Good morning and welcome to Fuji, Japan for the Team Representatives’ Thursday press conference ahead of this weekend’s Japanese V-Prix – the opening race of the 2022 Formula Virtual World Championship. Joining us today, from left to right, are; Ben Farrell of Arrow Mechanics, Harry Westwood from… sigh Samsung Galaxy Red Bull Westwood Racing Technology TotalEnergies Peugeot Sport Engineered, Bradley Downton from Downton FV Team, Lucas Wilson of Johnnie Walker Lucas V-Prix, and Rai Miyamoto from Ocelot Japan Racing. Welcome to you all. Scott Parkin – FVTV: We’ll start the press conference with one of the huge stories following the conclusion of last season, the news of Nathaniel Powers leaving Downton after eight-and-a-bit seasons in orange. Bradley, the five-time World Champion has joined one of your customer teams, Lucas, on loan for 2022; how has it been gearing up to a new season without Powers for the first time since, well, 2013? And also, to Lucas, how has it felt for you heading into a new season with the greatest driver in Formula Virtual history in your team? Bradley Downton: It's been a different atmosphere for sure. Nathaniel had been with us for so long he felt like part of furniture. In fact, I think he'd been around longer than most of the furniture! He's already been in our motorhome this weekend catching up with everyone. But it certainly hasn't affected anything in terms of how we prepare for a new season. We still have a fantastic team of men and women working on the cars and two extremely good drivers who know what they want and have already provided excellent feedback. Daniel (Jacobs - Zetticci's race engineer) has probably had the biggest adjustment. On Matteo's first lap in testing Daniel called him Nathaniel, but they had a good laugh about it! Lucas Wilson: We just feel so elated. It's an absolute honour and privilege to have Powers in our team. We also feel a tremendous amount of pressure as well. We are aware of Powers’ talent. We know he will bring his A-game. So we need to make sure that we do everything we can to give Powers the machinery to achieve the objectives we want this season. SP – FVTV: It must be such a motivation for all the guys and girls in the team. Coming to you now Harry, this season sees a huge change for Westwood with the switch to Peugeot power; Peugeot’s first time in the sport since the 2015 season, with Meteor and briefly Lucas. What prompted you to make the switch from a proven, race-winning engine like Porsche? Harry Westwood: Well first of all, I think it's important to mention this was a difficult decision; we've been in discussions with Peugeot throughout most of 2021. Porsche have been an absolute pleasure to work with upon our return to the sport and have made it feel like we never left. However, in Peugeot we saw an opportunity to build a partnership as formidable as the bigger players in Formula Virtual - they have a lot of ambition for the sport. It also helps that I've been a big fan of Peugeot as a brand for some time now! SP – FVTV: Certainly exciting times for Peugeot and Westwood. Ben, a big change for your team over the winter was the change from Jaguar to Honda power. With your star driver Yakumi Takahashi being Japanese, and now Japanese engines, what has the reception been like for Arrow this week from the hordes of fans here in Fuji? Ben Farrell: Yeah of course, an engine change is not normally something teams take in their stride immediately, it’s something that we'll have to adapt with, considering our new staff inside of the teams' factories, the various sponsorships that come along with that deal as well as the increased popularity in those motorsport communities situated inside of the Japanese area. In fact we have a fanzone set up for today because of the demand to see Yakumi, he's become a real star. SP – FVTV: It’s incredible to see how the fans have taken to him, great stuff. Now, we’ve both been around in Formula Virtual for a while now, Rai, and I remember – back in the early days of Ocelot – your team used to be renowned for instability and knee jerk reactions. However, there seemed to be a distinct change for 2018, and we come into 2022 with the team having had extreme consistency in terms of driver line ups, car performance, engine suppliers, and even liveries. Would you say this consistency is allowing Ocelot to gradually push forwards in the way you had hoped? Rai Miyamoto: I think it’s quite wild to finally have things nailed on in regards to being consistent, we were a bit slow in finding our ground during the early years. We’re well aware of the knee jerk reactions and such of the past but we’ve learnt and grown. After all Sic Parvis Magna. SP – FVTV: Of course! Consistency breeds success. Okay, the Team Representatives will now take questions from the floor. Rebecca Parnell – XtremeV: Your pre-season testing pace looked mighty, with your drivers topping two out of the three days’ timesheets. Are you going into this first race expecting to be fighting for the win? LW: I think we have to be cautious about the pace in testing. We don't know what different teams are running, set-up wise. Until