing event was Niki’s death. That is kind of the big theme of the season for us, so I was thinking whilst they were answering when I had a moment which I felt like being the best and I didn’t, of course… we are very grateful to win the championship but this one moment just overshadows everything else.

    CW: Mine probably, as you would expect probably, didn’t come on the circuit this year but for me, the real highlight has been our pit stop crew. You probably will track progress… unfortunately Red Bull have just pipped us to the best pit stop and crew for the year but the way that our pit stop team have worked this year has been… gives a capsule of the resilience that our team has shown throughout the entire year. They go out there each and every race and fight for our drivers and for the rest of the team like they’re fighting for podium position and that for me has been a true highlight.

    Q: (Beatrice Zamuner – Motorlat) Zak, how would you describe and assess your drivers’ contribution to McLaren’s 2019 improvement?

    ZB: I give them a lot of credit, both of them. Early in the season our car wasn’t as competitive and I think it’s the team, the drivers for bringing the car home constantly, not really making any mistakes and then the car’s developed well over the course of the year and we’re able to give them a faster race car but I think credit to both of them. Carlos has definitely shined (sic) this year and I think Lando’s been an excellent rookie that has shown a lot of maturity for a very young driver.

    Q: (Aaron Deckers – Racingnews365.nl) Toto, what was your impression of Nick de Vries last weekend and in general of the Formula E; is it going to be together the Formula One and Formule E, do you think?

    TW: I really enjoyed the experience, I must say. I’ve never been to Saudi Arabia before and launching our Mercedes Formula E journey was very special. The crowds were phenomenal, seeing how this country is opening up – something I didn’t expect in that way. And the racing is very different to Formula One, clearly you can say that. For me it’s Super Mario Kart with real drivers, but it’s absolutely valid to give that a chance. And Nick has already contributed a great deal to the team’s performance. He’s very mature and the way he’s – as a personality and as a racing driver – been able to slot into the team with Stoffel is really nice to see. We have set our ambitions or our expectations on a realistic target, which we have overachieved and both of the drivers contributed to this happening.

    Q: (Cezary Gutowski – Przeglad Sportowy) To the three engine manufacturers: is engine power convergence really possible given what’s going on around the Ferrari engine now after so many years, given you will have budget caps since 2021 which I guess does not include the engine development?

    TW: I think you will see, over the long-term [the] trend on engine performance is that it will stabilise. I think we have seen outliers in engine performance, we have seen very good races with Ferrari, we have seen Renault doing a step up and then the same way that has stretched us so I think, looking over many years’ cycle, these gains will get smaller, like in any mature industry, the marginal gains tend to decrease and I have no doubt that this will happen.

    CA: I think that the stability of regulations is showing that actual performance is converging which is good for the sport. I continue to believe that there are some breakthroughs to come that will come with new processes, with new materials, so that’s interesting, so you should watch this space and see what it still has to offer and going back to what I was mentioning before, there is an awful lot of innovation that I wouldn’t… it’s a bit unfortunate that we can’t really talk about because of all the secrets, of all the IP that’s involved and all the investments that are associated. Our engineers keep on having lots of ideas and that’s great to see. We’ve recruited a lot of young guys, coming from university. They are not necessarily passionate about Formula 1 but I can tell you that they are passionate about doing what they are doing in the field of the internal combustion engine and power in general and that’s good and extremely refreshing so I think it’s good that Formula 1 keeps on having this field of innovation for engines in general.

    MB: Will convergence happen? I think we are all convinced on that. The reason that we are all convinced is that the rules that we have all accepted are defined. There will be lines of restriction and therefore we believe that there will no longer be the necessity to develop as we are developing today and there will even be some freezing opportunities, also the power unit and the fact that we are starting freezing some of the components is that believe that there is only a very marginal benefit at some stage in developing and it’s good for the sustainability to start freezing and reducing the dyno activity so yes, we are all convinced that it will come to a convergence. I think we are already converging and in the next period that will happen, certainly.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines, Racefans.net) Given the uncertainty of commitment of at least two teams to Formula One after 2020, should Formula One actually actively go out now and try and attract new teams?

    CW: I’m not sure I know a whole level of detail about two potential teams leaving this sport but clearly we want a grid of 10 teams. That promotes great racing and we need great racing to ensure that our fans keep tuning in and watching us and clearly we want to be growing that audience as well so whether it’s down to F1 to actively go out and promote that or whether it’s down to those teams to make sure that they secure buyers… all I can say is Williams certainly isn’t one of those teams.

    TW: All the numbers that are coming in – from audiences in the conventional TV, digital space, sponsorship – are growing. I think this is a sport that also with the spending cap coming in in 2021 is an area of growth. There will be certain thresholds that will come into the rules about joining the sport, concerning certain franchise value. Leaving the sport now would certainly not be the right thing to do from a commercial perspective when it’s just about to turn into a new opportunity. Should we be looking out for new teams? If there is interest in joining the grid with a solid foundation, big brands why not have the discussion but I think we should all 10 of us be proud of being part of the limited grid, we should be conscious about the opportunity and the possibility that lies ahead and concentrate on making it a good business for everybody.

    MB: Not really much to add. I think the first objective should not look around but try to retain what we’ve got and only after, eventually.

    ZB: I think it would be great to see another team in the sport. I think that (indistinct) we’ve got a new race market, that creates excitement and so as long as it’s a quality racing team I think it would just add excitement and opportunity so it’s not the teams’ responsibilities to be looking for the next team to join but Formula 1, as Toto said… television’s up, sponsorship’s up, fan appeal is up and therefore the more the sport can grow the better.

    CA: I entirely agree. I would just add something that’s not been mentioned which is driver and driver development and access to Formula 1 for young drivers. That’s maybe an area where I think maybe one team ought to provided that they are solid teams project with good backing, not just opportunistic interest because it’s possible that the business model will become better but a good sporting project could be interesting because we all see that sometimes even good drivers should make it to Formula One and we all remember the time of teams like Minardi this type of team which were doing an excellent job in facilitating access to Formula 1 for those kids. We have a young driver programme and right now, even though we’ve got great talents, I’m not totally clear on how we will make it to Formula One. I think Toto experienced the same difficulty without opening something that is still touchy.

    TW: We will talk about it.

    CA: But we sort it out now. So I think you can see where I’m going at. I think it’s important to have stability of top ten teams for us and for most but think also about the dynamic of accessibility of Formula 1 to drivers.

    Ends

  • It has been a weird season: Charles Leclerc

    PART ONE: DRIVERS – Charles LECLERC (Ferrari), Max VERSTAPPEN (Red Bull Racing), Kevin MAGNUSSEN (Haas)

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Charles, if we could start with you, please. We’re going to take a look back at the last race in Brazil, to begin with. Having had time to review the video footage, what’s you analysis of what happened in the incident between you and Sebastian?

    Charles LECLERC: Yeah, we looked at it and I particularly looked at it, obviously, to try to understand how we could have made the things better. I think it was very unfortunate, first of all, because the touch was extremely small and it had a big drama after that, and that was a bit unlucky. But as a team we should probably try to be a bit less aggressive in between each other, for these things to not happen again. For the team it’s not good. For everyone supporting us it’s not good, so we will try for it to not happen again.

    Q: What has happened since the Brazilian Grand Prix? Have you guys all met up in Maranello and had a chat?

    CL: Yeah, I was there for the simulator, so on this occasion we also took the day to discuss a little bit and yeah, I’m pretty sure it won’t happen again.

    Q: Seb is still on your Christmas card list?

    CL: Sorry?

    Q: I was joking: Seb is still on your Christmas card list.

    CL: Oh yeah!

    Q: Charles, if we can look back at the season as a whole now. Your first with Ferrari. A lot of headlines that you can very satisfied with on a personal level – the wins, the seven poles, including being the youngest ever Ferrari pole sitter. But in terms of the team’s performance it has been a bit of a rollercoaster. How would you sum it up?

    CL: It’s been a bit of a weird season. We started definitely not where we thought we would start after winter testing. Winter testing was very positive and we arrive at the first race and we have been struggling quite a lot. After that I think the progression was very good. Austin was a little bit weird too; we still don’t really understand why we were so off the pace. Brazil we were back to where we wanted. But overall we progressed quite a lot, which I think is the most important [thing]. Now I’m really looking forward to keeping this momentum for next year. It’s the first time in my single-seater where I stay in the same team from one year to another, which also should be an interesting challenge to develop a car. Let’s see, but overall I think it has been a positive season, apart from the first race, which has been very negative.

    Q: Thank you Charles and good luck this weekend. Max, a question about this year for you too. It’s the team’s first season with Honda. Has it exceeded your expectations?

    Max VERSTAPPEN: I don’t know. It’s been very promising and I think also we had some good results. For me, what was more important was reliability. That has been very strong throughout the whole year and also the progression we made with the engine itself. Yeah, that has all been going really well. But we always want more, so we will never be satisfied with what we are doing. It’s been good and I think it is a good, let’s say, basis for next year as well. We learned a lot throughout the whole year and I feel confident that we can have a positive to next season.

    Q: Dominant win for you last time out in Brazil. Which team comes into the Abu Dhabi with the fastest car?

    MV: I don’t know; we’ll find out. Still, looking at the season, you’d have to say Mercedes. We’ll see how the weekend will progress. It’s still also a lot about just finding the right set-up. I think the last few races the three teams, the three top teams have been really close to each other and I hope it’s going to be the same here.

    Q: Thank you Max. Kevin, for your 2019 started strongly, but it tailed off quite dramatically. Why did it go wrong?

    Kevin MAGNUSSEN: I think there are a few different reasons, but it became very clear in Bahrain that we had a problem, which was really strange because in winter testing and in the first race the car was really good. Even in Bahrain in qualifying we qualified… I can’t remember, sixth of something, up there. Then in the race it just completely fell apart. So from there on it was a little bit of panic in the team. We couldn’t really focus on… kind of find the real root of the problem. We were looking a lot at tyres and blaming the problem on tyres issues whereas in fact it was a little more simple, I think, just aero issues, unstable aero and the whole platform just not being strong enough and consistent, stable enough. It’s a very, I would say, frustrating problem, because we have able to qualify well but in the race we just have not had any strength. That’s very frustrating as a driver, where you start in a position and then you’re just fighting to try to hang on to your position rather than attacking the guy in front. In that way it’s been pretty frustrating, but on the other hand, we are a very young team, it’s only our fourth year. Last year we got P5 in the Constructors’ Championship. I think that’s pretty impressive. I don’t think many teams have done that in their third year. So we’ve got to take some confidence from that as well and just build on the experience that we have had this year and the learning that we have done and then just come back stronger next year.

    Q: You say it’s been frustrating for the drivers, but how have you progressed as a driver this year?

    KM: Well, you always learn in any situation but especially when it’s difficult you learn different things and you just have to approach your problems in a different way and I think that gives you strength and some experience that you wouldn’t necessarily have gotten if you were just cruising and driving in a perfect car. So in many ways it’s also been positive, both for me, as a driver, and for the team as well.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Andrew Benson – BBC Sport) Question for Charles. You say you are pretty sure that an incident like that won’t happen again, but how can you be so sure. Was blame apportioned by the team in the meetings you had? What guidelines and rules have been laid down about racing together in the future and are you even allowed to race together in the future?

    CL: No, I think this doesn’t change. We will be able to race together. Obviously, Seb and myself are very competitive, we both want to win, but we also need to find the right compromise. We are also racing for the same team. As I said earlier, we need to be lees aggressive towards each other and give us a little bit more space for these things to not happen again. Of what I know, that’s the only thing that will happen for the next races, but maybe Mattia can go a bit further into that. Apart from that, I don’t think there is much we can do. Obviously, as I said, the consequences were huge in the last race but if you look back at the contact it was very, very small. It was unfortunate but we will make sure it doesn’t happen again.

    Q: (Jon McEvoy – Daily Mail) Charles, just to go back to what Andrew asked before. Did either driver do as was suggested and say “I was to blame for that”, you or Seb? And b, are there now sort of new arrangement that if you do have an accident for example that you might be fined or banned or sacked or is it just sort of idle hope?

    CL: On the second question there’s been nothing said on that. We called with Seb and we tried to understand both of our situations. I think probably Seb shouldn’t have gone to the left and he knows it and I probably could have done a better job of avoiding him going to the left. So yeah, both of us have a bit of responsibility, but the most important thing is that everything is clear with Seb and we move forward.

    Q: (Walter Koster – Saarbrücker Zeitung) Charles, before I start my question, I have to remind you of high praises – no doubt you have had more good races than bad ones, but if we stick to the less good races with bad luck and mishaps, such as Baku, where the Ferrari hit the barriers, in Bahrain where you lost the lead due to an engine problem, in Austria where you were caught by Max and Monaco, your first home race, was very disappointing with last place and probably the low point, in Hockenheim, it was a mistake of the driver and last in Brazil, the finish after a hard battle with your team-mate. Now, my question to the pop star of Formula 1: what was your best race among your worst races? Can you give us, please, a ranking regarding your five not so good races, starting with the worst? I’m a polite person or man, please excuse this question, but I still hope for an answer.

    MV: Wow!

    CL: That was a long question. Congratulations. Kevin, you can start.

    KM: I’m in a trance.

    MV: Well [Charles] you are the pop star, so first of all, can you sing?

