Formula One news

Column: Monza will be a real challenge

Here we are again with my column for F1Racing.net! The last race in Turkey was pretty interesting. The new track was really modern and good. As you probably saw there was a lot of action on track. The only thing was that most hotels were two hours away at least from the track! Many fans missed the race because of the traffic jams I heard which is a real shame…

Donuts at Zandvoort!

Then came the DTM weekend at Zandvoort, my home circuit. I was invited by Mercedes to join them with the Minardi Formula One team. It was great to see the guys again I worked with for the past few years in DTM. I had so much fun! First I got the chance to do a couple of quick laps and then I could burn some serious rubber! The team wasn't too happy with the donuts I did I think because the tyres were flat and I think they could throw away an engine. But it was fantastic to see all the fans enjoy the action, I had a fantastic time there in Zandvoort.

This weekend is the Italian Grand Prix in Monza. A race with a lot of history and situated in a wonderful park. The maximum speed you do at Monza is incredible! I was told that Montoya did 367 km/h during his test last week, incredible… Last week I tested on Friday with Minardi at Monza. It was a good day to get to know the track, as I never drove at Monza before.

Testing at Monza

Monza is a real challenging track. The high speed is great for me as a driver, and trying to get a good set-up can be difficult. Because of the high speed you want low downforce on your car, though the lower the downforce the more difficult the three chicanes at Monza will become.

The track is, thanks to its high speed, very demanding for the engine. In Turkey we drove the engine for the first race so we need to run the same engine again at Monza. We will see today (Friday) and tomorrow how our engine will do, else we might have to change it. But we will see how it goes. I will do the best I can to drive a great race in Minardi's home country.

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