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Part 1: Oliver Bearman, Alex Albon and Lando Norris.
Q: Lando, let’s start with you. Good to see you. Home race. You’ve got your own grandstand. You’re coming here on the back of a win last weekend. Just describe your sense of anticipation ahead of this one.Lando Norris: I mean, I’m very excited for everything. Every day is one to look forward to. Of course, the driving on track is still the best bit, but I’ve already done some stuff this morning. We did Trafalgar Square yesterday, which was pretty special. I went over to the stands earlier this morning. So, plenty of things for me to look forward to. All good things, all exciting things, more like a positive distraction more than anything else. So, it’s good. And, of course, coming off Austria is a nice feeling too. So, ready to get going.
Q: Lando, you’ve finished second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth here at Silverstone, but you’ve never won. If you were to do that on Sunday, would it be the crowning moment of your career so far?LN: Yeah. I mean, I think it’s tough to ever put something above Monaco, but I said it before Monaco that if I could win anything, if I could swap all race wins for one, it would be for a Silverstone win. So, it’s a plan. Obviously, a lot of work, a lot of things to do before then, but Monaco is special. I think they’ll be very different, for different reasons. Monaco is just the history, what it means to everyone and the people that have won there. Silverstone is because it’s my home race, and the British fans and the Lando fans, all those guys. So, different reasons, but it’ll be the one that probably puts the biggest smile on my face, bigger than Monaco, and it’s the one that since I was a kid and since I first started watching Formula 1 that I’ve wanted to win the most.
Q: Alex, let’s come to you now. While Lando was in Trafalgar Square yesterday, you were at 10 Downing Street. Just how did you find that experience? And what was it like seeing Formula 1 right at the heart of government?Alex Albon: Yeah. It was great. It was first time there. Have you been there before? No. Ollie was there as well. It was interesting. It’s bigger on the inside than it looks from the outside. Didn’t expect that. That was about it.
Q: Alex, in terms of performance, let’s talk about that. It’s been a frustrating run for you and Williams recently. Just what is the mood in the camp? How much confidence do you have that things are going to go better here?AA: Firstly, we need to understand why we’ve had so many DNFs. It’s a recurring issue. We have some tests to try to understand where it’s coming from. We’ll change our own plan and try to get to the bottom of it, but it’s not totally solved yet. So, obviously, it would be nice to finish the race on Sunday, and we’re working hard. We’ve done a lot of work back at the factory over the last two days to understand it more and more. I think we know what area we need to focus on, and then hopefully FP1 produces some results that we can move on from.
Q: Ollie, coming to you now. Your first British Grand Prix, 12 months on from the moment when you were confirmed as a Haas driver. Excited?Oliver Bearman: Yeah. I think excited is an understatement. It was 12 months ago I announced that I would race in F1 this year, and that was very special. So, returning as a full-time driver is an incredible feeling and really excited to race here for the first time as an F1 driver.
Q: What about the car? You’ve got some upgrades on it this weekend. What are you hoping they’ll do in terms of performance?OB: Yeah. We have some upgrades this weekend. It looks like it’s going to point us in the right direction. Generally, our weak point has been qualifying, because actually in race pace, we’ve been pretty strong. We’ve been P10 and P11 for the last two races, with qualifying positions that tell us that we shouldn’t be that good. So, this is going to hopefully bring a bit more quali performance, high-speed performance, and hopefully that can give us a few hundredths, because that’s all it really takes. It’s really tight.