    CL: Yeah, I can sing. I won’t sing now, but I can sing. I don’t know…

    MV: I lost you after a few sentences.

    KM: You have to rank your five worst races.

    CL: Worst races? Five worst? OK, that was a simple question. So…

    Q: (Walter Koster – Saarbrücker Zeitung) What was the best race among the worst?

    CL: So the top five best and the top five worst?

    MV: Wow.

    KM: Take your time.

    MV: We’ve got a lot time.

    Q: Your five worst races, please?

    MV: Are we going to make it more complicated? Like, this year or in his career?

    CL: My worst race this year was probably Brazil, second one Monaco, third one… Third one? That’s two. That’s good. No?

    KM: He’s had a good question.

    CL: That was a question only for me? OK, thank you!

    Q: Unless, Max, you’d like to offer your worst of the season, or Kevin?

    MV: Er, no – save the time.

    Q: (Joost Nederpelt   – NU.NL) Question to all drivers. If you were the director of the Drive to Survive documentary on Netflix, what moment of the season would you definitely put in?

    KM: I don’t know. I don’t know what… I have a thing in mind but we’ll see if it’s made it into it. It’s a surprise. Watching the next Netflix season two and you’ll find out.

    Q: Nothing else you can offer us now?

    KM: No, it hasn’t been that exciting from our side, so…

    Q: Max?

    MV: Hockenheim.

    Q: What bit of Hockeheim exactly?

    MV: I think they were following Mercedes closely in Hockenheim? I would like to see that episode. It’s a bit of fun, right? I mean, they can laugh about it as well: they still won the Championship, so a bit of drama involved in the series is good. If I would be the director – because you have to create the hits.

    Q: Charles?

    CL: yeah… I would not choose the last race but probably the Monza victory is the one I would like to see on the documentary.

    Q: (Adrian Rodriguez Huber – Agencia EFE) Question both for Charles and Max. I can imagine you being young and very talented drivers, you’re focussing on winning your first world title but do you every focus yourself like looking at Lewis, maybe winning six?

    MV: I was thinking about ten. No. You don’t need to think like that. It just happens or doesn’t. It’s 50:50. You just try to do the best you can, personally. You also need a bit of luck. You need to get into the right car at the right time and you need a dominant team as well for a few more years in a row. At least… it depends on how long your career is lasting. No, personally I don’t think about it too much because, as I’ve just said, it happens or it doesn’t. At the end of the day, I think already winning one title would be a great achievement.

    CL: Yeah, I personally don’t think about it too much. I believe that with work, anything is achievable, so I mostly think about how I can do my job in the proper way. Then, of course, the choice you make in a career are very important. It not only depends on yourself but it also depends on luck but I’m mostly focussing on work more than thinking about the title.

    Q: Kevin, I feel we should ask you as well.

    KM: I need to try to win a race first and then I can start thinking about championships after that. So, y’know… the ambition has always been there. That’s always been the dream since I was a little kid: to be Formula 1 World Champion and y’know, that ambition and that dream is still there but obviously I’m in a slightly different position to those two guys.

    Q: (Arjan Schouten – AD Sportswereld) Two questions for Max. What’s the importance of the third place in the Drivers’ Championships, and again, you’re on the long list for Dutch sportsman of the year election, together with six cyclists, three speed-skaters, a darts player, a world champion in chequers, a windsurfer, judoka, and the Champions’ League winner Virgil van Dijk, so I presume you’re going to win this one – what do you think?

    MV: First one, I think it’s always nicer than finishing fourth or fifth – but yeah, looking back in 20 years’ time and seeing that you were third in the Championship wouldn’t really make me very happy. I think we’re all here to win and, of course, fight for the title. So yeah, I think it would be nice after this weekend to be third but in 20 years’ time, I don’t think it will do much. And the second one, honestly, yeah, I have my own opinion about being nominated but I prefer not to comment on it.

    Q: Charles, can we get your thoughts on third place in the Championship?

    CL: It’s always nice to finish a season on the podium. I’ll give it all. Now, 11 points are quite a bit to recover in one race, but we’ll give it all and it will be a nice thing to finish my first season with Ferrari on the podium – but yeah, we’ll see what will happen.

    Q: (Lennart Bloemhof – Volksrant) Question for Max, you’re nearing the end of your fourth season at Red Bull. Regarding your dominant win in Brazil, and you’re fighting for pole positions now, do you believe you’re closer to having a Championship-winning car more than ever at the team right now?

    MV: Yeah. I think we do. Also, looking at the plans for next year – but of course you still have to wait and see what the others come up with. But we are of course… we want to fight for the title, so we’re going to give it everything we have to be competitive from the start next year.

    Q: (Milan Klemenc – Avtomanija) I have one question for all three: what are expectations for next year. We know new tyres 2020. I know you were interested after the last race. What’s your opinion?

    KM: I don’t even think the tyres have been chosen yet, have they? And then the aero is the same. So, on personal side, I’m hoping we will get a better car – but in terms of regulations and the racing itself, I don’t see it changing too much. It’s more 2021 I’m looking forward to: to see how that performs.

    Max, do you see it changing much next year?

    MV: Well, I hope we can fight for the title. That’s it.

    Charles?

    CL: Yeah, not much. I think we’ve been working pretty well, as I was mentioning earlier, with the car, so hopefully we can continue with the progression and start from a better place, the season, to be fighting for the title.

  • I will try to finish to the plan, says poleman Max Verstappen

    I will try to finish to the plan, says poleman Max Verstappen

    Saturday Press Conference in progess. An FIA image

    Sao Paulo, 16 Nov 2019: The following drivers who qualified on the top attended the FIA post-qualification press conference on Saturday: Max VERSTAPPEN (Red Bull Racing), Sebastian VETTEL (Ferrari) and Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes).

    Track Interviews (Conducted by Paul Di Resta)

    Q: Max, congratulations – pole position. It looked like the perfect driver/car combination today; nothing was going to stop you?

    Max VERSTAPPEN: Yeah, our car was really good. I think throughout qualifying the track temperature was changing a bit so we had to adjust for that, but yeah, straight away from Q1 the car was flying and it was really enjoyable to drive, so very happy with this pole position.

    Q: How nerve-racking was it? We saw you make a small mistake in the middle sector on your first run. It still put you quickest but you had to put the final touches on that to try to improve.

    MV: Yeah, I tried a different line, but also the track was a bit warmer and that gave me a bit more oversteer and then of course I went a bit wide. The second lap, luckily, was a bit better, so yeah, all; good.

    Q: And this track owes you something from last year.

    MV: I will of course try to finish to the plan.

    Q: Sebastian, second again, narrowly missing out on pole, but I guess you’ve got to be satisfied that you’re on the front row?

    Sebastian VETTEL: Yeah, I had a bit of a wobble in the exit of the last corner on the first run but I think Max improved his time, so fair play and I think it’s his pole position. Yeah, happy with the front row. Now we will see what we can do tomorrow. The car has been good. I think it got better throughout qualifying, which was the target. I think we improved it and I hope that we can keep that momentum for the race.

    Q: How do you see the race panning out? Do you think you are in the mix to race Red Bull, or do you think they’re too quick?

    SV: It will be difficult. Both Red Bull and Mercedes look a bit stronger managing tyres, but we are there for a reason: we’ve got the speed and we’ve got the power, so let’s see what the race brings. I am carefully optimistic. I think it should be a good race.

    Q: Great, have fun. Lewis, it was a great battle at the top between three of the big teams. You must be happy where you are, at the same time that you’re in the mix for tomorrow?

    Lewis HAMILTON: Yeah, definitely. Congrats to Max, a great lap by him. We seemed quite competitive in P3 and then we seemed to lose going into qualifying, or they gained. But no, nonetheless, I’m very happy that I was able to divide the Ferraris, that’s always a tough challenge. We’ve been down on power, I guess, compared to the others particularly, that’s where we lose most of our time. But nonetheless, I guess it absolutely everything that I had and I’m glad at the end, my best lap of the session was my last run – awesome.

    Q: On the back of your sixth world title, Lewis, I know this is a pretty special place for you to come. You embrace Ayrton Senna and see the Brazilian fans. What’s it going to mean tomorrow?

    LH: Yeah, I mean, this is such a tough race to win. The track is very, very challenging and there’s so much history here, so every time we come, of course for me… I’m often putting Senna’s helmet design on my helmet, just reminiscent… I remember watching him winning here and how crazy the crowd went. But I seem to have a lot of support here, so obrigado to everyone here.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Taking the second pole position of his Formula 1 career, Max Verstappen. Max you couldn’t…

    MV: You said two; I have three. I consider myself this is my third.

    SV: Mexico?

    MV: Yeah.

    SV: Ah, yeah.

    MV: And then Hungary. So this is my third. He said second. This is my third.

    Q: We can discuss this afterwards, Max! You couldn’t have been more dominant throughout qualifying. Just how good was that final lap of Q3 and how surprised have you been at the dominance of the Red Bull car around this Interlagos track?

    MV: I think the last few races have already been quite strong. I think from today we changed the car a but from yesterday and it seemed to work really well and especially in qualifying it really came alive. It had really good balance. Already in Q2 it felt really good.

    LH: You turned more power up?

    MV: You don’t do that through qualifying? And then Q3 I think also the track got a bit warmer, so it was a bit more tricky to get the lap time out of it…

    SV: Go ahead…

    MV: Why are you laughing?

    SV: I’m in a world of my own. You go ahead.

    Q: How good was that last lap though?

    MV: The last lap was pretty decent. It was alright. There are always things you can do better, but it was good enough.

    Q: And you’ve already touched on the track temperature. Is that how you explain how you were a tiny bit quicker in Q2 than in Q3?

    MV: Like I just explained to them, I didn’t tuck in on my last run, but I did that in Q2, which gave me two tenths or a one tenth advantage. That’s why we had such good top speed.

    Q: And Max, are you confident for tomorrow? Do you feel that you have a good race car under you?

    MV: Yeah, I guess so. The car already yesterday was not bad. I think today it improved, so normally it should also be better in the race but I guess we have to find out.

    Q: Sebastian, just a tiny bit off pole today. Were you pleased with the balance of your car?

    SV: Yeah, I was actually. It was getting better. I think we were a bit shy yesterday, more aggressive this morning, which was a step forward, and in quali it seemed to go up and get better – but I think also the track ramped-up, so yeah, obviously it’s good to, y’know, get in the front row. I was having a very good first attempt in Q3, went a little bit wide in the final turn – I don’t think I was the only one – but yeah, I think Max’s second time was a bit far away so I think we have to admit that we got beaten fair and square today. It was a bit of a surprise… not to see them that quick but to see them that quick on the straights. So, a little bit suspicious…

    MV: For once it’s you then!

    Q: And Sebastian, looking ahead to tomorrow, do you think you’ve got a competitive race car under you?

    SV: Yeah, I think so. Obviously we know the race for us is maybe not as strong as quali but I was quite pleased with the balance and we therefore did another long run this morning in practice and it felt much better than yesterday. So that gives me hope for tomorrow.

    Q: Lewis, coming on to you, didn’t look like an easy session for you – only time in the top three was right at the end of Q3. Could you just give us your thoughts on your car and how the session went?

    LH: It’s not too often it always goes particularly easy but it was definitely a challenging session. I think P3 was really strong for us and obviously once we got to qualifying, these guys had great pace and we were losing out to Max on the straights by quite a chunk, which is where the majority of the time was coming from but just kept chipping away at it. The last lap was as really as good as it could get really for us. The car actually felt really good, we were just lacking a little bit of pace on the straights but hopefully tomorrow that’ll put us in a good position in terms of longevity on the stints. Maybe. Who knows? But otherwise I’m happy to be able to split the Ferraris. It always puts a smile on my face.

    Q: Lewis, looking ahead to the race, now that the Championship’s in the bag, can we expect any different approach from you or anything different from you?

    LH: My approach is pretty much the same all year long but maybe we can try to be a bit more aggressive tomorrow, we can have some fun with these guys – but yeah, I don’t particularly see that there’s any reason to make any changes. That’s ultimately what’s got me to where I am today, so I’ll just continue with that.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – liviooricchioF1.com) The question is to Max and I ask also Sebastian and Lewis to comment. Max, you were really fast in the last sector, which is 1,200m full throttle. Can you make a comment about the development of the Honda engine? Also, Lewis, Mercedes power unit and Sebastian, Ferrari, comment about development of Honda please.

    MV: Well, I was not the fastest in the last sector but we were the fastest in the second sector, which is where the most corners are. I think throughout the whole year, both from the chassis side and the engine side, we’ve made good gains and yeah, we just continue to work like that. And also experiment for next year. So yeah, very happy of course with the progress throughout the season.

    SV: Well, obviously there’s no progress from one race to another because it’s the same engine I support. I don’t know, I haven’t checked but I don’t think they have introduced a new spec. I think it was a bit of a surprise, usually we’ve seen a lot of qualifying sessions and we were always a bit faster than everyone on the straights, losing a bit in the corners but today we were as quick, or Max and Alex were as fast on the straights as us, so… that’s about it. I don’t know why. I don’t think, I mean I know we didn’t do anything different, so…

    Q: Lewis, Honda’s progress this year?

    LH: It’s obviously great for the sport that we have another manufacturer that’s starting to produce good engines and helping the third team get up there. I don’t fully understand it because we’ve only had the few engines that we’ve had. I don’t know if you can bring upgrades to the engine, I don’t know. Anyway, they’re very, very quick and we’ve got work to do, that’s for sure but my boys back home are working as hard as they can for next year.

