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Marquez takes new pole record as Honda lock out front row
Marquez takes pole on Saturday at the Motorrad German GP. A Repsol Honda.image Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez has recorded his seventh pole of the season for tomorrow’sGerman GP, with teammate Dani Pedrosa in second and local boy Stefan Bradl completing the front row aboard his satellite LCR Honda.After a tricky FP4 session where rain was a constant threat, the sun was shining for Q2. Marc’s first exit was spoiled by a tyre issue but on his second run there was no stopping him. He set a time of 1’21.126 on lap seven, taking provisional pole, and then on lap nine he set a blisteringly fast time of 1’20.937, snatching Casey Stoner’s pole record from 2008 (1’21.067). Marc has qualified on the front row at the last twenty-one races, and this is his sixteenth MotoGP career pole (in just 27 races) signifying a 59.2% pole ratio in the premier class. Teammate Dani was also in superb form, setting a time of 1’21.233 on his first run. However, he found himself in the gravel after a small mistake in turn one on his second run and was unable to return to the pits and get back out on track in time. His time remained second fastest and he will start from the front row for the sixth time this season.
1st – 1’20.937 “The weekend has been affected by the crash I suffered yesterday, but I kept my nerve and little by little we’ve been getting better. I felt good yesterday afternoon and I was much better this morning. In the few laps I did in FP4, I could see that we had a good pace and a chance to fight for pole position. With the first tyre I didn’t feel entirely comfortable, but with the second one I had a good feeling and could see that there was good grip – so I decided to push a little more and put in a strong lap. Starting from the front is important for the racetomorrow, because this is a circuit where it is difficult to overtake. We will try and keep up the pace from practice, which I think has been good” 2nd – 1’21.233 “It was a good qualifying session and we had a good pace, despite the crash which was my fault when I think I hit a bump under braking but luckily I’m fine. I’m very grateful to my mechanics for the work they did yesterday to get the bike back running again after my crash in FP2. Tomorrow we will try to do our best, position ourselves well from the start, make a good tyre choice and hope the weather is kind to us! Our setup is definitely good, so I hope to have a good race” QUALIFYING RESULTS
Motorrad Grand Prix Deutschland – Round 9Pos. Rider Num. Nation Team Constructor Time/Gap 1 Marc Marquez 93 ESP Repsol Honda Team HONDA 1’20.937 2 Dani Pedrosa 26 ESP Repsol Honda Team HONDA 1’21.233 3 Stefan Bradl 6 GER LCR Honda MotoGP HONDA 1’21.340 4 Aleix Espargaro 41 ESP NGM Mobile Forward Racing YAMAHA 1’21.376 5 Jorge Lorenzo 99 ESP Yamaha Factory Racing YAMAHA 1’21.508 6 Valentino Rossi 46 ITA Yamaha Factory YAMAHA 1’21.651 7 Andrea Iannone 29 ITA Pramac Racing DUCATI 1’21.679 8 Pol Espargaro 44 ESP Monster Yamaha Tech 3 YAMAHA 1’21.771 9 Bradley Smith 38 GBR Monster Yamaha Tech 3 YAMAHA 1’21.794 10 Alvaro Bautista 19 ESP Go & Fun Honda Gresini HONDA 1’21.906 11 Andrea Dovizioso 4 ITA Ducati Team DUCATI 1’22.120 12 Nicky Hayden 69 USA Drive M7 Aspar HONDA 1’22.647 13 Yonny Hernandez 68 COL Pramac Racing DUCATI 1’22.411 14 Scott Redding 45 GBR Go & Fun Honda Gresini HONDA 1’22.436 15 Cal Crutchlow 35 GBR Ducati Team DUCATI 1’22.529 16 Hiroshi Aoyama 7 JPN Drive M7 Aspar HONDA 1’22.659 17 Karel Abraham 17 CZE Cardion AB Motoracing HONDA 1’22.778 18 Michael Laverty 70 GBR Paul Bird Motorsport ART & PBM 1’22.845 19 Colin Edwards 5 USA NGM Mobile Forward Racing YAMAHA 1’22.888 20 Hector Barbera 8 ESP Avintia Racing MotoGP FTR-KAWASAKI 1’23.029 21 Mike Di Meglio 63 FRA Avintia Racing MotoGP FTR-KAWASAKI 1’23.423 22 Broc Parkes 23 AUS Paul Bird Motorsport PBM 1’23.428 23 Danilo Petrucci 9 ITA IodaRacing Project IODA-SUTER 1’23.484 -
We’ve got the greatest fans here; It’s you guys that spurred me on: Hami
DRIVERS
1 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
2 – Valtteri BOTTAS (Williams)
3 – Daniel RICCIARDO (Red Bull Racing)
PODIUM INTERVIEWS
(Conducted by David Coulthard)
Lewis, congratulations. Your adoring fans. Your emotions must be running high right now. Your fifth win of the season. That equals your 2008 World Championship year. Now 27 grand prix victories, equalling Jackie Stewart. There’s only other Englishman in front of you with more wins – Nigel Mansell. So tell us about the emotions of today?
Lewis HAMILTON: It’s very mixed at the moment, but just to see the support we have here… I could see everyone cheering us on through the whole race. We’ve got the greatest fans here. And today, just arriving today, it’s you guys that really spurred me on so thanks very much.
Well it was a fantastic drive. You never want a competitor to drop out, but of course the battle is very hot between you and your team-mate Nico, so what was the emotion when you saw him have the issue?
LH: At the beginning… he got quite a good gap at the beginning and I really just tried to look after the tyres. After that I utilised the tyres, was catching and we came out on the harder tyres and I was catching him at a second a lap at the time. I couldn’t believe I had that kind of pace. You never want to see a team-mate fall behind, we wanted to really work and get those one-twos, but at the end of the day I really needed this result so I’m very grateful for it.
It was a great result. If I can move along to another man who has had a fantastic result. Third in Austria, second here at the British Grand Prix – you must be looking forward to Germany?
Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah, we are on the right way. Like I said on the team radio: one step more to go. The team has done such a good job. You see how quick the car is. It was behaving really well, it was really a pleasure to drive it. Still Mercedes is in front, but we are on the right way.
Any scares out there this afternoon or was it running like clockwork? You did some great passes.
VB: Yeah, there was some good stuff going on. I really enjoyed it. The plan was to come as high as possible, as high as the pace of the car is giving the possibility. I think as a team we made the most out of it. I have to say I feel sorry for Felipe, his 200th grand prix, a shame it ended like this.
If I can just come across to Daniel Ricciardo. Congratulations on your third place. Australians have a good record around here?
Daniel RICCIARDO: Yeah, they do! Obviously Mark enjoyed this track a lot, so it’s nice to be up here on the podium. It’s been a good circuit to me in the past, so really, really happy. We just held on at the end. I think one more lap would have been tough, Jenson was coming, but really happy with the podium.
If I can just come back across to Lewis…
LH: Where’s the gold trophy, man? This thing’s falling to pieces, look!
You might want to speak to the sponsor. Lewis, do you know the points situation now at the end of race nine?
LH: I assume we’re four points behind now. I think this weekend really just showed that, for one, you never give up. Yesterday wasn’t a case of giving up, I didn’t think I could do the lap, I was really shocked that the last sector was so fast. But coming here today I had my family with, just focused, the support from the fans, as I said, just spurred me on, and I really couldn’t have done it without them.
PRESS CONFERENCE
Lewis, many, many congratulations. Over the radio at the end of the race you said to the crew “I’m sorry about yesterday”. I guess your spirits were so down yesterday; they must be soaring now. But the race really was about the offset you had to Nico Rosberg and you were catching him in the middle stint of the race. Do you believe that without his problem you would have been able to pass him and how do you feel right now?
LH: Yesterday was a really difficult day. Obviously you never think situations like that would come up the way they did and I really felt… I went away feeling terrible for the fans. They all turned up and there’s so much support here, I felt that I had let them down, not only them but the team and myself. Coming back today, trying to turn that serious emptiness and negativity into a positive today was really my priority. The support has been incredible this weekend. Just thinking of the history of this circuit, the great drivers that have won in the past… leading last year and not being able to see it through. It’s been since… 2008 since I had the win and I just feel very, very grateful for the opportunity. I honestly feel that I had the pace today. I was catching Nico in the first stint. I was able to extend my first stint longer than ever before. I was feeling pretty comfortable. Of course, you never want a team-mate to fall away, to win like that. I was looking forward to a wheel-to-wheel battle but I’m sure we’ll get many in the future.
Well done. Coming to you Valtteri. From 14th on the grid to second at the finish, which is your best ever result in Formula One and your second consecutive podium, so brilliant effort. You did a one-stop strategy, which is a talking point, but surely the overtakes in the opening stint, there were so many of them – around the outside, around the inside – just tell us about your race?
VB: Yeah we knew that this race could be good fun. We knew that we had a quick car. Maybe it was a bit surprisingly quick today, but since the first stint the pace was good, since the first lap. I was able to go through the field quite well. Of course, sometimes it needed a bit of risk, because it’s really important to get through quickly and not get stuck behind people, but I really managed to get well in position, where the pace of the car was. I’m just really, really happy with what we’ve been doing as a team. Again, the race pace shows we are really doing the right things and I’m very happy to be part of this.
Well done. Completing a very happy podium is Daniel Ricciardo, in third place. For you strategy was the key as well. Like Valtteri you did one stop, you did something different, both you and your team-mate taking the hard tyre early on. Was the tyre deg much lighter than you expected today, was it a race where expectations were changing as the race went on?
DR: Pretty much. We chose to restart on the prime. It didn’t seem like the best thing to do at first because we were really slow at the restart. Valtteri and Fernando got past me pretty easily and pulled away and I was coming on the radio basically saying “let’s see if we can try something a little bit different” as we didn’t really have the pace as we hoped, as we expected today. Once we came in for the option, we just ran and pushed pretty much for the whole stint. I didn’t intend on doing a one-stop when I started on that tyre but laps ticked off and we were still able to keep the pace. The team said “do you think you could do another 15-20 laps” and I was like “at the moment, yeah, I think we can”, so we stayed out and just held on at the end. It was awesome. I think all three of us had a bit of redemption on our plate today. It was a pretty dismal Saturday for us. I think we’re all pretty happy. This is definitely one of my best podiums this year.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Ian Parkes – PA) Lewis, not very often this season you’ve had family with you: you’ve pretty much kept yourself to yourself at various races but this weekend you’ve had your brother, your Dad, they were here today supporting you. They’ve said on TV how down in the dumps you were last night. How much help did they give you last night after what happened yesterday?
LH: My family have been incredible. Last night, my Mum, my Dad, spent a lot of time with my Dad last night just talking it out. And my brother. And today I just said I needed them here today. Y’know? I just really wanted that support. I do come to the races on my own and I do generally do it on my own. I have my trainer with me. But I thought this weekend it would be nice to have them. At least today, as yesterday was such a difficult day.
Q: (Sean McGreevy – CSMA magazine) Lewis, would you consider this one of your great, greatest, great wins and how does it compare to 2008?)
LH: It doesn’t compare to 2008. It’s a different time, it’s a different experience. It’s still as special. Obviously 2008 was a much trickier race in a sense of being a completely wet track, everyone aquaplaning. Everyone being in the rain, everyone being soaking wet, it’s a different kind of experience that one. Today, I felt I earned it today. From the start some good manoeuvres and I really felt that I had the pace on Nico, I really was hunting him down like never before. I really was happy with the balance that I managed to get, even though I didn’t do the long run in P2. To say this is up there with all the greats… it’s my home grand prix, it’s my second win here and I’m very privileged to have even just had one, so I feel very humble to be up here today.
Q: (Julian Harris – City AM) Lewis, do you think this can be a turning point for you? Nico was up here yesterday saying that he thought he had the momentum at the moment – but he also said momentum comes and goes. Can this give you the confidence and maybe even the peace of mind to push on and get the momentum back in your favour.
LH: I came into this weekend saying it would great to really have that. I thought maybe the fans could be the wind in my sails to really change the direction and get the momentum. Obviously I’ve got the win today. I’ve got the points back. I’ve been chasing all year really, since I lost the points at the first race, and then I was chasing again after the previous DNF. It’s been very, very difficult. I was speaking last night, just comparing it to how difficult it is psychologically, it’s got to be something similar to the tennis players when they’re two sets down. It’s so hard to get your mind in gear, to get yourself back and not lose points from then on. And so the pressure is high but I really feel that now we’re back, kind of close and with the pace that I had today, I really feel that I can… just got to refocus for the next part of the season.
Q: (Dan Knutson – Auto Action / National Speedsport News) Daniel, what was your mindset last night and this morning, knowing that you’re so far back and, often in races, when you start that that far back, like these two guys, you’re not going to finish in the top three?
