Palmer, Vandoorne and Coletti discuss their session

GP2 Series: Welcome to today’s press conference following qualifying here at Hockenheim. Joining we have Jolyon Palmer on pole position for DAMS. In second place we have Stoffel Vandoorne for ART Grand Prix and in third place we have Stefano Coletti for Racing Engineering. Starting with you Jolyon, congratulations for a third pole position this season. That’s the best way to start your race weekend…Jolyon Palmer: yes, it started really well. It wasn’t so great during free practice though: I missed part of my lap and my tyres were going away quickly so I didn’t put in a very good lap. I had to come in to qualifying without great reference, but I managed to do a very good lap on the first push and put it all together. The qualifying was perfect for me because I did a good lap, pitted and saved the tyres as well. It does not get much better than that…GP2 Series: You set your best laptime on your third lap and no one could better your laptime after that. Did you feel like it was enough for pole when you did it?Jolyon: I thought there was a chance but you can never be too confident. Other people were really quick. We stayed a little bit longer in the pits just to see if anyone would improve. And then on the second run, I got around to scrub the tyres and the team were telling me if I needed to push or not and if someone was improving. It kept getting me worried but in the end we never had to push. I could safe a good set of tyres and after being so close in the last two qualifying sessions, I’m really happy to be back on pole.GP2 Series: Thank you Jolyon. Good luck for tomorrow. Stoffel, P2 today. That’s your best qualifying result since Bahrain where you started P2 as well. How did the session go for you today?Stoffel Vandoorne: Yes, it’s the same qualifying result as Bahrain and the same front row, so I won the feature race from the same position in Bahrain so I’m really looking forward to tomorrow and see if I can do it again! It was quite a good day for us: P2 in practice and in qualifying. I am a bit disappointed with my qualifying because I thought I could do a bit better, but anyway we’re in a good position for tomorrow.GP2 series: What do you think was missing today to challenge Jolyon a bit more and get pole?Stoffel: Well I didn’t manage the traffic properly. We made a small mistake with the set-up as well. I mean we’re getting there and it’s good to be back in the front.GP2 Series: Do you have more information regarding the tyre degradation of the soft tyres than Jolyon?Stoffel: It’s difficult to say really because we only did two push laps. For sure, there is going to be degradation because of the heat. I think that’s going to be the main problem tomorrow during the race. We’ll see…GP2 Series: Thank you Stoffel. Good job today. Stefano, you were quickest this morning and third this afternoon. How was your session this afternoon?Stefano: Actually, I don’t really know what happened. On the first run, my first push lap was not that great. Then, I put it a bit all together on the second push lap and I was P2, but when I went in for the second stint, I had traffic and then I could not do a lap unfortunately. So I didn’t improve my laptime and could not put one lap together. That’s why we missed a little bit. I think pole would have been difficult because Jolyon did a great laptime. I think P2 was still possible. I’m a bit disappointed after this morning’s practice result because I really think I could have had front row this afternoon. Still, it’s good to be third. I think tomorrow is a long race and anything can happen.GP2 Series: It is your best result since Barcelona where you started from third too…Stefano: Yeah, Silverstone was a disaster in qualifying and that was only my fault. We’ll see about tomorrow. I usually have good starts. I hope I will be able to put a bit of pressure on these two guys in the first two corners and then as I said, the race is going to be very long. It is going to be very hot. I expect a lot of tyre degradation from everyone. We will see. It’s going to be tough.