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Lewis, there seems to be a growing support for you to be knighted back at home, given your achievements. Just your thoughts please? Obviously a massive privilege. Motorsport is often overlooked in the Queen’s Honours List but obviously you’ve done something which only two people have done, winning the title six times, so your thoughts on that?

    LH: Honestly, I don’t really like to think too much about it. Just the fact that people have mentioned it, it’s already an honour, but it’s not been something that I’ve been chasing in my life. If, at any point, that was to happen, I don’t particularly know how I would handle it. I have stood in front of Her Majesty The Queen before and it was pretty incredible and I think she’s just awesome. Again, I don’t think it’s going to happen, and again, it doesn’t bother me if it doesn’t. It doesn’t mean I’m not British. It doesn’t mean I’m not continuing to try and raise the flag as well as I can but I do appreciate all the support I’ve had from my fans and also from the British media.

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Why don’t you think you’ll get it?

    LH: I don’t know, I just don’t think about it. I don’t know.

    SV: Do you get a sword? That would be cool if you get to keep the sword.

    LH: It’s just not something that you grow up thinking of. I’m really grateful just to be… I’ve got the MBE next Monday. It’s cool.

    MV: Is it going to be MBE, OBE, what else?

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) He will be Sir Lewis. You’ll have to call him Sir Lewis.

    MV: You don’t have to, do you?

    SV: We are so much older than Max, he has to call us mister, at least, and then you’ve got to call Lewis Sir.

    Q: (Gianfranco Papini – Momento GP) Sebastian, what do you think is going to be the key to defeat Max in the race tomorrow?

    SV: Well, we know that they are very quick in the race as well so I think… yeah, we did improve our car. The key will be to have a good start, I think, ideally get ahead and then I think we manage the tyres, we make the right call on strategy so we will see what happens tomorrow. I think in the end, we are racing here in Interlagos and for some reason there is always something crazy happening, so it might rain tomorrow, even though they say it’s sunshine but here you never know.

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Max, including the pole in Mexico, this is the first time that Red Bull have had three poles in the V6 turbo hybrid era so how significant is it for the team and for Honda to have a milestone like that in the first year? And to Lewis, Seb mentioned that he’s a bit surprised to see their performance here, especially in a straight line. Are you surprised as well?

    MV: Yeah, of course it’s good. Like I said before, we’ve been continuously improving throughout the season. Of course some tracks have been a bit better for us than others. Already last year I think here we were quite good but yeah, I think again we made a step forward this year, we learned from our mistakes in some recent races and we came back stronger and everything is working well so yeah, of course very happy with three poles but at the end of the day there are more races than that and we want more pole positions.

    LH: I don’t really know what to say. Yeah, of course, didn’t expect to come here and see… because I don’t think in the last race they had a speed deficit to us so… On top of that, they were quickest in the middle sector so they’ve obviously still got the same amount of downforce but obviously more power this weekend and considering we are at higher altitude, I have no idea where that stuff comes from.

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – liviooricchiof1.com) Lewis, yesterday with the asphalt at 23 degrees, you and Valtteri were a little faster in the simulation of the race with the medium tyres and also hard. Do you think now, with the new conditions and the asphalt more hot you can keep this small advantage you have from both these guys in race conditions?

    LH: I really have no idea. I think in general our race trim has often been quite good. I think the cars… these guys seem to continue to step it up a little bit more in terms of their performances have been improving, improving through the year. I think it’s definitely going to be a close race tomorrow, it’s not an easy track to overtake on but tyre durability has been a strength of ours or at least, I’ve found for me, so if that’s the same tomorrow then hopefully yeah, I can utilise that.

  • We were hoping to be fifth: Racing Point’s Otmar Szafnauer

    TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Toyoharu TANABE (Honda), Otmar SZAFNAUER (Racing Point), Christian HORNER (Red Bull Racing), Frédéric VASSEUR (Alfa Romeo), Mario ISOLA (Pirelli)

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Mario, if we could start with you please. Cast our minds back a couple of weeks please, to Austin, when the 2020 tyres were tested by the teams. The feedback was mixed, what did the teams tell you, and what’s the plan going forward with these tyres?

    Mario ISOLA: Yeah, as you said, the feedback was mixed. I believed that we had quite difficult conditions in Austin. It was very cold and the new tyres are designed with a different philosophy. So the plan now is to test them again in Abu Dhabi where we have a two-day test planned specifically for testing the new construction and new compounds, so we will have a comparison that is more reliable compared to Austin. We tested this new construction during the year with the teams and with their cars and we found an improvement in terms of overheating, in terms of compounds with a wider working range – but mainly the new construction was designed because every year the performance of the cars is increasing and obviously we have to follow this increase in performance. If we don’t change the construction, the only possibility is to raise the starting pressure – and raising the starting pressure is making the overheating worse and the behaviour of the tyre in general worse. So, the new construction has been designed with the target to keep the pressure as low as possible, according to the improvement in the performance of the cars. So, I hope that we can have a test in Abu Dhabi that is more representative. I fully understand during the race weekend all the teams are focussed on the race weekend itself, so they cannot adjust the set-up of the car – the aero-balance of the car – and the new tyres have a different profile. They are wider, especially on the rear, and this has an impact on the downforce of the car, as well as the balance of the car. So, we need a bit more time to test them properly on long runs, to understand if we achieve this target. After that, obviously we are very happy to accept any… not accept any decision but to discuss the result of the test and to see what is better for the sport.

    Q: Looking further ahead, the 18-inch tyres for 2021 were tested by McLaren at Paul Ricard recently. What feedback did you get from the drivers and the team?

    MI: It was positive feedback. They said that the 18-inch tyres were better than expected. They are more reactive, we confirmed some results that we had with Renault at Paul Ricard in September. So now we are finalising the 2020 test plan. Obviously we will have another 25 car-days of tests but I’m very positive. And in any case, what we have developed for the 2020 tyres, we have some concepts that we can transfer to the 18-inch tyres. So, it’s useful to keep this direction for the future.

    Q: Fred, coming on to you. We’ve asked you this question for a while now and you’ve finally got an answer for us: Alfa Romeo have re-signed Antonio Giovinazzi. Can you tell us your reasons for that?

    Frédéric VASSEUR: I think he did a very strong second part of the season, he improved a lot. He is now matching Kimi in quali and I think the issue is not on the driver side. We have to stay focussed on this and keep a consistent line-up, and it will be the best thing to do.

    Q: You say the issue isn’t with the drivers. Let’s turn our attention to the team. How well has this year gone for you and what are your plans for the team in 2020?

    FV: The plan is to do a better job next year for sure. We started pretty well this season, we were P4 after five or six races and then we started to have an issue. Different issues, not always the same, but we didn’t score a point in the second part of the season – or one or two points – but it’s not an issue always with the pace and, at the end of the day, we are doing too many mistakes collectively and this is the big issue.

    Q: Otmar, Checo told us in the press conference yesterday that 2019 has been a difficult and disappointing year for Racing Point. Would you agree with him?

    Otmar SZAFNAUER: Well, it’s not what we wanted. We definitely wanted to be a little bit further ahead. We’re just one point ahead of Toro Rosso and 18 behind Renault, so yeah, we were hoping to be fifth or fourth this year, so from that regard, it’s a bit disappointing. However, having looked back at what happened the year before this, when this year’s car was in development, we were in a bit of turmoil, especially financially, so it’s not surprising – although as a team we always want to do better.

    Q: As you say, you’re 18 points behind Renault, two races to go. How do you fancy your chances of catching them and even beating them?

    OS: Well, we’ll do our best. If we can mind the weighbridge and not start from the pitlane, that should help. Collectively, if we do a good job… but I think it’s not just up to us. I think we’ll need a bit of luck to be able to catch them – but we’ll do the best we can.

    Q: Tanabe-san, has this been a better first season with Red Bull than you expected?

    Toyoharu TANABE: So far, after 19 races in this season with Red Bull, we achieved positive results compared to previous years. And then two wins, one pole position and then, additionally, both teams on the podium in German Grand Prix. We made considerable good progress in the year. We want to do our best in the rest of two races in this season and then we want to carry over this positive progress and the momentum for next year.

    Q: As you say, lots of progress but has it been better than you expected, coming into the relationship?

    TT: In terms of the relationship, I think very good. And then, so far the results of the race depends on the performance compared to other competitors. It’s not easy to say good or bad. As a result, as I said, we got wins and a pole position. It’s good progress in the relationship.

    Q: Thank you. Christian, perhaps I could bring you in on this. How would you sum up progress with Honda during this first season together?

    Christian Horner: I think it’s been really positive. It’s been a great relationship. The two companies are working really well together. In our first year we have achieved seven podiums to date, two grand prix victories, two pole positions – albeit that we only started from pole once – but yes, the progress that has been made with the introduction of each engine has been great to see. Reliability has been strong. This year was always going to be a transitional year in this first year of this new partnership but it feels like momentum has built through the year and with stability of regulations in all areas for 2020, we’re really looking to take the positive momentum from RB15, the current car, into RB16, which will be our 2020 contender.

    Q: Better than expected?

    CH: I think in many respects, yes. I think if you look at… there were a lot of questions as to why we had made the move to Honda. I think very quickly, at the first grand prix, we achieved a podium. We’ve scored more points than we had at this time last year. All around, reliability has been strong, performance has been getting better and better. I think on the chassis side we were affected more than we thought going into the year by the front wing regulation change and Honda have certainly exceeded our expectations in all areas. So, it has been a really very positive start to this partnership.

    Q: Christian, just one more question for you. You’ve re-signed Alex Albon for 2020. Just your reasoning behind that?

    CH: Obviously Alex has done a very good job in his first year in Formula 1. He started the year at Toro Rosso and we then took the opportunity at the summer break to promote him into the senior team. The reason behind that was to have a look at him within our own environment. And since stepping into that seat he’s finished in the top six at every grand prix, sometimes having to start from the back of the grid or even the pit lane. So, he’s driven exceptionally well. He’s given great feedback; his pace is improving and improving, at many circuits at which he’s never been to before or countries he’s never been in, like here in Brazil this weekend. He’s earned the seat on merit. We’re excited about his potential for the future. It was a relatively straightforward decision to come to, to extend his relationship with the team as the partner for Max in 2020.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Christian, on Alex: he’s had a pretty rollercoaster 12 or 13 months from thinking he’s racing in Formula E to getting his F1 opportunity, driving an F1 car for the first time just before pre-season testing in the shake down and then obviously the Red Bull call–up. Now he’s going to be going into next year in a car you hope is going to be fighting for the title. Have you ever seen a turnaround like this in someone’s career and how well do you think has Alex handled that? 

    CH: What it demonstrates from Alex’s side is great tenacity. Originally he was part of the junior programme, he was released from that early on in his career and he really had to fight to retain a career in motorsport and rely on his talent, tenacity and never-give-up attitude. And the way he applied himself, you know, driving for Fred’s team in Formula 3, he pushed Leclerc hard that year. Formula 2 he graduated to and he had a strong career in Formula 2 and then, as you say, he was off to another discipline and then, ironically, trigged by the events created by Daniel’s decision to leave to Renault created this opportunity for him to join Toro Rosso and then very quickly you could see that he had a decent talent and great race craft and that’s continued and grown. And then the opportunity came for us to have a look at him within Red Bull Racing. It just shows that if you have the right commitment, the right attitude then things can turn around and talent does always rise to the top.

    Q: As a follow-up to that, can you compare and contrast Alex with Pierre Gasly?

    CH: I think that obviously for Pierre it was very tough for him coming into the start of the season off the back off two accidents in pre-season and that I think definitely affected his confidence and of course being the team-mate to Max Verstappen is a very tough job to have, having that reference point. For Pierre, it was a difficult first half of the season for him. Obviously we felt that with the pressure building on him, the public pressure, the media scrutiny, it was right to remove him from that and put him into the slightly less pressured environment of Toro Rosso. And since that switch I think he has driven again exceptionally well. You can see his confidence is growing. He’s driven some very strong races and his pace is getting better and better. He looks happier in that environment, which is good to see.

    Q: (Jesus Balseiro – Diario AS) Christian again, also about your drivers. Carlos Sainz used to be a Red Bull driver. What’s your opinion about his performance this year. And also, at any point did you regret losing him, just considering him as a good option for the second Red Bull this season?

    CH: Well, I think it’s been good to see Carlos get into a good car this year and he has done a very good job. He has done a very good job. He has driven well. He has very much been the best of the rest after the group of the top three teams and he’s driven some very strong races this year. We elected to go our different ways but we are still proud that we gave him the opportunity to come into Formula 1 and that he’s managed to use that opportunity to carve himself our a career, albeit now with another team.

    Q: (Marcel Teixeira – Reuters) I would like to know from the three team bosses how useful was this first session, because of the climate conditions, of course? It seems we’re going to have wet weather again this afternoon.

    OS: We didn’t do much running so… We did a little bit of running on the intermediate tyres so it was useful to do that. We gained a bit of understanding and a bit of data on what to do here on the intermediate tyre but we’ll see what the rest of the weekend holds. I believe tomorrow and Sunday will be dry.