DR: Mindset was just… yeah… like it always is I guess when you’re out of position, just go for it, try and do something a bit different. Not much to lose. I knew we were a better car than eighth on the grid, so… yeah… I was a bit surprised during the first stint, even though we were on a different tyre, I was surprised not to be as quick. We didn’t have much pace, so then it was ‘let’s try something different and make something work.’ Yeah, I was very hungry today. I like to think I always am but today I was pretty jacked up. So it’s nice to be up here.
Q: (Nick Skeens – The Independent) Lewis, today Niki Lauda said he thought in some ways yesterday was a good thing because it gave you a motivation and a hunger that perhaps you would not have had. Would you agree with that?
LH: No. I feel like I like I’ve… we’ve had four wins, now five wins, but I’ve had the four wins and I think my hunger is on a par with any other year that I’ve ever raced in – but yesterday was a real kick in the balls. I really had to pick up, pull up my socks and get on it if I want to win this world championship, and I can’t have situations like yesterday. The last two races I’ve easily had the pace to be pole position and I’ve not put it there. I’ve put it much further back, made it much harder for myself but now I’m going to try to rectify that for the future.
Q: (Mike Doodson – GPweek) Lewis, you’re obviously very happy with the gold trophy [present on the platform]– but you seem to have been a bit unhappy with the sponsor’s trophy. Did I hear you say it fell to bits on the podium? And how did you come to get this one between the podium and here?
LH: Well, yeah! This one’s a lot nicer. I mean, growing up watching Formula One, you see trophies like this. Real trophies, y’know? And the trophies that we have nowadays, whilst it’s a real privilege being on top of the podium, my one fell to pieces! The bottom fell off the one we just had. It’s plastic, it must cost ten pounds! It’s so bad. I might just get the plaque, which is probably the most expensive part of the trophy I think. Back in the day they really, really made the trophies. And this is the special thing about being on the podium and winning. These trophies mean – for me, I don’t know how it is for the other drivers – but this is what we have to show for our lifetime achievements. I hope we can get some better ones moving forwards.
Q: (Livio Oricchio – Universo Online) Valtteri, Friday morning you didn’t went to the track. Saturday morning also, only qualifying. You didn’t have miles in the track. Where you surprised at the beginning of the race when you started overtaking everyone with the performance of the car?
VB: Yeah, definitely. Our prediction was Mercedes is going to be strong and also Red Bull, we thought, would be here a bit quicker than us in the race and Ferrari to be really close to our pace. So, we definitely knew that the position we were starting wasn’t going to be that easy to get into good points and we were not really thinking about the podium, we were just thinking about getting in the points and, yeah, definitely it was a positive surprise in the beginning of the race. The tyre life wasn’t really a limitation so we could do the strategy. Well, I have to say the strategy guys did a really good job today. We actually switched the strategy during the running as we saw the tyre wear was so low. Positive surprise. Really happy.
Q: (Jussi Jäkälä – YLE) Valtteri, two podiums in a row. Does this show you and the team have learnt your lesson, how to score podiums. And is this maybe the start of a catch-up battle?
VB: Well, we are definitely a stronger team than we were in, let’s say Melbourne, or the first few races. Difficult to compare even to last year or two years before. I think we are really getting stronger all the time. It’s not going to be easy to be on the podium in every race as I think this season is going to be quite a bit race-by-race but we are definitely on the right way and really happy to be part of this. Myself, I have been improving also all the time. Every race I aim to be a better driver and as a team we aim to be a stronger team every single race – and that’s what we’ve been doing.
Q: (Haoran Zhou – F1 Express) Lewis, obviously the celebration after the race has been extraordinary. You managed to do a doughnut despite the strict restrictions on the engine and gearbox and you were singing – I’m not sure if you were singing or not but you obviously were feeling on top of the world. Can you share your emotions on the slowing down lap with us?
LH: Yeah, it’s so difficult to really explain the feelings. When you feel like the world is crumbling beneath you, somehow with your family and friends, they help pull you through and also the fans. Yesterday, after qualifying, it looked so hard to… I really was almost speechless when I spoke to them, and it was no one else’s fault but mine. I was just so disappointed in myself. And then to get that result today, to really climb through… the team have just done an incredible job. Even coming into this weekend, the developments and improvements to our car, the balance. My engineers, who work so close to me, regardless of how well we do, they’re so supportive and having that good team of people round you really makes a difference. I did the doughnuts… yeah, I hope it doesn’t do anything to our gearbox but I know how much the fans love it here and so it was really important to try and do at least one but fingers crossed, it should be OK.
Q: (Rosanna Tennant – Pole Position) Lewis, as media, we like to speculate on upcoming races as to who might win and who won’t win. Are you looking ahead, thinking next race Nico is going to have the home advantage, obviously Hungary was good for you last year? Do you look ahead through the season like that, blocking it out and perhaps where you might be stronger and work out the points?
LH: I don’t. You look at the schedule and you see what tracks you know that suit you. Just going into Germany, to Hockenheim, I know whilst it’s Nico’s home Grand Prix, he doesn’t have even one eighth of the support us Brits get here. The fans are unlike anywhere else so I’m not worried in that sense. It’s a track where I won before, in 2008 I think it was. It’s a good track for me, so I think… I’m gonna use the pace that I have, because I have the pace. I’ve just got to put the damn laps together and when I do, then I think the opportunities will come in front of me.
Q: (Ian Parkes – Press Association) Daniel, you’ve obviously become one of the most likeable guys in F1 I think it’s fair to say, but in denying – there’s that big beaming smile, thank you – but in denying JB’s (Button’s) long overdue podium here, do you perhaps feel like a bit of a villain for once?
DR: It did cross my mind a little bit. I was thinking… especially in the last few laps, he was catching me pretty quickly at the end. I had sort of stabilised the gap a bit and then with four laps to go, I think my options were really suffering and he was coming, so I was thinking, yeah, probably for once I’ve got a lot of people booing me and cheering on the local lad but obviously for me it was good. I think for him as well; they haven’t had a great season so a fourth is – yeah, it’s not a podium, but he’d still be fairly pleased with that result so hopefully we’re all happy.
Q: (Kate Walker – crash.net) For all three of you, and it goes along the lines of momentum but not championship momentum. Obviously we had a fairly long delay after all you guys all made mega starts on the first lap. When you’ve got that one hour delay, what are you thinking? Are you worried that you’re going to lose the momentum that you picked up? What’s going on in your heads?
LH: Yeah, I think it’s… We work very hard, I’m sure everyone is working so hard in preparation. You get in the car, do the start, you really gain the momentum and then the race stops and we had quite a long break. I went back to my room just relaxing, drinking, making sure I was having plenty of fluids and trying not to think of anything else. Yeah, it wasn’t alcohol. It isn’t easy but I managed to get back and start where I finished.
VB: Yeah, it’s not easy, you know. There’s a break and you need to keep your focus in the race. You can’t really start to think about other things than the race so you just need to keep thinking about… forward: the restart, how to get your tyres warm, brakes warm, everything. You can always speak with the engineer. You just really wait, let the time go and all the time keep focused for the next moment.
DR: It’s tricky when you don’t know how long the break’s going to be. The race was at one today, so you do all your preparation to sort of peak at one o’clock in terms of your energy and your focus so you get the race started and you feel your adrenalin and everything is where it needs to be and then it comes back down and I think the limbo of not really knowing when we were going to start again, it’s like do I still keep a high level of intensity or do I go and relax? When do I start to then warm up again? It’s a little bit tricky but at the same time it’s the same for everyone. It does break a little bit of momentum, I guess, but then it’s up to us and our trainers how we get it back and make sure we’re switched on for the restart.
Q: (Paul Turner – South Wales Evening Post) Lewis, this victory, is this going to help you mentally for the next race or is it back to square one at the next race, you have to start again and plan all over again?
LH: I think this is now, kind of… we’ll draw a line under that last nine races and now it’s attack mode, start again and now, utilising that pace and utilising the car’s pace. There are still some things we need to improve on. I wasn’t too worried about the time lost in the pit stop today as I knew the next one would be better. I’d been working on my position so I didn’t lose time in that but qualifying really – just getting myself back to my normal qualifying mode and that, I think, will be good.
Q: (Rosanna Tennant – Pole Position) Daniel, we were talking about what you do before the restart; can you explain what you do with your trainer and the tennis balls?
DR: We sort of change it a lot but it’s more to get the hand-eye co-ordination going. I guess everyone does something a bit different. Sometimes we use tennis balls just to get my hand-eye co-ordination switched on and make sure my reactions are there. We do some different drills with that. It depends as well on what… I don’t have a ritual routine as such but it depends on what I feel like doing before the race, but that’s something.
Mercedes AMG Petronas team for Hamilton that is dishing out winners this season. An Mercedes AMG Petronas image -
Nico Hulkenberg lines up on the 2nd row at Silverstone; Perez on P7
Nico Hulkenberg will line up on the second row of the grid for the team’s local race at Silverstone with teammate Sergio Perez qualifying in seventh place.P4 Nico Hulkenberg VJM07-04Q1: 1:41.271 Q2: 1:37.112 Q3: 1:38.329Nico: “That worked out really well for us and I’m very happy to come away with fourth place on the grid. On days like this you just need to be in the right place, with good timing and a little bit of luck. The track conditions were changing so much and at the end of Q3 I’ve never seen a track dry so quickly. There were a few spots of rain in the middle of the session, but on my final lap it was completely dry. Fourth place sets us up nicely for tomorrow, but it’s hard to know exactly where we stand in terms of race pace. We definitely made some progress with the car balance overnight with some tweaks and it was a lot less windy today, which worked in our favour. There is an interesting grid, which will hopefully make for an exciting race for the fans.”P7 Sergio Perez VJM07-02Q1: 1:42.146 Q2: 1:37.350 Q3: 1:40.457Sergio: “Today leaves us with mixed feelings. It was very good to get both cars in Q3 and ahead of some of our most direct competitors. Had they offered us this result before the session, we would have been satisfied; however, it is also disappointing as we know we could have had an even better result. We were in P3 up to the last lap, but when the track improved and I went out for a last run I ran a bit wide in turn 12 and lost all the temperature from my tyres. I also had to let some cars through and that made it a big problem for me. Otherwise I am confident we would have improved enough to stay in the front two rows. It’s a shame because we were making the tyres work really well until that moment and we were making the most of the conditions. Still, it is a very positive result and we should have a good opportunity to convert it into a good race and a lot of points. Silverstone is a very difficult place to overtake and track position is very important, so I am confident in that respect.”Dr Vijay Mallya, Team Principal & Managing Director“Today we had a very good result, which is always very nice in our home race. We have placed both cars in Q3 in very difficult conditions, which is a great credit to both the team and our drivers: we were on the right tyre at the right time and we reaped the rewards of some good strategy calls. It is a shame Checo was not able to finish his second lap as we thought we could retain his good position, but fourth row is still a very positive place to start and he has shown us before that he can make up positions come race day. Nico was impressive as he pulled a great lap when it mattered on a drying track. Starting fourth and seventh gives us a very good chance to score points and continue our battle in the constructors’ championship. Race pace is one of our strongest assets so we can look forward totomorrow with confidence.”FIA release adds:Nico Rosberg took his fourth pole position of the season in dramatic style at Silverstone, the German snatching top spot in the session in the final corners of his final lap in a rain-hit session that saw championship rival Lewis Hamilton finish sixth after abandoning his final run.
Behind Rosberg, Sebastian Vettel claimed his first front-row start since the Malaysian Grand Prix and Jenson Button grabbed a surprise third spot for McLaren at his and his team’s home race.
The session opened in relatively dry conditions and after banker laps on intermediate tyres, which left Hamilton in charge, ahead of Ricciardo. Throughout the opening laps, however, drivers were reporting that the track was dry enough for slick tyres.
Kobayashi was the first take on mediums but was soon back in the pits with a technical problem. The Japanese driver finished outside the 107 per cent cut-off, as did team-mate Marcus Ericsson.
The switch to slick rubber sparked a chaotic final few minutes as the field desperately tried to exploit the improved conditions. In the scramble for lap tyime it was perhaps inevitable that some would be caught out, either by traffic or by the conditions, as rain began to fall again in the closing moments.
The surprise was that it was Ferrari and Williams in trouble. Fernando Alonso spun on his final flyer and missed the cut, finish in 19th place, one ahead of Raikkonen, who had to abandon his runa due to yellow flags brought out by spins elsewhere. Williams’ Valtteri Bottas was 17th, ahead of team-mate Felipe Massa, both drivers having wild slides during their final laps.
Elsewhere FP3’s quickest man, Sebastian Vettel scraped through in 16th, behind team-mate Daniel Ricciardo. Jenson Button was fortunate, too, making it through to Q2 in 14th place despite having his best lap deleted for exceeding track limits.
