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  • Abu Dhabi GP: Final FIA Press Conference

    Abu Dhabi, 4 Nov 2012: The following top three drivers attended the final FIA press conference here on Sunday: 1. Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN (Lotus); 2. Fernando ALONSO (Ferrari) and 3. Sebastian VETTEL (Red Bull Racing).

    PODIUM INTERVIEWS

    (Conducted by David Coulthard)

    Kimi – your first victory since the 2009 Belgian Grand Prix. Tell us about your emotions at this time.

    Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN: Not much really.

    People want to know how amazing it is to win a grand prix. Tell us.

    KR: Last time you guys was giving me shit because I didn’t really smile enough, so maybe this time again but I mean I’m very happy for the team – and myself – but mainly for the team. It’s really a hard season for the team and not an easy time. Hopefully this gives them more belief, not just for the guys making all the work but also for the guys who run the team. I hope this can turn around the tables and give us many more good races and wins. If not this year then next year.

    Fernando, you never gave up, you were chasing Kimi down in the closing stages of the Grand Prix. You must be surprised to see your world title… well all three of you were technically in the world championship battle until this moment. Tell us about your race and how you felt it was going.

    Fernando ALONSO: I’m very happy, I think we were not super competitive this weekend. We started seventh, sixth at the end with Sebastian’s penalty so we have to fight all through the race, the first laps to do some good overtakings and then a very good strategy that gave us the ability to fight at the end for the victory. In the last couple of laps Kimi was a little bit slower, so we attack. But second, I think, was the maximum today, starting sixth, so a perfect Sunday again for us and we kept fighting until the end.

    Sebastian, did you honestly believe you could be standing here today, starting from the end of the pitlane?

    Sebastian VETTEL: Yes, I did, to be honest with you. After the first couple of laps obviously that target was drifting a little bit away. I had a messy start to the race, which is quite difficult at the back, to get through the cars as quickly as I could, damaged my front wing. And then to the safety car, yeah I had a little bit of a big mistake with Daniel [Ricciardo] I think, who was stopping his car on the straights and I was very surprised. Turned to the right and… if it would have been 50m earlier, 50m later I wouldn’t have done damage to my front wing further but after that, I said to myself ‘yeah, either we go full attack or nothing’. So that’s what we did and I had a fantastic race. I enjoyed it a lot. Obviously the safety cars here and there was helping, the second one, and after that, at the end it was a nice fight with Jenson. He was difficult to pass. I expected to have a little bit easier time because obviously I was passing the slower cars before and with him I was a bit struggling. Then I just squeezed my way past into Turn 11 which was nice, it was very fair but for sure, it was a thrilling grand prix, up and down all the time. Yeah. Obviously it’s very nice to stand here now, pick up a trophy and drink some champagne. It’s not actually champagne, I don’t know what it is but it tastes good.

    Your name is up there as a double world champion. Do you now feel that you’ve got your hands on one side of the cup for a third world title?

    SV: I think it’s still two races to go so obviously we see how quickly things can change. Yesterday was a surprise for us, I think would we have started from third it would have been a different race. But yeah, it was obviously a chance to fuck it up and we didn’t do that. So I think we can be very proud today: we got the maximum. We lost only a very little bit, I think we have the momentum still, the car is bloody quick, so looking forward to the next two races. We are definitely believing in it and that’s the target.

    Kimi, you’ve won before, you’ve won the title before and standing here you sent a message to the team about how you hope this will motivate future success, but when it is moment going to sink in? That you’ve won a grand prix in your comeback year.

    KR: I mean like I said, I’m happy, but there’s nothing to jump around about. Really we still have a few races to go, I’ll try to do the same again, and for sure we’re going to have a good party today and hopefully tomorrow, when we are feeling bad after a long night, we will remember how we feel so… I’m just happy for everybody in the team.

    PRESS CONFERENCE.

    Kimi, well done, congratulations. Fantastic win for you, you’ve really been waiting for this win, I think, all season and now it’s happened. What are your feelings?

    KR: Like I said before, I’m very happy for the team. We have had hard times lately and hopefully it gives some belief for the people, even more that… I mean they’ve been working very hard the whole year but with the hard times there’s a bit unknown in the whole situation and hopefully for the people who runs the team, who owns the team, the people who works for… for everybody, hopefully it gives a bit more support and hope that things will turn around and be even better than it’s been this year. So, great thing for the team itself, for the guys and, I mean of course I’m happy myself, but if I win it’s great, if I don’t I will try again and it’s not the end of the life. We’ve been close few times but now I said that even the last race I think we had the speed to even win the race but if you don’t start in the front we see what can happen. We knew the start would be a really big key and I got a really good start so I think with the McLaren we didn’t have the speed, at least in the beginning of the race – but then we have to finish the race to win so… I mean after that we were pretty good. Just the safety cars made us a little bit more tricky today.

    The start really was… gave you the second place straight away, it was a really excellent start.

    KR: Like I said yesterday, this going to be key, to get behind the faster car and not start behind the cars that cannot go as fast as us. And I mean we have a fast car for lap time in the race but if we stuck behind there’s no way we’re going to get past so, that’s what we could do this weekend: put yesterday in a good position and then made a good start and then just go from there.

    And how much is the development that has been taking place on the car with the exhaust etc, how much has that been bringing pace to the car?

    KR: It brings some pace, helps our straight line speed. So in average we gain some advantage but it’s exactly the same car we have in Korea. So we see how much even this year in all the races some circuits suits better for one team and the next one is not so good for you. We had good speed last race as I’ve already said. We made some mistakes in qualifying and paid the price in the race. So now we put all together like we should have done quite a few times this year but for one reason or another we haven’t. But at least we’ve got one win so we’ll keep try to push still and see what we can do in the next race.

    Fernando, tremendous pace at the end there, where did that come from and was it just a little bit too late?

    FA: Well, I think we just saw on the board eight laps to go, there was no more concerns about the tyres because obviously doing one stop you never know how the tyres will finish the race, and also after the last safety car we saw Sebastian with the soft and the first three of us, we were with the prime, so we didn’t know how much a threat was Sebastian for fight until the last lap. So after they lost a little bit of time, Jenson and Sebastian, and we didn’t care any more about the tyres, I push 150 per cent for eight laps and I tried to catch Kimi but it was never enough to be within one second for the DRS to be even closer. So at the end we didn’t have the pace to win but fantastic race anyway. We didn’t have the pace this weekend in any practice, in qualifying seventh and ninth and then today we were fighting for a victory – surprising again. This is thanks to a perfect car for the race, a perfect start, perfect strategy, perfect pitstops so everything perfect Sunday for us, maximising what we have in hands.

    Do you think the modifications brought to the Ferrari helped during the race today?

    FA: I think it helped for sure because when we tested it on Friday, they gave us some performance but we are talking very few hundredths of advantage that for sure when you have a gap to close that is a couple of tenths, when you bring hundredths and your opponents bring also some new parts, I think more or less you are in the same position. So, we need to keep working and in Maranello they work day and night very hard to bring new parts. Here in the track, mechanics work 24 hours and we are doing our maximum and we sure that hopefully it will be enough.

    Are you a bit disappointed that you didn’t have more of an advantage over Sebastian, you only pulled out three points?

    FA: To be honest we were concentrating on our race. Our simulations we had gave us the possibility to finish fifth or sixth, so we were not very optimistic with today’s race and despite what Sebastian was doing in the race we were taking eight, ten points maximum in our simulations. So we concentrated on our race. He did a very good race and he was able to use the performance in some of the parts of the race when he was in clean air plus the safety cars that I think put the group all together. So at the end I think this is nothing we can do, we just need to concentrate on our race and if we finish in front of Sebastian in the next two races then maybe we have a chance. So that’s our concentration now.

    Sebastian a pretty lively race for you one way or another. It’s quite lively back there isn’t it – there’s a lot going on?

    SV: Yeah, usually it’s hard enough to fight your way once through the field but we did it twice today so… Yeah, obviously not the first couple of laps we were hoping for. We damaged the front wing early, which didn’t seem to be a big problem but it was probably the worst possible time with the safety car. I think we were already quite high up, close to the top 10, around 13, 14, 15 or something like that. And then I had a moment with the Toro Rosso. I don’t know what he did. He was braking his car down and I was surprised, caught out. Maybe I should have paid more attention, but yeah, I went to the right and I wasn’t very lucky, there was the DRS board, which I took head on and then I thought ‘well, now the front is fucked at least, so we’ve got to change it,’… (sorry). We did it in the worst possible moment, during the safety car, when all the cars were already queued up and yeah we lost everything. We were dead last. At least we had a fresh wing and from then went through the field. It was a lot of fun. Quite difficult with some guys, a little bit easier with other guys, but the most important thing was that the pace was there and we were in a very strong position – already halfway through the race, 20 laps to the end and also on the soft tyres in the last stint. Obviously the safety car helped a little bit. Nevertheless, I think it was a fantastic race: a great fight with Jenson in the end, who was the most difficult to pass, obviously he was the quickest I passed in the whole race. We know that… I think it’s quite difficult for us to get past a Mercedes-engined car. It was very, very close with him. I enjoyed the fight a lot, tried a couple of times and finally made it. He was very, very fair. You can’t do that kind of move with all the drivers on the grid. And after that not enough laps left to catch up with Kimi and Fernando but the pace was there. Obviously we had an interesting race, up and down all the time and a great result in the end. It was a big chance to lose out a lot today, but we didn’t lose anything, so I’m very happy. The guys are pushing 100 per cent. I feel very happy they’re all behind me and I try to do my best for them. I think we have two more races ahead of us, we’re in the best possible position so I think we’re looking forward to the next race – a new grand prix, a new challenge. It’s difficult to know who is going to be quick but I think it was another race today where we see that it’s over as soon as we see the chequered flag and not before.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Kimi, was that your best start in a Lotus and after that, which one was the hardest competitor, the second safety car or Fernando?

    KR: I think we’ve had some very good starts before, but compared to the others, today was a pretty normal start on our scale. I managed to pass Mark and Maldonado before I changed into second gear. I’d had a very good start on the warm-up lap so I knew this was going to be good. That was our aim, to try to make a good start and we managed to do it, so it was key for our win today.

    For sure, the safety car hurt us much more than the others. We had a good lead and then nothing, and then twice. The first time was when Hamilton was in front of us but it definitely didn’t help us today.

    Q: (Leonid Novozhilov – F1 Live) Kimi Raikkonen, how and with whom and how many days will you celebrate this win?

    KR: I have almost two weeks. As long as I manage to get myself to the next race I think the team is happy. I try to get home at some point.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) Kimi, one of the highlights of the race was your radio messages, the ones that you were giving to the team. How distracting is it when you’re fighting behind the safety car or whatever, to have them reminding you to warm-up your wheels?

    KR: It’s a normal thing. It’s the same with all the teams. For sure, they are just trying to help but if you keep saying the same things two times a minute, I’m not so stupid that I cannot remember what I’m doing. It’s a normal thing, they are just trying to help. I know what I’m doing. I will ask for help if I need it. It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last time. It’s been many times with other teams also but they are all there to help you and try to put you in the best position. Different people like different things.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, was it a bit of racing into the unknown at the beginning; you changed the gearbox, the ratios? Were you pretty sure you could do this kind of race or were there some obscure points that you had to sort out during the first laps, to find out what you could do?

    SV: No, I don’t think it was racing into the unknown. Obviously what we didn’t know was how quickly we would get through the field. We knew that we were quite a lot quicker than the first couple of cars that we were approaching; obviously we have a different pace to Marussia, HRT, Caterham, so it was important to get through those. We took the chance to take ratios which helped down the straights, made life a little bit easier but obviously when you’re not in the pack, you pay the price as well, so I think it did help us for overtaking but when we were in clean air, it was surely not optimum but it’s always a trade. I think from Friday to Saturday we changed the car, not necessarily made a step forwards. We were changing quite a few things and getting closer to what we had on Friday which I think was a faster car so it was as simple as that.

    Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Fernando and Sebastian, Michael has had 56 races without a win after his comeback; are you surprised that Kimi won his 18th after his comeback?

    SV: No, I think it doesn’t matter how many races it takes you. The most important thing is that you get the results you can achieve. I think Kimi drove a fantastic race today. For the first time the car was probably able to win and he did it. I don’t know how their race was at the front, I was busy myself but I think we’ve seen this year that generally if you compare this year, the Mercedes was not as competitive as the Lotus, so it’s as simple as that, not in every race but in the majority of races. I think Michael showed his talent more than once in the last three years, even though he probably wasn’t as successful as he was before, I don’t think it makes him any worse.

    FA: I agree.

    Q: (Khodr Rawi – F1 Arab) Kimi, how special is it to be the first driver to win for Lotus since Ayrton Senna in 1987

    KR: It’s a long time for them, I guess. I don’t think there are any (of the same) people in the team any more. It’s a name. It’s the same team and it has been since Fernando was there, just a different name. It’s a great name for us, good past but you know I race for the team whatever the name is, I don’t really care so it’s just for the guys who do all the work. Maybe it looks good in somebody’s eyes but for me it really makes no difference.

    Q: (Mark Fogarty – Auto Action) To each of you: who is going to win the World Championship?

    KR: I wouldn’t put money on me! They are quite close; I don’t know what the points difference is. Ten? One bad race could decide the championship if they keep doing what they’ve been doing. It’s hard for Fernando but we saw yesterday and in races before that anything can happen. If it’s a normal situation I don’t think much can happen but one small mistake can decide everything.

    FA: Yes, I’m confident. We will fight until the end. We are not fast enough, this is true and we are honest with ourselves, we know this. We need to accept this. It’s a weak point, the performance that we have at the moment in our package, and we have some strong points which we will try to use.

    SV: I think we were not always fast enough this year but for the last couple of races we were, so looking forward to the next two races.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, this has been a pretty troubled weekend for the team. On Friday Mark had the issue with the KERS, you yesterday in the morning, then the problem with the fuel. How much of a relief is it for you to come out of such a weekend and be on the podium losing only three points to Fernando?

    SV: Honestly, I would have loved to have got past Jenson quicker and past Fernando as well. I think the speed was there but it turned out to be quite tricky to pass Jenson, and took a lot of time. But yeah, I think we can be very happy with today. I think it’s one of those races where it’s difficult to predict the outcome. We have simulation tools etc telling you one thing but I was convinced that you have plenty of chances and I said yesterday, obviously it was a big hit for us because if you can chose between starting third and last you don’t need to be a genius to make that one out. It was a big hit but I said yesterday that every chance is an opportunity and there were lots of chances today for us. I think we had a very good race, I enjoyed it a lot and I’m very happy with today’s result.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Motor und Sport) Sebastian, you said before that yesterday was a mistake. How angry are you that this mistake happened? You don’t have to be Einstein to calculate how much fuel has to go in for three laps, especially after it had already happened to Hamilton in Barcelona. Do you think the team should have been more careful?

    SV: There are so many things that could have worked differently. I made a mistake on the last run, I aborted the lap, nobody ever finds out, nobody realises there was a problem. As I said earlier, it was a mistake, there was no intention to go stupidly close to the limit for a gain of nearly nothing. I think it’s different to what happened to Lewis in Barcelona at the beginning of the season, obviously they deliberately put less fuel in the car and stopped on the in lap, but for us, we had enough fuel but somehow we had enough fuel on paper but not in the car. Obviously we stopped the car for emergency reasons, not to damage anything and then obviously it was quite a long procedure yesterday and unfortunately we couldn’t drain the fuel that we wanted and it was not enough to provide the sample so it was as simple as that. Rules are clear. I think the penalty was very harsh but we had to take it. Rules are clear. If it happens to you in race three and you are in a similar position at the end of the year, nobody is asking and it’s not a big fuss but if it happens to you three races from the end, obviously there’s more attention etc. We had to live with that.

    Q: (Luigi Perna – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Fernando, your last win was at Hockenheim in July, more than three months ago. Do you think you absolutely need to win one or both of the last two races to gain the title and do you think it’s possible to do it?

    FA: That will help, for sure, but I don’t think so.

    Q: (Vanessa Ruiz – ESPN Radio) Sebastian, so in the end, after all the difficulties, do you guys consider your result a surprise or not?

    SV: I don’t think you can talk of a surprise. I think we knew we were quick. I think if you look at the race, there were a lot of things that happened that you couldn’t foresee. I don’t know what happened to the HRT which caused the first safety car and I don’t know what happened to Romain who caused the second safety car, but obviously these things are difficult to predict. I think we knew that we had a chance to get into the top five, even with a normal race. Given the pace was there, as I said earlier, what we did from Friday to Saturday, obviously we tried to improve the car, not necessarily achieved that but we are hungry, we want to try things to make the car faster. I don’t blame anyone for that. I was one of the biggest drivers to make the changes, behind that on Friday, and they didn’t work, but yeah, obviously we’re not talking seconds per lap but small things and today we lost a position on the grid but we got the chance to change the car which we did and we knew that it will be a very competitive car. The speed was there, as I said, and obviously here and there we were a little bit lucky, but I think we created our own luck in that regard.

    Q: (Shubha Chandran – Chequered Flag, India) Sebastian, what kind of focus, commitment and mental strength does it really take to start from where you did, and eventually end up where you have, from a purely individual perspective?

    SV: The race is long. I said to the guys before the race that I trust them 100 percent and they can trust me. I will try everything. There’s no reason to give up. Of course, if you look where we started, it was the worst possible spot but we gave everything we had and I think when you do that, you cannot fail so it was a perfect example of that today. Everyone was focused on the moment and enjoying it as well. Don’t forget that, I think we are here, obviously, to fight for wins and stuff like that but we are also here to have a good time, enjoy and have fun and I think all the guys in the team at the moment, they don’t want to be anywhere else. Obviously it’s tough on Sundays. The tension is there, obviously you’re nervous, excited, any race such as this one, especially with the difficulty of starting last but it’s also the challenge that you like, to race every single lap. Obviously it’s nice to sit here and look back. Some days it will be difficult again, when we sit – not here – and look back and look at the mistakes that we’ve made, but hopefully we will learn from those as we did in the past to maximise the times that we sit here.

    Q: (Heikki Kulta -Turun Sanomat) Kimi, does it take anything from your joy that when you win you kill your last hope of the championship?