Questions From The Floor
Q: (David Croft – Sky Sports F1) It’s a question to all three of you. You’re all born in this country where the Formula 1 World Championship started, and we celebrate 75 years. Half a million people are going to come to this Grand Prix, which is the epicentre of world sport this weekend. Is this a bit of a pinch yourself moment that you three are very much part of this and out there and Formula 1 is pretty massive at the moment? Did you ever expect to be in this position, not just driving, but also Formula 1, given where it is? And do you ever stop and think, blimey, this is pretty cool, isn’t it? LN: I mean, it’s obviously not something you necessarily think of when you are a kid, when you’re watching it on TV. But you see the grandstands full, and you see all the fans. And I think that definitely adds to it. If you watched the race and there were no people there and you just saw a podium, I’m sure it wouldn’t look as exciting. So, I think it’s always very difficult to know what it’s going be like, the feelings, in the sense of coming here and seeing people with your shirts and your hats and shouting your name. You don’t know what that’s going to be like until you’re here. So, it’s hard to anticipate that feeling and have the knowledge of it. But it’s also the reason why we love our home race. It’s a great track, but it’s more the fact that the fans are the best, and it just gives you an amazing feeling that, for us, you don’t really get it in any other sense of life, that feeling of support and endearment. So, special. Even more from my side that this is my seventh Grand Prix here, I think, and every year it gets better and better, and my supporters have grown and grew, and now to finally have my own grandstand is also something that’s pretty incredible, to think that I’ll have that many supporters and that many fans cheering for me. So, special to all of us. At the same time, it’s one of the most loved sports at the minute, and it’s still growing. The amount of people that are going to be either here or back at home watching on TV and supporting people who are trying to do it for their country and do it for the Brits, it’s the same as when we watch tennis or football or golf or whatever. So, it brings a lot of people together and I think it’s always an incredible thing. But it’s weird to think that that’s us. That it’s going to be us on the TV and people are going to be cheering for us. So, it’s always hard to think of it from that perspective, but that is the perspective and that is the feeling that probably makes us more proud than anything else really is the fact you have those people supporting you. So definitely, for me, one of the most exciting, fun, enjoyable, and memorable weekends of the year, for sure.
AA: Yeah. I would say very similar to Lando in many ways. The sport is so fast-paced, it’s hard to self-reflect and look at where you’ve come from and where you are now. Silverstone for me, that’s where my dad took me to my first race, and the noise of the engines was obviously captivating, but in many ways also intimidating. I was like, there’s no way as a five, six-year-old that I would ever end up driving one of these things. Back then, they did sound louder, to be fair. But the impression it gave me at that time was partly complete awe, but also didn’t really believe that I would be able to think about going into one of them. It was always a dream of mine. Then I got my racing license at Silverstone as well. There was a kart track, which I think was taken down before. So, it always comes back to Silverstone when I think about my career. It’s what Lando says. It’s weird to think about now that you’re one of those drivers that you looked up to as a kid. Sometimes I don’t even want to really think about it. Just get on with my racing. But it is very amazing.
OB: Yeah. I’m just starting, so I don’t know how it feels to race at home yet, but my first time at Silverstone was in 2015 for the Grand Prix, so exactly ten years ago. I was one of the people in the crowd, cheering, and now to be one of the people on track and making people so happy and united is a really incredible feeling. I’m really proud to be racing in the UK, flying the flag, and hopefully we can all have a great weekend.
Q: Who were you cheering, Ollie?OB: I was cheering for [Sebastian] Vettel! Actually, if you hear the podium ceremony, you can hear a little kid shouting Ferrari, that was me. Lewis won but Vettel was third on the podium.
Q: (Nelson Valkenburg – ViaPlay) Yes, also for the three of you, a question. This is the home race. How different is your schedule? How packed is it for this weekend? And does it really make sense to say yes to everything that comes your way when it’s such an important weekend? Ollie, why don’t we start with you this time?OB: Yeah. Definitely a bit busier than the standard weekend. Starting on Wednesday, we visited the Prime Minister yesterday. Can’t say I’ve ever done that before on a race week, or ever, actually! But, yeah, it’s the home race, and of course there’s a lot more attention and stuff going on. But by the same token, I think we saw in Kimi’s case in his home race, a lot of extra stuff, and I think it’s important to still have the energy to race and remember that the focus of the weekend is qualifying and the race. So, I’ve personally been quite vocal with the guys about trying to keep things as efficient as possible, especially since it’s my first time. I want to remember it for being a great weekend and such a fun weekend on track, and we’re doing a great job of that.
AA: Yeah. I think it’s inevitable. For most of the teams at a home race, with a lot of people around, sponsors, family and everything like that, the demands are up, but I think the demands have been up every race, every year so far. It just gets more and more. But for the most part, we learn to try to stabilise everything and rest as much as we can. I think there are a few races where we don’t mind doing a little bit more, and Silverstone’s one of them.
LN: I definitely don’t say yes to everything. But this is a weekend when you almost want to do more, not more stuff, but more of the things like the fan stage. I’ll do it more than just one time, and I went to see the grandstand earlier and my merch store and things like that. There’s always a balance, which is the biggest part of it. I’m here to drive, to race, and to do well, and you have to always remember that’s the priority. But there’s only one home race a year. For me, it’s all about the enjoyment and memories and things like that. So, it doesn’t just mean more interviews, but it might mean more time with the fans and doing events rather than sitting down and doing more interviews. If you ask me now, do you want to do an interview, I’ll say no. But if I want to go and see the campsite and some of the fans, then I’m happier to do that because it’s more about the fans than anything else.
