Finally! It’s been a long old journey, including a connecting flight, but I’ve just arrived at my hotel in Sochi for the next round of the GP2 Series supporting the Russian Grand Prix. Time to get a bit of rest before I head to the track for Thursday’s track walk and preparation with the DAMS team for the weekend – and time, of course, to put my blog together…
It’s been a few weeks since the last round at Monza, and during that time I celebrated my birthday. Arsenal tickets were a nice present, and it was even nicer that we beat Man United 3-0!
Shortly after that I went to the Singapore Grand Prix with the Williams-Mercedes team. That was the first time I’ve spent a race weekend with the team being able to fully integrate myself, because usually on a Grand Prix weekend I’m so busy with GP2. My mind is always focused on that, so it’s difficult to take in much of what’s going on with the F1 team.
Singapore was absolutely amazing and I came away with a lot more than I thought I was going to. I was able to sit in on all the debriefs and the pre-race meetings. I was even able to get a photographer’s pass to go out and watch on the circuit and report back. It was a proper full race-weekend immersion, and as well as the nuts-and-bolts race-team stuff I was able to get involved with the marketing side and go to the sponsor dinners. It was my first time in Singapore, which is such a great race, and I really enjoyed the experience. I’ll be doing the same at the United States GP at Austin in a few weeks’ time.
After that my focus switched entirely to Sochi. I went there last year on the brink of wrapping up the GP3 Series title so it wasn’t a normal weekend for me really. By that time, it was all about closing out the championship and I went into each session not quite on the ball or giving it the maximum, because the risk of something biting if things went wrong was too great.
My approach is a lot different this year, especially as I learned such a lot about the track in 2014, and I’ve arrived with a really clear mind. A lot of people underestimated the grip level last year, but there was very low tyre degradation. It’s a strange place, and I can’t say I’ve really put it on my list of favourite circuits yet. But that’s probably because last year wasn’t too great for me – I frustratingly ended up just one point short of clinching the title and had to seal it next time out in Abu Dhabi. I definitely have plans to improve my enjoyment of Sochi by doing well there this year!
We should definitely be up there and in the mix. The DAMS guys got it right last year, with Jolyon Palmer winning the feature race, so we’re confident and hopefully we’ll be where we should be. We just need to crack on with fine-tuning over free practice and qualifying and doing the job to the best of our capabilities, and if we can do that we’ll certainly be in there pitching for another win.
