Q & A with Rubens Barrichello

The Brazilian, however, says he feels as young as ever.

Barrichello joined the other members of his Honda team in Tokyo to talk about their prospects for the 2008 season.

Q. You have worked with Ross Brawn before and you are working with him again, so what are your feelings?

Rubens Barrichello: Well, I feel very good. I had the honour to work with Ross before and I think Honda needed someone like him and it will be fantastic to have him on board. Not only because of his organization, but the way he works I enjoy it very much. So I'm looking forward to this year.

Q. When you worked with Ross before, he was a technical director, however now he is a team principal. Is this going to change the way you work together?

RB: I don't think so, because at the end of the day his position at Ferrari was very much the same as this one. It's just the name that has changed. Basically he's a very good person to organize the team and to get everyone on their right positions.

Right now, Honda has the ability and we have good people working with us, but we needed a leader and someone to control the whole Honda team, and I think that's why he's in the right place. At the end of the day, I think that there are no changes from what he has done in the past. Team principal or technical director, he can do fantastically well.

Q. Do you think you will have an advantage with the banning of traction control?

RB: I think at the end of the day I have a lot of experience, but to be honest, it's the first time on a V8 as well without traction control, because I've driven the V10 without traction control. And it's different. It's a little bit different because the V8 is a little more peaky and so it's a different way of driving.

But I feel so young, I'm 35 and I haven't reached the peak of my performance yet and I can use all my experience for that. So I feel very good, I feel I have an advantage.

Q. You will be the most experienced driver with the biggest number of GPs this year. What are your thoughts about that?

RB: I'm honoured that, with good race drivers coming and going from F1, I have always stayed for a long time and this year I'm honoured too to beat the record. I'm just having a great time. People say "You've done a log of Formula One", but I'm still haven't done enough.

I didn't win a championship and I'm still fighting for that. And it's very nice that I can beat the record. I'm very experienced but I feel very young.

Q. As an experienced driver, what do you think it's needed to succeed in F1?

RB: I think it's a combination of things. First of all, if you are very technical it doesn't mean you can be fast. So I think in Formula One you have to be fast, because you develop the rest. And that's how it's been my whole career.

I started back in '93 with a lot of speed, not a lot of experience, and then I developed all sorts of stuff. As Formula One progresses we have different things. This year we have grooved tyres and no traction control, so you are going to have to look after the tyres. S

o it's a good combination of everything, but mostly speed that makes a very good racing driver.

Q. In which areas are you happy and not happy with the current car?

RB: I'm happy that we improved the braking problems that we had last year, and we are still lacking a bit of performance overall. There isn't anything in particular that we have to be looking at. There is a new aero package that's coming for the last test in Jerez that will improve the car.

I say "it will" because the guys at the wind tunnel have done a fantastic job to improve the situation so I'm very optimistic about what it will give us. We need to improve the driveability side of the engine and also the mechanical traction of the car.

All that said, I'm still very optimistic that we'll have a good year. I'm prepared to give everything I have to really have the best season for Honda yet.