    KR: No, I think we knew already, a few races ago, that we didn’t have the speed to challenge at the front. We always said that we would keep fighting and trying to do the best that we can. We got the win, we might have lost the championship on the same day but I don’t really care. We didn’t really expect to be fighting with them anyhow. We’ve always been a bit behind and not really had the speed to challenge them in normal races and now in the last few races we’ve had very good speed and finally we put all the things together and won. We will try again next year.

    Q: (Anne Giuntini – L’Equipe) Sebastian, sorry to come back to yesterday’s incident but we didn’t really understand why you stopped the car, because a loss of fuel doesn’t really damage the engine, normally?

    SV: Obviously it was a precaution. We saw some numbers going down and in order to save the engine at last, save the pumps in between etc, we decided to stop the car, convinced that we had enough fuel in the car to provide a sample but, as I said, for some reason we didn’t have enough fuel so I don’t know what happened. There must have been a mistake somewhere which was a big hit, like I said, but I’m sure we will learn from that and it won’t happen again. I think we have done the exercise a lot of times, we know the rules. As I said, we are talking two hundred millilitres that were missing. If you go to the loo before qualifying or something like that it can make the same kind of difference. I think it’s very difficult to measure. It was a mistake for which we had to pay a very hard price but c’est la vie.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, in two weeks we’re going to Austin, you have the first chance to win the third title and it’s going to be your 100th Grand Prix.

    SV: Yeah, it sounds a lot. Obviously time goes by quickly. I’m sure when you ask Fernando and Kimi they remember their first couple of races and probably don’t feel that it’s so long ago. I think that more than anything, if you do something that you love, that you enjoy the time goes by quickly. Now, when I’m talking about 2006, 2007, when I started to drive a Formula One car for the first time, I still know most of the guys and can recall the places I’ve been. If you then tell me it’s six years ago, it sounds like a big number. I’m sure, when someone tells you the first time that you came into a Formula One paddock, it’s however many years ago, it might be shocking as well. Time goes by and obviously with age, you get a little bit smarter – hopefully. You learn certain things and you get a little more relaxed probably but also it’s important to stay childish, stay hungry and do mistakes, otherwise how can you go forward. All in all, looking forward to going home, get some rest, charge some energy to be full charged in America to attack and obviously try to win.

    Abu Dhabi podium on Sunday 4 Nov 2012. Lotus F1 team Photo

    Ends

  • Abu Dhabi GP: FIA Saturday Press Meet

    DRIVERS

    1 – Lewis HAMILTON (McLaren)

    2 – Mark WEBBER (Red Bull Racing)

    3 – Sebastian VETTEL (Red Bull Racing)

    TV UNILATERAL

    What are your feelings for tomorrow?

    Lewis HAMILTON: Very excited, very excited. It’s the first time for a long time to be ahead of the Red Bulls, and not to be seeing the tail of them at the start of the race but I know it’s going to be, as always, very, very tough in the race because they’ve got great race pace. But we are strong enough to fight them, the team’s done a fantastic job all weekend. The car’s felt beautiful all weekend. I don’t know why the car works so well here. We’ve not really made any improvements to the car since the last race, so I guess it just suits. The guys are still massively focused so I hope that tomorrow’s a good day for us.

    How have the long runs been looking?

    LH: We did a couple of long runs and they seemed to be OK. On one of my long runs I had a lot of traffic, but Jenson had a fairly decent long run, which shows… a bit like last race, we should be quite competitive. But for me it’s trying to improve the start of the race because these guys are so quick over the first couple of laps.

    Mark, well done, second fastest in qualifying. You’ve out-qualified your team-mate as well. But there have been some worrying moments, for example last week you had the loss of KERS and you had the problem yesterday. Are you slightly on the back foot?

    Mark WEBBER: Well, first of all credit to Lewis, he’s obviously got a quick car this weekend and he bumped us off the front row, that’s the first time in a while, maybe since six or eight weeks ago when we had a good run, so now they’ve done a good job today. Credit where it’s due and we did the best we could. I think it was a pretty smooth qualifying session for both Seb and I and we did what we could. I think it went well but as you say we’ve got a little bit of a fire going which we need to tidy up and the quality of the team is exceptional, we know what we need to improve on, to help our championships along. Obviously Seb’s still involved in the Drivers’ [title] and the Constructors’ is still important to us, so we’ll focus on tomorrow’s race. The car generally works pretty well on Sundays but Lewis and JB did some pretty strong long runs as well, so yeah, a little trouble this weekend but overall we’re positive and looking for a good strong run.

    Sebastian, obviously you had a problem with the brakes this morning and we’ve just seen you stop on circuit this afternoon, but you’re third on the grid, at least you salvaged that. What are your feelings about that?

    Sebastian VETTEL: I don’t why I was asked to stop. I think probably some problem. It shouldn’t be something major. Obviously this morning wasn’t ideal, not being able to run. So we didn’t get probably the answers that we were hoping for. Nevertheless, this afternoon we were settling in quite well and the pace was there, but I think as Mark touched on, McLaren, in particular Lewis, are pretty quick. So they were out of reach today. I’m not entirely happy with my qualifying, the last part of qualifying was quite tricky for me. I think I should have been a little bit quicker, whether it would have been enough to beat Mark… obviously he’s on a different sheet of paper, but all in all I think we can be quite happy. Race pace should be good tomorrow. As we know it’s a long race here and there’s a lot of things that can happen, so looking forward to tomorrow.

    But there must be a certain relief in being three places ahead of your main championship rival?

    SV: Is he sixth or…?

    Seventh.

    SV: Ah, so… yeah, I think we’ve seen so many races this year that have been up and down, so from where we start it’s obviously quite good, close to the front, so we go from there. As I said, it’s going to be a long race; a lot of things to look out for. I think strategy-wise it’s probably not 100 per cent clear yet, a similar position to last race in India, so yea, I think we have to look after ourselves, try to race this guy and then we should be in quite a good place tomorrow.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    So Lewis, you can’t really explain why you’re so quick here this weekend?

    LH: No, I don’t know. The car’s been feeling fantastic all weekend, like I said we haven’t come with upgrade packages, we haven’t got any… y’know we’re always modifying small, little wings but it does very, very little – but the car’s felt great from the get-go this weekend and done some fine tuning and every now and then you’re fortunate enough to make the right change and it feels even better, which it did. So, I didn’t really have to change too much going into qualifying. Actually I didn’t change anything going into qualifying from P3. That lap felt fantastic. The next lap I was up a little bit, I think I was up a tenth or so, and then I lost it. I had no idea I’d done a good lap, so it was just about going completely over the line and seeing if you can get something – but it didn’t work.

    We have seen a lot of drivers doing that this weekend and I guess it’s just exploring the limit.

    LH: Yeah. Well, I know what the limit is because I was on it when I did my first lap but I was trying to go way past the limit and see if it was possible. It worked for half the lap but then it didn’t work the rest of it.

    Mark, the reliability thing, has that set you back a little bit in terms of race preparation, yesterday for example.

    MW: Yeah, you would like to do that work for sure but obviously we have a huge amount of historical data, this year and also at this venue and Seb did some work. I did one lap, so I’ve got a little bit to look at. But it should be OK, the Friday’s running is never a bible anyway, it’s just a good reference. So we’re in pretty good shape in terms of data going into the race. So obviously we’ll have a bit of a look through in the morning to see how we’re going to prepare. But yeah, we realised we’ve got to work on our reliability. We’ve had a few issues of late and that’s something the group is on. There’s nothing Sebastian and I can do about it. It’s not our job, it’s their job and they know they’ve got to improve.

    And you’ll be starting ahead of Sebastian, so what chances in the first corner?

    MW: Well, good. You never know. Lewis’ starts lately haven’t been phenomenal so let’s see if he has a good one tomorrow. Generally it’s down to how the clutch is and things like that – it’s not really down to Lewis. We’ll see how they go off the line but I’m looking to go forward, for sure. Then we’ll get settled into the race and see where everyone is after that.

    Sebastian, the brake problem today, is that something that has been cured and you’re confident you won’t see again?

    SV: Yes, I think so. Obviously it wasn’t expected, it wasn’t the plan because the plan is to run in free practice – but I think we fixed the problem, I had a fantastic brake in qualifying, so I think we got on top of the problem at the end. I had a little bit of a run, two laps in the practice this afternoon, so should be fine.

    Overtaking has been difficult here in the past. Admittedly you haven’t had to do very much but it’s been difficult, there’s a double DRS, how vital is pole position and a good qualifying position?

    SV: Well, I think Lewis is pretty happy where he’s going to start tomorrow. Obviously we are not on pole but yeah, I think, y’know, third is not far off and it should be a good race. Obviously, as you touched on, it’s difficult to pass here, even though you’ve got long straights, we’ve got the double DRS so we’ll see if that helps. I’m sure it’s not impossible. It’s definitely possible to pass people, even though it’s not easy but, y’know, race pace should be good. Should be in a good position.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Lewis, yesterday you said after second practice that you didn’t believe you could get pole, it would be extremely hard. What changed? Was it you and your car that did more or was it perhaps Red Bull which haven’t performed as you expected?

    LH: They were slower than I expected but we were faster than I expected as well. Mark did a great lap as well – what’s the margin, it is three tenths? I knew that they were very very quick but I would never have imagined being this far ahead of them. But I did do a really really good lap, very happy with the lap. I thought that we would be a match or slightly slower than them this weekend and it’s a blessing in disguise to be ahead of them.

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Honorary) Sebastian, on a different subject, Michael Schumacher has just three races left in his F1 career. How do you view his last three years in Formula One?

    SV: We have commented on this a couple of times. I think Mark summed it up pretty well a couple of races ago, that obviously those three years are very different to the years he had before that, but it doesn’t make him a worse driver. I think the last three years he was hoping to have a better car than he probably had. When the car was there, I think he was able to use the potential so I think we’ve seen that he’s still very quick, for example in Monaco, when the car was there. Obviously very different to the years with Ferrari when they were dominating a lot, but it also shows that you need to have the right car beneath you, and the right team in order to fight for wins and championships.

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, in Q1 you touched the wall a little bit, did that have any effect on your mind during the rest of qualifying?

    SV: It was the first lap, I was a little bit greedy on the exit of turn 19 and I just brushed the wall a little bit so not really hard contact. There was no problem for the car.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto Motor und Sport) Sebastian, you were hardly able to run in the morning; had you been able to do that, would you have found out something which would have helped you in qualifying?

    SV: I think so. Obviously Saturday morning – or Saturday afternoon in this case – is the last chance before qualifying and also the first chance after practice on Friday to have a read on the car and I think we tried a couple of things. Obviously I would have loved to get a proper answer so I think that what we had in qualifying was still pretty good and very competitive but obviously some boxes will never be ticked so we won’t get an answer on the things that we wanted to but I’m quite confident we found a good compromise, nevertheless.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, is it a kind of relief having Fernando seventh, given that it’s not so easy to overtake here. Will that change something in your strategy going into the race, or are you going to race, attack and try to win?

    SV: I think we have to try to race. I don’t think you can go round looking at one guy in particular, so, as I said, you don’t have to be Einstein to make out that it’s good if you’re ahead and bad if you’re behind but today there’s no points, it’s a long race tomorrow. I think some of the guys were very quick in qualifying, arguably they are slower in the race so we are going to find out tomorrow. I think if you are quicker, then it’s also possible to overtake. Obviously it might be tricky, we’ve seen that in previous years but as I touched on earlier, it’s not impossible and for us, also in terms of strategy, we go for the fastest race, that’s what we have to focus on and at the moment, Lewis is ahead of us so we are trying to hunt him down.

    Q: (Leonid Novozhilov – F1 Live) Lewis Hamilton, do you give a chance to the Red Bull drivers at the start tomorrow?

    LH: Do I give them a chance? Definitely not, de-finitely not. As Mark was saying, I’ve had some very very bad starts but that’s down to clutch performance but I will be onto my guys tonight to make sure that that doesn’t happen tomorrow.

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Honorary) Mark, when we talked to Christian Horner on Thursday, he never used the word team orders. He did say you’re a strong team player, an important part of the team, and you would know what to do. Are you comfortable with that for tomorrow?

    MW:  Drive flat out.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Lewis, yesterday you were struggling more with the option tyres and this is why you were also explaining your difficult session. Do you think you have solved the problem?

    LH: Yeah, I just changed my technique a bit, in terms of warming them up and then from the previous race when we struggled in Q3 on the option tyres particularly in P3 in India, I think it was, we used the method that we improved there, which seemed to have helped this weekend, which I am sure other people are doing. It’s nothing special, it’s just with tyre temperatures and pressures and other things, but it worked, they worked really well.

    Q: (Mark Fogarty – Auto Action) You have pretty broad sporting interests, Mark. the Melbourne Cup is coming up on Tuesday, the (horse) race that stops the nation (Australia), they say. Are you interested? Will you watch it, do you have a tip?

    MW: I love sport but horse racing is not far off the bottom of my list. Gambling, in my house, my father didn’t tolerate it. Actually, I’m not a big fan of how much it’s rammed down your throat in Australia, in terms of how you can bet on who farts at what stage in a football match. It’s incredible how obsessed we’ve become with gambling and betting but each to their own. If you love gambling it’s a good buzz but it does nothing for me. I would rather ride my mountain bike.

    Q: (Mark Fogarty – Auto Action) That’ll be No then.

    MW: That’s a No. I got busted once. I was in the principal’s office at school for playing up and the race was on, so she couldn’t see me so she had to wait until the race was over. I did, when I was very very very young, my grandparents let us put a little sneaky fiver on sometimes, which wasn’t always allowed and the horse was called Tawrrific and it actually won the race, so I told her that I was very happy and she wasn’t very impressed, because her horse didn’t win.

    Q: (Mark Fogarty – Auto Action) Did you watch the Aussie V8s today?

    MW: Not enough, the time schedule is not very helpful and they’re parked down the other side of the track. I want to go and see some of the guys for sure. It was just great that they managed to drive on the same track as us, a slick operation as usual, it’s a good category. No, I haven’t got to see any of the action yet but I’ve seen the results, but I haven’t seen a single lap.

    Q: (Mark Fogarty – Auto Action) You could take Lewis and Sebastian with you. You guys would go and see the V8s, wouldn’t you?

    LH: Sure. When we have time.

    Lewis Hamilton poses with Road Safety backdrop after gaining pole at Abu Dhabi on Saturday 4 Nov 2012. Photo by Vodafone McLaren Mercedes F1 team.

    Ends

  • Abu Dhabi GP: FIA Friday Press Conference

    TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Andrew GREEN (Force India), Antonio CUQUERELLA (HRT), Rémi TAFFIN (Renault Sport F1), Ross BRAWN (Mercedes), Pat FRY (Ferrari)

    A question to you all about engines at this stage. It gets towards the sharp engine of the season and people are running out of mileage on their engines. Perhaps you could give us an update on how you are with engines at this stage?

    Andrew GREEN: We’re completely to plan. As we worked it out from race one, so no issues for us at the moment.

    Antonio?

    Antonio CUQUERELLA: Yes, same for us. We’re going to start this race, both cars with the last engine and it’s all according to plan as we planned in the winter.

    Pat?

    Pat FRY: Yes, exactly the same really. It’s going to plan. I think we have one engine left to play but touch wood it should be fine.

    Ross.

    Ross BRAWN: As with everyone else, you manage it through the whole season. So you’re making adjustments and corrections as you go through the year and we’re OK.

    Rémi, your teams?

    Remi TAFFIN: Let’s say since last race we’re on plan. We’ve obviously had up and downs during the year but we’re all fine. We also have some engines left obviously for six of our eight drivers, one left, which we should use for this weekend. So it will be up to eight this weekend for all our customers and we should be OK for the rest of the year. Obviously we have to manage the mileage on Fridays but yeah, we’re on target.

    Andrew, first of all, Force India seems to be fairly comfortable in the midfield but what does it take to get the team towards the sharper end of the championship?

    AG: Quite simple: you’ve got to out-develop the guys in front of you.

    Is that money? Is that personnel?

    AG: It’s everything. But ultimately you need the money to invest in the team, in the hardware and in the people and ultimately that will increase your rate of development. That’s what you need to do, that’s what we would need to do if we were to start to target these guys in front of me [Fry, Brawn]. It’s something we’ve discussed with the shareholders at great length, telling us where they want to be, what they want to do. There’s more discussions happening very shortly and hopefully we’ll be able to announce something in near future.

    Have you still got developments coming this year or are you working one hundred per cent on the new car now?

    AG: Oh, we’ve been on the new car for several months now. There’s been no development on this car since the shutdown effectively.

    Antonio, can you give us an update on how the team is developing in Madrid, in terms of staffing etc.,

    AC: Yeah. As you know we’ve done a big change this year, moving everything, everybody’s under the same roof now and we got our DO [design office] as it started from the summer and now our department is moving from Germany to Spain. We are recruiting, we are doing a lot of interviews and we are recruiting at a high rate of people. But still we are the smallest team, there’s no need to hide that. It’s a long way for us to get into the midfield, or let’s say the average size of team. But we are growing fast.

    In terms of development of the car for next year, is it going to be essentially the same car?

    AC: Oh no. It’s not going to be the same car. It’s going to have… all the cars they have a lot of common parts that carry over from one to the other but of course it’s going to be completely new in many areas: suspension, aerodynamics and many areas. Of course some parts of the transmission are parts we are going to keep them but I would say all the parts that are lap time-relevant are going to be improved or replaced.

    Pat, I think you made quite a big push for this grand prix in terms of developments. Can you give us some sort of update on it?

    PF: We’ve been pushing for the last few grands prix really. There’s a few new developments on the car; we worked through our programme this morning and this afternoon, looking promising but we need to analyse all the data as normal before we decide what to run for tomorrow.

    How much did you change your schedule to bring those parts to here? Is it something that’s recently come in? And how much has that been affected by the shutdown of the wind tunnel?

    PF: Well, we’re still using our wind tunnel. We’re obviously using a customer one as well. I mean it’s just been part of our normal tunnel programme if you like, and I suppose we are a little bit later this year than we were last year with the new car but development on that has been going strong for quite a while as well.