Q2 offered more uncertainty. The start of the segment was run on intermediate tyres following the shower at the end of Q1 but halfway through the track dried sufficiently for slicks to be used and again there was a scramble to put in a good lap. This time though, no front-runners were caught out and eliminated were Romain Grosjean, Jules Bianchi and Max Chilton (who delivered an excellent performance for Marussia), Esteban Gutierrez, Pastor Maldonado and Adrian Sutil. It was a rough session for Sauber. Sutil did not take part in Q2 having spun out in Q1 and late in Q2 Gutierrez also spun off, the rear of his Sauber hitting the barriers hard.
Top spot in Q2 was occupied by Hamilton, the Briton recording a lap of 1:34.870, three tenths clear of team-mate Rosberg but a huge 1.4s ahead of third-placed Vettel.
The final session was as thrilling and surprising as the first. The timesheet after the first runs had a predictable look to it, with Hamilton on top ahead of Rosberg. But with five minutes to go the track conditions again became marginal. Button was told to pit and adopt a wait and see attitude.
When the time came to gamble or stay put however, some were once again caught out. Lewis Hamilton was one of them. The Briton went out but seemed to decide there was no time to be gained so abandoned his lap. Rosberg, by contrast, along with several others, felt differently.
Sebastian Vettel claimed provisional pole but Rosberg had yet to cross the line. When he did so the gap was huge, with the German having almost 1.4s over Vettel. Button was a surprise third for McLaren, with Nico Hulkenberg fourth for Force India. Kevin Magnussen completed a good day for McLaren by taking fifth place and Hamilton qualified sixth. Seventh place went to Sergio Perez in the second Force India, ahead of Daniel Ricciardo in the second Red Bull. The final top 10 positions were filled by the Toro Rossos of Daniil Kvyat and Jean-Eric Vergne respectively.
2014 British Grand Prix – Qaulifying Result
1 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:40.380 1:35.179 1:35.766 21
2 Sebastian Vettel Red Bull Racing 1:45.086 1:36.410 1:37.386 19
3 Jenson Button McLaren 1:44.425 1:36.579 1:38.200 24
4 Nico Hulkenberg Force India 1:41.271 1:37.112 1:38.329 19
5 Kevin Magnussen McLaren 1:42.507 1:37.370 1:38.417 23
6 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:41.058 1:34.870 1:39.232 19
7 Sergio Perez Force India 1:42.146 1:37.350 1:40.457 20
8 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull Racing 1:44.710 1:38.166 1:40.606 18
9 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 1:41.032 1:36.813 1:40.707 21
10 Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso 1:43.040 1:37.800 1:40.855 21
11 Romain Grosjean Lotus 1:43.121 1:38.496 17
12 Jules Bianchi Marussia 1:41.169 1:38.709 17
13 Max Chilton Marussia 1:42.082 1:39.800 14
14 Esteban Gutierrez Sauber 1:43.285 1:40.912 16
15 Pastor Maldonado Lotus 1:43.892 1:44.018 15
16 Adrian Sutil Sauber 1:42.603 No time 8
17 Valtteri Bottas Williams 1:45.318 5
18 Felipe Massa Williams 1:45.695 5
19 Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1:45.935 6
20 Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 1:46.684 7
21 Marcus Ericsson Caterham 1:49.421 7
22 Kamui Kobayashi Caterham 1:49.625 8Hulkenberg who willstart on P4 with fans at a Silverstone autograph session. A Sahara Force India image eom/Sahara Force India press release
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Hamilton pushed to 6th in dramatic qualifying session; Rosberg takes pole
DRIVERS
1 – Nico ROSBERG (Mercedes)
2 – Sebastian VETTEL (Red Bull Racing)
3 – Jenson BUTTON (McLaren)
TV UNILATERAL
Nico, a very dramatic conclusion to that qualifying session. Right at the end you took pole position. Were you surprised by how much the track improved, particularly in the final sector, right at the end, after we’d had that rain?
Nico ROSBERG: Yeah, I mean, a quite crazy qualifying, just changing all the time and that makes it very, very difficult. In the end last qualifying also. On t
Nico Rosberg takes pole and is flanked by Jenson Button on his right and Sebastian Vettel at Silverstone on Saturday. An FIA image he first lap with the soft tyres it started to rain quite a lot, just in the last three corners, so lost a lot of time there and then everywhere else it was quite wet also on the in-lap, so I was sure, I told the guys already “that’s it”. And then we were sitting in the box and we just came to a general conclusion: “might as well go out and have a look at the track”. At least… because if you don’t have a look, there’s no chance but if you have a look there’s a tiny chance, so at least go out and have a look. It seemed like we should give it a go but even then I still didn’t believe that the track would be better. But what made it was the last sector, because everywhere on the track was just a little bit slower, because it was just damp here and there and a little bit wet. But I knew that I had lost four seconds on the previous lap, so even if I was slower than that lap, I still had the chance of going a lot quicker in those last three corners if it was halfways dry and that’s the way it turned out: I made the time in those last corners because it a lot drier and it just worked out perfectly. Even across the line, in Lewis’ gearbox – because I had to be there because otherwise it went red. I had to be as fast as possible in order to be able to do that last lap. So as I crossed the line it went red, like instantly, it was a very, very close call. I think all in all it was a very good team-mate effort; everybody working together, my engineers, together with me just made all the right calls and it worked out. It’s fantastic to have such a qualifying, where everything goes well in the end and a comfortable pole in the end. It’s awesome.
Very well done. Well, if it was a bonus for Nico, you actually had to do a lap didn’t you Sebastian, because you didn’t have a time on the board when you went out at the end there, so you were down in 10th place. What was going through your mind as you were going round the circuit? Did you think your goose was cooked?
Sebastian VETTEL: Well, to be honest at the start of Q3 we went out, I think one of the last cars. And on my out lap, just preparing the flying lap, it started to rain, so I got that wet last sector to start the lap and obviously then there was no point, we aborted the lap, because at that time it was impossible to set a decent time on slick tyres. Then we were back in the garage waiting and we said “OK, we might as well go out. If we go out on inters it will be difficult to beat the lap times that were set, so we go out on dry tyres.” We were one of the first to go out for one flying lap in the end. It was quite difficult to believe on the out lap that it would be dry enough but it’s a funny place. It was a very weird session. A lot of rain, no rain, drizzling, very fine rain, nearly like spray: I think England is the only country where you can get this sort of rain and conditions and changing so quickly. Incredibly difficult to know what was coming so on the flying lap you approach turn one and turn on is a pretty big balls corner, so it’s difficult to know how much risk you can take. Eventually you have to take some risk because, especially in my case, I wanted to set a lap. So obviously very happy that it turned out. Yeah, very positive and starting from the front row tomorrow.
Very well done. And you Jenson? Changeable conditions as Sebastian was saying and you were there or thereabouts throughout the qualifying session as the lap times went up and down. How happy are you with the result you’ve achieved today?
Jenson BUTTON: Like you cannot believe. I know it’s only a third in qualifying but for us at the moment, and for the last 18 months, this is… well, we had no chance of getting this result. Yeah, it’s nice in front of the home crowd to qualifying well and all the way through qualifying, as you said, the pace was there. No compared to the Mercedes, but with everyone else the pace was there. When I did my lap in Q1 on the option tyre in the dry I was about two seconds quicker than anyone when I did it. Made the mistake of losing the rear in the last corner, so it was disallowed. I thought I was going to be out, so to come through and be third in Q3 is a good result for today and I’m really happy that I could do it here in front of the home crowd.
Coming back to you Nico, obviously you’re on pole with your team-mate and championship rival Lewis Hamilton down in sixth place going into the British Grand Prix tomorrow. Your thoughts on the race?
NR: Yeah, of course, with regards to the championship, it’s good for me that Lewis is down in sixth. It will take him some time I think to fight through, though I expect him to come through quite quickly. And then I think very like we’ll be racing each other again. We seem to very quick here. This track really suits the car, more so than Austria, so I think it’s going to be a good battle again. Of course starting from pole is the best possible place and I’m very confident for the race.
PRESS CONFERENCE
Q: Nico, clearly a day like today it’s very easy to get it wrong and there are plenty of examples of that up and down the field. The track was fluctuating by as much as eight seconds a lap with rain and drying out. What are the most important things to take care of on a day like today?
NR: The way to go about it is to try to minimize the rise, especially with the car that we have y’know? We have such a fast package so really we just need to try to make sure we don’t have any big risks, even if then it doesn’t turn out to be the perfect qualifying and the perfect day. And that, I think, we did very well. Definitely tried to eliminate all the big downfalls and it all worked out well. It wasn’t perfect but it worked out really, really well. Everything came together so it was great to be on pole.
Q: Sebastian, you’ve been on the wrong end of this once or twice in the past so you know how it works but how much does the driver contribute to the decision-making process and how much of it is the strategists, your engineers and even people back at the factory?
SV: You would love that the pitwall was in a better place today, trying to predict the rain. I think it was impossible because it was very local. It could have rained every minute and could have stopped raining as we’ve seen. Difficult to predict and therefore it’s you inside the car obviously trying to get the best out of the tyres and the conditions when you’re on track and obviously together with your team trying to be calm on the radio and going for the right decisions. In the end there’s also the element of looking what the others are doing and trying to make sense of whether or not it makes sense to do the same. But it’s very tricky because, as I said, if you take our Q3, the first run, we went out just probably a minute later than everyone else and we didn’t get a lap at all. That’s how close the lap can be sometimes. You try obviously to go for a clear track but then you get caught out by rain. It’s tricky in these conditions to get everything right – so you need also to be a bit lucky.
Q: Jenson, it’s also a question of risk versus reward isn’t it? You mentioned that you were one of the first to go onto the slick tyres earlier on in the qualifying. It was the right time for that. We saw Ferrari and Williams at the wrong time and they’re starting from the back of the grid but did today, the track limits ruling, make things a little bit more complicated given how slippery it was out there.
JB: It did, yeah, because you could make a massive mistake and lose a second by going off the circuit and still put in a really good lap time to get through Q1, Q2. So, it made it really difficult. And obviously my Q1 lap quick enough by quite a long way but it was disallowed because I drove off the circuit in the last corner – but the whole of the qualifying session I felt that I could read the conditions pretty well. And then it came to Q3 and the last timed lap, which obviously meant everything. I said to the guys on the radio, “I’ve got wheelspin in fifth gear in a straight line.” I said: “this isn’t gonna happen,” and they said: “Just push, we’ve got nothing to lose.” We’re in a very different position to Nico. We have to take the risks to gain the positions at the moment. So, I pushed. Very aggressive lap but it worked. Big thanks to the team for their call. And being third here in front of the home crowd, on this weekend, this year, really means a lot. I’ll go to bed very happy tonight and look forward to the race tomorrow.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Alex Goldschmidt – Richland F1) Jenson, coming back to the discussion between yourself and Lewis on Thursday, you seemed to be the best hope for the British fans but obviously Lewis is going to come charging through the field. Depending on weather conditions, how do you see the outlook for tomorrow?
JB: I’ve made the race easier than previously thought but still we have to be realistic. I want to be upbeat, I want to be positive about fighting for a podium. If it’s like today that’s obviously a possibility with mixed conditions. As long as we make the right calls and the right strategy it’s possible. But in a dry race. A standard dry race, it’s going to be very, very tricky but, believe this, we will give one hundred per cent and get the maximum out of what we have this weekend and hopefully have a great result in front of the British fans.
Q: (Chris Medland – crash.net) Nico, you talk about the psychological edge you’re looking to get over Lewis and he’s starting to make quite a few errors in qualifying sessions which has always been a strong point for him. Do you feel that that’s part of the psychological edge you’re getting now?
NR: I’ve never talked about trying to get a psychological edge over anything, not at all. What I’ve been saying is that at the moment the momentum seems to be on my side and I just need to make the most of it because it comes and goes and I have a period now when it’s going my way and I just need to make sure I get as many points as possible on Lewis and it’s working out at the moment. But anyway, today’s just qualifying, there’s no points for qualifying and with the car that we have, even from sixth place, everything’s still possible, but of course it’s a big advantage to start first.
Q: (Haoran Zhou – Formula One Express) Nico and Sebastian, obviously 26.5s in the last sector for both of you, there’s only four corners in the last sector. When did you realise that there’s a lot of grip there?
NR: Well, it was very wet on the previous run in Q3, where we lost like four seconds in the last sector so as long as it’s a little bit dry patches and a little bit drier already you can gain a lot of time and on the out lap there was a chance, and then once I got round to the fast timed lap, I could brake quite late into there and it was quite dry so it was quite quick through there and that made a massive difference.
SV: Yeah, on the out lap it was quite slippery but then when I started the timed lap I could feel that most of the track was nearly completely dry, so arriving in the last sector after the long straight I just said, yeah, all or nothing and treated it as if it was dry. It wasn’t entirely (dry) in turn 15, I went a little bit wider than I thought but for the rest… for the last three corners it was quite completely fine.
Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Motor und Sport) Nico, you said you had to start the lap directly behind Lewis. First, how much time did it cost you in the first two sectors, where did you pass him and what did you think when you saw Lewis pulling into the pits?
