The car starts the year nothing like how it will end the year, and the amount of development you get during the season is incredible. The amount of development over the winter when you build a new chassis is just as incredible. If you do sit back and rest on your laurels – which is far too easy to do if you’re winning – it’s so easy just to go backwards.
Q:
You mentioned traction control. Some drivers have spoken out to say they think there will be more accidents in wet races because of the ban on TC now. What are your views on that?
GP:
There have been some big accidents in wet races
with traction control, so I don’t think it’s going to change. The problems you have in wet races are normally [down to] aquaplaning, and traction control can’t help [you] when the wheels aren’t touching the ground. It’s going to be more difficult than before, but I don’t think it’s really extreme.
The drivers will have to deal with it and be a bit more careful in the wet for sure, but I don’t think there will be too many problems with it making things too risky, because you drive the car to its limits. You don’t drive it past its limits, so I don’t think it’s a big issue really.
Q:
As you say, there’s a new driver at
McLaren this year too in the shape of Heikki Kovalainen; what has he brought to the team so far?
GP:
Obviously he’s only just joined the team. He signed before Christmas and he hasn’t done much work with the team so far, but he’s clearly got knowledge of
Formula 1, knowledge of racing and knowledge from his time at
Renault, so hopefully he can get in the car and drive quickly. I think we’ve got a pretty good development package with myself, Pedro [de la Rosa] and Lewis [Hamilton] continuing from last year, and hopefully Heikki can add to that and we can just pull together to produce a car that Lewis and Heikki can go and win races with.
Q:
Turning the attention onto your own racing activities, you competed in the DTM in 2007. How did it feel to return to the championship you’d won two years earlier?
GP:
It was great to come back; it’s a great series, and I really enjoyed racing again. It’s racing that I missed when I wasn’t racing in 2006, and that’s what I really loved about getting back into the seat. Winning at Oschersleben was a massive bonus for me, and that’s what I want to do – I want to be out racing and winning races. That’s the biggest aim for myself really.
Q:
You were in an older car than the 2007-spec ones. Did you expect to win a) so soon or b) at all?
GP:
I didn’t expect to, no. There’s no way of expecting to win [in a year-old car] – it’s never happened before and it hasn’t happened since – but certainly we had a chance to win a race and we took that chance. I think that’s what it’s all about; when you’re in a year-old car you have to take your chances when you get them, and that’s what we did.
Q:
How different was the series to when you’d last competed in it?