we get to a race weekend I don't think we know the proper order. Gianmario Angelino – Sportitalia: For so long Italy has worshipped Puccio Giodano as our hero – no – our God in Formula Virtual. Now we have the young, exciting Matteo joining your team finally. The country wants to know, Bradley, what can we expect from him in his first season? BD: I think we can expect great things. He's shown time and time again what a quality driver he is, and if we didn't believe in him, he wouldn't be wearing orange for his maiden season, we'd have negotiated a deal with another team for him to get some experience under his belt first. Having said that, I don't want to put any more pressure on the lad than there already will be from his previous results and the fact he's driving for a team who have been right at the front for the last five seasons. Let's give him time to settle and find his feet. Hugues Antoinette – Canal+: Good morning Harry. Your drivers are the same for a second consecutive season, Tumo’s sixth and Jules’ second at Westwood. In the second year for Jules, what are the expectations of performance against the veteran Tumo? HW: Last year we saw Tumo and Jules go pretty much even, but Tumo always looked to have a bit of an upper hand. This year, especially with contract renewals coming up, Jules has to at least be on the level of Tumo for most of the season. It's quite the ask, but I wouldn't expect it if I thought Jules wasn't up to the task. Hitoshi Ouchi – FansOfOcelot.jp: Rai, the new hero driver for Japan is Yakumi, but Ocelot will always be so huge for us with also Honda. Do you enjoy your home race to be the first of the season, or do you like to have it at another time so to have two separate occasions? RM: We absolutely love it at home as you can imagine, absolutely proud to be the only Japanese team in the sport. We care deeply about the fans and the country, representing it on a world stage is an honour. One of our dreams is to win here. We also happily love a second race here perhaps to even bookend the season. Theo Parker – VM Magazine: For this season, Arrow has entered into a new partnership with K8ley Racing, who have an extensive history across various Virtual Motorsport categories. Could you tell us exactly how the partnership will work? What do K8ley bring to the table? BF: K8ley racing and their associates have been a pleasure to work with over the winter break, with their growing experience over a number of categories, the additional funding and staff benefits both of our teams across all of the disciplines, especially when we were seeking a seat for youth talent Ellie-Mae Theodoulou. Neil Allenby – FVTV: My question is to all five of you. Since we have representation from teams who have historically been spread across the grid – from Downton at the pinnacle, to Arrow who have spent their first two seasons towards the back – what are your thoughts on Pre-Qualifying now featuring the bottom five teams? How do you think this will affect the spectacle of the Pre-Qualifying session, and how do you feel personally about it? HW: I'm very glad that Pre-Qualifying now includes the bottom 5 teams. I think it's cool that the top 10 of the championship is more important now. As for the spectacle, well it's more cars on track fighting for position, and increases the odds of a team like Meteor - no offense - making a surprise race or two. BD: In terms of pre-qualifying, it doesn't make a huge difference to us as we're not at that end this season. I think it's a sensible change though. It's now sort of a reward for being a top ten team that you get to avoid having to fight for your spot on the grid, as opposed to top eleven. In terms of the spectacle, I think it improves it definitely. We've now got ten cars fighting for six spots, as opposed to eight for four, so there's a better chance for those teams competing to be making the race, and more cars to potentially make an error and cost themselves. BF: Of course, being stuck in the process for our first two years in the sport, we actually view this as a more positive change, as it leads for more representation across the grid as teams compete for position, especially would've helped a few years ago, as the teams with guaranteed qualification who had abysmal pace were given shots at escaping Q1 due to their prior achievements, allowing 5 different teams into the mix permits closer competition and more accurate representation as to who the fastest teams actually are come race-day. RM: We’ve been a pretty hard campaigner against pre-qualifying and there isn’t much more to say, well adapt to the rules and situations. LW: Like Bradley said I think it improves the spectacle. I think it will be exciting for the fans and that's what we want for the sport. It is difficult though at the back of the grid and my heart goes out to those who are fighting at the back end of the grid. I remember when we were there and it was really tough. SP – FVTV: Great questions and answers there, it’s always interesting to see these things from different perspectives. We’ll now move onto the fan questions. FQ: Rai, who's your favourite fictional