    Q: Ross, obviously the announcement that Niki Lauda will have a role within the team has been of interest? How is that going to work with you?

    RB: Niki is non-executive chairman, chairman of our board. We meet our board several times a year, to discuss the major issues. I think Niki is also going to add a lot of racing experience to the board. The board meetings will probably have a slightly different complexion in the future. And Niki’s helping with some of the bigger strategic issues, such as the new commercial agreement with Bernie; obviously Niki had some involvement with persuading Lewis to join us – so those sort of issues but not involved with the day-to-day running of the team.

    Q: So your role essentially doesn’t change.

    RB: No, no. I’ve just a got a new chairman. I had one before, I’ve got a different one now.

    Q: You touched there on Lewis joining the team, to what extent would you encourage him to build the team around him, rather as Michael Schumacher did at Ferrari all those years ago? And how would that therefore work with the other driver?

    RB: Well, I think both drivers in the team contribute to developing a team, building a team. We are clearly not achieving the results we want to achieve yet, so we’ve got some progress we need to make and I think Lewis will be able to contribute a lot to helping us make that progress. We obviously believe and we know he’s a very very quick driver. This is perhaps a new challenge he’s facing of helping a team grow and develop and become more competitive. So there’s some different aspects, perhaps, to what he’s going to face with us and what he’s faced at McLaren, which was a pretty complete and rounded team.

    Q: Remy, first of all, interesting developments from Lotus with the Coanda exhaust; how does that affect the Renault engine? What do you have to do to the engine with different exhaust systems?

    RT: Obviously that affects the performance of the engine so get the performance down from the first attempt of the exhaust. Thereafter, we have to work on how we can assess this loss and try to minimise it, so that’s our main objective when we work on this exhaust back at the factory. That’s why you can see some different versions coming at any race we do, so that’s the part of the job we do.

    Q: And here, how much is the performance of the engine affected from free practice in the morning, through to qualifying or the race, the difference in temperature, 13 degrees track temperature, but how much does the ambient change affect the engine and performance?

    RT: If we look at what we’re going to get at the end of the race, it could be five to 10 degrees down. Engine-wise it’s more like what we’re going to try to assess for the cooling, for example, so we just basically have to get the data from P2 because it’s more or less the same timing, and assess the set-up of the car, we need to get with it, and that’s basically it. Racing is pretty close to what we’ve been doing in P2 so that’s when we will get the data and find out what we need.

    Q: Is there a power change at all?

    RT: Obviously there will be a power change, but let’s say it’s the same for everyone. The only real change that we have from Friday to Saturday or Sunday is the engine change, because we’re going to change the engine for tomorrow, so that’s going to be the main difference.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Alan Baldwin – Reuters) Ross, the FIA has published the entry fee requirements for next season with a significant increase in the amount for every point scored, which is probably going to hit the mid-table teams more than others. I was just wondering about your thoughts on that? Mercedes, presumably, can afford to pay it but it’s quite a significant increase on this season.

    RB: I think, for us, we would be delighted to pay it because we would be scoring a lot of points. In fact, if you’re a mid-range team, and considering the fact that all the extra facilities that we pay for separately at the moment are rolled into that entrance fee, I think for a lot of teams it’s going to be very similar. It’s going to make more substantial difference for those teams who finish in the top three or four of the championship. I was being a bit flippant, but obviously I hope that we can have that problem next year.

    Q: (Luigi Perna – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Pat, are you confident you can reduce the gap from Red Bull in qualifying or do you think you will suffer again as you have in the last races?

    PF: We are trying as hard as we can to improve the qualifying performance. As I say, we’ve got some updates here. I need to go through… or the guys need to go through and check the exact performance level, but obviously our race pace is quite reasonable, as last weekend showed. We need to work on our qualifying, so we will keep on trying, we will keep on pushing.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) A question for Remy: we understand that the new Red Bull or the new Renault alternators are going to be seen in Austin for the first time; could you tell us what work has been done to integrate them on the engines and what the differences are with the new specification?

    RT: The new specification we’ve been running now since Singapore. It was obviously run on Fridays but before we did that, we did the normal job we do with any parts that we fit on the engine on the dyno, for example, so it has obviously passed all the tests, so we are now quite confident that we can race it and that’s why we have a target to introduce that at race 19, so in Austin. The question now is whether we’re going to fit that on all of the cars or all of the teams we supply and it’s just a question of supplying the parts. It’s not that easy to get all the parts changed but obviously the major changes we’ve done is all about what failed and we’ve discussed bearings so that’s the work we’ve achieved so far, so that’s where we are.

    Andrew Green (GBR) Sahara Force India F1 Team Technical Director in the FIA Press Conference. at Abu Dhabi on Friday. SFI photo

    Ends

  • Abu Dhabi GP: FIA’s Thursday Press Conference

    Drivers Present:

    File photo of Ricciardo by Toro Rosso F1 team

    Vitaly PETROV (Caterham), Daniel RICCIARDO (Toro Rosso), Charles PIC (Marussia), Kamui KOBAYASHI (Sauber), Felipe MASSA (Ferrari), Jenson BUTTON (McLaren)

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Vitaly, like a number of drivers here today whom we’ll all be talking to about the same subject, the future is not decided for you. What are your feelings about that, what’s happening and when are we likely to hear about it?

    Vitaly PETROV: Bob, I think you’ll know what I mean when I answer this question. Last time you asked Nico [Hulkenberg] the same question so, I think I will answer the same: I’ll focus on this year trying to do the best race to race. My management is doing the work and that’s it.

    What about the recent performances? The car seems to be going better. Are you happy with that? You’ve been matching Heikki pretty much if not finishing ahead of him.

    VP: I’m working quite hard to beat him every race and I have a goal. Look like we now understand much more the car and the set-up. We’re very excited for this weekend because we bring quite a big package of updates, so we’ll need to test a lot of things in P1, P2 and P3 – probably even in quali. We’re looking forward to understanding them, as those updates will probably be on next year’s car as well. So I’m really excited to see how they are because in the last few months we bring some updates but we didn’t bring in… towards being quicker, you know. So this is why this test is quite important for us.

    Daniel, the news came out a couple of days ago that you’re staying with the team. I guess everybody thought that was automatic but it doesn’t seem that way.

    Daniel RICCIARDO: I guess until something’s signed and sealed, you always keep a bit reserved, so it’s nice to get confirmation that I’ll be back with Toro Rosso next year. Yeah, it’s good to now focus on the last few races and it’s good to know we’ve got that behind us for next season. There are some big expectations there have been some big changes throughout this year and they’ll be in full effect next year essentially. It’s been a little bit too late to make a huge difference this year but we’re definitely expecting good things for next year and I’ll have a bit more experience behind me, which will help as well.

    Talking about improvements in the car, will there be improvements here?

    DR: We hope so. We’re not bringing any big updates this weekend, nothing to brag about. We’ve been pretty good since the summer break, we’ve definitely been more consistent in compiling the points more regularly. Unfortunately, in India it wasn’t the case, but prior to that we’ve been pretty good. This weekend we’ll see what happens. Quite a few sponsors and guests here this weekend, so we’ll do our best to impress them all.

    Charles, also a question about the future. What is there in the pipeline for you?

    Charles PIC: I don’t know, there are still three races to go and I want to be focused on this. Of course we are asking about next year but nothing is done, so I will have to wait.

    Are there updates coming for the car here?

    CP: No. I think from Singapore we made a step and we are much closer to Caterham, our direct competitor and our objective is to try to keep this 10th position.

    Kamui, again, another future question for you, what’s happening with you?

    Kamui KOBAYASHI: Hi everyone. I have the same thing as the guys – we have to work hard to get next year’s seat. I think I’m pretty confident to deserve a Formula One seat but for sure we definitely need to focus for these last three races. So, let’s see. We don’t have so many seats [available] either, so this is also a big question, so I think I try to focus on the results and also negotiate with other teams or the same team, I don’t know.

    And this is a circuit where you scored your first World Championship points, so it must be one that you remember.

    KK: Yes, definitely. I have a good memory here. Abu Dhabi is one of my good memories of track, and especially I think like Toyota’s race is something special for me and at the same time scoring first points here. Of course I think we had different cars and I think had to take a different approach. But the last two years experiencing it with the same team I have quite a positive feeling for here.

    Felipe, we haven’t spoken to you since you were decided for 2013 for Ferrari. It must be a relief to be signed.

    Felipe MASSA: Yes, I think it’s very nice to stay with Ferrari after a long time now. Going to the eighth championship for Ferrari, not counting even when I signed the contract when I was a young driver. Not so young anymore but still a young driver, before Formula One, when I signed a contract for Ferrari. It’s a long time now. It’s very nice, and really looking forward to finish well this end of the Championship but also to concentrate 100 per cent for different and very competitive 2013 as well.

    The race results have been getting better for you over the last few races. Has that been because the car has come towards you with the development?

    FM: A little bit, yes, but also I think, y’know, I would say maybe I had a better direction for the second part of the season. I had good races before, for example the pace was very good in the race, the possibility to score good points and finish in the points was high but always something was happening with some race and I couldn’t put it together. I would say after August everything was much more in the right direction. Nothing was happening during the race; the position on the start was better; so I think you know, this helps a lot. Also my mind, I mean I put it on my mind that if it’s OK, it’s OK, if it’s not OK, is not OK and that’s fine. I try to enjoy, like I always did in my career, going in the car, trying to have fun, enjoy and I think when you do that, you can put the best possible and make the car as quick as possible and the result is there.

    Jenson, you’ve had three third places here. Is it a track that’s going to suit the McLaren this year?

    Jenson BUTTON: I really don’t know! I think as you’ve seen in the last few races, Red Bull, the Ferrari and our car have been relatively strong. Maybe Ferrari and us not quite as strong as the Red Bulls but this is a very different type of circuit to India. It’s not front-limited like India was, I think the rear is going to be the limitation. So, we will see. It is going to be very competitive, I think. And that’s just those three teams: I think you’ll also have a couple of other teams that we’ve seen be strong on occasions. Especially the latter part of the season, that we’ll see at the front fighting as well.

    I don’t know if you’ve been out on the circuit but they’ve added some kerbs, quite a few kerbs around the circuit.

    JB: I haven’t, no, I’m going to head out this evening. This is a fun circuit to drive. It’s a difficult circuit to overtake on but it’s fun to drive and it’s good that they’ve put bigger kerbs in, I think. Last year, if you saw the footage, we were using probably more of the circuit than we should be because there isn’t a limit in terms of a big kerb to stop you from going over the white lines. Now there are bigger kerbs, I think it’s a good thing: it keeps us all on the circuit, keeps us in the right place between the white lines. Now we have to see what the kerb ride is like because obviously it’s different to what it was last year.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Alex Popov – RTI) Vitaly and Kamui, since nobody in big business in Russia and Japan are interested in following you or supporting you next year, if it’s like this, would you consider looking for a foreign sponsor, a big international company, not specially Russian or Japanese?

    VP: I don’t think it’s my job to do it, because I don’t understand too much about it. My management must do that, and I hope for that, so I don’t know what to say.

    KK: I think it’s interesting, but after the race at Suzuka this year, since then I think Japan is more interested in motor sport, especially Formula One. I think if I had a little bit more time I could find more sponsoring from Japan. This is what I’m looking for. After Suzuka, we definitely had a lot of contact from a couple of companies. It’s very difficult to judge what I have to say, because I’m not deciding the team and I don’t know the budget. I have no idea. This is a very difficult moment, but at the moment I could find quite a lot of sponsors and we definitely see a lot of good signs after the Suzuka result. It’s very important to get international but also my preference is if I could bring some sponsoring from Japan, to get more popular in Japan. I think this is what I’m really focusing on at the moment.

    Q: (Ross Macdonald – Gulf News Broadcasting) Jenson, what is Abu Dhabi to you? Is it just another day at the office, or is there something special about the place?

    JB: I haven’t actually spent much time in Abu Dhabi. The only time I’ve actually been in Abu Dhabi was for a party, post-Grand Prix. Apart from that, I’ve never actually been to Abu Dhabi. I’ve only stayed at the hotels on the outskirts. I’ve obviously been to the circuit. The facilities out here are phenomenal, probably the best in the world. I think for the people watching and the people watching on TV, it looks like a spectacular race. I think everything’s done very well here. It’s a good Grand Prix, not a bad Grand Prix for me over the last three years. I like coming here, it’s an enjoyable Grand Prix for me but as I said, I haven’t been here, I’ve been down the road in Dubai for the last three days.

    Q: (Ross Macdonald – Gulf News Broadcasting) How was the party?

    JB: I can’t remember. It must mean it was good.

    Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association)

    JB: That’s always good: can’t hear Parkesy!

    Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association) Jenson, just been speaking to Sergio earlier and he’s mentioned that he’s already had a couple of conversations with you about McLaren, what it’s going to be like joining next season. I was just wondering about the ten year age gap between you two, whether you feel like an older brother to him in some respects?

    FM: Getting older.

    JB: I don’t actually think I’m that old. I was surprised when I was told he was 22-years old. It seems like he’s been around for a lot longer than that. But no, I don’t feel like an older brother, no. It’s important to work closely with your teammate. I think that when he’s in the team he will probably learn a lot from someone who is older, with more experience, which is me but I still think that when you’re an older driver you can still learn from a younger teammate, to bring fresh ideas to the table. But as an old brother? No, I definitely don’t feel like that.

    Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association) What do you expect to learn from him?

    JB: I don’t know yet. We’ll see.

    Q: (Alan Baldwin – Reuters) Jenson, just following up on Parksey’s question: how much has Lewis learned from you, given that the age gap there is a few years as well?

    JB: That’s a great question. I don’t know. I think you will have to ask him that. You’ll get a good answer, I’m sure, on that one.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) Charles, we have heard today that Marussia have confirmed that they have got financial difficulties. We know that there are possibilities of new investors in the team. Does this mean that you are broadening your discussions with other teams for a drive next year?

    CP: Actually, I try to be focused on my job and for the moment, my job is to give my best for the three last races. After we will see what’s open for next year. We are speaking with some team but I think it’s too early to say anything. Thank you.

    Q: (Mike Casey – Associated Press) Jenson, following up on Perez: what does he bring to the team? You’re losing Lewis, does he make the team better? From what you’ve seen in his driving, how is he different from Lewis?

    JB: Obviously it’s very difficult to know what he brings to the team, because he’s not there yet. With Lewis leaving, obviously the team loses a very fast driver, a guy that’s achieved a lot with the team, wins and obviously a World Championship – the last guy to win a World Championship for the team. It is a big loss but things change and you learn to move on and adapt. It’s definitely not the end of two strong drivers at McLaren. I think Sergio will be fast but I really don’t know. He’s obviously unknown in a McLaren, because he’s not there yet. But it’s a great opportunity for Checo and I’m sure he will take it with both hands.

    Q: (Ralf Bach – R&B) Jenson, do you think that Lewis is able to make a Mercedes car quicker and better next year?

    JB: I really don’t know. I think the first year with a new team is always a little bit tricky. It’s a new experience for Lewis. I’m sure he’s excited about it. I really don’t know. He’s as quick as they come but sometimes it’s not that easy to win Grand Prix and to build a team around you and also to help a team achieve great results.

    Q: (Gaetan Vigneron – RTBF) For all you: between Fernando and Sebastian, which is the driver who deserves the title the most, do you think?

    VP: I think it’s clear, for me, at the moment, today, that the Red Bull car has a big advantage compared to Ferrari. This year, Alonso did a fantastic job from the beginning; he’s had a few crashes but all of us know that Ferrari is not on the same pace as Red Bull. It will be difficult for Ferrari but I think Ferrari also has the passion to win and they bring a lot of updates maybe for this weekend or another weekend. I really don’t know, but what I can see at the moment is that Red Bull is the quicker car. That’s it.

    DR: I think he said that quite well. I think this season has been very hard to judge. It’s been a very exciting season. I think anything can happen, so even if it is the case that the package of Vettel himself and the car is better at this stage, it doesn’t confirm a World Championship. You have to get it done on Sunday and there are still three Sundays to go. Things can happen. I think they both have had their little bit of bad luck this season. I think, for now, they’re going to go head-to-toe but yeah, we’ll see. Obviously Red Bull’s been the car to beat for the last four races or so, but I think the pace is always changing, and Ferrari’s obviously got some good experience and some good people behind them, so I’m sure a surprise is not impossible either. See what happens, it’s exciting. I would like to be part of it.

    CP: Yes, I think maybe Sebastian is in a little bit better position than Fernando right now. From the last few races, they had a little advantage but I think it’s still quite open and there are three races left. The championship is still quite close so anything can happen.

    KK: For sure, I think Red Bull has the greater advantage but I think the last three races will be quite difficult to judge. At the moment, I think Sebastian has the greater chance but if there’s something… if Sebastian misses one race, then I think there is a lot of chance for Fernando. We will see. But at the moment I think Sebastian has more chance.

    FM: Well, I think both drivers have had a fantastic championship. I think Fernando did an incredible job up to now, Sebastian as well, especially in the second part of the championship, so I think we are not talking about one guy who has many victories and the other one not. I think we are talking about two drivers one of which will win and who we will say deserved it. But anyway, I hope Fernando will win.

    JB: It’s a very difficult one to answer. As Felipe said, they have both done a fantastic job this year. You would say that throughout the season, Fernando has been the more consistent. In the last few races, yeah, it’s been a great job by Red Bull, but also a great job by Sebastian. He’s been given the equipment and he’s delivered. You don’t win Grands Prix on your own, and you don’t win championships on your own, so whoever comes out on top is the driver and the team that deserves to win it.

    Q: (Vanessa Ruiz – ESPN Radio) Kamui, you just said that you were pretty confident that you’re going to get a seat next year. Sauber has just confirmed Nico Hulkenberg and postponed the decision or at least the announcement about the second driver, so I wonder what it is that makes you confident that you’re going to get the seat?

    KK: It’s a feeling. I have nothing, you know, but just feeling. If I can explain something I think it’s better but unfortunately not. I think we have to see. I think we still have the last three races and if we have some good results in the last three races maybe something can happen. I believe in that and try to focus. But the feeling for next year is just… feeling.

