Good morning and welcome to Montreal, Canada for the team principal’s Thursday press conference ahead of this weekend’s Canadian V-Prix – round eight of the 2019 Formula Virtual World Championship. Joining us today, from left to right, are; Nick Forrest of North Star Racing, Arthur Lapierre of Red Bull DS Automobiles Team Mathershaw, Lucas Wilson from Lucas V-Prix, and Alex Easton of Ecotricity DS Automobiles Team Phoenix. The empty seat between Nick and Arthur should’ve been Cory Evans of Koenigsegg Team Holmqvist but unfortunately, he’s unavailable to join us today, so welcome to the four of you. Reporter: We’ll start things off today with you Nick; Spain was your first podium since you won here in 2017, and Halvosen’s first podium for the team. How did it compare to the last two? Nick Forrest: It was a great feeling to get ourselves back on the rostrum, I don't mind telling you! Strategy was perfect, we did get a bit fortunate with Simon's retirement, but Beyer defended well, and he undoubtedly deserved to be up there too. It was also Johan's first for the team, as you said, he was absolutely thrilled with it, having not really been able to challenge since 2016. He went through a much tougher season with us last year, but we all kept faith in the progress we were making, and hopefully this has gone some way to repaying that faith. Reporter: That podium ended your two-race run without points, did you find an issue with the car that hampered you in those two races? NF: Strangely, no, there didn't seem to be any difference with the car between Malaysia and the two subsequent rounds. Although I think it's worth keeping in mind, Johan was caught up in that collision in Britain, and Gabriele also had that grid penalty to deal with, and then in France, Johan was easily on to score points after a difficult qualifying before his engine failed. We definitely had a lot of bad luck in those two rounds, but I don't think that can necessarily be attributed to the car, no. Reporter: That’s very true, the team haven’t had the best luck of late. Arthur; Allar just missed out on a podium after running close to Halvosen in Spain with Adrien retiring after the collision with Mario Juan Lopez; which leaves you fifty-seven points behind Downton now. Is the working relationship between the two teams becoming strained at all considering the ongoing title race? Arthur Lapierre: I think the working relationship is much as it has always been - there are a number of engineers who are involved with both sides of the partnership, so for them it's very much business as usual. As far as the race teams go, things remain the same with both teams looking after their own interests. We've been unlucky of late, so it would be nice to see the other side of that, but all things considered we're relatively happy with where we are compared to where we expected to be. Reporter: It’s incredible how well the two teams co-operate given the regular fighting at the front! Question to the two DS team principals; in light of the recent news that your respective teams will be splitting from DS Automobiles following the conclusion of this season, what does this mean for the DS Performance Young Driver Academy and all of the current young drivers in it? AL: I think it's premature to necessarily discuss the futures of the young drivers currently involved in the Academy - after all, this is their career, so there will be a number of discussions between both Alex and I to make sure both our teams as well as the drivers themselves are in the best position for the future. Alex Easton: What Arthur said, basically. Of course, the situation isn’t absolutely ideal but there are many more factors that decide the futures of our young drivers. From a Phoenix point of view, our focus on giving young drivers a pathway through the junior series and into Formula Virtual will remain a high priority target for us – as you’ve seen with Sergio and Thierry being given their FV debuts so far. So whilst the youth setup will be a little different, the principle should be pretty similar. Reporter: Sticking with you Alex, Alvarez took both Phoenix’s and his personal joint best finish in Formula Virtual last time out, how important has he been to you since he joined you last year? It was announced last weekend that you’ll be retaining your line up into 2020, how important is stability and continuity to the team? AE: To answer the first part of your question; massively important. Sergio has scored twenty-four of our thirty-three points so far in Formula Virtual, and the fact that the media have repeatedly commented on his performances against Carson – one of the most experienced drivers in Formula Virtual with two wins to his name – and Thierry – the reigning VWRS champion – just goes to show how well he’s done. Sergio goes from strength to strength each race and you can really see he’s going to have a great career in FV. As for continuity, yeah, I think it matters more to a small team of guys like we have because of the tight knit atmosphere that we want to maintain, maybe it’d matter slightly less to some of the bigger teams. Sergio has been with us from the start of our Formula Virtual career and James has been with us right from the start of his Virtual Motorsport career back in 2016, so those two in particular just ‘get’ the team and what we’re all about here, Thierry is very quickly learning what it means to be a part of our team too. Everyone at DS Phoenix was in agreement that it was virtually a no-brainer to stick with them for 2020. Reporter: That makes absolute sense then! Lucas; earlier in the season you were critical of Arden Hutchinson, but the tables have turned and it’s now Thunder who hasn’t qualified since Japan. Has Marcus been given a warning? How would you say your first season back in the sport is going as we near the season’s halfway point? Lucas Wilson: Definitely. I've had a word with him, both drivers are on a race by race contract. They are aware they need to perform. But we need to be aware that we haven't built the best car this year, that falls at my feet. We are all trying to push to create the best team. And obviously we need to do better because less experienced teams like Andromeda are running circles round us. Quite literally in some cases. Laughter Reporter: We’ve heard a lot about engines recently from DS Automobiles, where do you stand for 2020 regarding engine supply? Do you have a contract with Downton already sorted or are you looking to change? LW: First of all, we are so glad to be partnering with Downton who have provided us with exceptional engines