Jun
15
Hello everyone,
Well, it has been a while since I last updated you all on my progress. I have just woken up this morning from probably one of the most promising but yet disappointing race weekends in my life.
Before my race at Zandvoort this weekend we had tested at Hungary and made some very big improvements with the car and I finished up 5th. I now have a great feeling in my car for both old and new tyres. With all of this I went into Zandvoort full of confidence expecting a good weekend.
I kept myself relaxed coming into the weekend and had been on many long bike rides in the great weather and also flying my model planes. It is important to have other interests and hobbies because otherwise you could very easily get mentally exhausted from just living racing all of the time. Although, having said that, everything I do away from the track certainly contributes to my on track performance. Being 18 years old you can imagine all of my school friends are into lots of partying and drinking alcohol… but as a racing driver this is not an option for me. I cannot do any of this. I see a lot of my friends but they all understand that my career is far more important to me than any party so it’s not too bad.
So, the race weekend.
I arrived at Zandvoort in Holland for my second race weekend of the season on Thursday morning. I immediately loved the place. It is a real racing circuit. It is a very difficult circuit to hook a lap up though as it is very easy to make a mistake. Most of the corners have a big camber which allow you to carry massive entry speed and roll through the corner but not fly off the circuit.
We had an official test on Thursday evening for 1 hour. This went pretty well running in the top 4 on old tyres but then I made a mistake and went off at one of the fast 5th gear corners at the back of the circuit. I was lucky not to hit the wall but luckily the floor of the car dug in and it ripped all of the floors off the car which actually stopped me hitting the wall! This could have been quite bad as it is a 150kph corner. I limped back to the pits with 15 minutes remaining. The team put my car on jacks and did a mega job in getting me back out again. Because only so few minutes were left we decided to use my new tyres straight away. This was not ideal after just going off but still we ended up 8th overall and my pace was good.
My engineer Boyo was happy and I said to him that the car was very good. I felt happy for the free practice on Friday.
Free practice went very well on Friday. We finished in 9th but we didnt have new tyres so it was positive and we got blocked by traffic a few times.
Qualifying however was very unlucky. On my first set of tyres I was running very well in the top 4 and decided to pit 1 lap later for my new tyres to miss the traffic at the end of the session and to also have a slightly lighter car. I came in, and built up with a very good out lap. My first flying lap put me P.3 but the others were on lap 2 so I dropped to P.8 but I was on my lap 2 also with a green in my first sector only to have a red flag!!! This was a big disappointment. Because with the clock still counting down and only 6 minutes remaining when we got going again at the restart my tyres had been through a heat cycle and the best was gone. I managed another lap within 1 tenth of a second of my best so I ended up with 8th and 6th on the grid. In reality and we could see from the data, if it was not for the red flag I genuinely should have been at the very least the front 2 rows of the grid for both races.
With my pace in my mind I felt good for my races. For race 1 my first lap was a bit scrappy though and because we were the first race of the day and all of the sand offline it was very difficult to overtake so I finished a very processional race in 10th place. The pace was there I knew that so I was hoping for a much better race in the afternoon.
My second race was late in the afternoon after the F3 masters race. At the start 3 drivers including myself all moved on the grid thinking the lights had come off but they didn’t. I did not move far and the stewards said I was 4 inches out of my grid slot. I didn’t know this at the time but I raced on as normal. I did actually get a very good start eventually and attacked well into the first corner. I made some very good moves and got into 4th by lap 4. I was pushing to move into 3rd position and then I was given a drive through penalty for a jump start. You cannot imagine the feeling of anger and disappointment I had at that moment. My car was awesome, really very good and I know I could have and should have won that race. I was completely hooked up and for something like that to happen just really really hurts. This morning when I woke up it hurts even more.
But, from all of this. We are running at the front and I know that my time will come. I have a great team, a great car and some great people supporting me. I just want to show them that they are all right to believe in me. My time will come. It is my home race at Silverstone next weekend so I do not have long to wait until I have another chance. It would be a dream to win at the last ever GP weekend at Silverstone and would be something very special.
I look forward to updating you all again soon.
Thanks,
Rupert