    Q: (Ross Macdonald – Gulf News Broadcasting) Felipe, I know last year you took part in a charity football match when you were in Abu Dhabi. Is that something you will be trying to do again this year, or do you see Abu Dhabi as more than just another day at the office?

    FM: I thing Abu Dhabi is growing a lot. Every year when you come here you see so many new things so I think that’s very nice. I had a nice football match last year. This year we didn’t have it but anyway I think it’s really a nice place to come: you have nice restaurants, great hotels and everything. It’s beautiful. As Jenson says, it’s one of the most incredible races, even to watch. I really enjoying coming here. Hopefully we can have a good race as well, another great race for the people.

    Q: (Alan Baldwin – Reuters) Kamui, when you first came into Formula One you had about two or three races to make an impression and you did it and you secured your future. Do you feel that these next three races are a similar situation, that you could possibly change things in the last three races and secure your future?

    KK: Of course, I think this is a good opportunity like three years ago, but this year I have a little bit different feeling. I didn’t know three years ago that Toyota would leave Formula One, so just to give myself a good result, just driving for the same team. At the same time, I have to negotiate and do everything, a good result is very important, but this year it seems there are not many seats left so I think we have to move quite quickly as well.

    Ends

  • Indian GP: FIA Sunday Press Conference

    Indian GP FIA final press conference on Sunday:

    DRIVERS

    1 – Sebastian VETTEL (Red Bull Racing)

    2 – Fernando ALONSO (Ferrari)

    3 – Mark WEBBER (Red Bull Racing)

    PODIUM INTERVIEWS

    (Conducted by Martin Brundle)

    Sebastian, did you help design this race track or something? You seem so at home here, as  a driver and with your car.

    Sebastian VETTEL: I think it’s been an incredible two years for us, both times to come here and win the race, get the pole on Saturday and win the race on Sunday is fantastic. There’s always a very nice trophy so I’m very, very happy to pick up another nice one this year, so a very special grand prix. I don’t know what is it about this circuit but I really like the flow of it. Sector One is a bit slow with long straights but Sector Two and Three are really nice and I think we all enjoy it. Big thanks to the team, as I said on the radio, every single one is pushing very hard and I think there’s not one thing that stands out and makes the difference: not today’ not yesterday; not this weekend. I think it’s all of us working hand in hand together. If we’re here on the track or back in Milton Keynes, everyone is pushing hard and I think that’s what makes the difference. I’m very, very happy, I’m glad to be part of that and just enjoying the moment.

    You’ve led every race, every lap for three consecutive races now. The last man to do that was the great Ayrton Senna in 1989, you’re in great company and you’re clearly on great form.

    SV: Don’t say things like that! It’s very, very special. I think we all will remember Ayrton forever, not just because he was successful and he had these kinds of numbers speaking for him but he was a great person. So very, very happy.

    Fernando, do you ever, ever give up? You’re relentless.

    Fernando ALONSO. No, obviously, it’s not easy at the moment to fight with Red Bull but we will never give up. I think we are happy today, we have to congratulate them, they were fantastic this weekend so well done Red Bull, well done Sebastian – but yeah, we want to be happy and we want to enjoy Brazil, not only here so I’m sure we will do it.

    Bittersweet for you? You split the Red Bulls but you still lost points in the World Championship.

    FA: Yeah, we lost points but I think this was more or less the plan this weekend: we were not fast enough to compete against them, so we lost the minimum points, which is finishing second, so a s I said, better races will come.

    How fast was your car in a straight line. Take us down to Turn Four at the start, it was incredible.

    FA: Yeah, we were quite fast in a straight line but we are still missing a little bit of grip in the corners that hopefully will come in the next races. Today we have to thank the team for this fantastic straight-line speed that give us some good overtaking manoeuvres and some good action.

    Mark, you had to work hard to be up on this podium today.

    Mark WEBBER: Yes. First of all thanks to the crowd, they are fantastic today. I enjoyed the fight today; it was a difficult race, very difficult for me to get into a rhythm, we had a few issues we needed to manage on the car but fair play to the other guys it was a good, tough grand prix. Lewis and Fernando were very strong on the hard tyre and with our KERS it was very difficult. I was happy with how I drove and we’ll come back for Abu Dhabi.

    So when he breezed past you down the straight, you were missing your KERS at that time and just helpless? There’s nothing you could do?

    MW: Yes, that right. It was very difficult to defend there because you need the KERS to get you on that type of corner.

    Sebastian, we see some amazing names up here, champions including Fernando alongside you and you’re on there twice. Surely you must feel now that you’ve got one hand on that World Championship trophy for 2012.

    SV: The other one is probably Fernando and there are other ones as well. So I think if we speak about the World Championship, obviously this was another good step for us but still a long way to go and we have seen this year how quickly things can change. As I said earlier, it feels fantastic to be up here and have a race like that where everything works the way you want it to. Yeah, very, very proud, very, very happy and enjoying it. That was today. Now we are focusing on Abu Dhabi next week. There’s a lot more to come and we’ll try to take things step by step.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Sebastian well done, your fourth win in succession, which is amazing. And your thoughts on that.

    SV: As you said, it’s pretty amazing obviously. It’s very hard to target those kind of things. I think they either happen or they don’t happen. I think the secret, if there is any, is that we didn’t approach the first of those four races thinking we can win four. We focussed on the first one, then on the second one, then on the third one, then on the fourth one. So, really step by step. I think, as I said on the radio and earlier, I think the whole team is working together fantastically well. I don’t think there is one thing that stands out to make a difference. We can see that in every kind of area. We don’t have any problems on Friday, we get through our programme, we get more or less the answers we want, we are able to improve the car from Friday to Saturday with support here on the track but also in the factory. Guys helping us to improve the car. We get the most out of it in qualifying. We had a fantastic race today. Great pitstops as well, obviously those things are easy to forget and easy to remember when they go wrong but I think the pitstops were fantastic – at least the one I had. It takes a lot of discipline, focus in the right moment, to be there, to be sharp and I think we were in the moment. Not thinking about yesterday or last week or last race and not thinking about the end of the race or next week. So, really tried to focus on the moment, which I think is the best thing we can do to maximise the result today. As I said, I’m very happy, I enjoyed the race a lot. I think it was crucial to open a gap in the first stint to break the DRS early to Mark, who had a very good start I think, and it was quite close in Turn One. But I was able to brake a little bit late and have quite a good exit out of Turn Three, which was important for the remainder of the race, and then was able to open a gap, not just to Mark but also to the cars behind and obviously control the race from there. I think we were very competitive on the soft tyres; on the hard tyres I think McLarens and Ferrari were pretty competitive. Unfortunately Mark lost KERS but as I said, I think we were probably not as competitive on the primes as on the soft tyres but all in all a fantastic race. And again a fantastic trophy this year in India. Just very, very happy.

    A pretty amazing 33 laps on used soft tyres.

    SV: To be honest it’s difficult to know when you start the race how long you can go – but I think we felt after a couple of laps that the tyres were holding up reasonably well and then when you cross around 15/16 to 20 laps with still something in the tyres left, you obviously know it goes more to the direction of one stop. I think it was anyway always going to be one or two stops. On Friday the tyres seemed to last fairly well and again they did today. So yeah, it’s not always happening like that, sometimes we have a surprise on Sunday, so I think we prepared as much as we could but by that stage it was obviously clear to not split the 27 remaining laps in two bits: so to go with the prime stint and do the same as everyone else did. I think we all came the pits within five to ten laps.

    Were you actually being pushed in by Mark at the end there, back into the pits? Had you ran out of fuel?

    SV: Ah yes! I switched off the car. I was told to park the car under the podium but I didn’t know how far away it was. I didn’t remember that from last year. I think it’s the only big mistake that happened to us this weekend. But it didn’t really matter and Mark gave me a push. He’s quite popular for those sort of things. I think he gave Fernando a lift last year in Nürburgring when he had to stop on track. Yeah, gave me a little bit of a push to make it to Park Ferme to stop the car. Thank You.

    Fernando, as Martin was saying on the podium, we had a fairly good illustration of how good your DRS is on the straight. Two extraordinary overtaking manoeuvres, particularly at the start for example with the McLarens and then later with Mark.

    FA: The first lap we cannot use DRS anyway, it was just the slipstream and I was a nice run out of Turn Three and I could overtake both the McLarens. They were fighting but forgot I was there in Turn Four so they keep the fight by their own selves. We nearly touch each other but I was lucky to exit Turn Four without any damage and overtake one of them. Jenson was defending into Turn Six quite a lot so unfortunately we could overtake only one at the start. One after a few laps because I think we had a little bit more pace than Jenson and then with Mark it was a combination of KERS and DRS because I think Mark was running without KERS so that make a huge difference in terms of top speed and the overtaking was relatively easy.

    You must be pretty encouraged by this second place today. To be so close to Sebastian today.

    FA: Yes, I think it’s good news for us, seeing that we could fight Red Bull in the race. More or less we knew this. In qualifying we are not close enough to fight for pole position but in the race normally things improve for us. Today was another example but it was perfect for the strategy from the team: very good start, very good top speed and tyre management. Everything set up for the race, everything was fine and I push 120 per cent every lap so the combination was this second place.

    So when you look at Abu Dhabi, what are your hopes there?

    FA: I think we need to bring some new parts to Abu Dhabi, hopefully improve a little bit more then competitiveness of the car, try to be a little bit closer to Red Bulls on Saturday and hopefully on Sunday as well. Obviously three races remaining; championship is the main target so we need to recover some points and will be nice to finish in front of Sebastian in Abu Dhabi, whatever the position it is. And if we can win the race it will be even better – but for that we need to make a step forward. At the moment we are not able to win.

    Mark, a good start off the line.

    MW: It was good – just a shame it wasn’t a long Barcelona or Malaysia: it would have been a bit nicer but I had the run, obviously, but then the radius into Turn One on the inside… I mean we were together but it’s very, very tricky down in there and also I saw Fernando last year obviously if you brake on the limit it’s very easy to go a bit too far. So, Seb come across, which is fair enough and then I was worried about the other guys obviously having a very good exit on not just me but both of us. Turn Three: was very important to get to there in good shape. So, the start was good, exit at Turn Three wasn’t too bad. Obviously it’s tricky for all of use to get off there on the first lap. I got off there not too bad, got a little bit of a tow off Seb and then settled into the race from there.

    And then that first pitstop – you must have been longing to make that first pitstop and knowing you couldn’t – because you were losing time obviously just before the end of the stint.

    MW: No, I was pretty happy with where the stop is. It’s nice to go a little bit longer. We had to react to Fernando. We would have gone even longer. Obviously it wasn’t due to tyres, it was due to KERS that I started to lose the rhythm and the tempo: obviously when the KERS is coming on and off, we need to also screw around with the brake balance and lots of other things. The guys have got a huge amount of plate-spinning to try to feed that into the cockpit for me. The last thing you want in a one-stop strategy race is starting to have front locking. Because we need to do long, long stints. So obviously this is a pain in the arse and we had to manage it as best we can. The stop was really because of when Fernando pitted, so we had to react to that. Stop was alright and then the prime was a little bit more high-maintenance; a little bit trickier actually, I think for both Seb and I. I managed to break the DRS, managed to get away from Fernando. I then got myself together. KERS was there or there abouts, on and off, and then I caught… I mean the blue flags didn’t do nothing for the backmarkers, that’s the problem: the guys don’t know how much time they kill us in the fast corners. So, when you catch some of those guys in those corners, you lose a second and a half in one sector, or a second. Which happened twice. But, that’s the way it was. And those guys can’t do that when you’ve got guys… when you’re racing with Fernando, the three of us on the limit, Fernando’s going to be all over that stuff. So, it was back on again, and then when I had no KERS, I mean it’s not really a battle on the back straight. I went across to the inside but Fernando come past. They’ve got a very good top gear as well, big top speed. That was it. Then I pushed like… as strong as possible to get to the end of the race. So third, I’m pretty happy with how I drove, I think I drove a pretty good race but in the end it wasn’t enough. We could have got more points today for sure. Well done to Seb on the win.

    How much pressure from Lewis at the end?

    MW: Certainly needed to keep the focus and y’know, it’s so demoralising, that straight with no KERS. I think I was very lucky that Lewis made a mistake in Turn Three, I think on lap 57. I saw it in the mirrors, it was either 57 or 58. And that was important because I think he was starting to get a bit of momentum and I was very keen to keep him off the DRS as long as possible because once he got that I was toast. I think another two laps and he would have got me.

    When did you have the problem with KERS? When did you lose it first?

    MW: Around about lap 19, 20. Maybe a bit earlier. It was on and off and then completely off and then off. It was a moving target really.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Vinayak Pande – Hindustan Times) Fernando, yesterday you were quoted as saying that you were 100 percent certain that you will be this year’s World Champion. Do you still feel that way after this race?

    FA: Of course. We know that there were still 100 points yesterday and now 75 points (available). We are 13 behind. We know that we need to improve. We are not fast enough, especially on Saturdays, as I said, but hopefully we can improve the situation in Abu Dhabi or in USA. The races are long, and as we saw today with Mark, a KERS problem can happen to anyone, it can happen to Seb, it can happen to me and it can happen to all of us. Still many points on the table and I’m still very optimistic.

    Q: (Vinayak Pande – Hindustan Times) Of the three races that are left, is there any one in particular, do you think,  that will favour Ferrari?

    FA: I think Brazil will be quite good for us and hopefully it’s a happy Grand Prix.

    Q: (Sudhir Chandran – Chequered Flag) Now that you have been a part of two editions of the Indian Grand Prix, is there one unique feature about this track, destination or venue, which you find distinctly different from the others that you race at around the world, fans included?

    SV: I think every Grand Prix is special and has something special about it. Obviously it’s the second time that we’ve run here. So far, all the quotes from the drivers regarding this circuit have been very positive. It’s a lot of fun for us. It’s not so easy to manage the tyres in one lap for qualifying, but also over the race (distance) so it’s a big challenge and I think that’s what we like. There are some corners, like turn 15, where you always think that something went wrong and you will try and do it better next time. You get challenged to the limit which is obviously what we like. We don’t want to make mistakes but obviously we like those sort of places.

    On top of that, I think it’s an impressive country. Obviously last year I had a bit of time to have a look, and I think coming back is quite a big difference. Obviously, in here (the paddock) it’s something that we all know, the Formula One paddock but having a look at  Delhi or a little bit the life outside the circuit is very different to other places. I think there’s a couple of stations or a couple of stops on the calendar that are very impressive in that regard. India has a lot to offer. There are a lot of people here: 1.3 billion or more so quite incredible and just to see that, to see how people live here, to see the culture, I think is very very different.

    In life, I think a lot is always about expectations and in Europe expectations are very very high. Money plays a big role whereas here, I think, expectations are fairly low. Money is not that important. It doesn’t matter how old you are. I think it’s more important to have a healthy, happy life, to enjoy your life with your family, with your kids. Sometimes to compare the circumstances you live in, here in India compared to Europe – obviously I grew up in Germany – it’s black and white, it’s very different but it’s nice to see that the people are so happy, warm-hearted. I think it would definitely be nice to spend a little bit more time to travel around and get more of an idea. As I said, in here, everything is more or less the same. It will be the same next week when we go to Abu Dhabi, even though it’s a completely different place. As a country, this place has a lot to offer.

    MW: Good question and a good answer.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Moto und Sport) Sebastian, in the latter part of the race, the front end of your floor seemed to touch the ground. You could see sparks coming off it. Did it cost you time; it seemed to have repaired itself later on?

    SV: I noticed the problem. I think it was when I got the DRS of a backmarker, from Timo (Glock) actually, pretty close to the end of the race and obviously when you open DRS, you go much quicker down the straight and I saw some sparks. I think you’ve seen a couple of cars throwing out some sparks out of the back of the car this weekend. I don’t think it was really a problem. I didn’t feel anything regarding the balance (of the car). All the other laps it was no problem, but I saw it in the mirror, I saw Timo backing off and I think he was a bit afraid at the time. We obviously need to analyse what was the problem, but it didn’t cost us anything or slow us down.

    Q: (Shridhar Potdar – Sakal Media House) Sebastian, every time you make a point about the team members in the factory and those working behind the scenes. You seem to have a special bond with your pit crew which plays an important role in any driver’s success, whether he is a World Champion contender or not. Can you share what kind of relationship you have with your pit crew members and the main members of the team?

    SV: I think it’s the same for Mark and myself. Obviously we work very closely with the guys. I think we have 20 races a year, a couple of pre-season tests and obviously we spend a lot of time in the factory, we spend time here at the track, working with the members of the team, every single one: mechanics, engineers, all sorts of staff. Obviously you know who you’re talking to. If you’re new to the environment it takes a bit of time to get to know everyone and to get to know how everyone ticks. I think the special thing at the moment and the special thing at the beginning of the year at any stage is the atmosphere in the garage is fantastic, the guys are really incredible. I don’t know how they do it, they hardly sleep at night, only a couple of hours. They try to prepare the car as best as they can in order to give Mark and myself the best chance to have a solid race. Back in the factory, the people are pushing, obviously trying to improve the car. It’s obviously difficult to say thank you to each and every one because quite a lot of people work behind the scenes in our team, but everyone plays their role, it’s not a one man show. I think the result today or the result last week or whenever, the results in the last two years are not just thanks to me or thanks to Adrian (Newey), or thanks to any particular person in the team, I think it’s thanks to all of us. Everyone is pushing hard, there are lots of bright guys with good ideas. Obviously some guys are really important but all in all, that’s the spirit we share and it’s just nice to be a big part of it.

    Q: (L.P. Shahi – The Telegraph India) Sebastian, you say there is no one element that makes the difference. Are you under-estimating your own part in this?

    SV: No, that’s the way I see it. Obviously on a Sunday afternoon or a Saturday afternoon, whenever, in qualifying, in the race, when I’m out in the circuit in the car, then I know that there is a lot depending on me. If I get it wrong there’s no result, if I get it right it might be a good result. But I think there’s far more work behind that than just one lap in the race, or one lap in qualifying, one result in a year, in the season. That’s why I’m convinced of what I said and I think everyone is pushing very hard. Obviously it’s easier to measure if I make a mistake, I lose half a second in the last corner, it’s easy to say that instead of 1m 30.0s, I could have done 1m 29.5s but that’s why it’s difficult to measure the effort everyone brings in. The guys in the garage are working hard, preparing the car, preparing the pit stop etc. It’s obviously difficult to measure if you’re talking about performance or lap time, but then it becomes very easy to measure if you don’t finish the race, compared to a race where you do finish and you collect a lot of points. Sometimes it’s down to one guy who is obviously committed and does the right thing at the right moment, preventing a problem or sometimes his head is not right, he’s not fully committed then small mistakes add up to maybe a big mistake costing a certain result on a Sunday. I think that’s where it’s fair to say that we win together and we lose together.

