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Xevi Pujolar, Chief Race
Engineer: We head to the Autódromo José Carlos Pace, more commonly
known by its former name, Interlagos, for the final race of the season.
It is a challenging track that is known for its long top-speed section
up the hill and some high speed turns with lack of run-off area. Despite
only being resurfaced a few years ago, the track remains quite bumpy,
therefore good ride quality is required to achieve the performance in
the grip limited sections. The bumpiness and the anti-clockwise nature
of the circuit combined together make it a difficult race for the
drivers.The circuit has two high-speed sectors, a fast corner
combination at the end of the long straight and the twisty infield
section that requires a lot of grip, good ride quality and stability.
The second sector is very technical and the other sectors are driven by
speed. The compromise between downforce and drag is therefore key to
getting a good laptime. After an improved performance in Austin, the
team are aiming to continue to momentum to finish the season with
another points finish.
Pastor Maldonado: Brazil is one of the most enjoyable races of
the season and I always look forward to coming back. It may not have the
same impressive infrastructure as some of the newer circuits, but the
atmosphere is amazing and the track is very historic and usually leads
to very interesting racing as there are a couple of good overtaking
opportunities. The circuit layout is technically challenging and you
need to find a good balance when setting the car up between the
medium-low speed corners in sector 2 and the long straight as you exit
turn 12. The track surface is also very bumpy so you need a car that can
react well to this. Heavy rain is also common and if you react quickly
and are on the right tyre at the right time, you can make up a lot of
places. This will be my last Grand Prix as a Williams driver after three
seasons with the team so it will be an emotional race, and hopefully I
can have a good weekend and finish on a high.
Valtteri Bottas: After a strong performance in Austin where I
picked up my first points for the team, I think we will have a good
opportunity to finish in the top ten once again in Brazil. The weather
is often quite variable at Interlagos which gives teams a chance to play
with their strategy and make up places if we see rain during qualifying
or the race. I drove in FP1 last year and I have done a lot of work in
our simulator which correlates well to the actual track so I’m feeling
well prepared. The circuit is anti-clockwise, so has more left handed
corners than right handed ones, which is different to most tracks and
you need a car that has good downforce and is good in long corners.
There is normally a different atmosphere to this race as it’s the final
one of the season and historically the races are very entertaining, so
I’m looking forward to racing here and hopefully finishing my first
season in Formula One with a good result that will give us confidence
going in to next year.
Rémi Taffin, Renault Sport F1 Head of Track Operations:
Interlagos is a tough one. Sao Paulo is around 800m above sea level,
which has a big impact on the power of the engine. As the altitude
increases the air pressure drops and the air is thinner with a lower
oxygen content. For every 100m the engine loses around 1% of its
potential power output, meaning the RS27 will produce around 8% less
power than at a sea-level race such as Korea. For these reasons we
generally use engines with a higher mileage on their third race as power
sensitivity is not so critical. Over the course of the lap the track
also undulates significantly, putting the oil and fuel systems under
considerable pressure, particularly the last long left hand corner onto
the pit straight. The variety of corners also requires every engine
characteristic to be on form; top end power down the long, curved – but
also uphill – straight and good driveability through the back section.
Interlagos will see us wave good bye to the V8 engines after eight
seasons so naturally we want to get a strong finish to give it a good
send off.
Paul Hembery, Pirelli Motorsport Director: We’ve chosen the P
Zero Orange hard and P Zero White medium tyres for Brazil, which should
be best suited to deal with the different demands of the famous
Interlagos circuit, where uncertain weather is always a key additional
factor. There are a number of things to look out for in Brazil: despite
being resurfaced a few years back the track is always quite bumpy, which
makes it hard for
the tyres to find traction and increases the physical demands on the
drivers. However, with a relative absence of high lateral loadings,
apart from the final sector, Interlagos is not expected to be too
demanding on the tyres. As a result, we’re not expecting a particularly
high degree of wear or degradation during the race. Just like last year,
we’ll be giving all the teams the opportunity to test next year’s tyres
during Friday free practice. This should be of benefit to everybody,
given the fundamental changes in the technical regulations next year.
Race Data
Friday:
Practice 1: 10:00 - 11:30
Practice 2: 14:00 - 15:30
Saturday:
Practice 3: 11:00 - 12:00
Qualifying: 14:00 – 15:00
Sunday:
Race: 14:00
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