NR: Well of course I was disappointed, starting the lap behind Lewis because if I’m in his gearbox, that doesn’t allow me to do my pace so I was disappointed with that, but I didn’t have a choice with the situation, with the way it was and just managed to get over the line before the red light came. I actually saw the red light but it worked out. I wasn’t sure but then it worked out and then Lewis made a mistake in turn four and after that he then pulled over so as not to block me and I just kept on pushing.
Q: (Chris Medland – crash.net) Jenson, you were asked about Ron’s comments on Thursday, asking for a bit more from you. Does that make this perfect timing in response, this sort of result?
JB: He’s watching this, I’m sure! One result doesn’t mean anything. We’ve obviously talked since and yeah, I think there’s mutual respect there but when we all want things to improve quicker than what they are, we maybe say things in the press that maybe we shouldn’t. We have a really good working relationship and I hope that that continues into the future.
Q: (Silvia Arias – Parabrisas) You just said that this result doesn’t mean anything, but anyway, thinking about your father, so far it’s a nice position, and talking about fathers, Nico, your father got pole position in ’85 in similar conditions here in Silverstone, so what are your feelings about that?
JB: For me it was obviously quite an emotional slowing down lap. As I’ve said before – as we always say – qualifying’s qualifying and the race is tomorrow, but when you do a lap that you’re happy with and it’s in front of your home crowd and I knew the Old Boy would have been very happy, it would have meant a lot. I’ve had so much support from the fans, it’s been overwhelming, a lot of guys wearing pink out there in respect to my Old Boy. Yeah, a good day today and he’s definitely smiling down today.
NR: Yeah, of course I’ve also been watching how many supporters, how many people have been wearing pink. Even in my camper van, my driver, he came with a pink shirt and I was like ‘what are you doing?’ He never wears pink and then he explained to me that everybody’s supporting John… in memory of John so that’s how I came across it this weekend. With respect to my Dad, yes, there was one of his great days here in qualifying in Silverstone, something that I’m proud of also. I like to look back at the history and what was happening back then but there’s not really too much to compare to nowadays.
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It’s business as usual but we are gunning for 10th place: Caterham’s Gerry Hughes
TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Gerry HUGHES (Caterham), Rob WHITE (Renault Sport F1), James KEY (Toro Rosso), Pat SYMONDS (Williams), Adrian NEWEY (Red Bull Racing), Jonathan NEALE (McLaren)
PRESS CONFERENCE
Gerry, head of track operations at Caterham, could you fill us in on the details of the changes at Caterham in so far as it affects your department?
Gerry HUGHES: Well, I think it’s fair to say that from a track operations perspective it’s business as usual. The new owners are here for the first time this weekend, to observe the trackside operation. We’ll show then what we do on a race weekend and as I said, it’s business as usual.
So what are the objectives for the team for the rest of 2014 and looking ahead to 2015 in terms of resources and allocating them and that kind of thing?
GH: Well, after a period of uncertainty with the new owners coming in, they’ve given us a direction and a remit and certainly our goal for the remainder of the season is to finish 10th in the championship. The design of the new car is going ahead and is on schedule, so we look forward to 2015, but certainly the remit from the new owners is to finish 10th in the championship.
James, coming to you, obviously some good pace recently from Toro Rosso, but also some reliability concerns – retirements etc. And also of course the issue with Jean-Eric today.
James KEY: If I could you tell you everything James I think we’d have our issues sorted. I think some of it to be honest is a little bit of bad luck we’ve had recently. I think the last three events for us have been problematic, before then it was OK towards the beginning of the season. We’ve had a couple of self-inflicted issues and we’ve had a couple of unexpected issues. Monaco, for example, was entirely unexpected, we traced the issues we had with the exhaust but they’d never happened before then or after. So that was a bit of a one-off and a great disappointment because we were strong there. Since then we’ve had a couple of niggles that have been self-inflicted – a bit of brake blanking which was maybe a bit too high and this sort of thing, little operational things occasionally. A bit of a surprise in Austria with the suspension issue, so it’s been a frustration for sure, because when you have a little bit of pace and can finish in the points you want to make the most of that. But we’re looking at everything very carefully. Clearly we want to make sure we can get through this rather rough patch of reliability and just get on with the rest of the season.
Your drivers seem to be performing well and they’re well matched as well. How are you seeing their development?
JK: I think it’s good actually. I think having both of them so close. Dan’s come in this year and has an old head on young shoulders. His learning curve is extremely steep. His feedback and so on has developed tremendously. He’s been really quite strong right from the outset, which we’ve been quote pleased with. And Jean-Eric is a great driver and he’s more focused this year than we’ve seen him this year. He recognises that there is a hot-shoe across the table, pushing him, so it’s a very healthy situation. They work well together and we’re enjoying the fact that we’ve got two guys who are pushing each other.
Jonathan, there’s no escaping the fact, when you look at the championship table, that you’re the fourth-placed Mercedes-powered team. What’s the plan for turning it around and do you take some encouragement from what’s happened today in free practice?
Jonathan NEALE: I don’t think we take much encouragement from free practice today. Just talking to colleagues here about how the track has been today, it’s been quite unpredictable out there, both this morning and this afternoon. We’ve got a lot of work to do internally to rebuild on the difficulties we have last year. It’s well known that we’re actively strengthening the team at the moment. Eric and I and Ron are working hard to make sure we return ourselves to the performance of where we should be as quickly as possible, but it’s a tough job. There’s no easy way through this. You have to remember that whichever end of the grid you’re at, each of us has 80 runs per week in the wind tunnel by regulation. That’s it; you’ve got to make the most of it. So you have to fight hard and that’s what we’re doing. But there’s a lot of culture change going on, there’s a bit of strengthening of the team, there are some tough things to do, but we’re coming back.
This week Ron Dennis, your boss, gave Jenson Button a little bit of a hurry-up, as we say here in England, ahead of the British Grand Prix. What are your thoughts on that?
JN: I think he did the same thing to Ayrton Senna. I’m pretty sure he did the same thing to Kevin. I think if you listen to my phone on a daily basis he’ll be doing the same thing to me. It’s chip paper.
Thank you. Coming to you Pat. Can you tell us about this morning? It was not a trouble-free morning for the Williams team and also this afternoon, with Valtteri’s engine cover.
Pat SYMONDS: Yeah, it’s been a difficult day. These are the sort of contrasts you get in motorsport. A great weekend in Austria and today we’ve been like a dog running after a rabbit, trying to chase down our problems. Engine problems this morning; power unit problems. We were running and engine right up past the end of its life and it was a risk we decided to take and it didn’t come off. Accident from Felipe, bodywork problems this afternoon. And then on top of that it’s not been an easy day anyway, as Jonathan said. The wind has been gusting, it’s been very difficult to get a read on the car, the tyres have been hard too. It brought us back down to earth today.
It’s been quite a turnaround for the Williams team from last year to this year. At this stage of last year’s championship you had zero and now you have 85 in the Constructors’ Championship. It shows it can be done but what is still missing do you think?
PS: It depends what your ultimate targets are and the ultimate target is to win the Constructors’ Championship, so there is still a long way to go there. The improvements that have been made in the team are quite dramatic and they continue to show improvements all the way through. I think we need a good, solid, ambitious, long-term plan and just keep improving from here.
Adrian, it’s the first time we’ve had the chance to talk to you in an official session since it was announced that you are staying at Red Bull but in a revised role. Can you tell us how hands on you will be in Formula One cars in the future.
Adrian NEWEY: Much less so than I am at the moment, obviously. I think I will really be stepping back to become an advisor and mentor for the team, the engineers that we have there. Some involvement, of course, in the design. But that’s really towards the end of the year. For the moment I’m still fully involved.
Obviously there have been some changes at Renault. Can you give us your thoughts on that, in terms of the management changes?
AN: I think it can only be a good thing. Cyril joining; he’s a very strong person. I think it will bolster Rob in terms of Rob then being able to concentrate on all the technical aspects without having to also be involved in other areas. It plays to his strengths without a doubt and hopefully we’ll see the fruits of that in the future.
Rob, let’s throw that to you: what does it mean for you and your team of engineers?
Rob WHITE: I think it’s good that Cyril comes back to us; has a change of colour of shirt. I’m looking forward to sharing with Cyril the way forwards. As we said previously, it’s important that we step up to deliver the improvements that we completely understand are required. I think we have some very clear messages from Red Bull that have been expressed all over the place. It’s not hard to see what’s required. We know, we understand, and my job and of the team at Viry is to deliver.
So how close to the maximum performance from this power unit, in the current specification, are you?
RW: I guess that’s a kind of moving target type question. At any point in time you’re always extremely close to the maximum performance of the specification on the day. But the maximum performance of the specification can move on. I think we’ve seen already during the course of this season that we’ve made significant headway without a substantial change to the thing that you probably want to call the specification of the hardware and there’s still scope to progress during the rest of this season and then during the winter period then the way the regulations are, the way the engineering programmes are structured, then there’s more scope.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Marc Surer – Sky Germany) I have a question for James Key. When you watch the top speeds, your car is always right at the top compared to the other Red Bull team – Adrian always builds the slowest Red Bull car on the straight. Was it your intention to always make the car so fast on the straight? And if so what was the plan behind that?
JK: I think a lot of it is a car philosophy thing. For us, somehow, STR cars have always had a certain amount of efficiency about them: it was like it before these regulations as well. We tended to have cars that were relatively quick in a straight line. So, I think some of it is just natural from where we are. As a team, to be brutally honest, until recently we haven’t been able to extract more rear wing performance until now, so we probably just been a little bit low on rear wing capacity which has helped that. Equally I think that we did look at the competition in winter testing and recognise the only thing we could do to try to address some of the straight line speed capabilities of some of the cars, particularly the Mercedes cars, was to look at drag as well and, from a chassis perspective, try and tackle it that way. But I think it’s a track-by-track thing. Here we’re mid-table, so it’s not always the case.
Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines) Question for Jonathan. Jonathan, James said that currently you’re fourth of the Mercedes teams, however next year you’ll be first of the Honda teams. Obviously you’ve only got sixth months to go before the change. At what stage are you with this Honda development programme, who is responsible for what and how are the current testing regulations working against such a project?
JN: There’s several questions in that Dieter. There’s a lot of work going on in Tochigi and Sakura at the moment with Honda on the power unit. They are responsible for the power unit including the ERS in its entirety. We are responsible for the chassis and the systems integration piece. Hardware is running, the clock is running and time is short and I think there is a lot of work to do before we’re ready for January of next year.
In terms of how the regulations help or hinder, then I don’t think the current lack of track testing is an impediment because I don’t think we’re at that stage. We not ready for that at the moment to be quite honest with you. So, even if we could get out and run a car that’s not something we would consider right now. We’ve got our hands full with our current issues right now because regardless of what power unit is in the car, we don’t have the best chassis that’s out there and obviously given the performance of last year and this year our immediate focus is what’s going on inside McLaren. So, to some extent, we are doing what we’re responsible for and sorting that out. Of course, with an eye on the horizon. But yeah, we’ve got a lot to do. It’s exciting that the regulations have allowed, or attracted, another engine manufacturer in. I don’t think any of us are under any illusion as to how challenging that is going to be, to go through another iteration of the repackaging, and go through a winter of all of the heat-rejection stuff that we’ve done, the packaging, the ERS etc. We’ve been through it once, we’ll do it again.
Q: (Keith Weir – Reuters) Question for Gerry. Can I just be clear, you say the new owners are here this weekend. Do you mean the new management or the people who put the money up – the investors about whom there is a little bit of uncertainly about who exactly they are? And have you been given any guarantees as to the level of funding, staffing, that kind of thing for next season, if you’re talking about 2015?
GH: If I answer the first part of your question first, I suppose you probably know as much about the overall management structure and the investor as I do. Obviously clearly Christijan [Albers] is now going to be the team principal for Caterham going forwards and Colin acting as an advisor for the team. I think in terms of the short, medium and long term investment, that’s not something I’m going to make comment on here.
Q: (Mike Doodson – GPweek) If there are to be any significant savings in F1 budgets the area in which it would seem logical to a dimwit like me to make them would be aerodynamics which contributes nothing to road car design and has no interest – or very little – to the spectator. What would your response be if someone were to suggest the introduction of spec-wings and aerodynamics generally?
