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1 – Nico ROSBERG (Mercedes)
2 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
3 – Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN (Ferrari)
PODIUM INTERVIEWS
(Conducted by David Coulthard)
Q: Nico, that must taste good?
Nico ROSBERG: Delicious! The best ever!
Q: It’s been an incredible end to the season. This was, to me, your most
dominant win of the season, so tell us a little bit about the race and the
hunger you took into this final race of the season.
NR: No, I mean, yeah, Austin was sort of the low point of the season. It was
a tough weekend and since then I’ve just come back a lot stronger and I’m
very happy about that. I’m excited about how the end of the season went.
Next year can come any moment. It could start tomorrow if it were for me, no
problem, I don’t need any holidays! But, no, it’s great to end the season
like this, go on holiday like this and thank you so much, you’ve been
awesome again this weekend, for all your support and everything, thanks to
my team, absolutely stunning car you’ve all given me again today – just
unbelievable. Ecstatic.
Q: You mentioned Austin there. We could see the disappointment as the
realisation the championship had slipped away at that race. Can you tell us
a little bit, give the fans at home an insight. You’ve got the enemy within
the team, you work together to develop this great product but your success
is Lewis’ failure and his success is your failure. Can you give us an
insight into how you manage that? Because you guys have known each other
since you were kids.
NR: Yeah, it’s always tough to race Lewis, he’s doing an awesome job and
he’s one of the best out there, so an even better feeling to win, definitely
against such opposition. It’s a great battle internally all the time. That’s
what I race for, such battles, and I look forwards to more next year.
Q: Does that mean you guys can go and have dinner together now and reflect
on what was an amazing season for the team?
NR: Let’s skip that part – maybe we’ll catch up in the Amber Lounge later
on.
Q: Lewis, an amazing season for you – your World Champion Ladies and
Gentleman – it’s been a great season for you, I couldn’t help but notice it
doesn’t seem to have finished quite as strong as it started. We heard you
mention that there have been some changed to the car and it hasn’t quite
suited you but is it as simple as that or is there something else we need to
know now the season’s over?
Lewis HAMILTON: Well, firstly it’s been an amazing – an amazing – year, and
happy 44th UAE National Day. So happy to be here and celebrating it with the
UAE, they’ve done an amazing job for this show – and what a great crowd
we’ve had today. No man, it’s been a good year. I’m happy. I’m happy it’s
over, for sure. So now we can really enjoy. I really have to take my hat off
to this team who once again did an amazing job in building this car. The
pitstops today, the performance through the whole year, they’ve surpassed
their own expectations, our expectations, and so we’ve truly shown that
Mercedes-Benz is the best team in the world. I’m proud to be a part of it.
Q: Just to touch on strategy, we heard you again on the radio, asking the
team “can I go the distance on these tyres?” We know the team have to
deliver the one-two result. Nico earned the pole, he was leading the race –
is that just the inner racer in you? Even though you probably know ahead of
time that there’s nothing that can be done, that’s why you’re pushing your
engineers, pushing the team.
LH: No, I think in hindsight once Nico pitted I would probably have backed
off a little bit and I would have made those tyres go a lot longer. The
tyres were still fine at the end so I honestly felt that I could potentially
have taken them to the end. But as that didn’t work out, going too long was
probably not the right thing to do – but y’know, we gave it a try and did
the best job I could with it.
Q: I’ll just come around to Kimi Räikkönen. Ladies and Gentlemen,
statistically this is the most popular man in Formula One. You probably say
less than any of the other drivers, so welcome back to the podium. It’s not
been a great season for you but that was a World Champion’s drive today – so
why has it taken so long in the season to deliver this great performance?
Kimi RÄIKKÖNEN: I think we started better this season but obviously not been
ideal this year. That’s how it goes sometimes. And y’know, the speed has
been there but mistakes and problems and stuff like that. So the end result
hasn’t been great many times but today, or this weekend, was a bit better.
Everything was working well and things were running smoothly, car handling
well, so, it was good – but obviously not enough still to beat these two
but, y’know we did our best.
Q: Nico, finally with yourself, the smile says it all. The World
Championship is the one thing… this is your 14th victory. You can take pole
positions, you can win grands prix – how are you going to attack the winter
and come back next year and try and beat this man?
NR: Well I look forward to it as I’m sure it’s going to be another great
season next year. I’m sure the team is going to give us an awesome car
again. Of course we’re aware of the threat from the red guys and we don’t
them to come too close and we’ll give it everything over the winter. I’ll
try to keep it going, the current form, starting next year.
