Track Interviews - Conducted by David Coulthard
Oscar, it was a brilliant Saturday, not such a strong Sunday. You've got to take us right to the beginning. It looked like you had the corner and, in the end, Max swept around the outside.
Oscar Piastri: Yeah, just braked too early. And, yeah, I mean, it was a good move by Max as well. So, disappointing, obviously, but I think we made a few wrong calls after that anyway. Not our best Sunday. Definitely a lot of things to look at and review from that one. But, yeah, well done to Max and Red Bull. It was a good move but also, they had pace today. We'll look back at that one and see what we can do a bit better.
The rest of the race was obviously decided by first Virtual Safety Car, the luck of the draw when you make your stop, and then the full course Safety Car. Put us in the cockpit for those particular events and restarts.
OP: Yeah, it was tricky. Obviously, the VSC was perfectly timed for Max and Lando. I'd obviously used both my hard tyres at that point, so made the last restart pretty tricky. I tried my best to hang on to second, but, yeah, just had nowhere near enough grip. So, third it is.
Just on that overtake from your team-mate, always difficult when two cars are going into a tight apex. Just enough room for him there. But when you're on those older tyres, it was pretty close with your front axle.
OP: Yeah, it was tricky. I tried my best to hang on, but just didn't have the grip. I tried my best and it was inevitable. I think it was inevitable that he was going to get past, but I wasn't going to give up without a fight.
Well, congratulations. Still a podium.
OP: Thank you very much.
We have our second-place finisher here, Lando Norris. Well, it was an interesting Grand Prix. You started fourth, so that looked like it was going to make it a long afternoon for you. But as the race went on, it came to you, and we saw that brilliant battle in the end with your team-mate.
Lando Norris: Yeah, it was a long race from that perspective. Not easy to overtake, but we did what we could. I think Max drove a good race. They were quick today - probably a bit quicker. We couldn't keep up, and we had a good little battle at the end between Oscar and myself, which is always tense, but always good fun. But a good race. From us as a team, second and third is great. Of course, we would love to be up there fighting against Max, but they were too good for us today.
We saw some great wheel-to-wheel action with you having a go around the outside at the second chicane of the Mercedes. Just explain to us, when you commit to those sort of overtakes, you're putting a lot of trust in the guy on the inside.
LN: Yeah, I mean, it's with George, and I could tell he was struggling with the tyres a lot. It's just a situation you got to take advantage of. I mean, it's always risky. You never want to take too much risk, but we're also racing. And he's a fair racer. He's a good racer. So, some good moves today.
Well, congratulations on that result. By the way, you smell spectacular. I don't know what McLaren cologne you have.
LN: [laughs] Thanks!
As we come to our victor. Well Max, when the lights went out, it looked like you were staring down the barrel of coming out of the first corner in third place. You had Oscar who made a very good start and we had George right up his gearbox. But somehow, you had the commitment to go around the outside. Relive that moment.
Max Verstappen: Yeah. The start itself wasn't particularly great, but then I was still on the outside line - or basically the normal line - and I was like, "Well, I'm just going to try and send it around the outside." And it worked really well. That, of course, then unleashed our pace, because once we were in the lead, the car was good. I could look after my tyres and we had very good pace on it today. So, again, massive improvement from Friday, and I'm very, very pleased with that. Then that VSC was quite handy to pit. And even then, even on the Hard compound, I think our pace was very strong. But then, of course, there was a Safety Car, so the field was all back together. But even then, on the restart, I think we managed it all really well and, yeah, brought it home. Incredibly proud of everyone. It's been a very important week for us. The car has performed really well. And also, I think the whole execution of the race - when to pit, the pit stops themselves - they were all very good.
So, it's the 400th Grand Prix for the team. Your 65th victory, which, congratulations. That's an incredible statistic. We're into this triple header here. Well, you started it with also doing a bit of running last weekend as well. It seems that you just want to be on track at all times.
MV: Yeah. I mean, I like driving. I like racing in Formula 1. I like racing any kind of car. And, of course, next week is a completely different kind of track in Monaco. You know, that's also going to be very challenging. But for the moment, I just want to enjoy today and really take it in.
Well, we do want you to do that. But maybe just a quick word to the fans here at this Grand Prix. It's a historic racetrack, one that gave us a great Grand Prix.
MV: Yeah, I mean, it's always fantastic to be in Italy. Proper passion for motorsports. So, yeah, it's fantastic to see all these fans out here the whole weekend. So, yeah, thank you very much for coming and supporting all the drivers.
Press Conference
Max, very well done. The perfect race for you. Brilliant move on Oscar at Turn 1 after which there was no looking back.
MV: Yeah, the initial start wasn't that amazing, but then Turn 2, luckily, worked out quite well for me. So I was, of course, happy to be in the lead, but I was still not entirely sure how quick we were going to be because, of course, I was also in the lead in Miami, but we did not have a great pace there. So, I just tried to follow a bit my rhythm. I do think the car felt a bit nicer, a bit more controlled to drive now also in the long run, and that helped me, I think, also then look after the tyres probably a bit more than normal. So, yeah, overall, quite surprising, but, of course, very happy with what we showed today. Just hope that we can, you know, show this kind of performance a bit more often.
Can you give us a few more details on that lap one, Turn 1 move for the lead? You just said that your initial start wasn't great. At what point in the corner did you realize you got the job done?
MV: I think it's a bit like I started to carry a bit more speed to the apex. And then at one point, you have that kind of momentum swing then going into Turn 3. And then, of course, I knew that I was ahead, but it all goes so fast. And you have to be really precise, you know, to try and not go too far offline. But, yeah, luckily, the grip was alright there.
Any dramas at all after that?
MV: It's bumpy. So, yeah, my back is pretty hurting.
You pitted under the VSC on lap 29. How much longer could you have gone on the medium tyre, do you think?
MV: Not a lot. I mean, they were getting quite destroyed. It was already quite hard to be consistent in those last few laps. So, it wouldn't have been long before I think I was in.
And was a one-stop race possible?
MV: Yeah, for sure. I mean, that's why we just kept on going. I think Lando and I would have done a one-stop.
You mentioned at the start you hope that this sort of performance can continue going forward. Just how confident are you? Do you think it's track specific? And just give us a little preview of Monaco as well.
MV: I do think again, you know, this track has quite a few high-speed corners, which I think our car likes. I also think we took a step forward with the setup of the car, which helps. Monaco is, of course, very, very different. So, let's see how we are going to perform there. You know, last year was very difficult for us. I don't expect it to be a lot easier this time around because there's, of course, a lot of low speed, but we'll see. I mean, it's just one race on the calendar, where you try to do the best you can. Even after that, there's a lot of races left, but, of course, you can clearly see that once we go to high-speed tracks and corners, then we are more competitive.
Okay Max, great race, well done. Thank you very much for that. Lando, let's come to you now. Your fourth podium here at Imola. How does this P2 compare to your pre-race expectations?
LN: I mean, it's probably the best result I thought we could really achieve today. I probably just didn't expect the Red Bull to be quite as quick as they were. I'm happy with second. From fourth, it was a good race. But, yeah, Max was too fast today. It was a fun one.
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