AN: I’m not sure I agree with the some of the points you made in your question, to be perfectly honest, in terms of there being no interest from spectators. I think if you make the cars of an increasingly fixed aerodynamic specification then it becomes GP1 as far as the chassis is concerned. And we’re already, in my opinion, in grave danger of getting close to that; that the regulations define a lot of the car. So increasingly the cars will look more and more similar. I would actually – and of course you could say I would, wouldn’t I? – but I would be arguing for an opening of the aerodynamic regulations. As far as the cost is concerned then I think the RRA, in terms of restriction in wind tunnel testing and CFD goes a long way to reducing the aerodynamic cost because aerodynamic cost is two things: it’s the research – wind tunnel, CFD – which is hugely expensive, then the manufacture of the parts that comes out of that. This year I think we’ve seen a slowing of the number of parts that people are introducing because, as I say, the regulations are quite restrictive by one point, and by another point we are now heavily into a set of regulations that had their roots in the 2009 change. So everybody’s becoming quite evolved in where they are. But I think, certain from what I hear and people I’ve spoken to, journalists, then they insist that the public does have a lot of interest in the changes to the cars, what happens and that’s what differentiates it from other sports. That you have got this combination of different factors. You’ve got the driver, the chassis – which is obviously not just aerodynamics but it’s heavily aerodynamic-driven – and the powertrain. And it’s that blend of features that makes it exciting and interesting. If you look at IndyCar, for instance, which went to one-make chassis some years ago, ever since it’s been one-make it’s viewing has fallen and fallen. That would be my opinion.
Pat, do you have a view on this?
PS: Yeah. I think Mike I’d probably take you up on your statement that it’s not relevant. I think it’s extremely relevant. Within Formula One we don’t just develop the components on the Formula One car, we develop techniques. I have, in the past, been asked to use those techniques for a major OEM on road car aerodynamics for drag reduction, very successfully. In CFD, I think Formula One teams push CFD – computational fluid dynamics – much harder than would be happening were we not involved. And particularly in the areas of turbulent flow. That is extremely relevant to things like wind turbines. When you have a whole field of wind turbines, the turbulent flow off one turbine affects those in the wave behind and CFD studies which have been pushed hard in these area by Formula One are used to develop those sort of techniques – so I think what we do is extremely relevant.
Do you have a view on this Jonathan?
JN: I fully support what Pat and Adrian have said. I also think that to some extent the genie is out of the bottle of aerodynamics and I don’t think we can roll the clock back and go to the glorious days of sliding bicycle tyres around Monaco. I don’t think that’s going to be quite the spectacle that Formula One is now, in terms of its relevance. I do think that it’s relevant to efficiency and to car production – I would say that because we do that in McLaren with our sports car business – but I also think that a great deal is made of the cost-base of Formula One and the contribution of aerodynamics specifically to it. And I think there are a lot of proxy wars going on there that probably have more to do with income models and how businesses are being run. Nobody’s being forced to spend that. I think there are a whole load of issues being mixed into one – but for aerodynamics specifically, I support totally what Pat and Adrian have said.
Q: (Haoran Zhao – F1 Express) Adrian, are you going to change your office location because as we understand your office is quite close to Christian? What if Christian just came up and said ‘look, we totally messed up the twin exhaust, just sort this out for me?’ Would you do that, in the future, in the next season?
AN: I doubt if Christian would come up and say that to me. No, I will maintain my existing office within Red Bull Technology which I will use occasionally. I will have a second office in the new Advanced Technology department.
Q: That’s where you’re going to spend most of your time, is it?
AN: It will be the majority there, yes, that’s correct.
Q: (Bob Bull – BBC.co.uk/three counties) With the current regulations which don’t allow much change of the engines, once you’ve set them for the year, and the limits on what you can do with aerodynamics, do you think that the current situation is stifling innovation and possibly discouraging potential designers for the future?
JK: I’m not so sure… I think with the engine side the homologation was an agreed regulation and if you’ve got a bit of a disparity in reliability or whatever then that first year could potentially be quite tough for some compared to others. I think it goes down two ways. You’ve got, in some cases, restriction be it chassis or engine which maybe is a little bit off-putting, as Adrian has said, on the aero side, for example. Equally, it does also encourage innovation because you’ve got less areas to look at and some clever ideas often pop out of that. I think it’s just as interesting. It may be slightly more painful but I think it’s just as interesting and if we look at what happened in 2009, I think, when the new regs came along which is similar to what we have now for aero, that’s when things like F-ducts, exhaust-blown diffusers and so-on all popped up. Before that, we weren’t seeing such levels of innovation and that was with something that was more restricted. So I think within restrictions it’s still very interesting from an engineering point of view.
RW: I think there’s a number of elements in the reply. Firstly, as concerns the engine and the spec, I think it’s important not to get too hung-up about this aspect and certainly not without looking closely at the regulations and understanding them because the fact of the matter is that it’s a double-edged sword. The sporting regulations where the homologation restrictions are contained, are very explicit about what you may and may not do and it’s very simple: you may not do anything without the prior approval of the FIA. There’s a mechanism which is well-established, which works very well which deals with short-term matters. The fact is that it is potentially a restraint if you happen to have a silver bullet sat on the shelf that you want to deploy – well you probably can’t if its purpose is principally to make the power unit go quicker. On the other hand, it protects you if your competitor has a silver bullet on the shelf that he wants to deploy. Going forward, because this was a set of regulations built up over a period of time with some foresight and some knowledge of what happens when the power units are frozen or the engines – as they previously were – then the progressive freeze and the year-on-year permitted evolutions is a window of opportunity. It’s also a window of risk so I think that in the world of power units, to have in mind that there are mechanisms for the design and construction of the spec to change.
In terms of stifling innovation of designers, which I think was at the end of the question, I think for the time being, at least in the world of power units, we’re not yet there because we have a very complicated set of constraints. There’s a small number of things that are explicitly determined for us in the regulations; there’s many thousands of things that are not and therefore the freedom of expression is substantial.
And then an opinion that comes back to the previous question: I think we need to be extremely careful about unintended consequences because when stuff becomes really fixed and really standard, then you get into a fairly disreputable situation where in order to gain advantage, then you have to spend a massive amount of money and that becomes poor value for money and that’s an unintended consequence that we must be aware of as the future homologation requirements become more severe.
GH: I think the regulations are a framework by which we must all work, however they’ve been formed. As James said, obviously the aero regulations span a number of years now so I think there will always be areas for innovation, there will always be areas – as Rob said – where there’s going to be a greater level of restriction. I think that’s what makes Formula One Formula One, that there will always be innovation.
PS: I think it’s remarkable that we’re accused of lack of innovation when we’ve just introduced the most innovative power unit we’ve seen in years and I’m not just talking about in racing. And each aspect of that power unit is incredible: even gasoline direct injection, GDI, to run it at the sort of speeds that we’re running has been a bit of a breakthrough. The energy recovery, also a breakthrough. Even on the chassis side, there are a lot of clever things in there: passive pitch and warp-link suspensions, inertia dampers – there are all sorts of things that are still there. I’d agree, we don’t have the freedom of regulation that we might have had twenty or thirty years ago, but we don’t have the money to be able to do those sort of things but we still have inquisitive minds and a lot of the innovation is in the attention to detail these days and it’s all very relevant.
AN: I think it’s a very difficult one. Obviously, as engineers, I guess we would ideally like the sort of CanAm-type regulation of maximum length and width or whatever it was and do what you like within that, but realistically, that’s not practical nowadays, so I think it’s a very difficult one to strike that balance between something which allows the maximum amount of freedom whilst – as Pat hinted – not having the budgets going completely out of control, where it becomes a complete spending war and without having a huge difference in the performance of the vehicles, because if we had too much freedom, the chances are that one team would strike it right each year and everybody would complain that the racing’s a bit dull. Unfortunately, that has happened a bit this year but that’s another matter. I think as far as the power train is concerned, the only slight concern that I would voice is that I think it is absolutely correct that these power units are an incredible piece of technology and – as Pat said – something of which we should be very proud of as an industry. What’s not clear is that as the freeze becomes more and more solid – if you like – if one power unit then has an advantage over another or one is clearly behind, how that is addressed, because if you are in that position you have no way of upgrading your power unit because you’re frozen, then you’re doomed to forever be behind but I think that’s something which hopefully can be discussed and should be resolvable, particularly because the engines do all now carry – or all cars carry – torque sensors. Those torque sensors do seem to be a little bit noisy but basically very reliable and give a good signal and so it’s entirely possible for the FIA to look at the outputs from those torque sensors and see where everybody is, not only across engine-matched factories but also of course the variable of fuel, so if a particular engine and petroleum company has the benefit over another, then it’s able to do so and within that, it has the means, if it wishes to, to allow some equalisation for anybody that finds themselves behind in a frozen area.
JN: I think I need two points that I would add to that is that – Adrian mentioned it there – that there is still room and a lot of performance to be gained through the fuel and lube development which is open. Rob’s already mentioned – or Pat did – about what can be done around the energy recovery systems. But to the point about whether designers feel constrained, then I think it would be reasonable to assume that if the designers felt constraint and didn’t know where to go then we would see a much closer grid that we see at the moment. Mercedes have clearly put a package together that’s effective in a number of areas and the rest of us are working very hard to catch up. If that were easy, we would have done it by now, so I think there’s plenty to go at.
Q: (Haoran Zhao – F1 Express) Jonathan, the whole Formula One industry is crying out about the new power unit but yet at Le Mans this year we had 480bhp, six megajoul hybrid unit from Toyota and nobody from Le Mans is crying. Formula One being the peak of motor sport, what has happened and are you happy with the money that Honda is throwing in at the moment?
JN: Yeah, I’m very happy with Honda coming back, thank you. I’m delighted about that. It was a very ambitious programme. Formula One had the option to stay with the V8 technology but the regulation makers and the teams consulted and the decision was taken to put a very advanced and efficient series together. In our first year, I think that that’s thrown up some interesting challenges, many of which have been spoken about here already but we should never under-estimate the cost of development of these things and over a period of time, with stability, I’m sure that if we looked at the marginal cost of production of an engine in three, four, five years time under this level of homologation, even if there is some equalisation as Adrian discovered, unit cost of production will be very effective. What price the engine manufacturers will want to charge the teams at that point is a moot point but development cost of these vast technology things are not easy to do. We’ve got what we designed.
eom/FIA release of the transcript
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With all the fans, I am excited to race again at my home GP: Hamilton
DRIVERS –
Clockwise: Daniil Kvyat (Toro Rosso), Max CHILTON (Marussia), Valtteri BOTTAS (Williams), Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes), Felipe MASSA (Williams), Jenson BUTTON (McLaren) at the Press Conference ahead of British GP at Silverstone on Thursday. Image credit: FIA PRESS CONFERENCE
Lewis, if I could start with you: obviously you were on pole here last year, a former winner of the event, I see you’ve got the Union flag on the underside of the peak on your cap. Your feelings on racing at home and coming home?
Lewis HAMILTON: It’s always a special weekend or week for us British drivers. Coming here, seeing the fans, already having been at Goodwood and seeing how many people were there and the support that’s coming into this weekend. It’s very exciting for us and the feeling of being at home is really a great feeling. And the support, as I said, for me and Jenson and the guys here, it’s unlike any other place we experience. I’m really excited to see everyone and I hope that we can put on a good show and that the weather stays good.
You spoke after the race in Austria about damage limitation, particularly after what happened in qualifying. Clearly, I guess this weekend you want to start on the front foot and stay there. So I wonder what lessons you’ve taken away from the setbacks lately?
LH: There’s not really many lessons. There’s been these two races where we had a technical problem in Montreal and then in the last race I faced some difficulties on the driver side. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it doesn’t, but you’re always going from strength to strength, so we’ve learned some things but nothing we can particularly point out.
OK, thank you for that. Jenson coming to you. Similar question really to the first one to Lewis: the feelings on coming back to the British Grand Prix and racing in front of your home crowd. It’s a race you’ve not won, but you’ve always enjoyed being here.
Jenson BUTTON: Yeah, it’s always very special coming home for this grand prix. I think for every driver Silverstone is a special race. It’s a great layout; always a full house, whether it’s sunny, hot, raining, windy. But it’s especially special for a British driver racing at home. Whether you’re doing well or not you get the support. It’s been very overwhelming actually the last few days since Goodwood leading into this home grand prix, I think for all of us. So I’m very much looking forward to driving on the circuit tomorrow and seeing the fans.
It’s your fifth season with McLaren this year. How do you see things developing from here?
JB: We will see. For me, right now, it’s about doing the best job I can. The whole team, us as a team are working every day to do a better job. We’re not where we want to be, we’re not where McLaren is used to being, and we know that, so we’re working very hard. In terms of the future that’s something I can’t discuss right now.
OK, we’ll move on to Felipe: congratulations, I believe it’s your 200th grand prix this weekend you will be celebrating. So your thoughts on that and also on his rich run of form at the moment for you and the Williams team?
Felipe MASSA: Yeah, I think it’s a fantastic race to celebrate [at]. I think it’s an important achievement. It’s already a long time, when I started in 2002. It’s really a great feeling to have 200 races, in a great team, Williams-Martini home grand prix as well, at a great track, fantastic fans. So I hope we can have a very strong race, like we had in Austria, so I hope we carry on fighting [and we are] competitive. So I’m realty happy and I’m really happy with the team I’m celebrating 200 grands prix [with] as well, so I hope we have many races in front. It’s a great placed as well. Everybody knows everything about Formula One, everything about racing cars here. Sometimes you just see pictures and you have no idea how fans have amazing pictures like that to sign, that are very close to us. It is a great feeling.