    Q: (Luigi Perna – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Fernando, looking at the performance that you had during the race, and the result that you had at the end, second place, may we say that this was the best race of your season, or the best performance in the car?

    FA: I think it’s difficult to say, I don’t know, it’s difficult to chose. I’m really proud and happy of the Valencia performance, or Malaysia or some other races where we fight all the race through, Monza etc, but definitely this one was one of the best, I think, pushing from lap one to the last lap, not risking or taking more risks that in previous races with overtakings etc, so quite happy .

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Honorary) Seb, there’s been all the stories on the internet about you and Ferrari. Could you set the record straight please: is there any arrangement, agreement, talk between you and your people and Ferrari?

    SV: This could be quite funny now, what I say… No, there’s nothing, nothing to tell you, nothing I’ve signed. Nothing has changed. It’s quite amusing. I don’t know where it came from but… I don’t read much, so it’s quite a surprise when you get to the circuit and get all these questions. Nothing to report. As I said, I can’t be  happier at the moment, I’m very happy with…

    Actually, there’s one thing I would like to say about this. As I said, there’s no reason to write anything or report anything but obviously, as I said earlier, you don’t know every single one in the team, and it’s hard to speak to every single one, so if there’s – sorry to say – some bullshit in the press, obviously there might be some concerns back in the factory, but I’m 100 percent behind them as I feel they’re 100 percent behind me and therefore I want to get this straight: there’s nothing to report and I’m very happy at Red Bull Racing.

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Sebastian, during the last ten laps when Fernando passed Mark, did you fear that Fernando would come back after you and may be successful?

    SV: You never feel too certain. Obviously it’s important, as I said earlier, I tried to open a gap to – you know – later on, and no matter what happened, to have a little bit of a cushion, to have time to react to be able to control the race in the end. Obviously I was told that Fernando got into P2, Mark had the problem, so I think, as Mark said, obviously with a completely smooth race he could stay ahead. As we also said, on the hard tyres, McLaren and Ferrari were quite competitive. I think I had the same gap when he started to be second as I had in the end, so I was able to keep the gap and control the race.

    Q: (Frank Schneider – Bild Zeitung) Question to Fernando and to Seb: Seb, first, is there anything you want from Fernando at the moment; and Fernando is there anything you want to have from Seb at the moment?

    SV: Could I…? Ah, no you have a cap. I was just about to say, his cap, but he hasn’t… Where did you get that from?

    FA: I can give it to you but… I didn’t understand the…

    SV: I think we are both happy with what we have.

    Ends

  • Indian GP: Saturday FIA Press Meet

    New Delhi, 27 Oct 2012: World champion Sebastian Vettel set he pole once again and starts as a firm favourite to win the Indian GP on Sunday with the Red Bulls locking the front row but McLaren is raring to go keeping themselves at a striking distance with P3 and P4. Following drivers attended the FIA Saturday Press Conference:

    DRIVERS

    1 – Sebastian VETTEL (Red Bull Racing)

    2 – Mark WEBBER (Red Bull Racing)

    3 – Lewis HAMILTON (McLaren)

    TV UNILATERAL

    Sebastian, you’ve had a fantastic weekend so far: fastest in all three practice sessions and now on pole position: it couldn’t be a better start to your championship bid could it?

    Sebastian VETTEL: Ah, well, first of all it was a tight session. I think especially in the end. My first run, I did a mistake in Turn Four and had to abort the lap, so that was not as per plan. Before that obviously we had, yeah, quite a good qualifying session, so we decided to go obviously for another run and had only one set of tyres left. Fortunately I get the lap together and was very happy with the lap itself. Here and there potentially could have been a bit faster, especially around Turn Four because this time I made sure I’m not locking up the fronts but yeah, all in all, it was a great weekend so far, no problems with the car. I think the boys have been pushing extremely hard. We had lots of feedback from the factory as well which was very helpful from yesterday to today, so thanks as well to those guys there. We have to keep pushing obviously. I think we have a lot of races to go, important races, but the best chance of doing well is to focus on every single step. Today was qualifying. I think we got a very good result and now we look forward to the race.

    Obviously pole position last year and you won last year, as I say you’ve had an extraordinary weekend so far and you’re three places ahead of your main championship rival Fernando Alonso.

    SV: You know the races these days: you know that a lot of things can happen so I don’t think that means a lot. Obviously I’m very happy to be on pole; it’s the best possible position to start and I think if you ask those two [MW and LH] they would like to start in that position, so yeah, I’m very happy with that but there’s a hard race coming up tomorrow. I think we had a bit of a surprise on Friday in terms of long runs; everyone was quite competitive and tyres seemed to last reasonably well so we’ll see what that means for strategy tomorrow.

    Mark, fourth time you’ve been second on the grid so far this season. Could you have been on pole?

    Mark WEBBER: As Seb said, it wasn’t the smoothest session for him and I think also the same for me. The lap itself wasn’t too bad, last corner got onto the Astroturf a bit on the exit, so for sure didn’t have the cleanest run to the start/finish line so that was disappointing. But I’m driving the car. I did my best, it was close, as you say a pretty tight run thing between both Seb and I and then I didn’t get to do my last attempt. Obviously the McLarens doing very slow outlaps to get their tyres ready for the lap which is different to us and I had no grip in the first sector, so the build lap was… I didn’t get to do my second attempt, which would have been nice but anyway I was surprised to end up second, to be honest, but I’ll take that and we can have a good race from there tomorrow.

    Obviously a good one-two for Red Bull Racing.

    MW: Yeah, very good. As Seb touched on, I think the way the factory has helped us this weekend has been incredible. Milton Keynes has really been pushing hard, even though they’re not here they are with us in terms of work ethic and also for the team and the guys on the floor here. Obviously it’s not the easiest environment to work in, not in terms of temperature but in terms of other challenges and everyone’s getting through that pretty well. So far, so good, and today’s job’s done, tomorrow we’ll wake up with a new day.

    Lewis, only your second time third on the grid so far this season. Are you happy with that third?

    Lewis HAMILTON: Yeah, absolutely. The team have done a great job this weekend in just trying to dial the setup in the car. To have us on the second row, I mean we’re not quick enough to be ahead of these guys, but we can definitely challenge them in the race. I think our race pace was just as good as theirs through practice, so excited about that.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Sebastian, it was interesting to see the number of mistakes that have been made by all sorts of drivers, admittedly you had your own little error, up until then it seemed to be completely mistake free but it seems to be very difficult on that circuit.

    SV: First of all we started the weekend much better than last year, the circuit was in much better shape, I think they did a very good job in trying to clean the circuit so I think it was ready from practice one so that was very positive. Still around here there’s a lot of track improvements so in every session it just seems to get faster. Obviously when everyone puts on new tyres in qualifying then it gets even more quicker. Up to the point of Q3 we were very happy with the car and as you said had no mistakes. The first lap in Q3 wasn’t perfect: I locked my front right into Turn Four, I think I was just a bit too greedy under braking and it didn’t come back, so it didn’t stop locking and I went a bit straight, so I had to abort the lap because I’d lost too much time. And yeah, focus on the second attempt, which fortunately was fine. I was very happy, this time braking a bit too early for Turn Four but all in all it was a very good session for us, the car was fantastic. As we touched on earlier, the support we had from the factory, from Milton Keynes, was incredible, so big thank you to the guys there. I think we improved the car from yesterday. We had a couple of new bits, so seemed to be able to make another step forward so yeah, we have to keep pushing. Today is obviously a good result from us, first and second on the grid, one and two, but tomorrow is the main exercise with the race. I think the McLarens are very quick, went very quick in the long run yesterday, as well as the Ferraris. So, I think it will be a close race, also in terms of strategy it could be a surprise. We’ll see what happens.

    Pirelli have said there’s a possibility of someone running a one-stop strategy. Can you see that Mark, not necessarily for yourselves?

    MW: Well I don’t know how accurate they’ve been in the past but we can listen to them but we know come Sundays things can change, so we don’t get too wound-up with what Pirelli might say to be honest, because it’s changing on Sunday, even amongst all the teams. So we’re going to focus on what we think is the best on the day. Of course we take their advice but it’s not a bible. So, let’s see how the strategy goes. I think the car is working pretty well on Sunday conditions as well. Obviously today was a very, very strong performance from the whole team, to get the front row again for both of us was very good.

    Do you have a specific role in the championship now, would you say?

    MW: No. My job is the same as it always has been: push to the limit and get the most out of what I have.

    Lewis, you said you weren’t quite on the same pace as the Red Bulls but you must be pleased to be ahead of the Ferraris and third on the grid.

    LH: Third is a great position to start from so excited for tomorrow’s race, especially as our long-run pace seemed to be relatively good compared to the others. I think Ferrari potentially have slightly faster pace overall. Over all of us maybe but we don’t know what fuel they’re on. Otherwise we’re all very, very similar. Hopefully, if we can get a good start and have a good right with these guys in front, hopefully it’ll be a better race than the last one we did.

    The last couple of races have been quite difficult haven’t they?

    LH: Yes, I’m just looking forward to a race where we don’t have any issues and can just fight for position and try and get some good points.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Question to the Red Bull drivers: how do you explain such domination for the last three races? And how happy are you to have the two McLarens between you and Fernando?

    SV: I will start with the second question; tomorrow is the race, today was qualifying, no points are scored today. Surely it’s better to have him behind than in front. But I think we’ve seen a lot of different races this year; some races pretty boring, nothing happened; other races, pretty spectacular from the first to the last lap. I think tomorrow is going to be a long race, what sort of race we’re going to find out but that’s usually the exciting bit and that’s why we are looking forward to the race as well. As I said, I’m very happy to be in the position that we are in but that’s it. We go from there tomorrow.

    Q: And how do you explain the domination?

    MW: The drivers!

    SV:  Yeah.

    Q: (Sudhir Chandran – Chequered Flag, India) Sebastian, can we now safely call this your de facto home Grand Prix?

    SV: It’s a bit far away from my home country but I think I’ve liked this circuit from the first practice last year. Obviously last year was pretty special, to be the first winner here in India and to do it again this year is obviously the target. Let’s see what happens tomorrow, but as I said, I like the circuit, I think it suits our car as well, it’s pretty different in its characteristics, quite a slow sector to start with, with a long straight and then nice fast flowing corners towards the end of the lap. I think there are opportunities to overtake – hopefully we don’t have to seize them tomorrow. As I said, let’s see what happens.

    Q: (Shridhar Potdar – Sakal Media) Sebastian, in Japan, when you won the race, we saw you patting the car like a horse. It’s like a horse rider, after he finishes riding, he pats the back of the horse. This passion seems to be body and soul to you; is this passion the secret of your success?

    SV: First of all, the car is not a horse, so sometimes you might lose oil or fuel but I think the smell is nicer than what a horse drops! Obviously, you work together with your car. When we are out in qualifying on the circuit, in particular in qualifying or the race, we are obviously by ourselves. Sure we have contact with the team on the radio but it’s between you and your car… There is obviously a special relationship because when you’re out on track, you can’t come in and make a change whatsoever, it’s between you and the car. You’re very happy when you cross the line in a very good position after you’ve done a good race and say thanks to the car but also the car is what connects you to your crew. Obviously I’m working with the car on the track, the crew is working with the car in the garage. We all share a passion and obviously try to achieve a common goal. Maybe it’s just a nice gesture to say thanks.

    Q: (Marco dell’Innocenti – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Seb, to have two McLarens behind you tomorrow may not be too comfortable for you, but for Fernando, it could be more difficult. Is this an advantage for you, to have this cushion, this pillow?

    SV: If, could, would, should? We have to focus on the start tomorrow, focus on ourselves. We cannot influence what the others are doing. Fernando could have been a second quicker today than everyone and there’s nothing we could have done, apart from trying to mind our own business and trying to get the fastest lap we can, which I guess is everyone’s exercise in qualifying. It’s a long race tomorrow, a lot of things can happen and sure, if we are ahead, it’s better than being behind.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Moto und Sport) Lewis, it seems that corners five and six were the problem today. You had a nice slide there. I think Sebastian went off in the same place; is there anything in particular or special with that corner today?

    LH: No, not really. I think this track is incredibly challenging for all of us. The more and more we drive it, the more and more we realise that, and that’s what makes it a great circuit. Not everyone’s able to get the first lap… it takes a lot of focus and it takes a lot to get a whole perfect lap together. That’s a corner where you’re pulling a lot of yaw, a lot of G and putting a lot of load on the tyres and it’s very easy to… if you just touch the kerb or something like that you have an oversteer moment. You’re always trying to gain time through there because it’s quite an important part of the circuit, where you can gain time.

    Vettel addressing the Press at BIC after taking the pole for Indian GP on Saturday. Photo by Sutton Images copyright BIC

    Ends

  • Concorde Agreement should pave the way for stability: Monisha

    New Delhi, 26 Oct 2012: The following Team Representatives attended the FIA Friday Press Conference ahead of the Indian GP on Sunday: Eric BOULLIER (Lotus), Monisha KALTENBORN (Sauber), Cyril ABITEBOUL (Caterham), Martin WHITMARSH (McLaren), Christian HORNER (Red Bull Racing), Stefano DOMENICALI (Ferrari).

    First a question to all of you: I believe you have had several occasions to discuss your team’s future in Formula One. How do you feel those discussions have gone with regard to your individual interests and concerns? Eric, would you start?

    Eric BOULLIER: Obviously, as you said in your question if you look at the personal interests there are always some concerns and issues, but I think we had positive and constructive meetings all together with Bernie and the FIA and even if we are still far let’s say from closing and signing any Concorde Agreement, even if I think it should not take long now, we, with a global vision for Formula One we all believe there are some positives.

    Monisha, your concerns?

    Monisha KALTENBORN: My concerns straight away! I agree with Eric that it was good that the teams were invited to this kind of meeting to get the status on the negotiations between the commercial rights holder and the FIA and what for us is important is that we come to a conclusion which is good for Formula One. We know that each team has its own position in Formula One – you have the bigger ones and the ones who are in the middle and further back – but we need to have something which is good for the sport, the stability of the sport.

    Cyril?

    Cyril ABITEBOUL: Pretty much the same thing here as Monisha. Obviously, it looks like the last corner of a long negotiation and as always there are last-minute adjustments and last-minute compromises. Not everyone can be equally happy but you just need to make sure that not everyone is particularly unsatisfied, which is certainly not our case. We’re making sure to protect our key interests, because obviously smaller teams are fragile and we need to make sure not to be unnecessarily exposed, so that’s what we are making sure of but we are on a good track.

    Martin.

    Martin WHITMARSH: I think in the short term we’ve all got our own self-interests, but in the longer terms we’ve all the same interests and I think that’s the sport is successful, that it’s buoyant, it’s exciting and that it’s also viable. As a few of the others have said in front of me I think you’ve got to recognize that there’s a lot of challenge for quite a lot of teams and it’s important for all of us to reach for compromise, find a way forward that’s going to make sure that we can sustain all those teams. The good thing is this isn’t the old era, which was I think very confrontational and probably good for the media but less good for the sport. I think people here are recognising that now is not the time to have wars, now’s he time to be constructive, where necessary compromise and find a way forward for the sport.

    Thanks. Christian?

    Christian HORNER: I think the guys have done a tremendous job of telling exactly what wasn’t discussed at the meeting, which is obviously confidential between the parties. So I’ll follow the party line and say, yes, it was a very constructive meeting and we’re getting close to a conclusion but I think that’s really all there is to say at the moment.

    Stefano.

    Stefano DOMENICALI: Well, the last thing I can say in this spirit is that it’s clear that there was something discussed between the teams and the relevant parties – the FIA President and Bernie Ecclestone, who represented the commercial rights holder. The thing is that at the end of the meeting it was the President of the FIA that left room for discussion for future points that the teams may suggest to improve what we are discussing. But I believe it is the right thing to say that here it’s important to speak about the division of the future of Formula One and I believe that we are starting from good grounds and we need to make sure that we finalise this as soon as possible.

    Okay, thank you. I’m sure there will be some more questions for all on that subject. Now, some individual questions to each of you. Eric, starting with you, if I may. Obviously you’ve done a fair amount of development over the last couple of races, but looking back at the whole season, have you exceeded expectations this year, given that you’ve also lost quite a few points as well? And looking forward, do you think you can make the top three or top four?

    EB: That was the target – to be top four this year. Top three would be the cherry on the top of the cake, but obviously it’s tough to fight with the guys in front of us. But I’m quite happy… I should say actually very, very happy with how the team developed and worked this year. Obviously, we had a tough 2011. A lot happened last year which was not in our favour but this year we clearly pushed back and brought back the momentum for us. The team at Enstone and at the track here did an amazing job and both drivers did contribute a lot to the success this year with so many podiums. But yes, we all want more. Obviously being in the fight for the third place is nice. It’s nice for the team. We obviously want to keep this momentum and keep pushing and take any opportunity. I think the session this afternoon, we had good pace on one lap and on high fuel, so I’m happy to be the headache of my colleagues.

    Monisha, definitely the first lady of Formula One, and of course you’ve recently stepped up to be team principal of the Sauber team. Here you are at your home grand prix. How proud are you of getting that far?

    MK: I think for oneself it’s a bit difficult to feel proud about that, I think that’s for others to say, because I was given this opportunity and I was very happy to take it up. Not much has actually changed for me because I was anyway doing more stuff, for sure. It’s just this little step to this title but now you really feel the entire responsibility on your shoulders.

    Cyril, a new appointment for you, what exactly is your role, what is the hierarchy now at Caterham F1?

