Jos Verstappen: “A lot of faith in STR11 potential”
Published on 24 February 2016 by Mike Motilall
If there is one Dutchman that knows the ropes in the Formula 1-world, then it must be Jos Verstappen. As the father of the Formula 1-driver Max, he is quite involved in his sons new racecar. When we spoke with him last Monday, he said it was too early to speculate where Toro Rosso is compared to the other teams. Still, he remains Holland’s most successful Formula 1-driver. Is he able to shed some more light, based on his experience, on what we can expect of Max’ car next year? What does he think of the recently announced changes in the regulations? We asked him.
“No matter what Max said, the most important thing this week is that we are able to test the reliability of the car”, says Jos, “it has to be as reliable as possible. We need to do the mileage. The balance needs to be right, because that is what gives the driver confidence. Yesterday we did 120 laps and are very pleased with that. It looks pretty ok. During a test, you cannot blindly compare times together. All the different compound tyres have all been used by the different teams. We haven’t. We only drove the hardest compound available in Barcelona this week. But the STR11 is not where it needs to be, so we are also not looking at that. During the test next week, the car should be able to come close to what it should be like in Melbourne. Even next week, the car won’t be completely ready, but then we will have a better feeling how the car performs. I have faith it will work out.”
If you cannot test any aerodynamics now, what then are you able to test? “There are so many electronics that you need to tweak and get perfect: you need to e.g. set up the accelerator and also the brake balance. The team is also searching for the right level of cooling, you can do a lot of modifying there. But it’s a miracle the car is even here! That is really so. And now the team needs to look what they can do to improve the car in the future. There are many things you can change on such a car.”
You have a lot of faith, is that based on what you know that is coming? You know more than we do. “Yes. Based on how we are driving now, on what we know about how others are driving and based on the difference there is between the different compound tyres: I think that the complete package looks solid together." He warningly adds: “We need to be able to see that on the clock. You can calculate all you want: with different tyres we win a second, with a low fuel load we win this much, add some other components and then we win an x amount of seconds. All good and well, but we still need to make it happen. Aerodynamically it looks hopeful. It should be ok.”
When testing it is always hard to guess where you are compared to the other teams, because you don’t know their fuel load or their set up. Toro Rosso is making miles without a good set up and only on the medium compound tyres. Still you say you know where the team is at: how can you measure that? “We have very good simulation programs and we have a lot of experience. When we compare the times of the first laps with that of the fastest laps of our competitors during their long runs, and we know on which tyres they are running, we can somewhat know how much fuel they are carrying.”
This season there are no developments to expect regarding the engine, so will progress be primarily sought aerodynamically? “Yes, that is always the most important area of a Formula 1-car.” And last year’s car was good. “It is even better this year!”, he replies decisively. “It still needs to be shown, but I don’t think that will be an issue.”
This season, there will be some changes in the regulations. One of which is the tyre regulation. During a race weekend more tyres need to be hand back over to Pirelli, there are more compounds available per weekend and the teams need to indicate their choice of tyres well in advance. It’s not getting quite easy, is it? “No, you need to indicate, regarding your choice of tyres, what you will be doing in three months’ time. Maybe it’s not easier, but it’s definitely more exciting. All the more if a team chose wrong.” Also qualifying has been changed to make it more interesting. What is your opinion? “I think the old system was not too bad. I found it pretty exciting, especially the last two minutes of the session. But I think they want to spread the excitement of those last two minutes. You cannot save your fastest lap for the final dash and you need to keep your wits about you. You know, you need to experience it once before you actually know how it is. It is easy to say ‘I don’t like it’, but maybe it’s something great.”
“What people want to see, is racing. They don’t want to know who is going to win in advance, and that is now the case.”