You’re kind of unusual I guess to have got to 200 grands prix and it’s the first time you’ve come here racing for a British-base team – that doesn’t happen very often. Your thoughts on that, the Britishness of the team and what that represents to the country.
FM: Yeah it’s a great team. It’s a very important race for me; it’s a very important race for Williams as well. For us, me and Valtteri, as well, for the championship. We are working very hard to improve and be better and better race by race and I think that’s what we are managing to do and it’s really a great feeling and I hope we have a good one.
Valtteri, coming to you. As Felipe was saying obviously it’s a good run of form for the Williams team at the moment. You got your first podium a couple of weeks ago in Austria. Do you feel you can take on the Mercedes again this weekend.
Valtteri BOTTAS: Well, I think overall Mercedes has been performing really, really strongly. It’s been difficult to keep up with them in most of the races – I think Austria was maybe a one-off, we will see. We know that we have been improving but you expect everyone else to do as well. It’s difficult to say. I think this season, we are going to see, the rest of the season, it’s going to vary quite a bit the performance between us and them, so we will see. We will do our best.
After the race in Austria, you always have a debrief, all drivers do with the team, when you went through and looked at everything did you learn anything, were there any mistakes there or were you happy with the way it worked out.
VB: Well, we’re definitely happy with the result we got – third and fourth, a lot of points for the team, that’s the main thing. I think it’s like every race, always if you look into the fine details you can always something, maybe, you could have done better. But the main feeling is very positive. It’s really good to continue from here. There have been many opportunities we could have done a lot better in previous races and now we’ve done a solid job, so that’s good to see. We know we can do it, so it’s good to continue from here.
Max, coming to you, home race for you as well, of course. What experience did you have last year when it was your first time and what are you looking forward to this weekend?
Max CHILTON: I’m just obviously looking forward to another home grand prix. Last year was pretty special. Your first ever home grand prix is something you won’t ever forget. I’m probably a little bit biased, but I’d like to think that it is, if not the biggest grand prix of the year, then certainly one of them. It’s just awesome to have so many spectators, a lot of them are camping, and waving the Union Jacks. I remember last year, free practice one was typical English, with lot of rain, but they were still there doing the Mexican waves and having amazing spirit, so I just hope we can put on a good show for them this year.
You’ve out-qualified your team-mate for three of the last four grands prix. What’s been making the difference for you lately?
MC: Just experience. Qualifying’s always been one my strong points but when I came to F1 I struggled initially. But with experience I’m working that out and I’m developing as a driver. There are techniques you can use as well. I find visualisation really helps. It’s a weird sport we’re in. You very rarely get to practice what we preach. Golfers, tennis players are out six hours a day; with us, yeah we have simulators but apart from that we’re not doing the sport that often. So the more you can practice, in any way possible, helps.
Daniil, last three grands prix, you’ve qualified twice in the top 10, but you’ve had three straight retirements, so I guess the feeling at the moment is one of frustration, right.
Daniil KVYAT: Well, yes, it’s true. We had quite good speed, which we couldn’t consolidate into some good result unfortunately. But last three races we couldn’t come to the end, but I think it’s been a good sign that we do have speed, we do have something to fight for and we’ll just keep on fighting.
So overall then, half way through you first grand prix season, are you happy with the impression you’ve made in Formula One?
DK: Yeah, looking back on it, I think we’ve been achieving maximum from ourselves, we’ve been taking maximum out from our package. I was always learning some new things, it’s been always a good improvement through the season. It’s been good but it doesn’t feel like half a season anyway. We’ll see what the next half of the season will bring us.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Huansho Zhao – Formula One Express) A question to Jenson and Lewis. Murray Walker asked you two this question back in 2010 when you were still team-mates, that we had a colossal fortnight of sport, England’s out of the World Cup, Andy Murray’s out of Wimbledon, Britain is looking at you two, perhaps three of you, how do you feel about Sunday, are you afraid of history repeating itself. Would you like to give your 2014 answer to this question?
JB: I personally feel all the pressure is on Lewis!
LH: I think it’s the other way around!
JB: He’s in the best car, c’mon, make it happen! For us, for Max and I suppose a little bit for myself it’s going to be tricky to get on the top step of the podium and, yeah, it would be amazing to have a British victory. The crowd would go absolutely wild. So, I’d love to see that. For us, as I said, it will be difficult but Lewis has got a shot so hopefully that will be the case.
Lewis, you feel a sense of responsibility?
LH: I was going to say exactly the same thing about Jenson, I think we should hand the baton over. No, at the end of the day we’re both, all of us, are going to do our utmost to try to represent and perform for the country. You never know how the weekend’s going to go, you never know how people have developed, improved – but of course, us as a leading team, hopefully we’ll have a good shot this weekend and I’ll do everything I can to bring at least a little bit of joy and add to the great success that some of the top athletes have.
Q: (Abhishek Takle – Midday) Questions to Felipe. Firstly, congratulations on 200 races but, if you look back to around 2012, you had I suppose a lowest point of your career in terms of competitiveness. Looking back at that time, with all the pressure and some people saying you shouldn’t be in Formula One, did you at that time think you would make it to 200 races?
FM: Well, for sure, yes. I was thinking that everything is possible. Things change very quick in Formula One. All of us, we have good times and difficult time. You always need to pass through a difficult moment. You always learn, and definitely I learned. And I still believe I have many races in front and I still believe I can be competitive and I think when you don’t believe anymore, it’s the time to stop. But you need to feel, not what other people say. I really feel competitive and there’s still a lot more that I can do.
Q: (Ian Parkes – PA) Question for Jenson. Ron Dennis came out with some rather intriguing comments recently urging you to ‘try harder’. Just wonder what your thoughts are on that: whether you agree with him even, or whether you are in fact giving your all in what is a relatively uncompetitive car again this season.
JB: I think Ron’s practicing to be a motivational speaker maybe. I think when we’re in the position that we have been in for 18 months, it’s not easy. For anyone within the team. It’s very, very difficult. So, no, I think we all need to work harder as a team. I don’t think we should be pointing a finger at any individual within the team. I think we’ve got ourselves into this situation and we’ve got to fight our way out. I don’t do things in half-measures. I have the experience in Formula One to know that you need to give 100 per cent and I always do every time I’m in the paddock, at the factory, on the phone to my engineers. Everything is 100 per cent.
Q: (Luke Murphy – Formula Spy): Question for all drivers. There’s been some minor criticism of Pirelli lately that their tyre choices have been too conservative. I just wanted to know what your opinions were on that.
VB: I think the compound choices for the last two or three races haven’t been too bad. Obviously the compounds are a bit harder than last year. Those are the compounds and they choose the tyres we need to use in the race weekend and it’s our job to make the most out of them. So, that’s it.
Max, anything to add?
MC: No, not really, I’ll just copy what Valtteri said. The tyres are pretty conservative, they haven’t been too bad.
Felipe?
FM: Yeah, sometimes a little bit conservative. So, I like… I think in the last two races it was fine. When it’s one stop it’s a little bit boring, I prefer maybe two or three. Two is fine. I think, y’know, using the very hard tyres is not really great, I prefer it to be a little bit better than how it is.
Lewis, I guess in a tight battle like yours, the strategy is an important part of the game – you want more options rather than less?
LH: erm… no, I was just thinking this isn’t a bad thing. Pirelli have done quite a good job this year. We haven’t had any tyre blow-outs, which is a real positive for us, it’s what we wanted. You can’t always get it perfect, so whether or not they’ve gone a little bit too far in that direction, we can decide perhaps at the end of the year. I’m sure they’ll alter it again for next year. Of course we always want more grip, so every time they get softer, that’s a good thing for us.
Jenson, anything to add?
JB: Yeah, I think the last three races it’s been the right choice to have the supersoft and the soft. Barcelona felt a bit too hard but I mean it’s pretty difficult being limited to only four compounds throughout the season. Here it’s the hard and the medium but you need a bit of stability for the high-speed corners, so, if the temperature’s alright, it should be fine.
Final thought Daniil?
DK: I have no problem with Pirelli, it’s all good for me.
Q: (Sarah Holt – CNN) Tomorrow we’re due to see the first female on track for 22 years when Susie Wolff takes part in first practice for Williams. That’s got to be a good thing for the sport, especially in terms of being an inspiration for future females who want to take part in motor racing. I wonder if Valtteri could comment first as Susie’s teammate, and also if we could hear from Lewis and Jenson as well?
VB: I think it’s great from Williams that they give the opportunity and she’s already been with Williams quite a bit doing development work in the simulator and did a test after Barcelona. I think it’s really nice to see her getting the opportunity to drive in the race weekend in FP1.
Q: Lewis, I guess you raced against quite a lot of girls lower down in karts but they’re no longer competing when you get to this level. Your thoughts on whether this will be inspirational?
LH: I didn’t race against many girls. Susie was one of the very few if not the only one that I raced against. I saw her in karting but she was always in the class above me and then we raced Formula Renault together. She was great. We shared a podium together a couple of times. I think she’s done remarkably well in her career. She’s very very talented, so happy. It’s going to be really cool, I think, to see her in a Formula One car tomorrow.
JB: Yeah. First of all it’s good that it’s Silverstone as well. From what I’ve heard, she knows this circuit as well which is a positive thing. Jumping into a Formula One car, I’m sure she’ll feel a little bit of the pressure in front of the home crowd, but she’s been working with Williams for quite a while so I’m guessing she knows the ins and outs of the car and the team. She’s also driven already – hasn’t she? – in a test and went very well. So it will be good to see her on track tomorrow.
Q: (Mike Doodson – Auto Action) This is for Max: I was very interested in you talking about visualisation. I think other drivers have done the same in the past. I wonder what is the procedure you take to sit down quietly and particularly have you ever timed your visualised lap and how close did it come to the real one?
MC: Yeah, it’s something I’ve heard about a lot in the past. It’s all trial and error. You have to try things to work out if you like them or not. It’s just worked with me recently. I tend to start it the week before a Grand Prix and yeah, you just do it in some quiet space. As you know, it’s not deadly serious, you just kind of practise a lap and obviously the first few laps you’re miles out and then you just gradually get into it and you build from previous memories and you slowly get down to a time where everything is just there and ready to kind of be extracted into the car, so when you’re actually doing your first flying laps on a Friday, it’s kind of there ready to be used. It’s a simple technique which helps and – as I said earlier – our sport is very weird, we’re very rarely actually doing what we preach so the more practice we can get the better.
Q: Is visualisation something you all do? Yes. No. No. No.
Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Lewis, how important is it for you to win here and turn the championship back to your momentum, because it seems – looking from the side – that until Monaco, your season was quite smooth and then it seems that you were a little bit surprised about how hard is the fight. Is this the wrong impression?
LH: I’m not surprised. I’ve known how close it’s been since the beginning of the year. Nico won the first race. As every race, it’s important to be out ahead. I had the advantage for a few races and Nico’s had that for at least the last couple. But now this is the British Grand Prix, I’m going to do everything that I can to be out in front and as I said, try and represent… when it’s your home Grand Prix, it’s one of the greatest experiences you can ever have as a sportsman and as a driver, so that’s what I’m working towards this weekend.
Q: (Alan Baldwin – Reuters) Three guys in the front, there were some comments this week from Bernie about Monza, suggesting that it might not be on the calendar much longer. I wonder if you could just comment, as the guys who had been there the most of the six here, as to whether we should take that seriously and how much of a loss for Formula One if it were to go?
FM: Yeah, I think we’re still carrying on racing in Monza. It’s a fantastic place, great fans, so for sure, if we are not racing in Monza any more it would not be good for Formula One. We need to go to places that people really love – Formula One racing, like Silverstone. If we lost Silverstone it would not be positive, it would be a negative for all of us so I hope we can keep going to Monza for many many years.
JB: It’s an iconic racetrack, one of the old school tracks. There’s so much history. The fans absolutely love this sport, they will do anything for this sport and they’re not going to be there to support us, they’re there to support a certain team, but that’s great to see. It’s nice to see their passion, they’re very patriotic and the circuit’s fun to drive. It’s a very unique circuit, very different to any other circuit, very low downforce circuit, always throws up a good race so it would be a shame not to see it on the calendar.
LH: Yeah, I agree with both what Felipe and Jenson said. I think it’s important not to forget that this sport would not exist if it wasn’t for the fans. Obviously there are certain business decisions people make but there’s tracks we’ve been to where there’s been no one in the grandstands and there’s a few, particularly, which are very very special like Monza where you have a full.. you know, the circuit’s just full of fans and it really does make the event. I think it’s important that we try and keep that in the sport.
ends/FIA release of the transcript
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Marquez makes it a perfect eight after dramatic Dutch TT: Moto GP
Assen, 28 June 2014: Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez has taken his eighth win from eight races, continuing his flawless run in 2014, and has become the youngest rider to win eight successive premier class races (21 years 131 days), taking the record from Mike Hailwood (24 years and 71 days) who won the eighth of a 12-race winning sequence in 1964. Marc’s teammate, Dani Pedrosa, had a fantastic battle with Aleix Espargaro and took third place on the podium, alongside Andrea Dovizioso. Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso was
Marc Marquez of Repsol Honda (left) after his 8th win along with Pedrosa (irght) , third on podium on Saturday 28 June 2014. A Repsol Honda image second while Valentino Rossi was fifth, according to a Repsol Honda team release.