    CA: My main role is CEO of the F1 team. As you know Caterham is a large group with many different activities, so my focus is definitely on the Formula One team. As you can imagine, there’s plenty to be done there. It’s a position taking care of the day-to-day business, reporting to the shareholders so anything about that but no more and even my experience in the automotive industry, in the Formula One with Renault, over the past seven years had some things that is quite normal as an evolution but a great opportunity. The only thing that maybe is particular is that this is Formula One and one of the shareholders remains the team principal.

    And is he the man you report to directly?

    CA: Obviously, the two shareholders and the rest of the Group.

    Looking at the championship Martin, you’re still there with a chance – it’s not over until it’s over. What are your feelings, what are the feelings within the team now as we tackle these last four races?

    MW: I think it’s really business as usual. We have four races and we have to try to do the best job we can. We come to every grand prix seeking to win and we’ll be doing nothing different in these last four races. It’s an incredibly competitive season as we’ve had ups and downs, I think we’ve underperformed in the last couple of grands prix so that gives you a bit of pain but it also gives you some determination to do something better in the last four races. So, I think it’s been an interesting season and there’s no reason to suppose it’s going to stop being one for a few races to come yet.

    What’s it going to be about, Christian and Stefano? Is it going to be about development of the cars? Is it going to be about the drivers themselves? Is it going to be about circuit suitability? Perhaps you can talk about your own feelings as we go into these last four races.

    CH: I think all of those factors are going to play an element. It’s going to be about getting the most out of the next four weekends; it’s going to be about being reliable; it’s going to be about being quick; it’s going to be about not making mistakes; optimising the package that you have throughout a grand prix weekend. It’s set to be a fascinating run-in to the championship over the next four races. I think we’re set for a real spectacle over the next four events. I’m sure it will go all the way down to the wire.

    Stefano?

    SD: I agree with Christian. For sure at the end of the day being pragmatic it’s important to do adding and summing up all of the points Christian was saying, not one point more than the other. So at the end of the day that is the situation that we have to face. And at the moment we are behind and we need to fight believing that it is possible because that’s the spirit I want to see within the team. And when I speak about the team I speak about everyone but I’m sure that is really what I feel walking around the garage and also in Maranello. We know that is a very tough job but that is part of the game. If you think where we were the first day of testing, and where we are now after a lot of months, I think that we need to be in one sense not happy but on the other hand very proud of what we did – because the first day when we shake down the car in Jerez was very worrying. So, I just recall my guys, to make sure we keep the momentum with the positive attitude up until the end and then we will see. If, in this case Sebastian – or another one, because as we always say, up to the moment where the classification is finished, we need to respect everyone – will win, they will deserve it, and we need to make sure that we will congratulation with them. But up to that moment we will make sure we will fight with every resource we have up until the end.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    (Sruthijith Kurupichankandy – The Economic Times) Question for the gentleman from Ferrari. Is it common for your team to use your car to make political statements – and if not, why did you decide to make an exception in India?

    SD: Well in that respect I understand what you are saying. There was a press release that was done two days ago, so if you want any clarification of that, our press office is absolutely very pleased to answer to your question. But y’know, if you look behind in the past we’ve done a lot of initiatives but y’know, there’s nothing that I want to into very specifically because it’s not really the place where I should do it.

    (Ajit Devadason – SIFY.com) Question to Monisha. Sauber have traditionally had a tendency to attract excellent talent, groom them and then pass them on to the big teams. Do you plan to change that?

    MK: Well passing them on was not really our strategy, it just happened.  So I wouldn’t really agree on that and say that we need to change anything on that. It’s true that historically we have been attracting young talent and it appears to be that we can provide them the right kind of platform that they can show their talent. Of course in the last case now we would have also liked to continue with Sergio but he’s going to fantastic team, one of the more successful teams in Formula One and for us it shows that we can still provide that kind of environment to a young driver to show his talent. And how we can change? Simply by ourselves being more competitive.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) Christian, it’s an open secret that you’re in a slightly different position to the other teams when it comes to your stance on the Resource Restriction Agreement (RRA). Could you explain to what extent that’s made your negotiating or bargaining position a bit more difficult when it comes to the general discussions, the entry, the costs, the potential tax, the new working group, all of that?

    CH: I think that they are two separate things. The resource restriction, the concept of the resource restriction was to – and still is to – reduce costs in Formula One, the costs to compete in Formula One, and that’s something that we’re not opposed to. We are fully in favour of costs being controlled in the sport, we just disagree with the mechanism, at the moment, how they are presented to control those costs and our concern is that different entities, different organisations are treated differently in what is proposed so far. It doesn’t include the engine, for example, so there’s freedom to spend, at the moment, on the engine, particularly the new power train in 2014. But I think that what has come out of the discussions recently – and with the formation of a new Concorde Agreement, it gives the opportunity to sit down with our colleagues and hopefully agree a strategy on what does work and what does control costs, for the larger teams as well as the smaller teams, for the future, that is sustainable, that includes all aspects of the operation of a Formula One team, because currently, as proposed, the RRA doesn’t deal with so many aspects, whether it be KERS, for example, whether it be exhausts, whether it be drivers, whether it be other aspects of spend and cost drivers in Formula One. So hopefully there will be that opportunity over the coming weeks and we remain committed to ensuring that there is a workable solution that’s transparent, that’s fair, that’s balanced for all the participants.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) Do you feel isolated?

    CH: I don’t think we find ourselves isolated. We elected to leave FOTA just over 12 months ago so we haven’t sat in FOTA meetings. We attend all the technical working groups, we attend all the sporting working groups with the parties that matter, we’re present in all discussions.

    Q: (Daksh Panwar – The Indian Express) Stefano, the Indian government has criticised the decision to the put the flag (of the Italian navy) on the car. So given that that has created controversy, will you review it for Sunday’s race?

    SD: Honestly, as I said, I don’t think this is a matter for this press conference to discuss this subject, to be honest. And as I said, if you have any questions or doubt about it, we have our press office available to you.

    Q: (Alan Baldwin – Reuters) Stefano, question about your car: Nick Tombazis said a few things before the weekend about the wind tunnel and updates not working as they are supposed to in the last couple of races. Are you confident on today’s evidence that you’ve got to the bottom of the problem there?

    SD: Well, it’s difficult to say. For sure, being a pragmatic guy, we need to make sure that with the little of what we expect, today we will analyse the data. It is difficult to see, for example, FP1; the track was changing every lap so we need to take that into the analysis that the engineers are going to do now but for sure, the elements that will make the difference really, up to now, up to the end, if we would like to bring new updates on the car, we need to make sure that they are delivering what we are expecting, saying without doing, but making sure that this will deliver the objective that theoretically we would like to bring and this is a fundamental element that also relates to the fact that we need to work very hard to make sure that the problems that we had this year, mainly at the beginning of the season, will not happen again at the beginning of next season, so it’s quite long work that we are doing at home to make sure that we will improve that situation.

    Q: (Luigi Perna – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Stefano, about the new elements on the car; what worked and what didn’t?

    SD: I don’t know! We will see when it counts. Today is too early to say. The people will have done a good job if the car has improved in performance relative to our main competitors. If that is not happening, of course that means we haven’t done a good job. But it’s too early to say.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) Question for the back row, please: I understand you might not want to confirm any of your decisions regarding who you might have selected for your drivers for next year, but will you be confirming your line-ups before the end of the season or during the winter?

    EB: Before the end of the season.

    MK:  We as well.

    CA:  Same thing.

    Q: (Shreyas Sharma – Mail Today) To all of the teams; last year we saw that the tyre wear at the circuit was an issue. On the evidence of today do you think that has improved; whoever wants to answer that question?

    SD: I believe that last year…

    CH: Ladies first!

    SD: Ah sorry, for sure! Last year was a completely new track, for sure the asphalt was in its first year of life so I’m sure that this year the situation with the tyres if you compare to last year is different. And looking at the runs of today, it seems that the tyres are more stable than what we saw last year, but that is my feeling after the end of the first day of practice.

    Q: (Alan Baldwin – Reuters) Monisha, Kamui was saying yesterday that he’s trying to find extra sponsorship and he’s busy working hard in Japan trying to find some backing. To what extent does his financial situation and backing influence the decision on whether he stays or not?

    MK: Regarding Kamui, we’ve always said that we know his strengths, his qualities as a driver and these kind of aspects have not played any role in it. If you look back, even when we took him up, also then people criticised us for that decision, and everyone knew that he doesn’t have any sponsorship package so nothing has changed on that.

    Q: (Vanessa Ruiz – ESPN Radio) So, Monisha, does the fact that he’s looking for a sponsor mean that he’s leaving Sauber?

    MK: I don’t know. I think you have to ask him that. We’ve not had any talk like that and, as I said, we are generally also looking at him, talking to him and I think we know him quite well by now, to know what we have if we keep him on.

    Q: (Ubaid Parkar – F1Pulse) Martin and Stefano, considering that there aren’t a lot of regulation changes next year, are you worried that Red Bull’s recent form means that you might be chasing Red Bull again next year?

    MW: The fact is that you go into every year with high expectations. I think everyone works hard to improve the car. Red Bull’s a very strong team, Ferrari’s a strong team, the three teams behind will all be competing next year so if you’re wise you go into every year worried about the eleven other competitors. You never know what they’re going to spring, you don’t know how good a job they’ve done. Sometimes you don’t know how bad a job you’ve done yourself, so that’s the exciting thing about Formula One. Everyone goes off the radar screen. We don’t get pace information for a period of time. We all work hard to develop a new car. As I say, during the winter you start to grow confident about what you’ve done but you’ve got to be mindful of the fact that there are eleven good teams working hard to beat you.

    SD: Well, on my side, with regard to next year, I would say that the situation could be more or less the same as this year. While everyone is trying to catch up the target that in terms of pure performance at the moment Red Bull have set, even in previous years, in my view, 2014 will be a re-set where there is a chance, where once again the field will be split into separate sections because it’s a totally new (set of) regulations, it’s a totally new power train, so I’m expecting that will be a year when we can see some incredible or interesting big surprises, or we can see the risk of having to field in one group because of this technical challenge that is huge. There’s not a lot of time, because of course all the teams will try to push hard in 2013 and then at a certain moment they will need to decide what to do for the year after and bear in mind that this year, I would say, most of the development that you can bring to the next year’s car, for 2014, you have to forget it and make sure that you have a good project that has to start from a white sheet of paper and you have no reference with the other competitors so it will be a big question whether… I’m sure that the first day of testing in 2014 will be quite a challenge and quite interesting for all of us.

    Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association) Stefano, I heard your answer earlier regarding having the Italian flag on the car but are you not courting political controversy by displaying such an emblem, bearing in mind that the FIA’s statutes states no team or entity within Formula One is allowed to make political standpoint?

    SD: I think that if you look at what is written in the press conference (release) it is not really what you are saying. I think that you have to refer to that, to be honest, and look what is written exactly, and the reason why we put that on. There’s not any political intention or discussion in that. If you look at that, that’s really what is written.

    Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association) I have read it, and obviously you’re making a point regarding the two sailors that are in dispute with…

    SD: No, no, that’s not true.

    Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association) It’s on the website. I’ve read what’s on the website. You’re saying that it’s for the two sailors.

    SD: It’s not true, to be honest, what you’re saying.

    Q: (Dhruv Behl – Auto X) Just a generic question to the entire panel: what is India like in year two, compared to last year? So far, how has the weekend been?

    CH: I think it’s fantastic…

    MW: Ladies first.

    CH: No, absolutely, you’re quite right, Martin.

    MK: Go ahead, no go ahead. I could be slightly biased on that.

    CH: I do apologise. No, it’s fantastic to be back here. It’s a great track, it’s truly impressive what you’ve done here in India and I think that the race was tremendously well received last year. I think the circuit has a great blend of fast corners, slow corners, long straights, so it’s a pleasure to be back here and it’s great to see the evolution that’s happened during the last twelve months with what’s happened in and around the circuit.

    SD: Absolutely. I totally agree.

    MK: I fully agree with that. I think last year was really a fantastic event here and the FIA also awarded the promotor here with a special award for promotors at the end of the year. People were welcomed here with a lot of warmth. It’s difficult to really top that but to keep that and still get away with all the hiccups that we had in the first year is a great achievement.

    EB: Obviously I agree. I just say that when I arrived yesterday the first comment from my team was – as you will see – a lot of details and attention has been done to the track and it’s much much nicer and better. That’s really proved the commitment of the promotor and the country which is good.

    CA: Clearly some additional work has been done between the two years. Last year it was quite challenging work to be done, to deliver on time, which was the case, it was a good race, won by a Renault engine, so a good memory there. This year, we haven’t had much time to enjoy the country because we are in the middle of a battle to try and recover our tenth place. We would love to do that in India, obviously, it’s going to be challenging so if we could get a little bit of help from the weather, some rain, maybe that would help us in trying to get an abnormal race. Other than that, it’s great to be in a part of the world which is important for all the sponsors, all the car makers which are basically starting to appear here. It’s good to be here.

    MW: I think we’ve talked a lot about the facilities and I think the facilities are good and they’ve got better but I think the really important thing was that last year you really sensed that really crazy passion in its first year and it’s early days in this year’s race, but I think we want to retain that and build on it because clearly India’s a new and very important market for Formula One and looking ahead now, we’ve got to build upon the passion that we saw in its first year and make sure we don’t go flat, we don’t lose the interest, we’ve got to maintain that momentum. So the facilities are good but I think that this is such an important market for anyone, we’ve got to build on the passion we saw.

    Q: (Luigi Perna – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Stefano, considering the last three races, the gap of performance of Red Bull compared to your car and the others, how much chance do you have to close this gap and try to win this title?

    SD: In terms of closing the gap in performance, it’s difficult to say because our main competitors but also McLaren, they are always improving, so it’s difficult to say where we are relative to pace/performance but in terms of percentage with regard to the possibility of winning the championship, I think that, as we said before, there are too many elements that are on the table: strategy, race mistakes, problems that we still have – I would say – less than fifty percent because they are in front of us, but the race is full open.

    Ends

  • Narain believes BIC offers more grip this year

    Greater Noida (New Delhi), 25 Oct 2012: The lone Indian driver in Formula One, Narain Karthikeyan believes the Buddh International Circuit will offer more grip in 2012 than it did during its debut grand prix. He was talking to the reporters at the FIA Thursday Press Conference at the BIC ahead of the Indian Grand Prix on Sunday.

    Karthikeyan is one of very few drivers with experience of Buddh this year, and argues the circuit has improved with age. “I think the track is already in a lot better condition than last year,” said the Indian driver in Thursday’s FIA press conference. “It was very dusty, and because of the landscaping that they have done, the dust has settled. There’s no more constructio

    n around the circuit so we already have a higher level of grip and the circuit looks quite nice. As you know, I drove the MR Formula 2000 car a month ago; it was already very good. Temperatures won’t matter, they are going to drop a few degrees from today [30°C], I think, but it’s OK. The tyres are fine; compared to last year we have the same allocations but [the compounds are] a little bit softer so it should be fine here.

    The Indian driver also revealed HRT have an upgrade for this race. While suggesting it might be worth several tenths, Karthikeyan voiced the hope that a bumper crowd would be in attendance to see a more competitive performance from the Spanish team.

    “We’re coming off a hugely successful race last year, so expectations are high and I hope on Sunday we see a big crowd, a strong one. In India there is a lot of passion for Formula One and comparative to our neighbouring countries, like China, the understanding of Formula One is a lot better. It’s going to be a good grand prix, I hope. And for us, we have a small update, which is a rarity for our team. Hopefully it’ll work and we’ll have a few more tenths. I know we need seconds but it is what it is and I’m not complaining, I’m happy to be driving here and will give it my best.”

    Press Conference was attended by: DRIVERS – Heikki KOVALAINEN (Caterham), Bruno SENNA (Williams), Jean-Eric VERGNE (Toro Rosso), Narain KARTHIKEYAN (HRT), Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN (LOTUS), Nico HÜLKENBERG (Sahara

    File photo of Narain Karthikeyan by HRT F1 team

    Force India).

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Gentlemen, your thoughts on India? some of you have been here before, some of you haven’t, so your thoughts on what you’ve experienced so far and what you’ve seen so far and what you think of the country and what you think of the circuit.

    First of all Heikki, you’ve been here before, you’ve been training in Abu Dhabi so you’re used to the heat, what do you think of the weekend coming up and the country itself?

    Heikki KOVALAINEN: Well, I think, like you said, last year was the first year that we raced here. I think the event itself was really successful. Especially the circuit; I think they’ve done a great job here with the circuit. I think the layout is one of the best in the calendar, there are really some nice corners, the surface is nice and smooth, so it’s always enjoyable to drive here and we can set up the car nice and low and get them gripping quite well. So, I’m looking forward to another good event this year. It seems like the locals are picking up the Formula One more and more, so it’s working quite well here. Hopefully we get a lot of people coming to see us on Sunday.

    Bruno…

    Bruno SENNA: Of course I agree with Heikki regarding the track; it’s one of my favourites in the calendar as well and coming from last year to this year, the improvement on the facilities and everything is quite impressive. I think everything was a bit rushed last year, so everybody was a bit ‘oh this isn’t ready for the race,’ but at the end of the day it’s always the case when it’s the first year of the circuit. All the rough edges have been sorted out for this year so it’s a much nicer place. Of course the experience of the track is a whole different thing and I think for everyone who’s not used to India it’s a big cultural shock but it’s a culture full of history, full of richness and I think if you learn how to appreciate that sort of stuff, you can learn to appreciate the country.

    Jean-Eric, your first time here I think?

    Jean-Eric VERGNE: Yes, indeed. To be honest I don’t have much to say about this track except that it looks like a nice one, really smooth. The race from last year looked quite nice and I’m really looking forward to drive on it and it should be a good experience. As Bruno said, off track it’s quite a different country and to be honest I haven’t experienced much: I stayed in the hotel, I was quite far from everything, so didn’t see much, just on the roads, which look quite messy but beside it, yeah, we’ll see how the weekend goes.

    Narain, obviously a very busy week so far for you so far, a very busy weekend coming up as the native from the host country.