PRESS CONFERENCE
Q: You knew what Lewis was doing, obviously, in terms of strategy in the
final part of the Grand Prix, the offset on the tyres etc, and you
responded. Are you pleased with the way you drove today?
NR: Yeah, for sure, ecstatic with the way it went, because really
master-managed... controlled the pace through the race and managed my tyres
and used them optimally and pushed all the way through to the end, so had
good pace there with tyres that’s for sure and had a lot more laps on them
than Lewis’s so very pleased with that, definitely.
Q: I wonder which of the two of you goes into the winter feeling the
happier?
NR: I’m feeling very happy.
Q: Lewis, you’re a three time World Champion, it’s been a record-breaking
year, which of the two of you goes into the winter feeling the happier?
LH: I think being World Champion sounds a lot better than winning the race,
so that’s good.
Q: Tell us a little bit about your race because we were let in on quite a
lot of radio, partly, as David Coulthard just referred to there, your
question whether or not there was an argument for staying out, but also in
the final stages there to do with the engine modes and some quite firm
instructions from your engineer, what they wanted you to do. Maybe you could
just let us into that a little bit and also from a strategy point of view,
you pitted after Vettel who went onto supersofts and you put softs on, so
maybe you could just explain that?
LH: Well, I just did what I was told pretty much, most of the time and then
yeah, I tried as hard as I could in the first stint, I tried to keep a
relatively decent gap to Nico, looking after my tyres and then my right
front... or both fronts went off quite early and Nico was able to... in the
clean air, was able to look after them. In the second stint I was quicker
and getting close and then... I could make the tyres last longer, yeah, of
course, but after that it was really down to the team, whether or not we
went to the option or the other tyre. I’m not sure which one was better but
the prime tyre was quite good. I’m not sure whether or not I could have
taken it to the end but some part of me just wishes I’d just given it a go.
But no, the engine modes were going up and down throughout the race, not
really sure they were like that because they had lots of life left in my
engine but I’ll ask when I get back to the debrief.
Q: Kimi, your third podium of this championship, you finished eleven seconds
behind Lewis which is about 0.2s per lap over the Grand Prix distance here.
Do you take encouragement from the way that Ferrari’s finished the last
couple of races going into the winter and next year?
KR: I think the whole year, as a team, has been quite good comparing last
year and obviously not so good for myself but the speed has been there and
it’s just not been able to produce the results and having some issues and
mistakes but this weekend has been pretty OK, the car’s been handling well.
I think in the race we could have been quite a bit closer but we had some
issues at both pit stops so we lost some time and then I slowed down a bit.
But I think we had a reasonably good speed, they didn’t really pull away a
lot from us. At certain points, I think we were catching them and then they
were pulling out but not an awful lot in it. It’s never nice to finish third
but I’ll take it after previous races. I guess it always could have been a
better finish but OK, I think it was more or less what we expected to get.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Lennart Bernke – Bild) Nico, Lewis, will you get each other a Christmas
present?
NR: Hmm, maybe a Christmas card.
LH: I don’t think we’ve ever done either so there’s no reason to change.
Q: (Rami Akhawi – Car on Web) Nico, about next year, are we going to see you
as a World Champion, because already you entered the season with great
victories, so is it the same way to start 2016?
NR: Well, unfortunately 2016 is so far away. At the moment I’m just enjoying
now, enjoying the wins. I’m going to party tonight, I’m enjoying the fun,
enjoying that I progressed also a lot in the end of the season, too late for
the championship of course, but so great now to have it and that’s it. I
can’t tell you about next year unfortunately, but I’ll give it everything
Q: (Fadi Kallassina – Arab Shift) Lewis, what’s your feeling for not getting
the first position with the 44 celebration national day?
LH: I’m really grateful to have been associated with the UAE with the 44th
national day. Yeah, I’m still going for that 44th win. I’m quite happy with
the amount of wins I’ve had in my career. Of course, I always want more but
I have to be grateful for the ones I do have. Hopefully we’ve got another
three years with this team so I’m looking forward to next year, to come back
fit and healthy and let’s see what we can do next year.
Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Kimi, does it now, afterwards, feel any
better to finish the season fourth (in the Drivers’ championship) instead of
being fifth and especially after being 12th last season?
KR: Not really. You guys have been asking between me and Valtteri for a long
time and still it doesn’t make much difference to me. It’s not what you
think, a Finnish championship, it’s a World Championship and there are
winners it goes from there. If you don’t win, it doesn’t make an awful lot
of difference if you’re second, wherever you finish. I’m happy to have had a
kind of OK race in the last one but it doesn’t change anything really of how
our season went, what to expect for next year. One of the better weekends
but we’ll take it and go from here. |