this year. As regards the future, we will be making an announcement shortly. Reporter: That’s one to keep an eye out for! Okay onto the fan questions. First one here is for Lucas; “What is your favourite fizzy drink?” LW: Does Champagne count? Puts on purple tinted glasses Reporter: I don’t see why not! Arthur; “You’ve won here four times, is learning and speaking French the key to success around this circuit?” AL: Bien sûr! But seriously, French is a very global language - what the English-speaking world calls French-Canadian is named in French as Québecois, and is a very different dialect to Metropolitan French so for Rob learning French, it'd be like trying to understand an entirely new language again at times! For instance, the difference is huge compared to UK and US English, more similar to European and Brazilian Portuguese. However, this all has very little bearing on running a race team - in our team, as is the case up and down the paddock, the working language is generally English, with us using little bit of French for informal discussions, so whether we're in Montreal, Mexico or Melbourne, our garage is going to sound exactly the same. Reporter: Merci Arthur. Nick; “How was it commentating on a race where you got a podium? Any different to watching from the pits?” NF: Well, it was different in the sense that I had to talk for ninety minutes, continuously! In terms of not being on the pit wall, it's not too much of a challenge for the team, since strategies are locked in before the race. Johan and Gabriele have got their engineers, and Alan [Hunt] is more than capable of taking the reins if anything unexpected crops up. It does seem that North Star usually have a good race when I'm up in the booth, though, for whatever reason! Reporter: I’m sure you’d like to be up in the comms box every race if possible! Final fan question for Alex; “You’ve re-signed Thompson as your reserve driver for 2020, is he of any real value to the team?” AE: Whoever came up with that one obviously doesn’t know much about the team or James! James is what we call priceless for a whole host of reasons; his constant tireless work in the simulator and input into all of our package upgrades is phenomenal - we absolutely wouldn’t have been able to win the battle for seventh last season without that. As I mentioned earlier on, he’s been with Phoenix since his Virtual Motorsport career started in the FV3 series in 2016, then up into FV2 with us in 2017, remaining there in 2018 while also stepping up into Formula Virtual with us as reserve, and then continuing his role into the current season. Not to mention he doesn’t mind rolling his sleeves up and doubling up as a member of the race weekend team who maintain and repair the cars! But all in all, having someone who you actually get along with is by far and away the most important thing in any working relationship, and James is an all-round top bloke. Reporter: Excellent. Gentlemen, a question to you all. Recently, series CEO Nic Morley announced a raft of changes regarding the financial regulations of Formula Virtual – the first of which comes into effect at the end of the current season. Now that you have all had a few weeks to sit down with your respective teams and analyse these rule changes, how do you think they will affect a) the sport and b) your team? AL: I think the changes are interesting, and it's going to be important that teams have adequately adjusted their long-term planning to ensure financial security. I'm sure we'll see some teams prosper through this good preparation, while I'm also afraid there will be some teams that start to struggle because they don't fully realise the implications. As for us? We'll be fine. NF: Similar boat to Arthur, I'd say, North Star should be pretty much okay when the newer financial regs come into forces. From what we understand, they're intended to close up the grid, which is always a good thing. At the moment, with the way the finances are handled, there's a noticeable drop, we found, between the top three teams, and the head of the midfield where we find ourselves, before it rises back up again further down the grid, so hopefully the changes can give a better chance for teams in our position to challenge the frontrunners more consistently, rather than dropping down after just one year. LW: It will affect our team, for better, I think. I can't be certain of that but Nic is certainly very aware of us at the back of the grid and wants to see us progress. So, I think these rules changes are a positive step forward for us at least. AE: These guys have pretty much said all there is to say really; I think the sport should – in theory – see more teams able to utilise the financial structure to take the fight to the big teams. I think the financial structure that Nic and the FVA want to introduce is very fair and I don’t think there can be any complaints from teams over not receiving a fair share of the prize money. At the end of the day, the biggest financial gains are made by the teams who really market themselves well enough to establish powerful sponsorship and manufacturing connections. So, if we – Phoenix - find ourselves lacking funds to make our way up the grid, I think we only have ourselves to blame for that. Reporter: Very interesting to hear everyone’s thoughts on the rule changes, I’m sure there’ll be more discussion about them over the next few months. Finally, everyone’s hopes and expectations for the weekend, and who do you think are favourites to take the victory on Sunday? AL: I hope to win for sure, but we'll be aiming to get back on the podium after some slightly harder races lately. I'd say Downton are the favourites for sure. LW: We hope to make it on the grid as normal. For the win, I would have to say one of the Downton boys. NF: I think we have to be looking for another strong haul of points this weekend, Holmqvist seems to be closing in quite quickly, as do Ingram, so we definitely need to be outscoring them as often as we can be. In terms of the win, Downton have been on a real run recently, and they usually run well here, I think I'd probably put my money on them this weekend. AE: We’re just enjoying ourselves at the moment, to be honest. A point or two would be fantastic but my only hope is that we get a good race for the bumper crowd that we’re expecting this weekend. As for the win; Downton have been on an incredible run as Nick mentioned but that Honda V12 in the Franklin should give them a real boost on the long straight – I’d guess one of the Downton’s or Enrique.
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