    Narain KARTHIKEYAN: Yeah, we’re coming off a hugely successful race last year, so expectations are high and I hope on Sunday we see a big crowd, a strong one. What I always say, in India there is a lot of passion for Formula One and comparative to our neighbouring countries, like China, the understanding of Formula One is a lot better. It’s going to be a good grand prix, I hope and for us, we have a small update, which is a rarity here for our team. Hopefully it’ll work and we’ll have a few more tenths. I know we need seconds but it is what it is and I’m not complaining, I’m happy to be driving here and will give it my best.

    Kimi, your first time in India. What are your thoughts, your impressions?

    Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN: Well, I came last night at one o’clock, so I’ve only seen the motorway and the hotel. The hotel, outside it, looks nice. I have no complaints so far. The circuit – I haven’t gone around it. That is tomorrow. I’ll tell you about it.

    Are you a fan of Indian food?

    KR: Yeah, actually I am, if it’s the same as it is in Europe. I like it, but you know I have no experience yet of the local food.

    Nico, I expect you’ve have a busy week?

    Nico HULKENBERG: yes, we obviously we’ve had quite a few visits to India over the last two years. We’ve been here since Monday doing work with the local media and being in Delhi. I’ve been a few times here but I enjoy it every time I come. It’s a very different culture and a special experience to come here. It’s very different to all the other Asian places we go to. They’re always very welcoming, very friendly. I enjoy being here. Obviously, the track is new to me, so I’ll have to learn that one tomorrow. I’m generally looking forward to the weekend really. It’s a special weekend for us and hopefully we can entertain the crowds.

    Now, a question to all of you about your future. I don’t know if you’ve got things signed or not. Just give us some sort of update as to what’s happening next year? Heikki, would you like to start?

    HK: I wouldn’t actually like to start, but now that you’re pushing me… Nothing’s been signed for next for myself yet. Personally, my target and my focus is at each race weekend for our team it’s quite important that we try to regain that 10th position back from Marussia. It’s not going to be easy but I think we have to do whatever it takes to be in a position to do that if a freak race happens again. So, the main focus is on that and regarding the future with the team and with Tony, we haven’t decided yet. I think Tony knows what he gets with me but then he’s evaluating other options I think to see what he wants to do. And I’m waiting. In the meantime, of course, my management is also working. There’s nothing really to report but the main thing I think for myself and really for our team has to be to keep pushing to get that 10th position back, it’s quite crucial.

    Bruno – for next year?

    BS: Nothing has changed from the last time I was here and you asked me the same question but the focus is still the same: keep pushing and trying to get points for the team and then hopefully be on the grid next year.

    Jean-Eric?

    JEV: I haven’t thought about it really. So far I have a contract with Red Bull. I think I just have to keep doing the job I’m doing and improve myself every race weekend and I’ll think about this race weekend and Abu Dhabi and then think about next season, but I’m quite confident about staying with Toro Rosso and that’s what I would love.

    Narain?

    NK: Again, I have a good relationship with HRT; it’s my second year with them. They’ve built a good factory and everything else. On paper next year they’ll look the best so realistically I’d like to stay here and that’s the plan right now.

    Kimi, we’re told we can expect an announcement next week or so, is that the case?

    KR: I don’t know. I mean, we have options but nothing is decided but I guess it will be decided at some point.

    Nico. There are rumours about concerning your future. Where you’re going to go, when do you think you will know?

    NH: I know there is lots of talk about my future but at this point I don’t want to make a comment on the speculation. I’ll just focus on this weekend, which is the most important thing.

    Are things settled? Can you say that?

    NH: Just no comment.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Shridhar Poddar – Sakal Media House ) Kimi, how has the break from Formula One to rallying helped you, because your second stint has been turning out to be as good as the first one?

    KR: It hasn’t really done anything. I was pretty happy to go and do something else for a while, did some racing and I’m enjoying it again. It’s the same places – OK, there are some new circuits and places to come to this year and a new team, but apart from that, Formula One hasn’t changed and it’s exactly the same. For me, nothing’s really changed. People always talk about where I was last time, that I didn’t have the motivation but I thought I drove better than I ever drove in the last year; it was just that we had a pretty bad car at that time. Nothing has really changed for me.

    Q: (Vinayak Pandey – Hindustan Times) Narain, you have probably driven on this circuit a lot more than other drivers. The conditions in Delhi were unexpectedly cool and there was a rain shower on Wednesday. Should the temperatures become cooler than they are right now in qualifying and on Sunday, do you see any particular changes in the way the cars will handle or the outcome?

    NK: I think the track is already in a lot better condition than last year; it was very dusty, and because of the landscaping that they have done, the dust has settled, there’s no more construction around the circuit so we already have a higher level of grip and the circuit looks quite nice. As you know, I drove the MR Formula 2000 car a month ago; it was already very good. Temperatures won’t matter, they are going to drop a few degrees from today, I think, but it’s OK. The tyres are fine; compared to last year, the hard compound – we have the same allocations but it’s a little bit softer so it should be fine here.

    Q: (Chetan Narula – PlanetF1) Kimi, how big a challenge were Pirelli’s tyres for you, because the last time (you were in F1) you had different tyres, and now you have totally different compounds and everything?

    KR: I admit that I had some thoughts about the tyres before I did one private test – OK, it wasn’t the race tyres, it was some other even more worse tyres but I thought that they were fine. When you come from rallying, they have much more grip and the tyres were OK for me so after that, I already knew that I would not have any issues, because there was a lot of talk that maybe it was not good, but when I came back, I didn’t really remember how it was two years earlier, so I thought that the tyres were completely fine and I still do so. OK, they wore off a bit faster than in the past in some races but it’s the same for everybody and they’ve been doing a very good job for Formula One so I’m happy with that.

    Q: (Chetan Narula – PlanetF1) And you haven’t won this year but despite that, how good a comeback has this been for you?

    KR: Yes, I’m happy. If you had told me before the season that I will be in this position with this many points  and stuff like that I would have taken it but of course when you do some good races you always want more and more and then you’re disappointed if you’re not. If you do well you want more and more. It could have been better but it could have been much more worse also.

    Q: (C. Raghunath – The Hindu) Kimi, do you fancy your chances this year? You’re third in the championship…

    KR: Yeah, of course. We’ve had a chance. It’s the difference like in 2007. We had a car that you knew that could win all the races and right now we are not the fastest car so we need more help to really win it but we will keep trying and hopefully we can achieve it. We will try until there’s no chance but it’s a bit different situation. But if we can improve the car in the next three races, you never know, so…

    Q: (Vinayak Pandey – Hindustan Times)  Kimi, after which race did you feel that the Lotus team didn’t have the same competitiveness as it had at the start of the season?

    KR: I think in Spa we had some signs but then we have seen this year that one race you can be very strong and the next not so good, it’s been up and down between the teams. For some reason, after the summer break, some of the teams have been much more consistent. I think we still have a good car. We improved it in the last race again but we are not at the level that we maybe were compared to others at the beginning of the season.

    Q: (Gary Meenaghan – The National) Nico, you said that you mentioned that you got here on Monday. Could you just give us an idea of some of the things you’ve been doing since you got here?

    NH: Well, mainly a lot of media interaction. We are an Indian team so there is quite a bit of interest, so we’ve been around, talking to a lot of TV stations, went to some studios, did a sponsorship event with Hackett which is a team partner in clothing. It’s only two days and two days pass pretty quickly.

    Q: (Gary Meenaghan – The National) Did you meet Vijay?

    NH: No, we haven’t met Vijay.

    Q: (Shreyas Sharma – Mail Today) Narain, since you are closely associated with this track, some changes have been made, although the changes are minor. Do you think it will make the race more interesting, faster?

    NK: No, the layout remains the same, just that the kerbs are extended a little bit in turns five and six and then they put some astroturf to keep the dust down because a lot of cars were going off in that particular corner last year. Apart from that, as everyone has said, the layout is fantastic and I’m glad they haven’t changed anything, it’s nice to drive on, it’s pretty flowing and it’s fast.

    Q: (Shridhar Poddar – Sakal Media House) To all the drivers, whoever wants to answer: the long straight is something that the DRS was really tailor-made for although we didn’t see too much overtaking last year. How much overtaking do you think there is a scope for over here?

    NK: We won’t be doing much overtaking so I think…

    HK: We have the same problem as Narain so…

    BS: Normally, the overtaking is more due to the tyre difference between the cars than to long straights or DRS. Long straights always help a little bit but if you’re coming from a corner like turn two, which is a long corner where you put a lot of heat into the tyres, into a hairpin, where traction is a bit more compromised so overtaking really is more due to the tyres than anything else in current Formula One. But if you’re in a Toro Rosso  then you have about 20kph more top speed than everyone else then you can overtake as well!

    Ends

  • FIA Sunday Press Conference: Korea

    DRIVERS

    1 – Sebastian VETTEL (Red Bull Racing)

    2 – Mark WEBBER (Red Bull Racing)

    3 – Fernando ALONSO (Ferrari)

    PODIUM INTERVIEWS

    (Conducted by Johnny Herbert)

    Sebastian, you’ve got to be happy with the way it’s gone? Perfect start, perfect race, third straight win, you’ve got to be happy with the way things are going?

    Sebastian VETTEL: Yeah, very pleased, fantastic, I’m very, very happy. I think it was a fantastic race. Obviously the foundation was to have a good start, which I wasn’t sure because I was starting on the dirty side but I have to say I had reasonable grip and a very good launch. I think Mark had a little bit of wheel-slip and I was able to get even side-by-side. Even then it wasn’t over because it’s a long way. When I was up-shifting to seventh gear I could hear Mark coming, he was side-by-side and then I tried to use my KERS to defend and fortunately had a good exit after the third corner, so was able to stay ahead. And after that tried to push. It was quite close in the first stint, Mark was always on my toes but towards the end I felt I had a little bit more left in the tyres and could go a little bit longer. We had two brilliant pitstops. The only mistake I did was once I locked-up the front right quite badly into Turn Three, bit of a mistake from my side but fortunately by then we had quite a cushion to the cars behind and were able to control the gaps in the end. I think we were all a bit worried about the front tyres because we’ve seen a lot of people locking up wheels and overshooting the apexes. So, really, really happy. I have to thank the boys on this one. The mechanics in the garage because they have been flat-out, arriving here obviously there’s not much break from Japan to here, flat-out every night and working very hard on the car. I think we have done another step and that is exactly what we need and hopefully we can carry that momentum through to the next races.

    Mark, second place. Pole position was obviously a good start for you – unfortunately on that start you just didn’t get off the line – but what was the race like for you? What difficulties did you have, if any?

    Mark WEBBER: The start wasn’t sensational. I’ll have to look into it but yeah, probably the initial getaway wasn’t too great but after that it was… everyone wants… it’s not the best corner to lead off so I thought, OK, we won’t risk too much in the first corner, and then we got a good slipstream off Sebastian but it was just neck-and-neck for us along the back straight. After that I just tried to hang in there as best I could. But then it was just about tyres, looking after the front right. And at the end of each stint it was difficult to keep the front right alive. Yeah, the first two stints were quite tricky for me and then the last stint I was much happier with the balance but it was all too late then. So, good drive for Seb, great day for the team, the guys did a great job. Of course I’m disappointed but I’m happy to get a good result in the other side as well. Thanks to all the fans for coming out today. Cheers.

    And Fernando, well the championship battle is on now isn’t it? You’ve led for so long in this championship, you’re six points behind – I think you should be happy today because the car was quite competitive. Do you feel that? Do you feel there’s more to come from you and Ferrari?

    Fernando ALONSO: Yes, definitely. I think we have to be happy with the performance today, we finished third and fourth, just behind Red Bull that at the moment are difficult to beat. So, it was a good day for the team, for Felipe, for me, and I think we also overtook McLaren in the Constructors’ Championship, which is something that maybe we didn’t expect two or three races ago, so definitely we are moving in the right direction. We just need a little last step to be as competitive as Red Bull and I think it will be a beautiful last four races to the end.

    Seb, a last thing from you, obviously you’re leading the championship finally, how are these guys, especially Fernando, going to be able to beat you? What are you going to do?

    SV: It’s tough but that’s what it is about. I’m looking forward to the next couple of races. We had a good last couple of races but y’know we’ve seen the championship is pretty much up and down, a lot of things can happen. What do we do? I think we have to focus on ourselves; we need to have our best possible results and then we go from there. I think at the end of the year if we have enough points there’s a lot of people telling us so we don’t have to do the mathematics ourselves.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Sebastian, well done. First of all, was it really all about the start, and then tyre management I guess?

    SV: Well, we didn’t know! It’s difficult to say. Obviously now we can say that the start was very important. In my case obviously we started from the dirty side. I think the right side generally we saw last year, usually is a bit better but I had a very good launch and yeah, could see that Mark was struggling a little bit in the first bit of the start and I was able to get side-by-side and obviously then had the inside into Turn One, which was very good for us. But it wasn’t over at that stage because there’s still a long straight and quite a big headwind all race from Turn Two to Turn Three. I could hear him coming and obviously he was side-by-side but fortunately I had the inside and after that I focussed on having a very good exit out of Turn Three, which fortunately I had and then I was able to stay ahead. I think it was then that Mark was side-by-side with Fernando, going into Turn Four. It was a perfect start for myself and after that a perfect first stint. I think towards the end I was able to pull away a little bit and open a gap to Mark which helped to stay out a little bit longer and I think after that we had a very good stop, a very strong second stint opening the gap again. Only at the end of the second stint I had a mistake, braking for Three, locking up the right front. I think a lot of people suffered issues with the front today so the last stint I tried to control a little bit more and I had more juice in the tyre until the end. Obviously we had the gap and were controlling that towards the end, but I think once you reach the point where the front tyres are gone, it’s sudden death, so there’s no point of return. We were talking a lot over the radio, trying to stay on top of the problem and manage the front tyres quite well, which I think we did until the end. Very happy with the result and have to say thanks again to the mechanics, the team, they have been working more than what we should ask them for. Every night, flat out, the whole team and I hope now they get a bit of a break, some sleep finally. But obviously it’s a nice reward to finish first and second today for the guys in the garage. Really pleased with the result.

    It’s the first 1-2 for a team this year, so that’s the reward. But obviously Ferrari’s going to come back as strong as they can, McLaren too. Have you still got bits in the pipeline, is the motivation still there?

    SV: I think the motivation is still there for sure. The guys, I don’t know, I could not deal a single night with that lack of sleep and they do it three weeks in a row. So, really impressive and I think we are not lacking motivation. The spirit is perfect in the garage, the atmosphere is great and I think we all want to do our best and to really try and win the race on a Sunday. I think we’ve been pushing very hard all season; we have tried lots of stuff. Sometimes it was more successful than other times but the most important is today. Obviously whatever happened is history and we have to look forward. Very pleased with the result today. I think we can have a couple of drinks tonight before heading back. It’s difficult to predict the next couple of races. As you said, the first 1-2 this year, I think it shows how difficult the season has been for everyone. Ferrari was extremely competitive today, probably more competitive than everyone expected in the race. Both of them, Felipe I think was only a little bit off Fernando, so yeah, quick in the race, we know their car works in all circumstances, so we have to stay on top of our game, focus on ourselves and do what we can.

    Mark, exactly what happened at the start there? We could see from Sebastian’s… it’s almost as if when you moved into second gear it…

    MW: Yeah, I think we were chasing the clutch quite a bit after the first launch on the formation lap, and also coming to the back of the grid the boys were asking me to get the move clutch ring quite a bit so the initial launch wasn’t good. The first bite just kicked to wheelspin and from then on I knew I could have some issues. It was just a very… mediocre let’s say… run to the first corner. Seb got a good one. All wasn’t lost, obviously, second corner, getting the slipstream on the back straight I thought it was still possible to do something there. We were side-by-side, I had a tow but when once I pulled out I just hit a brick wall as well, both of us were just…  vvrrrmmmmmm… and then everyone just coming up behind as well. So, yeah, and then after that we had to manage the tyres really, look after the… go as quick as you could, looking after the tyres but also trying to keep some pressure on Sebastian. It’s the way it is these days: you’ve got to look after the black things on the corners and yeah, so that’s part of it. Mixed emotions for me, it’s still a very solid result, I was very, very happy with the lap I did yesterday, could have easily been not on pole but I was through a solid lap and today is a good result but yeah, it’s mixed emotions. Second is a big difference to first. I have good points and champagne but it’s not what I was after. But for the guys, it’s a great result for the team and they’ve done a very good job in the last two weeks and I’ve got to congratulate Sebastian on the win.

    Fernando, your fourth third place but I’m sure you’re looking forward to getting back on top. What sort of effort can you imagine Ferrari making before the next couple of races?

    FA: Well see, I think it’s a question mark. We didn’t bring to the last six or seven races nothing new so we are doing what we can at the moment and we are trying to save points which I think we are doing perfectly every Sunday. Again it was a perfect Sunday for us: good start, good strategy at the right time and in the right moment. Then finishing again on the podium. So, I think it was a very strong Sunday but we hopefully make a little bit of a step in terms of performance and then we can fight for bigger things. But anyway, very, very happy with today’s race, very happy with the performance. We saw Sunday again move us a little bit closer to the top guys, and also with the position in the championship. Obviously we lost the lead by six points but if we think how it went for us the last four or five races, with two retirements, nothing to do with the team, no mistakes from the team, not mechanical problems or anything like that, just some people flying over us and things like that. With all these problems, being six points behind leaves open a lot of possibilities for us in the last four races.

    You got to within 1.4s of Mark at one point, 1.3s, but similarly, Felipe got to within about the same of you as well. Was that all down to tyre performance?

    FA: It depends how much you use your tyres or what the conditions of the tyres in that part of the race. We seem to be a little bit more competitive or less competitive. Or closer or a little bit further than the opponents in terms of distance. Obviously it was nice to try to be within one second here because you can use the DRS on the straight – but we could not have that possibility so we lost a little bit there.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Fernando, as you said, Ferrari is not bringing any new parts. You’re still there fighting and staying close to them. How frustrating is it?