rabbit? RM: Bugs or Lola, but in all seriousness the World Championship. FQ: Based on Downton's pre-season performance and recent success I think it's fair to say you'll be towards the top of the order. What is the minimum requirement for your new driver Matteo Zetticci? What would you classify as a successful season? BD: That's a tricky one. As before, I don't want to publicly put anymore pressure on Matteo than he'll already be feeling. He knows our expectations and he has his own - which are definitely more ambitious! We're all too aware he will need time to find his feet, FV is a completely different beast. But as long as he's roughly in the mix of where we believe our car should be, he's doing the job we want of him at this point. FQ: To Harry. What made you decide to partner with a new engine manufacturer rather than stick with an existing one? It's generally been seen that those in "engine groups" perform better than those out on their own. Would you agree with this, if so, are Peugeot on the lookout for another team? HW: I think the importance of technical partnerships and relationships between these teams can't be underestimated. We have gone with a bit of a gamble, being one of two teams to supply just themselves. I don't think you have to be in a group to do well, but it helps, and as such I believe Peugeot are looking around the paddock. I can't comment for them though, you'll have to find Polnareff for that! FQ: My question is for the Arrow representative. How confident are you that the Honda power unit will be an upgrade from the Jaguar power unit? BF: Across the winter and our pre-season testing data Honda have shown us more than sufficient evidence as to why we made the move, we had a few sensor issues across the test which were purely team side, as we tried to understand and push the boundaries of the powertrain. Their experience and wealth makes the team truly believe we can achieve great things this season. SP – FVTV: Alright, a final question from myself to you all before we end the press conference. As well as the change in Pre-Qualifying format, this season also sees a number of other changes for Formula Virtual. We now have street circuits on the calendar, but also the lowering of the ride height of the cars and the reduction to just three tyre compounds. Regarding the latter two; what challenges do you think these changes pose for teams this season? HW: Regarding the tyres, testing data showed they are still very similar to the compounds we used last season, so I'm not expecting much of a challenge on that front. As for the lowering of the car, it presents a myriad of interesting challenges for teams. Teams who used a higher rake will have to alter their philosophy, and now kerbs and bumps at circuits may make the car feel a bit more nervous and prone to becoming unsettled. I for one am very excited to see the sparks fly though! BD: I won't profess to be a font of technical knowledge, and I think you've had a great answer from Harry already in relation to the ride height changes. But I will say sparks always look cool - we've seen that in other racing series' - and especially under the lights for the night races, it should make these cars look even more awesome. In terms of the change to tyre compounds, it's a really interesting one. Knocking off one compound reduces strategic options for sure, but then it's very rare we ever saw both the super soft and hard tyres in the same race, whereas I expect now we'll see all three compounds used in multiple races. I don't think any team was massively on top of the tyres last season, so I think it's just going to be a challenge for all teams learning how these new tyres work, and establishing over several races which compounds work best on which tracks and in which conditions. Our strategy team are very excited to get into the data of it all. BF: Our team actually believes the lowering of the ride-height of the cars has helped us a lot when compared to last year's regulation changes, our old aero philosophy has allowed us to pretty much just streamline our concept from the years before giving us a platform to springboard off. As for the compounds it makes the workload on the team less to properly understand the deltas between each tyre, gives us more time to focus on the raw pace of our car at the slight cost of a potential strategical advantage when using either of the extreme compounds of the spectrum. RM: I think the others have summed this up rather well, we’re excited about the street circuits and the possibility of Monte Carlo in the future perhaps. LW: Again, quite well covered. I think it does present a design challenge to the teams with the lower ride height so it will be interesting to see if every team has managed to get around the issues that are associated with that. SP – FVTV: Alright, fantastic. That’s it for today’s press conference. Thank you to the fans who submitted questions, team representatives in attendance, and to all of those at home tuning in. We’ll see you tomorrow for Friday Practice ahead of the season opening Japanese V-Prix!
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