Good morning and welcome to Monza ahead of the Italian V-Prix weekend, round sixteen of the 2018 Formula Virtual season. Joining us for today’s Thursday press conference; on the back row we have Cory Evans of Koenigsegg Team Holmqvist and Bradley Downton of Downton FV Team. On the front row are; Alex Easton from Phoenix Motorsport, Adam Blocker from FIRST Motorsport, and Rai Miyamoto of Ocelot Japan Racing. Welcome to you all. Reporter: As usual we’ll start with the winners of the previous V-Prix, Downton. Bradley; congratulations on winning such a special race a fortnight ago, despite the incident at the end which we’ll come to shortly. How huge was that result for the team and for Klaas? Bradley Downton: It was massive; it has really lifted the entire team. After the season we had last year, going nine races without a win was tough for the boys and girls, so to pick one up – especially when it came quite out of the blue given our recent lack of pace compared to DS Mathershaw and Ocelot – is brilliant. The fact it was the hundredth race helped too. That’s cemented in history now and we’ll forever be the team that won the hundredth Formula Virtual race, that’s pretty special. With regards to Klaas, it helped lift his mood certainly, but he’s still not happy in the car. There’s still a lot of work to do there, but hopefully this will help lift his confidence back up, and that’s half the battle. Reporter: After the incident near the end of the race, do you think stricter punishments need to be brought in for backmarkers interfering with faster cars? BD: I think a lot of us in the paddock have been pushing for stricter punishments for a while now, especially in terms of the backmarkers. Look at that other series – that Formula One thing – some guy got a ten second stop/go penalty for taking the leader out last weekend I hear – and I think that’s absolutely spot on. Obviously it’s trickier here because of how things run, and usually penalties for those at the back don’t affect things as much, but I think they should still be handed out – at least in some sense. It’s disappointing, but we’ve got to a point this season where very little seems to get punished, so we didn’t even bother asking for an inquest into the incident, it seemed like a waste of time. I understand the stewards’ point of view on this; they don’t want to just go handing out penalties here, there and everywhere, but I think we need some firm rules and guidelines. Perhaps it’s something that can be discussed and looked at over the winter? Reporter: Same question to you Cory, as Will was involved. Cory Evans: Yes. What happened there was a shambles and it cost Will second place. It keeps happening and nothing gets done. It needs to change. I think back to Mexico 2016 when one of our drivers hit Felix who was then leading, and they absolutely deserved a penalty because it was stupid, but nothing then either. We need to be more severe and consistent in terms of penalties for idiotic driving. Reporter: I think everyone is in agreement with you there. As your 2019 line up has already been confirmed; how impressed have you been with Beyer, Bergkvist and Thunstrom in their respective 2018 campaigns? CE: We would not have signed them if we had not been impressed. Felix has been on Will’s pace and quicker on more occasions than we expected, so that was a no-brainer. Meanwhile, Seb and Max have both done brilliantly in their seasons. Both were in the Championship fights, and for Max especially that was brilliant given he was only a rookie. Reporter: Adam, Oleksandr was involved in the incident and was quite vocal about it on social media afterwards, stating that Vocquelin doesn’t know how to race. Do you agree with his criticism? Adam Blocker: In general I agree with his assessment of Vocquelin, although in this case I think it was a racing incident. And Zozulya also shares some responsibility for ignoring blue flags before the incident. Reporter: As well as that, there was a rather big crash earlier on in the race between Alvarez and Vasquez. Alex, what’s your take on that? Alex Easton: I’ve not watched it back all that much – I’ve only really seen the replays at the time – but it looked like one of those unfortunate racing incidents to be honest. Sergio has had two of those in a row now, both quite similar actually in that he came upon an accident unsighted and ended up with terminal damage, but that’s just one of those things. Sergio went to the medical centre after James was taken there to make sure he was okay – thankfully he’d only suffered minor injuries and was a little shaken up, but was fine really. The two of them have actually had identical paths to Formula Virtual; VARS in 2015, moving up to FV2 for 2016 and 2017, then both of them in their rookie years this season in FV. So they have a lot in common and get on really well! We’re all just thankful that no one was seriously hurt at the end of the day – which is testament to the fantastic safety of these cars. Reporter: It certainly was a scary one. Rai, coming to you now; the decision to run Kinnumen for the last few races seems to be paying off as you’ve now overtaken Franklin for third in the Constructors’ standings. How important is it for the team to maintain third? Rai Miyamoto: I think bringing Kinnumen in was a good call by us, unfortunately I feel this move may have and should have been done a lot sooner in regards to how many points we were unlucky to have dropped. But I’m hoping it can still pay off however with keeping third crucially. Reporter: Since this is the first time we’ve had you in here since Cheema FV Racing were