    FA: Nothing new, nothing new. The last five years of my career has been like this. I’m good, I’m confident, used to this situation. We have normally one set of tyres in Q3, there is not time for mistakes, no time to lock up a tyre or go over a kerb or anything like that on Saturday or on Sunday. We are always on the limit, but we feel comfortable, let’s say, like this. We seem to extract the maximum from the car when we are under pressure and as I said, four beautiful races to come with good possibilities for us to fight for the championship, but in the end, I’m sure there will be some circuits where we are a little bit more competitive, and some circuits where we are maybe not competitive enough, but overall, in the last four races, as we said, now we need to score seven points more than Sebastian, that will be extremely tough but we believe we can do it.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) Fernando, earlier on this season, before this round of fly-aways, you said that Ferrari’s best circuits were going to be Singapore, Japan and Korea. We’ve obviously finished those. What kind of expectations do you have for competitiveness at the other circuits, apart from Austin?

    FA: We will see. It will depend obviously on the updates in the car. I think we will see in India if there are any new parts. If there are, we will need to test them. For sure, the other teams will also bring new parts, maybe more than us, so we need to see which of them are working, which of them are not working and for who they work. I think the performance of the car will depend on that. I think in Singapore and Suzuka and Korea we felt competitive. In Singapore maybe not so much but we were able to be on the podium. In Suzuka we saw Felipe finish in second and here both of us were third and fourth, so overall they have been more or less good races for us apart from the puncture in Suzuka, so in terms of performance I think we are there. Obviously Red Bull have made a step forward and they won three races. They were one and two in qualifying in Suzuka, one and two in qualifying here, one and two in the race here so it’s something that is not in our hands.

    Q: (Carlos Miguel – La Gaceta) Fernando, do you believe that the yellow flag was a key factor in the beginning of the race, nine laps with the yellow flag in the first sector?

    FA: I don’t think so, I don’t think so because I was not within one second of Mark so it was not really a possibility to use the DRS – obviously with the DRS you cannot do it. I think it was maybe a little penalty – or a little bit worse for the guys behind me. I think Lewis, Felipe and Kimi didn’t have the possibility to open the DRS because of the yellow flag and I think for Felipe’s race it was a little bit easier if he could overtake Hamilton straight away at the beginning, but not for me.

    Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, in the last few laps, on the radio we were always hearing the team telling you to be cautious, go slow, there was a problem with the tyres and then you set your fastest lap on the last lap, so what is the truth: was it a big risk?

    SV: Obviously you start your stint in the beginning with a little bit more than 20 laps to go, after the last stop. I think you can work that out yourself, you have a lot of kilos in the car. Towards the end it’s nearly empty so you go quicker without even trying harder. I think it’s the same for everyone, given that you still have the tyres. Obviously we try to look after them during the whole of the last stint, because we’ve seen in the stint before how sudden the front tyre can lock up and you can lose control of the front tyres, so obviously we didn’t want to run into that sort of problem again, especially with pressure from behind so even if you have quite a big gap, when you start to struggle a lot with these tyres, then there is a lot of time lost within a couple of laps – I’m speaking of a couple of seconds per lap, so we didn’t know that. As I said, we controlled that very well so we still had some shoes left, tyres were not new but they were not completely worn until the end so I was going a little bit quicker in the last sector so that’s why the lap time was pretty similar to what I started with in the beginning of the stint, but calculate the difference of fuel and it’s a big difference.

    Q: (Flavio Vanetti – Corriere della Serra) Sebastian, do you also now have a psychological advantage over Fernando, from a technical point of view, as Red Bull seems to be ahead. And secondly, how did the double DRS help you, as you didn’t use it in Suzuka?

    SV: Well, I didn’t use it again today in the race. It was obviously not an option. It’s not just one feature on the car that makes you go quicker. I think we tried to work a lot around the car and sometimes you bring some new parts but sometimes you just work on the set-up: you do something smart, you listen to your stomach, you listen to what you see on the data and you act on what you see on the data and everyone is pushing hard. You sometimes might find more with the set-up than you might find with new parts so, as I said, we are pushing very hard but I think if you look at this season, it has been pretty much up and down and it was very good for us in the last couple of races but we also know how little it takes to maybe end up in a different position in the Grand Prix. I think we can take nothing for granted, we have to look after ourselves. Whether we have a mental advantage or not, psychological advantage or not I don’t really care. I’m not into those kind of things. As I said, we look after ourselves. There’s a lot of things we have to focus on to do a perfect job and that is the target every weekend.

    Q: (Cristobal Rosaleny – Car and Driver, Spain) Fernando, you used to say that the weakest point at Ferrari was in qualifying, but Red Bull looked clearly faster than you in the race. Were you expecting that and are you a bit concerned for the next races?

    FA: Of course I was expecting that. I think we were not the fastest car in the race in our championship so I didn’t come to Korea expecting to be the fastest car on Sunday. We always said that we improve on Sunday compared to Saturday. I think between the two cars, in 15 or 16 races, the other Ferrari was in Q3 six times, ten times not in Q3 so definitely there is not the performance in qualifying which we then see on Sunday, when we normally improve. Yesterday we were P4 and P6 and today we were in P3 and P4, so definitely on Sunday there is always a step forward for us but we never believe or we never thought we were the fastest in the race and today was more or less as expected or better than expected, because we were fighting with Webber all the race which was something we were not able to do in Singapore or in Suzuka.

    Q: (Marco dell’Innocenti – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Mark, if you look at these two guys beside you, do you think that with the 18 points from today, you still have the chance to fight with them for the championship?

    MW: Yeah, well it’s getting tricky now. I obviously need some bizarre circumstances. It’s clearly possible for me to win Grand Prix. You just need to get everything perfect and today I didn’t, I paid the price. I can win some races before the year’s out but the gap is massive to these two guys. That’s the way it is. We have quite a few races and all the points add up at the end of the year. Of course we’re all on our game, we all drive pretty well. I only smelt a little bit of tyre smoke off Seb today so I knew that that was unusual for him, but apart from that it was a clean Grand Prix for all of us and that’s how it generally goes for us three, when we don’t get smashed out by other people. It’s difficult but you never never never know.

    File photo of Sebastian Vettel. Red Bull Racing photo

    Ends

  • FIA Friday Press Conference: Lotus goes Coanda

    In Korea, Lotus became the latest team to migrate to a Coanda-type exhaust system.

    James Allison at the Friday Press Meet in Korea. Lotus photo

    In Friday’s practice sessions, Lotus ran the system, generally assumed to be advantageous for gaining downforce. Later, speaking in the FIA Friday press conference, technical director James Allison stated the likelihood was that his team would retain the system and run it during the rest of the weekend.  “We’re reasonably happy with the way they’re working,” he said. “I think we’re at the beginning of a relatively long road with them – they’re not straightforward to make work perfectly first go out but the numbers we’re getting from them are good.”

    Lotus have ran with a more straightforward system for much of the season but Allison revealed work on the Coanda has been continuing in parallel at Enstone. “We kept working on the [coanda] because it was fairly clear that was where the centre of gravity of opinion in the pit lane was and also because it was a reasonably productive avenue back in the wind tunnel. It got to a point where the gain of the coanda system was sufficiently far ahead of our previous race system that it was quite clearly something that we ought to look at both for this year and also to make sure we’re doing the right thing for next year. That’s pretty much the history of it; probably could have committed a bit earlier but then things were going quite well for us on the track as well.”

    The decision to go with a conventional system from the start of season was characterised by Allison as being based upon the trade-offs between potential gain and risk. “At the point when we were committing to what we were going to start the season with, we had two paths: a coanda path and what we chose which was a very simple exhaust which was there to optimise power. At the time, the coanda solution was worth a little bit more theoretically than the power maximising solution but you had to be confident that it was going to deliver all the downforce that it promised, because you could be fairly certain that it was going to deliver all the horsepower loss that the more convoluted exhaust pipe requires. So if the downforce didn’t materialise, you knew you were down on the deal. Where we were when we launched our car, that was a relatively finely balanced decision. We launched with the simple thing.”

    TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – David GREENWOOD (Marussia), Mark GILLAN (Williams), Pierre WACHÉ (Sauber), James ALLISON (Lotus), Paddy LOWE (McLaren), Adrian NEWEY (Red Bull Racing)

    David, you’ve made progression in 2012, presumably you’re hoping to carry that through to 2013. How is work progressing on that car?

    David GREENWOOD: I think it’s been mentioned many times, the aero rules are quite consistent between 2012 and 2013, so a bit like a few other teams we opted to stay developing this car a little bit longer but now we’ve firmly switched over to the ’13 car and that’s going reasonably well. A little bit of layout change required because of the KERS, so it’s taken a few wind tunnel sessions to start getting into that with different wheelbases etc., so really that’s what the aero guys are focussing on. To mention the KERS, obviously quite bit of installation work going on to there to get that into the car from the design guys. But that’s gone reasonably well, the first chassis is in manufacture and the guys are starting to do sample crash tests, so we’re in a lot better position than maybe we were last year. So hopefully with doing a bit more of our homework earlier one, we’re looking to progress.

    You’re in the intriguing position of having technical partnerships with two other teams: McLaren and Williams. How does that work and what are the benefits to that?

    DG: Starting with the McLaren one, which is the first one we did, with McLaren Applied Technologies, it’s going very well. We’re pleased with the wind tunnel, we’re pleased with the correlation we get to the circuit, which is one of the things that’s given us the ability to progress at the back end of this season. Most updates that we’ve had have done what they should, so that’s been very pleasing. The simulator programme is going well, particularly helping Charles with learning circuits. This back end of the year has been perhaps circuits that he’s not used to, so that’s been a valuable tool for him. Moving on to Williams, we’re exceptionally pleased with the support we’ve had from them on the installation of the KERS. It’s been really, really good support from them and it’s enabled us to get it into the car relatively easily and all of that work has gone well so far.

    Mark, we’ve seen the Williams good in the first part of the season, then there was a less productive middle part, and now it seems to be coming back again. How do you see the season so far?

    Mark GILLAN: In terms of pace, our performance has been improving through the season – we just haven’t capitalised on the general pace of the car. We obviously had a high point at the beginning, at Barcelona, and really haven’t delivered the points that we should have over the last number of races. Hopefully the last race was a turning point: we didn’t qualify as strongly as we were hoping, the race pace was very good but we need – as you always do – to string it all together through the weekend. And that’s something that we have to aim to do.

    And plans for the rest of this season and maximising the good points of this car for next year?

    MG: Last season we basically spent the last six events developing the car for this year and understanding the weaker points on last year’s car. This year we’re really pushing to the end of the season with development, and balancing the development all the way to the end of the season with 2013 – and obviously very importantly 2014 as well.

    Pierre, I guess the burning question is ‘can you catch Mercedes?’

    Pierre WACHÉ: I don’t know. What I know is our car performed well in Suzuka, we had quite a good car. I don’t know if for these kind of races we’ll be at the same level but I think it will be more challenging for us in qualifying, maybe more in the field – but we can expect good performance for the race.

    Can you maintain this car for next year? It’s interesting that things have slightly changed on the technical side of the Sauber team.

    PW: I think we can maintain and improve what the car is delivering at the moment for the next year. Clearly we follow the same concept in terms of developing the car, make a good basic of the car and try to improve the weakness of the last year’s car, like we did this year. And try to do that in the most efficient way. It’s what we try to do: to use as less resource as possible but for the maximum performance and be able then to develop the car during the season.

    James, everyone’s talking about the modifications here, and whether they’re working or not. What the general viewpoint?

    James ALLISON: Reasonably happy with the way they’re working. I think we’re at the beginning of a relatively long road with them – they’re not straightforward to make work perfectly first go out. But the numbers we’re getting from them are good, so yeah, quite pleased.

    Romain Grosjean yesterday said you know the weaknesses of this car. What are you able to do about them?

    JA: Same as anyone else – you just chip away at them. It’s an annoying sport this: you can think you’re making progress and then everyone else gives you a wake-up call. But we’ve got a good team back at the factory and a good team here at the track. We just keeping working away at the things that aren’t so good and try to make the things that are good even better. It’s always the same job.

    Paddy, five races to go and according to the FIA sheet you’ve used all eight engines. Is that a concern?

    Paddy LOWE: No, not at all. We’re working exactly to the plan we set out at the beginning of the year. I think, like all the teams, we deploy our engines in what we consider the optimal pattern across the different races. Some circuits are better for power than others, so we happen to have used engine number eight where we thought it was best. Other teams have different solutions. But there’s no concern at all, it’s all to plan.

    You seem to have had a few reliability issues of late. Would that be fair to say?

    PL: It hasn’t been what we’d like. I think if you look on a historical level it hasn’t been that bad but they all came in a bit of a bundle through Italy and Singapore. Very unfortunate for us but actually overall, looking at the season, it hasn’t been so terrible.

    Adrian, Japan looked so good, is that representative of the circuits for the rest of the season would you say?

    Adrian NEWEY: It’s very difficult to tell, I think. We’ve seen swings from race to race, team to team all through the year. That’s been one of the hallmarks of the year. You’ve only got to look at Mercedes performance in China, which looked so dominant, yet they’ve been less dominant on other races. So I wouldn’t like to predict anything on the basis of one race.

    Here there are so many different characteristics of this circuit. You look good in the third sector. Is that a sector you concentrate on? Do you concentrate on one sector of a circuit?

    AN: No. It’s a tale of two tracks here in as much as the first is very long straights. Engine power is important. And then you’ve got the rest of the lap, which is quite twiddly, so you can get quite big swings between the various sectors.

    If I can come back to David Greenwood: the same question for you about eight engines, with Charles Pic. Is that a concern for you?

    DG: Yes, I would say so. At the minute that is a concern on where we are with the engines.

    So it’s not tactical?

    DG: Perhaps not in our case.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Miguel Sanz- Marca) Mr Newey, do you think it’s possible that one of the final five circuits won’t suit your car? Is there any chance?

    AN: It’s wholly possible. Just don’t know which ones yet! As I said, I don’t know which one yet.

    Q: (Kate Walker – Girl Racer) James, you’re one of the last teams if not the last team to play around with the coanda effect. I know you’ve had it in development for a while. What was it that took so long to get it to the track?

    JA: Well, at the point when we were committing to what we were going to start the season with, we had two paths, a coanda path and what we chose which was a very simple exhaust which was there to optimise power. At the time, the coanda solution was worth a little bit more theoretically than the power maximising solution but you had to be confident that it was going to deliver all the downforce that it promised, because you could be fairly certain that it was going to deliver all the horsepower loss that the more convoluted exhaust pipe requires. So if the downforce didn’t materialise, you knew you were down on the deal, so where we were when we launched our car, that was a relatively finely balanced decision. We launched with the simple thing and then we got under way and have had a reasonably bright season and have been pretty competitive deep into the year. We kept working on the other solution because it was fairly clear that that was where the centre of gravity of opinion in the pit lane was and also because it was a reasonably productive avenue back in the wind tunnel. It got to a point where the gain of the coanda system was sufficiently far ahead of our previous race system that it was quite clearly something that we ought to look at both for this year and also to make sure we’re doing the right thing for next year. That’s pretty much the history of it; probably could have committed a bit earlier but then things were going quite well for us on the track as well.

    Q: (Daniel Ortelli – Agence France Presse) James, are you going to again try your double DRS or are you slowly giving up on that project?

    JA: Certainly not giving up on it because there is some goodness in there but that really is tricky – well, we’ve found it so anyway. So we will keep working on that but you probably won’t see it as much on Fridays; we’re going to bring it out to play again at the young drivers’ test and hopefully make a bit of progress there.

    Q: (Vanessa Ruiz – ESPN Radio) Some drivers mentioned that they could not practise on the simulators for the Korean Grand Prix because the teams didn’t have the laser models. Did that happen to all your teams, and secondly, to use an expression that Mark has just used, how does that affect the capitalisation of your cars?

    AN: Well, yes, Mark went in the simulator prior to leaving for Singapore, did both Singapore and Korea. Sebastian, to the best of my memory, didn’t do Korea. I think, really, the level that Formula One drivers are at – the more experienced ones, certainly – then they don’t really need to go in the simulator, if you like, to warm themselves up and remember whether turn one’s a lefthander or a righthander. As you started to hint at in the second part of your question, it’s more for the engineers to understand what’s required at that circuit, but at the same time, everybody has simulation techniques as well. The only difference, really, between simulation and simulator is that one has the driver in the loop, the other is effectively driven by the computer. We’re not going in blind, we’ve had two years of experience at this track so I don’t honestly see it as a particularly big factor.

    DG: I think, from our perspective, it was a little bit more difficult for Charles to learn Korea versus Japan because of the quality of the track model. That has shown up a little bit this morning. He did say it was harder and definitely in Japan he got more on the pace quicker. It’s not ideal but we’re all in the same situation, so that’s what we use and we get on with it.

    MG: I agree. The level of fidelity of the simulator model obviously depends on the quality of the laser scan or whatever other information you can extract from it. What Adrian says is quite true: the more experienced the driver, the less they require the simulator in terms of preparing for the event but for instance, with Valtteri, who has not been round this track before, the simulator is a very important tool, so he maybe spent a little bit more time getting up to speed with the track than he may have done if we had had a very detailed model.

    PW: For us, we don’t have a simulator so it doesn’t change anything for us, compared to other tracks. For sure, in this case the driving time during Friday is very important and also the set-up is defined by simulation before Friday and to leave as much time as possible for a good set-up for the driver, so then he can train on the track.

    JA: Neither of our two drivers had been here, and I don’t think Kimi had even been round the track but you could see how quickly both of them adapt to it. I think any racing driver worth his salt can very quickly come to terms with the track and I really don’t think I can add much more to what Adrian said. The driver-in-the-loop simulator is much more for the engineers than it is for the driver.

    PL: Yeah, the same. I think ultimately it just affects the quality of that particular track that you create and it would mean that this wouldn’t be a circuit that you would use for very in-depth studies because we don’t have that data, but it doesn’t actually affect this event particularly for us.

    Q: (Edd Straw – Autosport) James, will you continue to run the new exhausts tomorrow?

    JA: I think so, yeah. We haven’t decided yet but it looks like we will.

    Q: (Daniel Ortelli – Agence France Presse) Is anyone of you brave enough or senior enough to tell us what’s on the agenda of the October 23rd meeting in Paris?

    PL: Well, we had a meeting in – was it May or June? – yeah, we had a meeting in Monaco in May and I believe there was going to be a second meeting in August or late July and this is that meeting postponed. It will be to continue the same agenda which is about cost-saving and regulations.

    Ends