    CH: Well, for us it was quite an expensive session. It started good. Alex, first time in Brazil, first time on the track, went fastest on the intermediates and then as the circuit looked like it was starting to get dry, I think there were ten cars that went out on slicks and Max went off at turn two – but on his own this time…

    OS: On his own last time too, by the way!

    CH: And Alex unfortunately, with cold brakes, he locked up into the last turn and did a bit of damage so it’s dented the mechanics’ lunch break to get the car ready for the next session.

    FV: For sure it’s not an easy session, it was much less expensive for me than for Christian, but he has much more money also. But no, at the end, the evolution of the track was so huge that it was difficult to do comparison. You had some cars on track with slicks, with wets, with inters [so] I’m not sure it was the best session of the season.

    Q: (Emerson Furkim – Car Magazine) I would like you to talk a little bit about the new regulations for the 2021 season, so I have two short questions. The first one: do you think that the budget cap will really close the gap between the teams? And the second question is will the fans really see more overtakes on track with the new cars?

    TT: For the PU manufacturers, we don’t have a budget cap. In the regulations, we have a testing time limitation, big reduction required and in terms of the teams, I need to hear from the other people. Also that area of chassis development required (for more overtaking) we will see. From a PU point of view, we try to make a strong PU and then make the race more fun.

    OS: Well, the budget cap… we’re going to be nowhere near it so it will not have a big impact on us but some of the bigger teams that will have to perhaps downsize I’m sure it will have an impact in the short term and then they’ll hit some type of equilibrium where they’ll continue to be strong but I think it will have an impact at the beginning. Will the new regulations help overtaking? I can’t predict that. We thought that the new front wing this year was going to do that and it didn’t so I’m unsure. Hopefully the work that’s been put in with creating a different wake of the leading car will have an impact on the following car but whether it allows more overtaking, I can’t predict that.

    CH: Well the budget cap question… what you have to remember about the budget cap is that it’s fixed for a five year period so for certainly the top three teams it’s a considerable challenge to get into a position to obviously get under that cap for 2021 onwards. And then obviously once we are there we have to stay there for five years, so whilst there may still be some divergence between the smaller teams and the larger teams over a period of time and hopefully as revenues continue to grow within the sport with the plans that Liberty… and the growth that they expect to see during the next five years I think things will naturally converge. I think the frustration about the regulations are it makes next year very expensive because we have effectively three things going on: we have the current car to develop, we have tyre testing on behalf of Pirelli with a sort of an interim car and then we have the development of a new car to a new set of regulations, so next year is a big challenge. And in terms of the outcome to the rules, do they achieve the target? Only time will tell. I think the intention is great in what they are wanting to achieve with this high wake concept. Whether that’s achievable only time will tell. The cars are going to look a lot different, it’s very much a clean sheet of paper, the regulations, so with that you tend to get divergence rather than convergence and obviously the cars are a little simpler, there’s not as many aerodynamic influencing elements all over the car so it’s certainly going to be interesting and hopefully the intention is to get it to be more driver influenced which I think is only a positive thing.

    FV: Yeah, the situation is a bit different compared to the teams but for sure the budget cap won’t affect at all the six or seven teams on the grid. It will affect the top teams but on the other hand they will have more resources to develop the new car next year as Christian said before, but the most important thing for me is the stability of the regulations of other period but if we change the regulations another time in ’23 or ’24 but it will be very difficult for the small teams to have an advantage on this. And then on the overtaking, I think the target is clear but the FIA and the FOM worked pretty hard to reduce the wake of the cars and to have a better understanding of this but now we will see only in Melbourne ’21 what is the situation.

    MI: To reply to the question, we are not subject to the budget cap. About the regulations, I want to be positive because if it is true that the cars that are following are losing a lot less downforce, obviously this is a big help for the tyres not to overheat and to keep the performance and this should help overtaking, then obviously we will know in Melbourne 2021 but I want to be positive. I think we are taking the right direction.

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Christian, you mentioned Alex’s off in FP1. Obviously the conditions were quite a significant factor in that, so can you just sort of brush this one aside or has he got a little bit of a nasty habit of this, because we’ve seen a few times in practice this year he’s had quite costly accidents?

    CH: I think today wasn’t… you can’t put on Alex’s account. I think maybe we were a little bit too optimistic getting out there, trying to get him laps in on a track that was still pretty damp in the middle sector. Max, as I say, he had a moment at turn one, turn two. There were other cars that were running wide so I don’t think today we can blame that on Alex but he has had a few little incidents this year. Thankfully they’ve all been on Fridays and Saturday mornings. When it’s come to it in qualifying and the race he’s absolutely delivered.

    Ends

  • My dad told me when I was like six.. to never give up; that’s kind of the family motto: Hamilton

    My dad told me when I was like six.. to never give up; that’s kind of the family motto: Hamilton

    Hamilton after he race on Sunday. Photos by Abhishek Aggarwal

    DRIVERS
    1 – Valtteri BOTTAS (Mercedes)
    2 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
    3 – Max VERSTAPPEN (Red Bull Racing)

    TRACK INTERVIEWS
    (Conducted by Martin Brundle)

    Q: Valtteri Bottas, pole position to victory and you’ve just beaten on the greatest drivers of all time in Formula 1 history. You must be so satisfied with that victory?
    Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah, it’s a nice win. Feels good. It just felt very good since yesterday, the car, and yeah, we had a strong pace so we were able to get the win. It was the only I could really focus on and do this weekend in terms of the championship, but obviously it was not enough and Lewis got the title…

    Q: You weren’t lucky with the traffic. Was there a point where you thought ‘I might not win this now’? You really had to come back at Lewis and his pace was amazing.
    VB: Yeah, I wasn’t quite sure which strategy was going to be ending up the better one, but luckily my pace was good so I could make even that two-stop happen, which was not planned initially. Yeah, we both had some traffic here and there.

    Q: Have you got a quick word about Lewis and for Lewis?
    VB: Yeah, obviously big congrats to him. I personally failed on my target this year, but there’s always next season. But he deserves it. He had some season.

    Q: OK, we’re going to talk to the six-time world champion. He had a great second place today as well. Lewis Hamilton, congratulations, six times a world champion. You’re one clear of the great Fangio and you’re one behind Michael Schumacher, bless him. How does that feel? What’s going through your head?
    Lewis HAMILTON: It’s just overwhelming if I’m really honest. It was such a tough race today. Yesterday was really a difficult day for us. Valtteri did a fantastic job, so huge congratulations to him. Today I really just wanted to recover and deliver the one-two for the team. I didn’t think the one-stop was going to be possible but I worked as hard as I could. I’m just filled with so much emotion. I have my whole team here, everyone back at the factory. I’ve got my mum and my dad, my stepmum and my stepdad here, my uncle George and my aunt from Trinidad, and all the family back home obviously. It’s just an honour to be up here with those greats.

    Q: Great start: you went around the Ferraris, so now you’ve put yourself into nice championship position. You could have put your feet up, but you just never give up do you?
    LH: My dad told me when I was like six or seven years old to never give up and that’s kind of the family motto, so no. I was pushing as hard as I could. I was hopeful that I might be able to win today but it didn’t have it in the tyres unfortunately.

    Q: How far can you go? How many championships? Just where can this end?
    LH: I don’t know about championships but as an athlete I feel fresh as can be right now, so I’m ready for these next races, we won’t let up, we’ll keep pushing. I’ve got to say a big, big thank you to all team LH around the world, everyone that has come out here this weekend to really make this event what it is, and also to all the Brits and people with the UK flags supporting me this weekend. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart.

    Q: Congratulations once again. Max, you kept the great Mercedes team very honest today, you pushed like crazy, but in the end the strategy didn’t quite work out for you?
    Max VERSTAPPEN: Well, it didn’t work out but I think we did the best we could. They were just a little bit faster today. I tried to stay close in case something happened. For us it was a very good race. It was fun, I could still see the cars ahead of me and I think we had quite decent pace today.

    Q: Yeah you did. Your pace was relentless. We thought you were going to have a chance to catch and pass Lewis right at the end. Was that in your mind too?
    MV: Yeah, but there was a yellow flag on the back straight, so I couldn’t use the DRS. Otherwise, I think we could have been second today, but nevertheless still good to be on the podium.

    Q: And a quick word about Lewis?
    MV: Yeah, of course very impressive. Yeah, what else to say? He’s just doing phenomenally. He has a great team behind him, and, yeah, I hope we can take the fight to them next year.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Valtteri, many congratulations, you nailed it this weekend, winning from pole position. Did you have any concerns during that race?
    VB: Thank you. Obviously, a really good weekend, some solid progress since last year on a track I struggled with a bit. So yeah, obviously, as an individual race weekend, really pleased. Crossing the line really made me happy, because it was not an easy race. Even though the start went as planned, it was strong, also the first stint. But for me, Plan A was to do one stop, but Max pitted quite early, moved to two stops, so I had to try to cover him and then I went for two stops as well. Lewis stayed long, he tried to do one stop and one stage I worried that it was going to be a better strategy for him. All I could was focus on my every single lap, corner, trying to perfect everything, you know, with the traffic, all that, trying to minimise the losses and maximise all the gains I could. Then it was all about seeing towards the end of the race where we are. And my pace was good today and at the end I could catch Lewis and have some good fighting with him on track, which I enjoyed, and it was a good feeling to get ahead and to win the race like that it feels good when it doesn’t come easy.

    Q: Well done Valtteri, second win in three races, very strong end to the season for you. Max, coming to you: without that yellow flag at the end for Magnussen might you have had a go for second place?
    MV: Yeah, absolutely. Because of that you have to lift off, otherwise I would have definitely gone by. But that’s how it is. Sometimes those things happen. Overall, we had a really good race. I was just struggling with some weird oversteer in the car. Initially, they said it was my front wing, which had a little bit of damage but after the race I looked at the car and I was missing a big piece of my floor in front of the rear tyre, so that definitely cost me a lot of lap time today. I don’t know when it happened but already quite quickly into the race I had this weird behaviour from the car, which I had not felt before. So that’s a bit unfortunate and otherwise I think we could have been stronger today. But still, to be on the podium here after a very positive weekend in general I think was a really good achievement for us.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Abhishek Aggarwal – Indiainf1.com) My question is for Max. As you finished third today and in the championship points you are closing the gap now, do you think with two races remaining you can pretty finish ahead of the Ferrari driver and finish the gap and close in at three?
    MV: I think the gap to third is quite big. It might be a little bit too big to close, but let’s see. Today was good for that. But of course my last few races we lost so many points, that was not ideal. I expect we will be competitive in the last two races so let’s see how it will all work out for us. It is of course always better to finish third than fourth or fifth, even though I think everybody wants to be first, but we will try everything we can.

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Valtteri, I guess you knew coming into this that it would be unlikely that you would remain in title contention, so the fact that Lewis has wrapped it up here, does it take the sting out of that to win but also win in the manner that you did and beat Lewis on track in a straight fight?
    VB: This weekend, winning it was the only thing I could do to try and maintain the title hopes and delay them. Obviously I did my part, which feels good, but Lewis was strong this weekend, as he always is, so he got some solid points and got the championship. I’ve got mixed feelings, really. As an individual weekend it was strong but then, on the other hand, I felt this year being best of the rest it doesn’t feel good. But it always need a little bit of positives as well, you know. It’s my best season in Formula One so far, so that’s good, and looking at other positives, I’ve made huge gains in many areas, in terms of race pace and everything. But yeah, winning the race this way, Lewis still… I’m sure he really wanted to win this race, to win the title by winning the race, I could stop that and that feels good, obviously. But I just look forward to next year – it’s a new opportunity.

    Q: (Luis Vasconcelos – Formula Press) Valtteri, the first time you passed Lewis it was pretty straightforward, there was a huge pace differential. The second time you had two attempts: the first one you had to go wide and the second one you made it. Can you talk is through those last two attempts?
    VB: Yeah, I was closing in, there was also some traffic also ahead. Lewis had a bit of a mistake in Turn 11, so I could suddenly get this first opportunity. He covered the inside, so I had to take the outside line, although I was ahead, but he braked very late, so eventually I had to run off the track to avoid the collision, but it’s fine because if I was at his position I would have done the same, to defend as well as you can, so I’m fine with that. The other opportunity: again I think he went a bit wide on Turn 8 or 9, so I could get very close before the back straight and then it was much more straightforward. Again, I had good momentum out of exit of 11, got the tow and got him. So, then, after that, it felt like job done and tried to get car home without mistakes.

    Q: (Lawrence Edmonson – ESPN) A question for Valtteri. Congrats on the win but as you mention it’s slightly bittersweet. So when you look back at the year, where do you think it got away from and what do you think, ultimately, was the difference between you and Lewis this year?
    VB: Overall I think there were a few mistakes, for sure, from my side I should have been able to avoid. There were a couple on race starts, at least some of them were mistakes, some were maybe unlucky moments but they made me learn. Then a couple of qualifyings I messed up in Q3, definitely, which cost me starting position for the race and compromised the race and I lost points because of that. And then, otherwise, I don’t know, luck, unluck (sic) whatever has been pretty even for me and Lewis overall, so he’s just been on a great level again this year, every single race, and I’ve not been able to be at my very, very best every single race, but much more often than ever before, so the direction is clear for me in terms of my development, overall. It’s a good momentum now and in terms of race pace, which has been my weakness in the years before, I’ve made huge gains by working really hard with the engineers, you know, every single detail of my driving and set-up. That’s getting better and that gives me really confidence for next year and, unlike at the end of last year, now I really look forward to the year ahead, and I’m already excited to start the next season and start from fresh. So that’s going to be good fun.