In true Assen style, the weather played a key part in today’s twenty-six lap race. As the riders left their garages for the starting grid, rain arrived and forced a delay to proceedings. Whilst some riders remained on the grid, both Marc and Dani returned to the garage to evaluate the best course of action and to decide if they should start on slicks or wet tyres. Both selected wet tyres and the race got underway at 14h20 local time.
Marc held his position from the start, and enjoyed an early battle with Dovizioso on the first lap, passing each other five times before passing him for the lead. Dani slipped down to fourth behind Aleix Espargargo as a fantastic battle began to develop. The track began to dry quickly with a dry line emerging and on lap six most of the front runners chose to enter the pits to swap bikes for the dry set-up on slicks. They filtered back on track and began to rediscover their rhythm but Marc made a small mistake on lap eight and Dovizioso passed him to take the lead. Dani was tucked in behind Espargaro and on lap nine they passed each other a few times but Dani wasn’t able to complete the pass. On lap twelve rain flags were shown again and the bikes with wet set-up were prepared in the pit lane. Thankfully the weather held off and didn’t worsen, enabling the Repsol Honda riders to continue their chase.
Dani briefly passed Espargaro on lap sixteen but was again passed back and Marc passed Dovizioso on the final turn and began to push, setting a fastest race lap (lap nineteen). Meanwhile Dani managed to pass Espargaro on lap eighteen and built himself a comfortable gap to take the final spot on the podium – his 90th podium in MotoGP.
Marc has now won in every class at Assen – MotoGP (2014), Moto 2 (2012 and 2011) and 125cc (2010) – and he celebrates this eighth win in a row with his brother, Alex, who also won on his Honda in the Moto3 class earlier today. He now has a perfect 200 points from 200 and leads the Championship by 72 points over Rossi. Dani is in third place but equal on points with Rossi (128).
With 200 points in the season, Marquez said: “It was a tough day because this was a race where I could have lost many points, but we were still able to extend our lead in the Championship so I’m very pleased with how it has gone and how we dealt with the flag-to-flag. It was our first experience of a race like this, with both wet and dry conditions, and we even had a little scare after the bike change. We are very happy with this victory and to have got a very important 25 points on a weekend we had circled on the calendar.”
Teammate Pedrosa said after the race: “It was a very difficult race and was even a bit chaotic at first, when it came to having to decide which tyres to put on the bike. I kept a cool head and chose the option of wets, because at first the track was a little damp. I should have pushed more in the opening laps – but I chose not to incase it rained again – as the track began to dry out. The rain didn’t come and I had a good fight with Aleix for the podium in the dry. I am happy to have taken the rostrum finish, because you never know how races like today’s might go, but this one went well for us and we are now focusing on doing a good job in Germany.”
Movistar Yamaha team release adds:
Movistar Yamaha MotoGP’s Valentino Rossi rode impressively this afternoon to take fifth during an unpredictable race at the Assen TT. Teammate Jorge Lorenzo briefly led the race, but later fell back after a tyre change, finishing in 13th place.
There was uncertainty before the start of the Dutch GP, with the riders already on the starting grid when the race was delayed due to the rainy conditions. It was finally declared a wet race and two extra sighting laps were given.
Rossi initially went out on slicks but decided last-minute to change to wets after the warm-up lap. Though this meant he had to start the race from pit lane, the setback didn’t hold him back for long and he was quick to move up the order, reaching 13th by lap three. At the end of lap six chaos ensued again as the track started to form a dry line and half of the riders came into the pits for another tyre change. Rossi dived into the pits with the first group, rejoining the race in tenth position. He was quick to find a good rhythm and closed the gap of 2.325s to Pol Espargaro, Carl Crutchlow, Alvaro Bautista and Stefan Bradl over the next six laps. The Doctor then only took another three laps to move up to fifth place. He was consistently closing on Aleix Espagaro in fourth, but there were not enough laps, leaving him to hold fifth at the line
Teammate Jorge Lorenzo had a good start, the Spaniard moving up from ninth to sixth in the first lap. Having found a good wet pace, he threatening to break into the top five when changing weather again disrupted the race. Lorenzo made the change to a dry bike and having returned in 17th was able to move up several positions to 13th by the flag.
With fifth place Rossi scores 11 points and is now tied for second place in the championship with Dani Pedrosa, 128 points behind Marc Marquez. Jorge Lorenzo gains three points, leaving him in fifth in the championship standings, ten points behind Dovizioso in fourth.
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Rosberg pips Hamilton to extend championship lead; Maiden podium for Bottas
Spielberg, 22 June 2014: Mercedes AMG Petronas driver Nico Rosberg took his third win of the season at the Austrian Grand Prix ahead of Lewis Hamilton despite a determind charge by the Briton to second from ninth on the grid.
The German’s win extends his World Drivers’ Championship leade over Hamilton to 29 points. Williams’ Valtteri Bottas claimed his first podium finish with third place ahead of pole winner Felipe Massa. Sahara Force India was once again in double points as Sergio Perez, who disappointed with an controversial last-lap clash in the last race, did a wonderful job finishing 6th after starting 16th while Nico Hulkenberg, lost a place to Daniel Ricciardo during the fag end, but managed to finish ninth.
Hamilton *lef) had to be content with a second place as Rosberg extended his championship lead. A Mercedes AMG Petronas image At the start, pole position man Felipe Massa made a solid getaway to hold the lead. Behind him Bottas lost P2 to Rosberg into Turn One but managed to wrestle back the advantage at the following corner. Behind them Hamilton made a storming start, climbing to fifth from ninth on the grid. He went one better in the final turn of lap one to pass Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso and he then settled in behind team-mate Rosberg as the field crossed the line to begin lap two.
Sebastian Vettel though was in trouble. At the start of lap two he slowed dramatically and reported that he had lost power. He pulled over and seemed set to stop but then mysteriously his RB10 seemed to right itself. He was told to ‘go racing’ by race engineer. The champion though was a lap down on the field and a significant recovery looked impossible. The Red Bull driver soldiered on at the back of the field, surviving a collision with Esteban Gutierrez along the way, until he was eventually told to retire his car midway through the race.
Team-mate Daniel Ricciardo also had a rocky start. Pushed wide in turn two on the first lap he dropped from fifth on the grid to eighth. He was soon after informed that he should not use his overtake button for the whole race and hampered by power problems he was soon down to tenth.
With the opening supersoft tyres being used by the bulk of the field graining badly, the first round of pit stops wasn’t long in coming. The main body of stops was triggered by Jean-Eric Vergne on lap eight, the Toro Rosso swapping the option tyres for prime softs. He was followed a lap later by Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg and on the following lap by Kevin Magnussen, Daniil Kvyat and Ricciardo.
Rosberg pitted from third place on lap 11, allowing Hamilton to fly past. Hamilton couldn’t find the pace necessaryon his own in-laps and stop, however, and when he emerged after his own stop on lap 13 he found himself just behind Rosberg.
Leader Massa, meanwhile, was readying himself for his tyre change on lap 14. His stop was far from perfect however and when the Brazilian emerged he found himself behind Rosberg and was then quickly passed by Hamilton.
Bottas’s stop on lap 15 was much quicker, however, and the Finn was able to split the leading Mercedes after taking on soft tyres. The order on lap 16, then, was Sergio Perez, who had started on softs and had yet to pit, followed by Rosberg, Bottas, Hamilton, Massa and McLaren’s Jenson Button, who had also started on the soft tyre from 11th on the grid.
On lap 27 Rosberg passed Perez for the lead, the Mexican ceding the position without much of a fight having been told by his pit wall that the race would come back him as his strategy played out later on. Bottas too sneaked through but Hamilton had to wait until the next tour before he could pass the Force India. The delay allowed Rosberg to pop in a fastest lap. Hamilton responded with his own but the gap had by now drifted to 2.4 seconds.
Perez eventually made his first stop on lap 29, tajking on a second set of softs before rejoining in seventh position.
At the front the battle was hotting up again as Bottas and Hamilton closed in on Rosberg, who made a small mistake. The Williams driver got to within a second of the leading Mercedes, with Hamilton in close attendance, but Rosberg soon responded and the gap widened to 1.1s.
Hamilton made his second stop in lap 39, taking on a final set of softs and rejoining in fifth. Rosberg though kept going for another lap and following a three-second stop he retained his advantage over Bottas and Hamilton. When Bottas pitted on lap 41 his relatively tardy 3.4s stop allowed Hamilton to move ahead and claim second.
Massa made his final stop on lap 43, switching to soft tyres in 3.4s. The Brazilian then unfortunately found himself behind Sergio Perez, who was set for a longer stint on his second set of soft tyres.
On the road the leader was Alonso and the Ferrari driver continued until lap 47 when he took on his final set of soft tyres. He emerged in sixth place behind Massa. At the front, Rosberg led by 1.6s from Hamilton, with Bottas a further 5.7s behind.
The question now was whether Perez in P4 and Button in P7 behind Alonso could make any impact once they made their final stop for supersoft tyres?
Unfortunately for Force India, the answer was not much. Perez took on the option tyre on lap 55 and rejoined in eighth position, five seconds behind McLaren’s Kevin Magnussen. The Mexican had enough pace in hand to pass Magnussen for sixth place on lap 66 but with a 13-second deficit to Alonso and just laps left sixth was the best Perez could do. Button, meanwhile made his stop on lap 58 but lodged behind tenth-placed Raikkonen in the closing stages the McLaren driver failed to make a significant move.
At the front the battle for the lead finally flared in the final three laps, with Hamilton attempting to get inside DRS range of his team-mate. With a lap left and with Hamilton just 1.1s behind his team-mate both drivers were told they could use all the tools at their disposal. As the pair went through turn three Rosberg lit up his brakes. Hamilton saw an opportunity but he too erred in the corner and the chance was gone. Rosberg hung on to claim his third win of the season. The win means he stretches his championship lead over Hamilton to 29 points.
With Hamilton second, Bottas took his first podium finish with third ahead of Massa and Alonso. Perez held onto sixth ahead of Magnussen but Ricciardo made and exdellent last-lap pass on Hulkenberg to steal eighth. The final points position went to Raikkonen who easily kept Button at bay.
2014 Austrian Grand Prix – Race Result
1 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 71 1:27:54.976 3 25
2 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 71 +1.9 secs 9 18
3 Valtteri Bottas Williams 71 +8.1 secs 2 15
4 Felipe Massa Williams 71 +17.3 secs 1 12
5 Fernando Alonso Ferrari 71 +18.5 secs 4 10
6 Sergio Perez Force India 71 +28.5 secs 15 8
7 Kevin Magnussen McLaren 71 +32.0 secs 6 6
8 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull Racing 71 +43.5 secs 5 4
9 Nico Hulkenberg Force India 71 +44.1 secs 10 2
10 Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 71 +47.7 secs 8 1
11 Jenson Button McLaren 71 +50.9 secs 11
12 Pastor Maldonado Lotus 70 +1 Lap 13
13 Adrian Sutil Sauber 70 +1 Lap 16
14 Romain Grosjean Lotus 70 +1 Lap 22
15 Jules Bianchi Marussia 69 +2 Laps 18
16 Kamui Kobayashi Caterham 69 +2 Laps 19
17 Max Chilton Marussia 69 +2 Laps 21
18 Marcus Ericsson Caterham 69 +2 Laps 20
19 Esteban Gutierrez Sauber 69 +2 Laps 17
Ret Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso 59 +12 Laps 14
Ret 1 Sebastian Vettel Red Bull Racing 34 +37 Laps 12
Ret 26 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso 24 +47 Laps 7
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Felipe Massa leads an all-Williams front row: Austrian GP
Felipe Massa leads an all-Williams front row after an exciting qualifying session for the Austrian Grand Prix today.
. Valtteri led the way from Nico Rosberg until the final moments with a great lap securing his front row position alongside his teammate.
. Today’s result is Felipe’s first pole position since Brazilian Grand Prix 2008 and the first front row lockout for the team since the German Grand Prix in 2003.
Rob Smedley, Head of Performance Engineering: I am really pleased. The guys have done a very good job. This is just the start of the 71 laps though but we will start in the best position possible. We need to think hard about how we maximise this in terms of points at the end of the race. Tomorrow will be hotter but we know from our long runs where the issues will be that we will face, it will be a defensive race tomorrow as we try to keep everyone else behind us but for the team this is a much deserved result for all the hard work that has been put in both at the factory and race track.