announced to be running Alfa engines next season; how much benefit do you think them running the same engines as Ocelot will have? RM: It’s fantastic to bring Ahmed aboard he’s a seriously passionate dude around the paddock and our relationship is very strong, we hope this partnership works out for us both very well. So it’s fantastic to have him come aboard to the Alfa brand. Reporter: Same question to you too actually, Adam, with AMR joining you in running Ford engines? AB: Data is invaluable in any industry, but in motorsports especially. In FV we have limited track time, so while the Ford engineers can do a lot of calibration and data gathering on engine and chassis dynos, running an engine on the track is always slightly different to running on the dyno for a number of reasons. The cooling system on the car is completely different, the electrical harness is slightly different, the vibrations are different, and the track is the only time to truly test driveability. Having more cars on track should help better correlate dyno performance to car performance, improve engine driveability, and provide more data to justify future design decisions. We will also inevitably have more engines failures to learn lessons from due to the increase in engines running on track, which should allow us to correct reliability problems faster. Reporter: Thank you for the incredibly detailed answer! Okay, we’ll get the fan questions out now. First one here is for you Alex; “Are you a B team to DS Mathershaw?” AE: Haha, if I had a quid for every time someone’s said that over the last few weeks, I’d have... well, about a tenner. With regards to Phoenix becoming a ‘B’ team; we’ve got a little something to announce soon on that, keep an eye on our social media! Reporter: Intriguingly cryptic! Alright next up is for FIRST; “Is it true that you get a lot of people calling asking for birthday cards and cakes for their one year olds?” AB: No one ever calls twice. Reporter: Similar type of question for you Cory; “On average, how many people mispronounce your team’s name on a daily basis?” CE: In Sweden, no-one. Everywhere else, quite a few. It probably is not the easiest of names to get your tongue around. What is more annoying though is seeing my first name spelt with an e. I have no idea where people have got that from, but it is Cory, not Corey. Reporter: I’ve seen that too, I’ll be sure to correct people in future! Oooh, great one here for you Bradley. “If you could only listen to one album for a whole week, what would it be?” BD: Oh wow, what a brilliant question. I think my answer is either going to shock you completely, or you’ll know me enough that it’s completely expected. Firstly let me just say though, I’m not big on albums. I’m more the kind of guy who – if I like a song, I like the song – and that’s that. Having said that, there’s one artist I simply adore; Taylor Swift. To ask me to pick an album, cor blimey. I mean, Fearless has Love Story which was just brilliant. Speak Now has so many great songs on it and then Red has Begin Again. It would definitely be an older album as opposed to her newer stuff. Oh, I don’t know, can’t I choose all three? Reporter: Nope, it says one album on the card, you’ll have to choose one! BD: Oh fine. Fearless. No, Speak Now. Yes. Speak Now – final answer. Reporter: Ha, excellent! I like that question so I’ll throw it out to the rest of you. AB: Metallica – Metallica, also known as ‘The Black Album’. RM: I’m not really sure, in all honesty I’m a bit of a pain when it comes to music. I tend to choose songs that I like from albums rather than choosing a whole album together. I do however really like the songs Simple Man by Shinedown and John Cash’s Hurt. Guess you could say we have a fun atmosphere. AE: Definitely Maybe by Oasis. I suppose it depends a lot on where you’re at in your life; if you asked me ten years ago god knows what I would’ve said, probably a hip-hop album, it all comes down to where you’re at in your life and what really resonates with you, y’know what I mean? For me, music isn’t just about something being a good tune. Definitely Maybe has fantastic tunes right the way through, I never skip a single song. But the main thing for me is the feeling that it gives you when you listen to it; it absolutely encapsulates the feeling of Manchester in the nineties and early two thousands perfectly. I suppose if you’re not a Mancunian, it probably won’t have anywhere near the same effect, but even so, it’s a quality album in it’s own right and there’s nothing I love listening to more. CE: It would be Avicii’s two albums. I cannot pick just one. Reporter: Great answers guys, it’s nice when we get some of these more personal questions sent in sometimes isn’t it? Question to all of you now; what is your take on the expansion to fifteen teams for next year? And what do you make of the new entries that have been confirmed over the last couple of weeks? AB: I’m pleased that the series is strong enough to support fifteen entries. Running a team in FV takes a lot of resources so it says a lot that some teams are willing to enter FV despite not being guaranteed to qualify for races, given the costs. It will be interesting to see how the new teams do. They can only learn so much from what previous new teams have done due to how much the series has changed and will change. However, I still think that the Lucas team has an advantage here from their previous FV experience, so I predict them to be the best team over the long term. And they signed Arden Hutchinson who knows how to qualify a car. BD: I think it’s absolutely fantastic that more