    Q: (Stew Myrick – KTXX FM) Congratulations to you both on your respective finishes. There was talk on Friday about bumps on the track, on certain portions of the track. For both of you, how much of a concern was that today and how much did it change your strategy going into today’s race?
    VB: Only really the biggest effect in terms of driving was trying to avoid mistakes into Turn One with the bumps in the braking zone. Apart from that, there was a line in Turn Nine where there was a big bump that you could kind-of have a little bit less of an impact with that line, you would lose a little bit of time. So, always when I could, I tried to manage the car by taking that line, taking the time loss but making sure we didn’t damage the car – because obviously, example Sebastian, he had damage in his suspension, probably because of the bumps, so we tried to play safe when we could – but other than that it was not too bad. I think it brings a bit of character to the track. Obviously sometimes visibility is poor because of that but hopefully they don’t get any worse because that would be difficult to cope with.
    Max?
    MV: I don’t mind bumps but they’re almost like ramps in some places. But anyway, I think they will adjust it for next year. I think we have talked enough about it.

    Q: (Christian Menath – motorsport-magazin.com) Question for both of you. Ferrari was pretty strong since the summer break. Today they were nowhere. Have you been surprised by their performance and do you have an explanation for that?
    MV: Not surprised. At all. About it. After what came out. So that explains everything.
    VB: What came out?
    MV: The piece of paper.
    VB: I haven’t seen it.

    Max isn’t surprised. Are you surprised Valtteri?
    MV: Clearly!
    VB: Actually, I am. Because I haven’t seen that piece of paper. Look forward to seeing it. But yeah, it was crazy. Since the beginning of the race they were far away – but Red Bull was really strong today, as they’ve been now everywhere lately. So… yep.

    Q: (Peter Windsor – Clarksport) Congratulations Valtteri on a superb pole and win. Just going back to your driving again, there was a moment when you didn’t know if you would be racing for Mercedes after this year, and the contract was taken up, and it was announced that you were staying – and I’m wondering in the build up to that, how much uncertainty there might have been in your mind, and whether that might have affected your ability to work as you just described, and how long that period went on for – or was it a given in your mind that it was always going to happen?
    VB: There was definitely uncertainty for 2020 at some point. Lots of rumours. I had no idea what was going to happen. I just had to wait. So, for sure, as an athlete, as a driver, it’s not an ideal situation. You can’t be completely with peace of mind and focus on the job and, y’know, feel mentally free and in the right place. It’s tricky. When that continues, you know, year after year, every single year of your career, at some point it’s getting a pain in the ass – so it’s definitely nice to get the contract signed. But, it’s going to be the same story next year. But not too worried at this point because the pace is good, I enjoy the driving, I enjoy working with the team and hope they appreciate that as well.

    [Valtteri and Max leave, Lewis arrives]

    Q: (Abhishek Aggarwal – indiaInf1.com) Lewis, congratulations first of all. In two out of two races we’ve seen you went on with the one-stop strategy. Was that always the plan or are you kind-of improvising, the tyres are responding good and you are making it work ‘til the end?
    LH: Well, today, I think it originally looked like it was going to be a one-stopper but that changed once the temperatures came up today. You could see the guys ahead were starting to struggle on their tyres. Max then stopped quite early. So, I don’t think the team was expecting to do a two-stop, for sure, and on my side, I was thinking, ‘OK, I’m starting fifth, I’ve got to figure out how do I get to first.’ That’s all I’m thinking all day: how I could win this race. And so, I nursed those tyres like the best that I could possibly do. And I think that’s probably been a real strength of mine this year. I think I’ve always been able to do that kind of thing but to get the car in a position where you’re able to do that, and each year I’ve been getting better at it. And to eke as much as I could out of those tyres, I was so close to being just able to keep those guys behind – but I’m grateful to have been able to contribute to the team getting the 1-2.

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) How would you rate this title compared to the five before? Is it the easiest or the toughest?
    LH: No way has it been the easiest. It’s been the hardest year for us as a team. We lost Niki this year. A crucial member and a real pivotal member of our team and the emotional rollercoaster that we’ve been on with losing him, and a race where I didn’t have Bono here, outside of the car, just trying to remain focussed throughout the year. That is the toughest, and only really other athletes who are at the top of their game can really, probably related to it, probably because it’s just: arrive: week-in, week-out, can’t drop the ball – like I did yesterday, for example – and being about to bounce back from the tough… the lower days. And this car has not been easy, not been easy for us. It’s not been easy for us. We started the season honestly going off to Melbourne thinking that we were going to be behind. Mid-point of the season we were behind, and it’s been a real challenge, this second half of the season. It’s been the toughest second half of the season that I think we’ve had as a team, fighting against Ferrari and Red Bull, which is great, we welcome that. But, I don’t know, every journey is different. Every year you go through a different rollercoaster ride of emotions to get to where you’re going. I wrote something in my post this morning, that each and every single one of us is struggling with something in life. Whatever it may be: small, big. I tried to show people that, from the outside, things always look great but it’s not always the case. And I am also struggling with lots of different things and battling certain demons and trying to make sure that I’m constantly growing as a person. I think yesterday was something that was sent to test me, and I was able to do one of my favourite races today, I think. I was really happy with that one.

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Congratulations Lewis. Because you’ve had this run of success now with Mercedes, I guess one of the things that sometimes critics question is how much of it as team and car – but if you look at Ferrari, they’ve had their strongest season to date and you and Mercedes have still pretty much wiped the floor with them. So how satisfying is it to have built this team around you. And a second question on Ferrari. Are you surprised at how much they faded from competitiveness this weekend specifically?
    LH: On the performance side, no I’m not surprised. You saw that advantage they had through the season, and even last year. They had a huge amount of power, but more so this year, out of nowhere, had a tonne of power and I really just think, at will, whenever they wanted they seemed to have more. This weekend, I don’t know how their speed traces with ours but it’s definitely not like it used to be. It was seven-tenths we were losing on the straights before. Winning world titles. There’s not a single driver in the past that’s won a title without having a great team around him. There’s not a single world tennis player that’s won a title without having a great team around him. It’s part of the game and it’s how you navigate, and how you utilise those tools that are around you and those people around you to shape the future of the journey that you guys are on. And I’m just a chink the chain with this team but I feel very, very privileged and feel very… I feel really happy with my contribution, y’know? That I’ve been able to help steer the team in the right direction with the development, with the way the car needs to get quicker. And, more often than not have delivered performances for them when we’ve had a car that’s quicker than the others and also when the car has not been as quick as the others. Particularly that last year, they were just too quick for us to beat but we out-willed them, we had to out-think them and we did that collectively as a team.

    Q: (Andrew Benson – BBC Sport) Lewis, I know you’ve talked about qualifying this year and you not being happy with that, but overall you’ve kept up a very consistent level, probably the highest I think we’ve seen from you. Would you say this has actually been your best season overall, as a driver?
    LH: I think so. I definitely think so. I think last year was a year of just continuous growth and I think this year has also been continuous growth but I tried to make sure that I’ve started the season as I finished last year. And I think that’s just stayed through the season. If you looked, I’ve been very consistent in qualifying. I’ve not had particularly spectacular pole positions that perhaps I did last year – but it’s been, y’know, first, second row the majority of the time, except for this weekend. And apart from Hockenheim – but I’ll give myself a pass for that weekend because I wasn’t really 100 per cent. Otherwise I think it’s been the best performing year and I think I’m really just trying to… I’m working on a masterpiece and I haven’t quite finished it yet, so I’m trying to understand… it takes a long time to master a craft and whilst I feel like I am mastering it, there’s still more to master. There’s still more to add to it. There’s still more pieces to the puzzle to add. There’s going to be more ups and downs along the way but I feel like I’ve got the best tools now, to this point at least, to be able to deal with those.

    Q: (Peter Windsor – Clarksport) You’ve always said that you would take each race as it comes; you’re looking forward to the next race already and how motivated you are to win. But the championship is there now and I’m interested to know now whether – looking back at yesterday – maybe what happened yesterday wouldn’t have happened if the championship hadn’t been so close? That’s one question, and as a sort of corollary to that, when you woke up this morning, were you thinking ‘got to win today’; or were you thinking ‘got to get the championship done today’? Or both? Or neither?
    LH: I woke up this morning and I wasn’t really thinking of the championship. I think really I generally try to put that always at the back of my mind and during the season I’m generally not thinking about it, I’m taking it one race at a time. That’s worked for me in the past and so what ain’t broke don’t fix it. Each weekend there’s a different build-up to it, there’s a different journey towards… in that week or two gap that you have and you come across so many different people, different territories that you’re in and it’s a real roller coaster and each time you’ve got to arrive with positive energy, with the right fitness, the right mental attitude. So anyways, yesterday… it sucked, you know? I love qualifying and I was looking for one of those special laps and it was below average. I practised it, practised it and practised it and to think that we’re towards the end of the year and I’m still having those experiences… it’s OK because if it was all good and perfect there would be nothing to be excited about. I came here today in fifth, knowing that it’s going to be a very, very tough race. I watched all the starts from all the previous seasons that we’ve had here, trying to figure out where I’m going to place the car at the beginning of the race and all I could see was first place. How do I get to the guy that’s right on first. I wasn’t even looking at… when I was in third, I wasn’t even looking at the blue car that was ahead of me, I was looking at Valtteri and that’s how I’m built, I’m always looking and wondering… I was like, don’t give me the times of the car ahead of me, I want to know the times of the car ahead because that’s the one I’m trying to beat. So that’s how I’m wired and I was hopeful that potentially this… there was a long way to go on those hard tyres. So I tried not to doubt that we could make it. But Valtteri did a great job today so hats off to him and I’m really genuinely pleased for him and he’s done a fantastic job this year. He’s taken a real step in performance and I tell you what’s really hard: when you’re in the team, you help each other sharpen your tools so when I work with an engineer… I’m pretty sure Bono’s always been a great engineer but I like to think that through our collaboration, I think he’s now probably the greatest he’s ever been as an engineer and the same for me as a driver. And when you work with those people closely and then your number two goes over to the person in the other car and then starts to utilise what you’ve experienced for all those years to give advantage to the other driver, that makes it really hard, so this is why it’s probably been even more of a challenge, particularly from within the team to work with the first year new guy in Marcus, who’s done a fantastic job but it wasn’t so easy at the beginning. And then all my cards have been shown on the other side so creating new strategies, creating new thought processes, trying to really be innovative when it comes to my driving style, having to try and keep an ace in the pocket. Where the hell do you find that used time, so you’re constantly recreating the way you go about driving and try not to show everything, you know, and I think this year, as I said, I think he’s done a fantastic job but I’ve just managed to keep that edge which gave us this championship.

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) Lewis, I was struck by something you just said to one of the previous answers, you were talking about dark or demons. You mentioned demons, battling demons. Would you care to elaborate any more on that at all? It just strikes me as a strange time to mention that, given the success that you’ve had this year.
    LH: Well, not particularly; to each and every one of us is personal, what we all challenge when you look in the mirror each day, when you feel good or you feel bad for whatever reason. There’s always the darker side that’s always trying to pull you down and you’re constantly having to wake up… I don’t know how you guys wake up in the morning but I look in the mirror and I’m trying to lift myself up and say ‘yes, you can do it. Yes, you are great. Yes you can be fit if you go and put that time in. Yes, you can win this race if you do the right steps and you continue to believe in yourself, and no one else is going to do it for you.’ So it’s just encouraging yourself always and I’m just trying to show a side that I didn’t understand that we’re all similar in many ways. I would say this year that losing Niki, I didn’t think that was going to hit me as hard as it did. It really was upsetting and I miss him dearly today and I didn’t realise how much I loved the guy, from the moment that he was calling me, when I was back home, asking me to come to the team, to when we sat together in the hotel in Singapore, the weekend my gearbox broke at McLaren, to him always taking his hat off so our negotiations to all sorts. Great conversations about his planes, that was a tough pivot point for us in the end and also we lost a young kid in Spa. Again, I saw it on the TV, I saw it happen. That again, when something like that happens, can put lots of doubts in your mind and batting that off and thinking OK, jeez, is it time to stop or shall I keep going, because there’s lots of life afterwards. I still want to spend time with my family, I still want to have a family one day, all these different things, but I’m so charged to do… and I love doing what I do so much that I don’t think there’s a lot that can particularly stop me in that sense.

    Q: (Rebecca Clancy – The Times) Lewis, six World titles, it doesn’t just put you among the greats of Formula One drivers, it arguably makes you one of the greatest British athletes ever. How do you get your head around that, is that something you are able to comprehend yet?
    LH: I don’t see no – and I don’t know why, I really don’t know why. How am I supposed to feel, you know? I was just saying out there in the scrum that I remember watching this sport when I was younger, waking up, come downstairs, my stepmum, Linda, who’s here today, she would make me a bacon sandwich and me and my dad would sit there together and watch the Grands Prix. It’s odd to watch it and see someone in the TV set and now to be the person that’s in the TV set, you know, and be doing something like the great that I saw in Ayrton and the great that I saw in Michael. It’s beyond surreal to think that this journey, my life journey has brought me to this point in winning a sixth title. But I don’t really know how I’m supposed to feel right now. I just feel… I don’t believe in the whole cloud nine thing, I’m flying super high right now and I’ve got my family with me which is just… I don’t remember the last time my stepdad and my stepmum, my dad and my mum were in the same… at a Grand Prix. I don’t think I’ve had them at a World Championship Grand Prix before so again, to experience that and share that with them, people who have ultimately been at the core of who I am and sacrificed everything they had for me to have the life that I have today, to have this opportunity to do this today, so I was really proud to see them all smiling and share it with them.