Felipe Massa: It’s an incredible moment for me, but the whole team is feeling this too. The team has a great history and we continue to build on that. It’s a special day. I had some traffic earlier in the session but when it counted I did the best I could. There is a lot to do tomorrow and we have a very strong Mercedes behind us. Today is a day I won’t forget though and it’s the first time my son has seen me get pole so emotions are high.
Valtteri Bottas: I am really happy for us as a team as it is such a good result. It couldn’t have been a better Saturday for us. I would have liked to have been on pole, but Felipe had the better lap when it mattered. Tomorrow isn’t going to be easy as the Mercedes are still the quickest car. I pushed a bit too hard on my final lap at Turn Six, but I was already down on my quickest. Tomorrow the strategy will be important and so we have to be clever with what we do. We are in a better position than the Ferraris and the Red Bull so it should be really good fun.
Felipe Massa takes pole position for the Austrian GP. A Pirelli image -Ends-
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Pole is the beginning of some great possibilities: Felipe Massa, Williams
21 June 2014:
DRIVERS
1 – Felipe MASSA (Williams)
2 – Valtteri BOTTAS (Williams)
3 – Nico ROSBERG (Mercedes)
TV UNILATERAL
Felipe, pole for the first time since, I think, Brazil 2008. Describe your emotions now.
Felipe MASSA: Yeah, I’m so happy with what’s happened today with us and our team. It was such a great moment. It was already long time when I had my last pole position, which was, yeah, in Brazil, 2008. So, such an incredible moment. For sure we need to concentrate on the race tomorrow, you know, it’s a difficult and important race for us. But I think it’s a great moment. The best place to be is here in the first place. It’s something that I got the chance to be many times in all my career and I am again now. After a long time I couldn’t be in this place and I hope this is just the beginning of maybe some great possibilities to be here again, not just in the qualifying but also in the race. The race is tomorrow but I’m so happy, very emotional – not just for me but I think it’s a similar feeling what I feel and what Williams feel as well. Williams Martini had an incredible career in the past and they are back to the top, they are back to the fight. There is still a lot to do but the work is going on the right line. I’m so pleased for me and for Williams Martini as well.
Very well done. Coming to you Valtteri. Your best ever Formula One qualifying in second place. You were in provisional pole though, but it looked like a mistake on your last and it ended up very close with Felipe, I believe only nine one hundredths of a second the gap between you.
Valtteri BOTTAS: Yeah best position so far in my career, so one more place to go. Well done Felipe. I’m really happy for us as a team. This result is really good at this point. We’ve made some big, big steps from last year and now we get a result like this. Of course it’s only Saturday but still we can see that all the hard work really starts to pay off. I’m really happy for us. As Felipe says the race is tomorrow, so we need to focus on that. It’s going to be a different story tomorrow, it’s not going to be easy to keep the Mercedes cars behind for sure, and even some other cars like Ferrari and Red Bull are going to be strong. Yeah, not a bad day today but we just need to keep focused now.
Very well done. Nico, coming to you now. Championship leader but it’s not the first time that you’ve not been on the front row of the grid. Did you expect to have these two cars in front of you and what happened today for you?
Nico ROSBERG: No, of course, I definitely didn’t expect the Williams to be ahead of me today but they did a good job and it just didn’t come together perfectly for me. I also lost out on that last lap because of Lewis spinning in front in the corner, so I couldn’t do that lap. You have to lift off two tenths of a second you know and doing that, to do at least two tenths you have to do three tenths and it’s just… it wouldn’t have been possible to improve on my lap time so I backed out of it. So that definitely cost me today but that’s just the way it is. But still third place is OK, it’s OK to start from there tomorrow and I have a quick car in the race, so I’m still looking forward to it and I’ll make the most of it.
Well done. Coming back to you Felipe. Obviously the race tomorrow, but there’s a big football tournament going on at the moment in your home country. I guess though that all eyes will be on you in the early part of tomorrow, what do you expect?
FM: Yeah, I think there is a lot going on in Brazil in this moment so I really expect that we can have a great show, a great show for everybody which is looking, you know the World Cup in Brazil. So I hope the best definitely for the World Cup in Brazil but I hope the best for Brazil. Just before I go to the car my son gave me a little Neymar, a little one, so I bring the little one to the car and I put on the side of my helmet. It was a nice feeling. I’m a great fan of football, so I hope we can have a great World Cup. I know what it is to win at home so I can imagine winning the World Cup at home is like a dream come true, not just for the players but also for everybody which is watching, so I really hope the best for Brazil.
PRESS CONFERENCE
Q: Felipe, it was noticeable this morning in Free Practice Three that you guys were working on qualifying from fairly early on. Was it a real plan here to really focus on qualifying and do the best possible job that you could do here this afternoon?
FM: Well, it was not different, what we was doing this morning compared to the other races. We were doing similar working compared to what we was doing before, so definitely… also the Saturday the qualifying is the main focus y’know, but it was no different to what we did in the other races so… but I mean it’s pretty clear that our car was good, our car was competitive and it shows really a very good performance today and also yesterday since we started, both tyres it shows good performance. And it shows again in the qualifying that definitely we are a little bit surprised – we expect maybe Mercedes to be a little bit heavier, y’know? Just preparing the qualifying to put the right level of fuel and be like they were in the last races. Maybe not a big gap because this is a small track but, yeah, it was a little bit of a surprise – but it was a great job from us. From both of us, from the team, from everybody.
Q: Valtteri, it’s obvious, as Felipe was saying, the car is working well. But it seems this year, your team, when you’ve bought updates to the car, they’ve worked straight away. Obviously the correlation is very good between the wind tunnel and the race track and everything seems to be pointing in the right direction.
VB: That is true. We haven’t been making any bad updates. We’ve always… if we have bought something it has always worked and that has been a big improvement from last year. We can really put all the energy into the right direction, developing parts and knowing that they will work, so, no energy wasted there so that’s good. Like Felipe said, I’m really happy for the result today. For us as a team it’s a great achievement. Of course it’s only Saturday but we are really looking forward for tomorrow, trying to get some really good points with both cars. So, we really just need to focus on that.
Q: Nico, some thoughts from you. Obviously still a good chance for you to win the race tomorrow, taking on these two gentleman here. And also some thoughts on your team-mate who’s going to be starting down in ninth.
NR: Yeah, chances for the race are obviously good from P3. It’s more difficult than starting on the front row, of course, but it’s still a good chance there because I think it’s possible to overtake on this track. First stint, also, the tyres are going to degrade massively on the Option, so already there maybe at the end of the stint there’s a little bit of a chance. And I’ll have a good race car for sure. The balance was not ideal today in qualifying but definitely more a race car. So, in the race I’m sure I’ll be more happy with it. So I look forward to trying to make the most of it. Points-wise also with Lewis starting in ninth, that’s of course for the team not good but for me it’s, yeah, good that way. I need to make the most of it and try to extend the gap tomorrow.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Livio Oricchio – Universo Online) Nico, last race Mercedes didn’t win after six races in a row winning everything. Here, the first competition with qualifying ended with Mercedes not starting again in the first position. It’s just the circumstance of the competition or the opponents are really approaching your team?
NR: It’s a short track here and still we have the fastest car, even today, it’s just that I didn’t get that second lap to give it a go and my first lap, the balance was not good. In general also today my balance was not good because I’d worked more for the race – but I didn’t expect it to be that bad. I didn’t expect to be that uncomfortable. But anyways, not it’s third and for the race I’m sure I’ll have a good car, so, I think that’s a very small view that we’re taking now: two races, no wins, no pole… or no pole now. But I still think we’re dominant and definitely have the fastest car and I hope it’s going to stay like that for some time to come.
Q: (Michael Shields – Reuters) Felipe Massa, how does it feel to be starting from the pole position? I think this is the first time since 2008.
FM: Yeah, it’s the first time since 2008. I think it’s always the best feeling we can have. Being the quickest on the track against everybody, it’s always the best feeling a driver can have. A driver always works and fights to achieve this. It’s definitely a great moment, this qualifying. Only, work for tomorrow is very difficult. Long and tough race but, y’know, is a good start.
Q: (Sarah Holt – CNN) Felipe, you had a chance to win in Canada last time out and you’ve spoken passionately about the events that happened there since then. Do you think that tomorrow you’ve got a cool head and Williams has got the race pace that you need to make it a win this time and keep Valtteri and Nico etc at bay?
FM: Well, I think that depends on these guys here. We need to try to do the best we can. I think we have a good car, definitely we show a very competitive car since yesterday morning. I think what happened at the last race is past. I think you cannot live the past, we need to live in the present and the future. We lost some opportunity, we lost great points in Canada. Unfortunately we had some problems in the first pit stop when I lost four or five seconds and that put me in a difficult situation for the race but I had incredible pace as well and looking what happened with the Mercedes, it would definitely have been possible to win. I was in front of Ricciardo and he won the race. Normally my pace was also good to fight with… to be in front of him. The race is tomorrow, it’s a different situation, we’re starting in a better position which is always a help and we need to see how Mercedes will be tomorrow in the race but we will try everything we can, definitely.
Q: (Panagiotis Seitanidis – Alpha TV) Felipe, we saw a very touching emotional moment with your wife and son. After all the troubles you had with the accident and the difficult times that came after that, how important was the support of your family all this moment, and what did your son tell you, or what did you feel when you looked at him at that moment?
FM: Actually, I was also very close to my family. When I was a kid, with my father, my mother, my brother, my sister – we were always together at the races. I have always had great support from my family and then after, with my wife, my son now. It’s a great moment. When I saw him, it was just like… he never saw me in first place so it’s the first time. I think that makes the father feel nice, a good feeling, to see that your son is looking that you are in first place so it’s a great feeling, it’s a great moment and for sure, it’s part of my motivation. He’s part of everything I’m doing for my career, so it’s definitely a great feeling. I hope we can have a great race tomorrow as well with him watching and my wife and all my family as well from home.
Q: (Sven Haidinger – Sport Woche) Valtteri, what influence did the arrival of Pat Symonds have on your team and on the performance of the car?
VB: I think we can see it in the performance. I think the results have shown that he’s been one of the key persons for Williams to come back to closer to the positions where we belong to be in the races. As soon as he arrived, many things started to change and are still changing. Every week, as a team, we are still getting stronger and stronger, so we are definitely on the right way and that is thanks to Pat but also many other people in the team.
Q: (Anthony Rowlinson – F1 Racing) Felipe, has the change of team environment to Williams allowed you to find your best form again?
FM: For sure, I had a great time with Ferrari. I’m not a guy who is trying to speak bad about the past. I have had an incredible time in my past and I really enjoy everybody from Ferrari, but I feel that sometimes a change helps. Always when you are in the same place for many years… also I had a difficult moment as well, you know, it was good to have a change. I think it was good for the motivation and everything, so I think it was definitely positive, this change and I really really feel happy with Williams Martini with really great people. I think they work 110 percent, happy, and they really believe in my job, they really believe in what I say and I think that’s really positive. It makes me feel better, it makes me feel nice and it makes me feel very important inside the team.
Q: (Mikhail Rudoi – Autodigest Belarus) Valtteri, tomorrow, when you will see green lights, how do you think? You will concentrate not to lose second place or you will try to attack Felipe to the first turn?
VB: I think you always try to do the best you can. I think it really depends how good a start you get and it depends on the situation, what kind of start the other cars around will get and then you see how is the situation but I think both of us, me and Felipe, we really need to just try and do the best we can, try and go as forward as possible after the first corner and the first lap and keep the position as long as possible. We know that Mercedes’ race pace is going to be really really strong so it’s not going to be an easy day tomorrow but we will do our best.
Q: ( Eli Shaouly – Automagazine, Israel) Felipe, it’s the first time that somebody actually beat Mercedes fair and square this season. This actually looked closed, like finished, one or two races ago. Do you think it’s now a new opening, do you think you can handle a big challenge to them or do you think it’s just one track that is very unique and the future will be different? Maybe also Nico can answer this?
FM: Honestly, we cannot forget what Mercedes has been doing up to now. We cannot forget that they didn’t have a clean qualifying as well. For sure, for the moment they are in front. For the moment, they are stronger. I hope, during the championship we can close or maybe can even pass (them). This is what we’re always working for, you know. But I think it’s not enough to say that we are there with Mercedes. I think that for the moment we don’t know. For the moment is maybe this track helps us definitely, but we don’t know. As Valtteri just said, I think we will see a very strong Mercedes tomorrow, so we need to be ready for everything, we need to be ready also that finishing behind them is still an incredible job for us.
NR: I still think we are the quickest team and car at the moment, but we are always keeping a close eye on the opposition and today Williams was definitely close, so we need to keep on pushing. Today was Williams, two races ago it was Red Bull that were getting closer so we need to go for it, but I’m confident that we can keep up the development rate and stay ahead.
eom/FIA transcript of the Press Conference
Motorrad Grand Prix Deutschland – Round 9