people are being given the chance to be a part of this truly wonderful series! I think they all look like solid outfits. Obviously Lucas have some experience and have signed into the best technical partnership with ourselves and DS Performance. From what I’ve seen of the Andromeda team they look exciting and like they could cause a surprise or two, and Cheema are going to be such a great addition. Ahmed is a brilliant bloke and so passionate about the series, it’s great to finally see him as a proper part of it with a team. RM: As I said before it’s great to bring teams in, I mean all be it we feel fifteen is a bit much but, it is what it is. It’s great to have Ahmed on board and nice to see the purple back with Lucas, while Andromeda could cause a few upsets. CE: I think it is good for the series for more people to be involved. I have not seen much of the new entries but good luck to them, it is nice to see a mix of new and returning teams. AE: Ah it’s fantastic isn’t it? Formula Virtual is constantly growing – I’ve actually heard rumours that we’re gonna get sixteen teams next year but we’ll see if we get an official confirmation on that – but yeah two more teams than the previous seasons means that even more people will be involved with the sport, which is fantastic. I think in the cases of Cheema and especially Andromeda; those teams are from countries who’ve never before had a team in Formula Virtual so I’m sure will provide much more exposure than ever in their respective countries. As to what I make of the three confirmed teams coming in; I spoke to Lucas Wilson (Team principal of Lucas V-Prix) in the paddock in Belgium and he seems like a great guy, our oaths never really crossed back in the day as we were in FV2 at the time, but it’s been great to meet him and we’ll obviously see quite a bit of each other with both our teams being in the DS-Downton stable from 2019 onwards. Ahmed (Cheema, team principal of Cheema FV Racing) is a guy who I’ve known for a long time now, we’ve always had good chats since he first started appearing at race weekends. With us loaning Carson to them for next year, pairing up with Nikolai, I reckon they’ve got a great driver line up. And then we have Hector, and the Andromeda team. I’ve personally not had many dealings with him – only really to greet each other as we’ve passed in the paddock – but he seems very ambitious, and I’m sure the engine deal with Honda will serve them well, Honda seem like a reliable engine year in, year out. They’ve also signed Will (Hoskins), who is a great driver. Brazil next season is gonna be even more mental than usual with the Brazilian fans having a team to cheer on, as well as Enrique! Reporter: We’ll stick with you actually, Alex. There’s been a lot of speculation from experts this season that you’ll struggle next year, having had such a good first season in FV. Do you think Phoenix will be behind the new teams? AE: Yeah I’ve heard plenty of that! Straight up honest answer is no, I don’t think we’ll be behind the new teams. That’s certainly not the plan anyway! But if we are, that just means they’ve done a better job than us and we need to work harder, it’s… look – 2018 has been phenomenal – we’ve gone toe to toe with twelve, then eleven, of the best virtual motorsport teams in the world… and currently hold seventh. In my eyes it’s an absolute honour to even be here, and a huge achievement to even beat one of the others, within reason. In all honesty, no one knows where anyone will be next season until testing gets underway, so you can ask me again in March! Reporter: I’ll be sure to! Alright then final question to everyone, you know the drill guys. What are your expectations for this weekend? AB: To be in a position to capitalise if chaos happens and continue making use of practice sessions to gather valuable data. BD: I mean, we’d love another win, but I think we need to be realistic. A podium and strong points is the aim. The bigger goals for the weekend are to keep ourselves in both Championship fights somehow, and ensure we confirm ourselves in at least second in the Constructors so there is no threat from behind in the final two races, and so we can then focus all our efforts on somehow overturning the mammoth advantage Adrien and DS Mathershaw have built up. You’ll see from our tyre choices – once they’re announced on Saturday afternoon – that we’ve gone bold here. We know we don’t quite have the pace and have to work strategy to our advantage, so this is it. The call really is win or bust for us this weekend I feel, I just hope it goes our way. RM: It’s going to be an emotional one for us, in our second home, in front of the Tifosi, Puccio also needing that form to return. I’m hoping for something amazing but again I expect DS or Downton to be too good. AE: Points would be great, but it’ll be a tough ask. I reckon we might be able to challenge Holmqvist here as we’ve looked to be close to them recently and we should have a slight engine advantage, but North Star’s V12 should put them right up with us, and you can never count out Lopez – it could be a great scrap actually! CE: Points, simple as that. Potentially picking up another big result if we can nail another strategy call, but we would need luck. We have nothing left to fight for now this season though, focus is solely on 2019. Reporter: Excellent stuff guys. That’s all we’ve got time for today, thank you to all the team principals in attendance and everyone at home for tuning in. Make sure you catch us tomorrow for Friday practice in Monza! Comments are closed.
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