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Auto Action, Speedsport) Lewis, you’ve talked a lot about what this all means to you. You’ve also not had a moment to yourself. Is there a time – tonight, tomorrow, next week – when you sit down and really reflect on everything?
    LH: Usually the reflection comes at the end of the year when work finishes and you can just take a load off and just sit back and have a beer. I will be with my dogs, with my feet up and just only then you can have a moment to grasp how great a year it has been. In my mind, I’m just too competitive, so I’m thinking OK, we’ve got two more races to go, how am I going to do a better job, how am I going to improve in qualifying. There’s two more qualifyings to try and get pole, how am I going to see if I can potentially pull out a lap like I did in Singapore last year. How am I going to work it that I can be at the front of both of those. I’m always just looking to improve and I really love being in this sport. I’m so grateful to this sport for giving me a life and giving my life purpose. Also, with social media, we have this platform where you can also have a work and have an impact on people so I’m grateful for the position I’m in and as I said, I really like the idea of trying to create a masterpiece. I think we all should be challenging ourselves to create our own masterpiece in some way, shape or form, and mine’s not finished.

    Q: (Phil Duncan – Press Association) You’re obviously now within one of Michael’s record. How motivated are you now to end your career as statistically the greatest driver that’s ever been in a Formula One car?
    LH: I think it’s really… it’s all about how you position your thought process. I’ve always said to you that reaching Michael’s was never a target for me. I’m not really one that really thinks of records and those kind of things. I definitely had thought that getting anywhere near Michael was just so far-fetched and I remember having my one for a long period of time, then getting a second one. It was so far away and now yet it seems so close yet it is so far away that I still can’t really even comprehend. The challenges that we’ll face in these next coming months, the next season. You look at these other teams that have really been putting some astonishing performances in in the second half of the season. It’s going to take another load of incredible performance and work from myself and all the people who are around me and I really don’t want to have to think about it right now. And also, I don’t want to build up the idea of trying to get to Michael’s… to get to seven because at the moment, I’ve got enjoy right now. Tomorrow’s not a given, I don’t know what’s going to happen over these next days or months but what I have to do and what we all really should try to make sure you enjoy each day because one day you’re here and one day you’re not. So not trying to think of what’s going to happen potentially at the end of next year or 2021. I believe that I have the ability to continue to grow and to do more with this team and within Formula One and so that would be the target but time will tell. Right now I just focus on trying to be as fit and healthy as I can be and smile as much as I can and enjoy this beautiful journey we call life.

    Ends

  • Drivers talk about bumpy track and tyre management

    Drivers talk about bumpy track and tyre management

    Saturday’s press conference in progress. Photo By Abhishek Aggarwal in Austin

    Austin, 2 Nov 2019: The following top-3 drivers attended the FIA press conference after the qualifying session on Saturday: Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes),  Sebastian Vettel (Ferrari) and Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing).

    The Track Interviews were conducted by Paul Di Resta.
    Transcript:
    Q: Valtteri, congratulations, man. That’s got the team worked up, to get a pole position today. It looked a bit unexpected yesterday but you’re starting on the front row.
    Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah, really happy about that. It was a nice lap in the beginning of Q3. You rarely get those kind of laps and on a track like this it’s a good feeling. Yesterday was tricky, there were many things not quite right with my car but we managed to find all the reasons and we did good work this morning with finding all the details and I could just find the places I needed to really focus on and, yeah, I knew how to put it together, but to put it together, it was a nice feeling to actually do it in Q3.

    Q: you nailed the first lap in Q3, conditions looked like they got worse. Was it very tricky at the end?
    VB: The last run there was a bit less grip overall. Sector 1 I was already losing one or two tenths. I’m glad no-one could improve at the end and I couldn’t either, so happy days.

    Q: I’m going to take a bit of credit for buying you that coffee this morning. You owe me one, but congratulations, well done. Sebastian, lining up on the front row, it’s a long run up that hill. How are you feeling?
    Sebastian VETTEL: I think it looks a shorter distance on the inside, no? I guess that’s what I have to say, being second. No, congrats to Valtteri, obviously it was very exciting because we were all so close. I thought I had a little bit more. I left some in the high speed for the last run, but in my final run when I got there I was already a little bit down. I had two decent laps. There was always… one hundredths, you know, there is always somewhere. But overall, happy, let’s see for tomorrow. Hoping for a good start and then for a good race.

    Q: I guess the main thing for you guys and the advantage comes down to the first lap and you’ll try to use that extra speed you’ve got on the straight?
    SV: Yeah, it’s not that long and part of it is uphill, but we will see. I hope to have a good start off the line, which will be crucial, and then we will see where it takes. Obviously all of us are on the medium tyre, so nobody has an advantage there and then, yeah, it’s a long race. We will have a busy race tomorrow. The first lap for sure is important but there is a lot of racing after that.

    Q: Max, P3, I know you’re not going to be happy with that but further up and it puts you in the fight.
    Max VERSTAPPEN: Absolutely. I think for us on this track to be that competitive was a very good result. Qualifying was just very tight.

    Q: And I guess the race… you looked very strong yesterday. Are you going to be in this fight all the way and pushing?
    MV: Let’s see. Normally we are quite good in the race and also now this time, even compared to last year, we were much more competitive in qualifying. Of course that gives us a lot more hope for tomorrow, so let’s see what’s going to happen.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Many congratulations Valtteri. Fifth in Q1, sixth in Q2 and then that brilliant pole lap in Q3.
    VB: Thank you. Yeah, it definitely felt good putting that lap together in the beginning of Q3. After yesterday it was not an easy day to approach as I had a difficult day yesterday. Luckily, we found many things ion the car that were no quite right and also the set-up direction we changed completely and it felt a lot better this morning. Then I was just focusing on the things that matter and the places I needed to improve. So I had a very clear vision in my mind of how to do it but it was then down to actually doing it and it felt good to have that lap in Q3. Even though Q1 and Q2 were a bit off I knew it was somewhere there and I managed to find it.

    Q: Now, let’s look ahead to tomorrow. You have to win this race to keep the championship alive. Are you happy with you car’s long-run pace?
    VB: I think as we have seen recently, normally on Sundays we are competitive. So, it’s obviously very good starting from pole here. Some corners are quite to follow for the cars behind. I believe we have the pace for that and that’s going to be the only thing in my mind for tomorrow. Now, you know, only a very, very small part of the weekend is done. The big part that matters is tomorrow and I need to focus on that.

    Q: Many congratulations Valtteri. Forty-three per cent of the races here have been won from pole. Sebastian, your 100th career front-row start. How satisfying is that?
    SV: Gosh, I’m getting old. Obviously it was a very nice session, it was really fun to drive the car thus afternoon, but if you are so close to pole and just on the wrong side of it then I guess Valtteri had a bit more fun. It was OK. I don’t know, what was the gap? It was very small, like one or two hundredths. So that is always there. I had a very good first lap and I had some margin maybe in the last sector where I was maybe taking it a little but too conservative, making sure that I finished the lap, set the lap first and then improve on the second lap. Unfortunately, I didn’t improve, so my plan didn’t quite work. Overall, it was good. I think we will have a strong race tomorrow. The car felt a lot better today than yesterday, which is also what we needed, so let’s see what happens tomorrow.

    Q: What are the tactics on your way to Turn 1 tomorrow. Do you think the man next to you might be a little bit tentative because of the championship? Are you hoping that’s the case anyway?
    SV: I don’t know, I’ll just pass him and then we’ll see what happens! If he’s thinking about it then I have a good chance. We’ll see. Obviously it’s a long race. The first lap is important but we have a lot of laps after that. But if I can pass him, I pass him.

    Q: Max, you were the only one in the top three to improve on your final lap in Q3. You actually said over the radio that you might have gone a little bit too early on that final lap. Do you think it cost you any time?
    MV: No, I just questioned if we were going a bit early but they just said we were ahead of the train compared to the Ferrari and Mercedes cars, so that was it.

    Q: And just tell us about that second lap. It is so close between the three of you. Have you been able to pinpoint where the time is, where you might have been able to get pole position?
    MV: Well, I think in general Q3 was a bit more of a difficult session than Q2, for example, where I found the grip was maybe not the same – but of course that’s the same for everyone. It was just a bit harder to get your lap out and yeah, in general it was just very positive for us in qualifying to be that close. Compared to last year we made a really big step forward and, anyway, now the last two races, I think, we have been a lot more competitive. So that is very positive. I think we are definitely improving and learning, and also looking ahead for next year, I think we are definitely going in the right direction. And yeah, in general very pleased. I think the whole weekend, we had quite a smooth weekend. I didn’t really have a lot of trouble with the set-up or whatever. So, to be here in the top three, of course I would have liked to sit in the middle bit still, I think it’s been very positive.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Christian Menath – motorsport-magazin.com) Question for you Max, could you please talk us through the situation, I think in Q2, Q3 with Lewis? It was a pretty close one.
    MV: Yep. So, we were all lining up to do our lap, or to get to the last corner, and I think it was Seb, the first Ferrari, then Charles and then I had Dany in front of me and we were all just slowing down to make space, and Lewis just drove by like nobody was there and didn’t care. So I was like: well, if you don’t care, I don’t’ care. So, I want to get my position back. I mean, everybody’s just respecting each other at that point, just to start the lap. That’s why it was such a close call.

    Q: (Abhishek Aggarwal – Indiainf1.com) Question to all the drivers. So, in the first three practice sessions we heard from all the drivers the track was a bit bumpy. We see lock-ups and cars being spun. So, in the race tomorrow how important is the tyre management, and have you thought about any other strategy to preserve tyres? What are your thoughts about that?
    VB: I think with the bumps here, just the main place where it can really affect your race, if you have big lock-ups into Turn One under braking. Those are quite big bumps – but normally, even though, if you lock the wheels, you can recover. So, I don’t think it’s going to make like a massive difference. Every track, there’s tricky points, tricky places that you can really damage the tyres and, obviously, coming into the weekend and in the weekend we’ve done all the analysis already for the long runs in terms of, in theory, where are the best places to preserve the tyres, and where to be slightly cautious at times, when you can, and so on. So business as usual, I would say.

    Q: Sebastian, how much worse are the bumps this year, compared to last year?
    SV: A lot worse! I think the ground is the problem here, it moves, for some reasons. I don’t know what they installed under the track when they were laying the track but yeah, I think they are aware. I mean, they tried everything. They brought some people out last night to grind parts of the track again to try and make it better for us – but now there’s not so much you can do. We’ll see, as Valtteri said, it’s not going to change the world upside down tomorrow in the race. I think it’s more an issue for quali where you’re really pushing to the ultimate limit and, you go also significantly faster. So, I guess tomorrow should be fine – but for sure it will be a bumpy race. I hope all three of us do well tomorrow but I think the last thing we need is somebody tapping our shoulders after all the tapping we get through the corners around the track. So, yeah, we’ll see what happens.

    And Max, your thoughts.
    MV: Yeah, not much more to add, is there? I can say the same, but…

    Q: (Lennart Wermke – Bild) Seb, question for you. Frankfurt beat Bayern Munich 5-1 today in the Bundesliga, I feel that’s quite an emotional result for you, what’s your opinion on that game and do you feel for Niko Kovač who’s very much under pressure as a Bayern Munich coach?
    SV: We are playing football or we are racing here? Is it that boring to watch? You have no question about what we actually do? I think there’s rain forecast in China tomorrow. Do you want me to comment on that?
    VB: I heard it’s snowing in Finland…
    SV: I’m a big Frankfurt fan but, to be honest, I didn’t know. I found out just before qualifying, so obviously by then the game was done. I think it’s a good result for my team and Niko Kovač has been part of Frankfurt for a while, so of course I feel for him – but I hope he finds back the success very soon.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto Motor und Sport) Question to Seb and to Max. The run to the first corner is pretty short, but it’s uphill. Does that improve the chances to overtake compared to the same distance but flat?
    SV: Well, they say we have more power so probably it helps if it’s uphill, because you need more power but, yeah, it’s not an awful long way. We will all try to have a good start and then you go from there. That’s the main target. I think the uphill bit doesn’t change so much. It’s trickier here for braking, so I think we need to be watching out but other than that…
    Q: Max, you’ll be on the cleaner side of the grid…
    MV: yeah, I think it’s more than that the track is very wide, so you can of course do a lot of different lines, compared to some other tracks where it’s just very narrow. I think the uphill bit… it’s that short and, of course, power matters a bit, like Seb said, but not enough, I guess, to make a big difference.

