Jos Verstappen Q&A

"When you're on a two-stop strategy it helps you to pass, and also it helps you to make a better start. I overtook three people into the first corner, then I overtook Panis and Villeneuve on the next straight. Then after the safety car went in I passed Irvine, and I passed Coulthard. So I could pull away from the rest of the field, and that gave us a lot of space, and that's what we needed. You also have to look after your brakes if you do one stop, because they get a very hard time. In general we were very happy that we chose two stops."



"Of course. But four people stalled on the grid, so that helped! You have to overtake a lot of people in the beginning, and obviously I did that in races before, so I was hoping to do that again. And Austria is not so bad for overtaking, so that's why we decided to go for two stops."



"I like to be battling with the big guys, and hopefully we can do that more in the future. It's very important for the team, and for everybody. It's great."



"I must say we've been making a lot of progress, so in that respect I'm very happy. But we're not as quick as we thought we would be, so that's been disappointing."



"It's reliable, we don't have any problems on that side, but we need a little bit more horsepower, and I don't know when we will get it."



"I think they had a lot of problems with reliability before, and over the winter they solved those problems. And then you can start working on it, so in that respect it's running OK. But you still need a lot of horsepower, and that's where we have a small problem."



"It's very close racing, and in qualifying it's very difficult as well. When you gain a tenth or two, it can make a huge difference. But we have our programme, and I must say I'm very happy with what they're achieving at the moment. Hopefully the engineers know what they have to do, and race by race we get new stuff on the car, and it works really well."



"It makes it a lot easier to drive. You come out of the corners and floor the throttle, and the electronics will do the rest. For sure it takes a lot away from the driver, especially in the rain, but also quite a lot in the dry."



"I think our system works really well. For sure there are always areas to improve, but so far I'm very impressed with what the guys have done with it."



"You press a button, pull the clutch, select first gear, press a button, hold it, give it the right amount of throttle, and when the lights go off you have to put off the button. And then the car does the rest itself. Anybody can do that, those sort of starts, and I don't enjoy it as much as before."



"Yeah, maybe some drivers are more nervous at the starts, and maybe they are not as good at controlling the clutch and so on. And I think it should be down to the driver, how good your starts are, and it's not any more."



"Sometimes difficult, and sometimes very good. When you do a very good job he's very happy, and when you do a reasonable job he's not so happy. That's typical Tom, we know how he is, and I have no problems with it, and it works very well I think."



"He knows what's going on, and he understands us really well, and I think he can push people really hard."



"I haven't heard that much about it! He has a lot of other businesses next to his F1 team. I only concentrate on the team, and I'm very happy with that. All the rest is his own business, and I hope he will succeed in it."



"No, I hate Monaco! It's nice to drive in the streets or whatever, but to me it's not so challenging. It's between the walls, so you have to behave very carefully. It's like driving in the wet, and you can't overtake. So for me it's not racing. I just don't enjoy it..."