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Auto Action / Speed Sport) For all three. The bumps were bad but were you ever even vaguely tempted with your engineers to do a softer suspension setting?
    MV: I think you always pay attention to it but luckily in most places… it’s only really Turn One where it can influence you but, of course, if you will go a lot softer then it influences the rest of the track, so sometimes you just have to live with maybe a little bit more difficulty into Turn One.
    VB: No, we didn’t really want to do that much compromise because of the bumps. The losses then, elsewhere could be quite big, so we just need to try and deal with the bumps, and we thought that’s the best way for this track, this year.
    SV: No compromise, no sacrifice! Put a cushion in my seat, that’s the only thing to soften it.

    Q: (Erik van Haren – De Telegraaf ) Max, are you surprised about the performance of your car, because you sound way more positive than a few weeks ago?
    MV: Yeah, I think of course Mexico was very good but we also expected it to be competitive. But of course the races we had before that were not like we wanted so I was a still a bit ‘ok, let’s see if we found the performance back?’ and clearly this weekend was very positive overall so I think we can be very happy about it. Like I said before, it’s a good effort from the team as well to not give up and just keep pushing and try to find the performance back like we also had actually before the break. That’s why I guess I sound a bit more positive.

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) For Seb and Max: the two of you usually like to roll out quite cool, special crash helmet designs. We’ve had a few US specials here. Last weekend in Mexico Lewis asked his fans on Instagram… to quote him he asked if he thought that the rule to only have one major design change each year was BS. I just wondered what you thought about the restriction on helmet designs and if that rule was relaxed, would you do more throughout the year?
    SV: Well, I change it anyway so… I think it’s our helmet and we should be free to do what we want, so I think the rule is major BS. Yeah, I think it’s a part of… we have very little room left to sort of express ourselves and the helmet is probably the only one and if people like it, that’s great, if they don’t like it well it’s not their helmet so I think we should be in charge for designing which way and which colour our helmet has.
    MV: Yup, I agree. I always loved when Seb was at Red Bull and changing his helmet every race, almost, more or less. It was cool  because you were just like ‘what is he coming up with now?’ I do a few but I’m not going to say I will do a different helmet every race because it’s just too much effort in designing the helmet but I think if you want to make it blue or red, the next race, why not? It’s your crash helmet and you should be able to do what you want and of course in the past, there have been drivers who have always had the same helmet and then they say ‘yeah, but that’s how we can distinguish the drivers’ but at the end of the day we have massive numbers on the side, we anyway have a halo on the top so let us do what we want with the helmet now. I think anyway it’s very nice to have a different design every year because it’s a bit boring always to keep the same helmet.
    Q: Valtteri, do you think it’s a bit boring to keep the same helmet?
    VB: I don’t know. Sometimes it’s nice to keep the same helmet but for sure sometimes it would be nice to do something special, every now and then and obviously everyone might have a special occasion, you know, whatever, or a special connection to some certain country where you want to do something special or pay a respect to someone you know or whatever. It would be nice to see a bit more freedom because like both of them have said, it’s our personal thing. We should be in control of that rather than anyone else.

    Q (Lawrence Edmonson – ESPN) Valtteri, yesterday it looked like you were losing a half a second to Lewis in the middle sector alone so was there an actual problem in the car or was it a set-up thing and did you get to the bottom of it – well you obviously did get to the bottom of it but what was it?
    VB: We actually found quite a few things not quite right. A little bit with the set-up, I think. I think I started to go in the wrong direction, some things on tyre pressures, temperatures and we found some reasons for quite a big straightline speed difference which made an effect on sector two so those combined, when I started today in practice three, I was like ‘wow, this is a different car, it feels normal’ and I was happy again. I knew, since the first run this morning that it can be a good day if we can get everything right.

    Q: (Jim Vertuno – Associated Press) Valtteri, how do you think Lewis, as your team-mate, how do you think Lewis will react or respond to starting fifth? Do you think he will be aggressive tomorrow on a track where he’s had so much success or do you think he will be patient and lay back with the championship on the line for him?
    VB: I think it would obviously be better to ask him directly. I don’t know what his mindset is right now but from what I know of him, he’s going to be there, fighting hard. For sure he also hates losing, he always wants to win like all of us and obviously he’s leading the championship with a big margin, he doesn’t need many points and I’m sure he would like to win the championship in a nice way eventually when and if it happens. But obviously I will try to delay that, I try to focus on my own race, try to focus on winning the race rather than anyone else’s opinions or mindsets.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto Moto und Sport) Seb, you said the car was much improved compared to yesterday. Was it also on the longer runs, could you find out in P3?
    SV: Yeah, obviously we didn’t do long runs in FP3 but I think overall the car felt better than this morning so… we changed quite a couple of things which I think helped and they will also help in the race. How the pace will be, obviously we will find out tomorrow but at this stage I’m quite confident. I think we also struggled in particular on the hard tyres so I think we just didn’t get them to work and that should not be an issue tomorrow.

  • We have a good engine and we hope to keep the advantage in future: Ferrari

    We have a good engine and we hope to keep the advantage in future: Ferrari

    Austin, 1 Nov 2019: TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Franz TOST (Toro Rosso), Zak BROWN (McLaren), Mattia BINOTTO (Ferrari), Cyril ABITEBOUL (Renault), Claire Williams (Williams)

    The FIA Friday Press Conference in progress in Austin. Photo by Abhishek Aggarwal

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: The 2021 regulations are now locked-in, having been unanimously ratified by the World Council, so can we start please by getting your thoughts on them. Perhaps Mattia, you could start?

    Mattia BINOTTO: Obviously, as you said, it has been voted. As Ferrari we are part of the World Council, we voted as well in favour. We believe it is the right moment to look for a discontinuity, for our sport, it has to be sustainable, we are all aware of that. We need to work hard as well in the future on a more sustainable, green, as well, sport. There is a still much to work on, so if there is anything, I would avoid to say that it is locked down. I think this is still at a starting point where altogether now we need to collaborate, improve furthermore what is certainly a good set of regulations, but still much to develop, improve and certainly as well, looking at a more sustainable sport in the future, on the power unit, on the fuel, whatever can be done. I think that’s a responsibility we’ve all got together. So far, we collaborate well with FIA and F1 but still much to do.

    Q: Cyril?

    Cyril ABITEBOUL: Yes, I think it’s good that it’s done. It’s an important milestone but, as mentioned by Mattia, there is so much more to be one. I would still acknowledge a number of innovations in this set of regulations, because there will be a new set of regulations with the financial regulations that will complement technical and sporting. Otherwise it’s a compromise. Some people would have liked it to be a bit different, maybe a bit more open or a budget cap a bit lower, things like that – but it’s a first step, in my opinion a good step, it’s in Renault’s opinion a step that’s going in the right direction for a sustainable sport, so let’s see what’s coming next but it’s good now that we have clarity on what’s coming up for 2021. We can all now start building up this beautiful car that we have ahead of us, and start spending towards this new regulation.

    Q: Claire, your thoughts?

    Claire WILLIAMS: I think from a Williams perspective we’re delighted that that new regulations were approved by the World Motor Sport Council. They’re everything that we’ve wanted to see from the various perspectives, whether they be technical and most clearly the financial regulations that are coming on board for 2021 are exactly where we wanted to be. We understand that they’re a first step, moving forward but they’re certainly a right step in the direction that we wanted to ensure that the sport – but also teams like ours – remain sustainable for the future. I think we’re all very aware of how unsustainable at the moment Formula 1 is from a cost perspective. So, to have a level of cost-capping at this first juncture is really important to teams like ours. I don’t think that can be underestimated. The technical regulations as well are a step in the right direction. I think there’s probably some tweaking to do – but I think certainly as a first step they’re exactly what we wanted to see.

    Q: Zak?

    Zak BROWN: I agree with everything that’s been said before me. I think it’s a good day for Formula 1. I think it’s going to be exciting, 2021, because there’ll be much change. I think through this process, the Formula 1 teams got closer relationships with each other, which is something that, while we certainly still don’t all agree on everything, I think relationships have been built for the better of the sport. I also think working with Chase and Ross and the FIA, that’s been a good process. I’m sure we all would like to see some things modified but that’s always going to be the case. In our case, I think the budget cap, there was one area we would like to have seen something more aggressive, quicker, it would have been that, but it is what it is and I think most importantly we have clear direction moving forward.

    Q: And Franz?

    Franz TOST: All the parties have done a good job. That means Liberty Media, the FIA and the teams to come up with these new regulations – because all the main topics are covered. What are the main topics? The cost cap – because we need to come down with the costs in Formula 1; b) the money distribution: it’s more fair than it was before. Then the new technical regulations; the new sporting regulations and as well the governance. I think that’s an important time frame to bring everything within next year and then 2021 in the right direction. It’s a new start for Formula 1 and I hope it will be a successful start.

    Q: Zak, you’ve worked hard at restructuring McLaren over the last 18 months, so how much personal satisfaction does the prospect of P4 in the Constructors’ Championship give you?

    ZB: I’m very pleased with the season so far. There are still three races to go. We had a poor Mexico which I think was a good reminder that, while we’ve had a good year, with three races to go there’s plenty of points still up for grabs but certainly the off-season progress, the people that we’ve brought on board, Andreas leading the team, James Key, Andrea Stella getting promoted, and really all the men and women at McLaren. Our relationship with Renault, they’ve been an excellent partner. I’d like to give them a lot of credit for our success this year and our improvements. And yeah, it’s certainly a lot more enjoyable being at this Austin US Grand Prix than it was this time last year.

    Q: Cyril, while we’re talking about restructurings, you announced a reorganisation of your aero department this morning. Just tell us a little bit more about that. Why have you done that?

    CA: I think it’s fairly straightforward what we’re trying to achieve. This year has been marked be an amount of satisfaction but also some struggles. It’s clear that this position of P4 that we had last year is going to be challenging to retain this year, to say the least, against Zak. But I’m happy that it’s a Renault powertrain that’s going to maintain that spot in the future. We’re also in a close fight against Franz and Toro Rosso, and Racing Point, so a number of challenges. We’ve been focussed on growing, in terms of quantity, making up the numbers, it had to be done, but in parallel we need also to look for a bit stronger technical leadership and making the team stronger in that area where we were a bit lean at that level, so that’s exactly what we’ve gone by restructuring our aero department with a mix of external recruitment and internal promotion. So, I’m not going to go into the specifics but we all hope it’s going to support our best, all that there is to offer because aero department is a big department with very nice facilities, state-of-the-art equipment, so they need to know to deliver more.

    Q: Claire, Nico Hülkenberg has ruled out a move to Williams in 2020 and Nicholas Latifi is doing FP1 for the remainder of the season except for Abu Dhabi. Is that an indication of your plans for next year?

    CW: No, the plan was always to have Nicholas Latifi in the car for these practice session that you’re seeing him in, in the next couple of races and in Mexico as well. It’s no clear indication. We’ve made it very clear in the media that we won’t be making our driver announcement for that second seat for 2020 until after Abu Dhabi this year.

    Q: Franz, Pierre Gasly said yesterday that your car hasn’t changed much since he’s been back with the team – yet the results have been strong in the last few races. If what he says is the case, how do you explain the upturn in performance in recent races?

    FT: Maybe he slept not so good here. The car made some progress because we came up with a lot of aero updates, and don’t forget that also Honda also came with a new fuel, in Suzuka, which brought us a good performance advantage. Nevertheless, Pierre gets also more and more familiar with the car and with the team, and therefore he is showing a good performance and we are happy about this.

    Q: And you’ve finished in the points here for the last five years. Do you think you can do it again this weekend?

    FT: I hope so. This is the target. It’s not only to finish in the points. We should be really good in the points, to score a lot of points, not only one or two points. But we will see. Our competitors are very strong and it will become an interesting race.

    Q: Mattia, what’s your analysis of last weekend’s race in Mexico? Have you had a chance to look through what happened and how you can help yourself this weekend?

    MB: Well, what happened? Certainly when starting on the first row it’s always difficult somehow not to get the best result in the race but I think what happened is that first maybe we were not fast enough in the race, because if being faster they could not have undercut us. That’s the first analysis. Generally speaking, sometimes to win you need to take some more risks. And risk to me means somehow brave and brave enough means that maybe when Albon stopped we should not have stopped with Charles, staying out. But in doing that means that we were pretty sure the tyres would not have lasted to the end by stopping at that time, which was wrong, wrong assumption. So it means that in terms of tyre modelling, tyres understanding, there was still some tuning that was required. So now, they’re looking back at all the data. We are furthermore trying to improve our tyre model for a better understanding and that will give us in the future probably a better opportunity for a better choice.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Question to Mattia. Your two drivers are fighting for the third place in the Championship. Is it an important thing for you? And the one who will finish ahead of the other, will be the team leader for next year?

    MB: OK. What is important for us, at first is to confirm the second place in the Constructors’, and hopefully we can do it here this weekend. What is still important for us is to add some victories for Ferrari team in the last few races. And I think very last is third place in the Drivers’. And then whoever will be… not important. With that said, the start of next year, not at all.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Line / Racefans.net) A question to Mattia. Obviously, you are on the WMSC and you voted in favour of the regulations. You also have a veto. Had you any stage considered triggering the veto about any aspect of the regulations or at the very least voting against the set of regulations?

    MB: As first, as we said, we voted in favour, so we are happy with the new set of regulations or if not happy then we are at least convinced it is the right way to go. Did we consider it in the past? I think as many times we answered to the same question, for us it was more important to collaborate with F1 and the FIA to makes sure that by the end of October we got the best package to be voted and I think that’s where we put our focus and put our effort. That’s all.

    Q: (Abhishek Aggarwal – INDIAinF1.com) Mattia, last week in the post-race press conference Vettel mentioned that Ferrari cars are quickest in a straight line and the fact that the power unit is great, it’s just that there’s less downforce and that when the tyres get a bit older there’s some pressure. Now, given the fact that this track is more favourable with regard to downforce do you think Ferrari will have an edge this weekend?

    MB: No. I think of this as two different points. First, we are still lacking downforce compared to our competitors and that’s an area of weakness, something that we improved all through the season. I think that today we’ve got a good package but not good enough and we are very aware that having downforce is important, certainly on some circuits, like Budapest and Mexico. But if you look from Budapest to Mexico we did a great step forward in the right direction. So we will need to add further downforce, we will need to add further downforce for next season and that is important for the race pace, tyre degradation and so on. Adding downforce will mean adding drag and we will be slower then on the straight. But still today we believe we’ve got a good engine and that’s in our favour and we hope to keep the same advantage in the future.

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) To all five please. The final regulations came out yesterday. They’ve been described as immature and underdeveloped in recent weeks. Now you’ve got the initial tranche of provisional regulations, I guess, are there any early red flags or concerns about areas that needs further development or are particularly green?

    FT: No. So far we have now a good basis on the technical regulations as well as the sporting regulations. Of course there will be further discussions and some fine tuning but the most important pillars are fixed and the rest then we will see.

    ZB: I agree with Franz. There are no red flags. Fine tuning the regulations… they’re quite complex and long and new, so I’m sure there will be questions, comments and modifications but nothing that appears to be alarming and no big, gaping holes at the moment.

    MB: No big issues. Certainly all the teams will start developing the cars for 2021 and put more effort and I’m pretty sure by putting more effort into it we will find out eventually some areas that will need to be further improved. But again, I think what will be important is the process of discussions, the process of regs modifications, which means as well a governance we need to put in place and that will be key from now to the start of 2021 and the earlier we do that the better it will be.

    CA: To pick up from where Mattia left it: to confirm all details of the governance, because in order to make changes as we develop the cars and as we face some unknowns or some loopholes, we need to see how we can fix what is missing from the regulations. The other aspect, the other chapter that is maybe not developed enough is maybe the roadmap on the engine side. We exactly know where we are on 2021, but fuel, bio-fuel, freeze, partial freeze, progressive freeze, complete freeze? In our opinion those aspects need to be addressed so that the economic side of the engine activity is also sustainable – just as sustainable as the chassis side.

    CW: I would agree with what everyone has said so far. I don’t think there are any red flags in there. I would also probably say use of the word ‘immature’ would be slightly unfair to the countless people that have put a huge amount of effort into these regulations on the side of the FIA and F1. A lot of people have been involved and a lot of people have spent many, many hours making sure that these regulations are in the best possible place that they can be up until this point. And I agree with everyone else that there is just some tweaking that needs to be done to them.

    Q: (Bernardo Becht – Correio do Povo) With the cost cap coming and these new regulations – for Zak and Claire, the teams most concerned – won’t there be two development teams for two cars until the cost cap coming in, stars to take place. Won’t it be harder to catch up? Ferrari and Mercedes will have two teams working to develop a 2020 and 2021 car. Won’t it be harder to catch up later, with less money, when there is a cost cap working?

    ZB: It’s hard to catch them right now. Ferrari and Mercedes are fantastic racing teams and they have tremendous resources. Yeah, this is going to be a journey, the cost cap. There will be a lot of spending in ’20 that will have implications for ’21. And of course once you get a head start when you see regulations, whether it’s on the power unit front, stability over time tends to bring things together. So, I think Ferrari and Mercedes are in a great position and we’re all trying to catch up and it will take some time.

    CW: Yeah, obviously, I think we’re in a slightly different position to McLaren. Our budget is much smaller than theirs. For teams like ours, for Alfa, for Haas, they’re operating on considerably less budget than the rest of the grid. It’s a really difficult piece of work at the moment to try to marry up the programmes we are running for not just this year but for next year and ’21. But I would say it is probably the lesser of two evils. We did try, in the Strategy Group, to see if we could bring the cost cap in earlier, so the bigger teams wouldn’t have to spend all this money they’re worried about spending for next year. That would be clearly a bonus. There’s clearly going to need to be some convergence, which I’m sure we will see – we’ve got stability on these regulations for five years from ’21 and beyond. It is difficult. It is incredibly difficult. But these regulations, particularly as I said earlier, the financial regulations that we are seeing, are the right things for teams like ours that are truly independent and rely solely on sponsorship.

    FT: Yeah, I mean it’s clear that the top teams have an advantage. They will use the next year, even this year already for developing the ’21 car. They will have this performance advantage for ’21. The cost cap, real, will count from 2022 and ’23 onwards – 2021 will be a difficult one. But this was discussed anyway.

    Q: (Joe Saward – Autoweek) We’re talking about saving money and we’re increasing the number of races. Now, there is a cost to that, financial and human. I’d like to hear your views on whether 25 races is too much? To everyone.

    CW: Twenty-five is a lot of races, you quite right. Looking at 22 for next year is an awful lot and all the teams are having to look at the impact of that on personnel, just purely from a lifestyle perspective and having that work-life balance, it’s incredibly difficult. We’ve all got support personnel that we can rotate in and out. I think obviously for the bigger teams it might be an easier challenge from that perspective: they have a bigger budget in order to bring in more people in order to support that rotation. It is difficult. From a financial perspective though there is an offset, so obviously we go to more races, there is more money in the pot that then gets distributed. So really from an offset financial piece, it’s not the end of the world. It’s more managing people, the people we have working for us and not putting too much pressure on them for 25 weekends a year.

    CA: I think it’s a good summary. I’m pretty sure that the figures can work, so it can still be economically positive to expand the calendar, to increase the number of races, but as Claire mentioned it’s really a stretch for everyone and I think the main questions is a question of quantity versus quality. But having said that we live in a world where we need to have as much and as frequent touch points as possible with the fans, with the media, with digital, creating content. We are in a world of content, where you need market share, you need to visible, you need the exposure. It’s a difficult one, probably not one for us to answer, probably one for the promoter mainly. It’s a stretch for all of us. In my opinion the measure made on the sporting side to sort of reduce the weekend are going in the right direction, it doesn’t really balance enough of what an expansion of the calendar will mean in the future.

    MB: I think there is not a clear answer, and by not having a clear answer it means it’s a good question. I think we are not all convinced at the moment. I think it’s part of the discussions we may need to have with F1. It is a compromise at the end. It is an extra effort financially and I’m even not too sure it will be to our benefit. It depends on where we are going racing in the extra races. How much are the revenues for those ones. There are a lot of points that will need to be addressed on the number of races. But still, again, it’s a matter of being positive, collaborative and finding all together the right answer.

    ZB: I think my only build is I’d like to maybe see alternating races as a potential solution. I think when you have new countries that want to embrace Formula 1, that is a good things and it exposes us to new parts of the world, but maybe instead of having 25 races, which I think is achievable, though it would require doing things differently than we do today, then I think maybe alternating some races on the calendar would be a good compromise to grow the sport without straining the system as much as I think 25 races would.

    FT: There is nothing to add, everything has been mentioned.

    Q: (Jean-Louis Doublet – Agence France Presse) The track looks much bumpier this year than it was last year; do you think it could create problems with the integrity of the cars during the race?

    FT: So far I don’t expect any problems. The engineers have time to analyse all the data and then I’m convinced they will find a correct set-up, even for a bumpy track. I don’t expect any problems in this case.

    ZB: It certainly looked bumpy from what I saw on the screens from the first session. I’ve not had a chance to speak with the drivers to get their feedback. I’m not worried about the integrity of the car. Could catch a driver or two out in the race, there were definitely a few drivers going off the track so it could create some excitement.

    MB: Yeah, certainly bumpy. I think that to say right now that it will not affect the reliability would be very brave because later on in the race weekend we may find the opposite. As a matter of fact this morning, with Charles, we had a small inconvenience due to, we believe, on a bump, a small issue happened just as an example so yes, it needs to be managed, we all need to be aware of it and making sure that it doesn’t affect the result.

    CA: Not much to add. I think it’s in addition to the reliability, it can also affect the set-ups and finding the proper balance between sector one with the understeer that you can create on those bumps, that you can fight but to the expense of what you get in sector and stability and oversteer. So it will be a compromise, might be an interesting chance for all of us.

    CW: Our engineers were talking about it this morning, how bumpy it is and Nicolas was reporting particularly turn one and two were particularly difficult to get round, I think. Just from our perspective, we’ve had a lot of race attrition over the past three or four races and we just would like a very clean weekend so that our poor manufacturing guys don’t have to do a whole lot of work after this race going into Brazil.

    Q: (John Massengale – Speed City Radio) Zak, do technology fans need to worry about the 2021 rules with cost caps? Cars look great but technology fans don’t want F1 not to be at the pinnacle.

    ZB: No, I don’t think they have anything to worry about. Formula One’s always been the pinnacle of motor sport, unbelievable technologies and I think where things are going with the broadcasts and social media I think the way that we communicate with fans via technology is actually just going to increase so I think fans have plenty to be excited about for the future of Formula One.

    Q: (Graham Harris – Motorsport Monday, MotorsportWeek.com) For Franz, Zak and Cyril with perhaps some comments from Mattia and Claire: that dreaded word Brexit looks like it’s headed sometime before January 31. With Zak and Franz and Cyril having facilities in and out of the European Union, what measures have you taken that your daily workload isn’t increased and there are no problems going forward. And perhaps Claire and Mattia, have you made any preparations for Brexit, has it wasted a lot of money so far? Any other comments?

    CA: I have to say that I have lost this plot a bit recently but yeah, we’re working, we have some measures in place. I think we know how things are going to take place and shape up for anything related to races. We are not totally clear on the logistics between our two factories, one being in France, the other one being in the UK, that could cause some delay and that’s still unclear. We are working with the Renault-Nissan Group on the logistics side to make sure that we understand exactly… we have access to the authorities and then they will be able to help us in that respect so we are lucky to be part of a group in that respect. On the personnel side – because we’ve recruited a lot, 24 nationalities working in our factory in the UK, obviously we don’t want to lose these people, so we understand that there will be some sort of grandfathering, some measures to protect them, at least for initial years, until we know a bit more about the exact measures but again, I think we first need clarity about Brexit itself.

    FT: I was at the wind tunnel in Bicester on Tuesday when we discussed this topic for quite a long time. You know the major issues are logistics and of course the people, the employees who are working there, not coming from England and currently it’s difficult to make a plan and a programme because we don’t know all… at least the final process. Once this is out, once first of all if they decide the Brexit, that they know what they do, or what they want to do and then we have to sit once more together and find the best possible way.

    ZB: We have a team back at the factory, a little Brexit working group so we’re prepared for it. I think it will impact everyone’s business to a certain degree but fortunately it’s been going on long enough that I don’t think there will be any surprises and we’ll be working around it accordingly.

    Q: Mattia, any Brexit thoughts?

    MB: No, not really. We do not have a working group, at least in Maranello on that one. Obviously we will need to take care for our people we’ve got, for UK people in Italy but it’s not worrying us, certainly.

    CW: Like Zak says, we’ve had a steering committee on this for the past year now because there are clearly a lot of touch points that are going to have an impact when it eventually does happen around personnel in particular. I think Cyril said he has 24 nationalities, we have 28. There are a lot of considerations on obviously not just the people who are working for us but their families as well, whether they are based with those people in the UK or whether they are in Europe. There are issues around foreign exchange, around freight, crossing through borders, people crossing through borders, so there’s a lot of working that’s going on and obviously with the continued uncertainty that makes life a bit difficult so we’re looking forward to the whole thing being resolved sooner rather than later and we can all move on from that.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines / Racefans.net) I believe you’ve very recently received your draft commercial offers, let’s call it the Concorde Agreement. Is this is a good document, acceptable document for your business models or is it just a good starting point for negotiations?

    MB: So through that, we just voted the new set of regulations but the entire Concorde Agreement needs to be discussed and agreed and signed, that’s on the commercial button, the governance as well. Working group have been set, to start discussing the details of the documents. I think it’s only after having seen the details that we may assess where we are and what’s required.

    ZB: Same as Mattia. We’re going through it, it’s a long complicated document, no major red flags and we’ve got the necessary people within our group going through it to all contribute to questions, comments that we have so I think like any legal document, there’ll be lots of commentary but we’re pretty comfortable with what’s been presented.

    FT: The basis is OK, we are working on it, our people and so far I haven’t seen any big dramas or red flags. I think the document itself is so far acceptable. Once more, we are still studying it.

    CA: Well, I hope and believe that the principles of Concorde are more or less in a good place. Maybe not everyone will agree with that but I’m talking really about the key principles but clearly we are not dealing with the details… You are both looking at me. Am I going too far? No, frankly I don’t expect any major renegotiations of Concorde terms, what’s been proposed, because that’s something also that’s part of the discussion of the whole package, even though it’s not been signed up so anyone is free to sign or not to sign but clearly I expect that the details of the drafting of the document to take much longer – we all know that when one lawyer gets involved so at least we have twelve lawyers. So that’s going to take a bit of time probably to get a grid.

    CW: I don’t have much to add. Everyone has said what I would say. We’re looking through it and we haven’t seen any red flags to date.

    Ends