Skip to main content

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Autosport Plus

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Recommended for you

Alonso denies claim that Aston Martin's Hungarian GP upgrade will decide his F1 future

Formula 1
British GP
Alonso denies claim that Aston Martin's Hungarian GP upgrade will decide his F1 future

Dixon to leave Chip Ganassi Racing at end of 2026 IndyCar season

IndyCar
Mid-Ohio
Dixon to leave Chip Ganassi Racing at end of 2026 IndyCar season

Kay back to the top of Autosport National Rankings table

National
Kay back to the top of Autosport National Rankings table

Alonso: Silverstone will be "not fun to drive" with 2026 F1 cars

Formula 1
British GP
Alonso: Silverstone will be "not fun to drive" with 2026 F1 cars

Motorsport UK and BRDC unite to develop young British drivers

National
Motorsport UK and BRDC unite to develop young British drivers

Tsolov or Lawson? Red Bull and Racing Bulls face a tough decision over 2027 F1 line-up

Feature
Formula 1
British GP
Tsolov or Lawson? Red Bull and Racing Bulls face a tough decision over 2027 F1 line-up

F1 drivers to take to Lego minicars at British GP

Formula 1
British GP
F1 drivers to take to Lego minicars at British GP

Gresini signs Mir and Holgado on two-year MotoGP deals

MotoGP
Dutch GP
Gresini signs Mir and Holgado on two-year MotoGP deals

Malaysia preview quotes: Virgin

Timo Glock: "For me, Sepang is a good track when the weather is dry. The heat and humidity are quite punishing and we would normally have two weeks to fully acclimatise to be ready for track and cockpit conditions of over 50°C. Plus you have the additional factor of humidity, which can be around 70%, so the cockpit can be a pretty uncomfortable place to be. It's one race where you don't want your drinks bottle to run out, although it's a bit like drinking English tea anyway because, try as we do, we can never get the liquid to stay cool. When we have weather like we saw last year through the practice sessions, it's impossible to prepare well and obviously if it rains during the race on that scale, you're just a passenger in your own car

"It will be interesting to see how different it is to race here with the heavy fuel, especially through the nice quick corners, although there are mix of low, medium and high speed corners which make this a challenging track generally. Apart from that I'm hoping we can have a better weekend. Everything was going well until I had my suspension problem, and we are starting to get on top of our issues as they arise. We have good pace and if we can continue to improve our reliability then I'm confident we will be in a better place by the time we get to Europe. In the meantime, every session at every race weekend counts and we have some good developments to evaluate here in Sepang this weekend."

Lucas di Grassi: "Last weekend was disappointing for me because of the reliability problems we had. However, we have to move on and focus on better things to come. The guys are pushing really hard and we are improving all the time, sometimes in ways that may not be visible to anyone outside of the team because the problems are what other people see.

"Our obvious target here is to finish the race and we will be doing everything possible through the weekend to work towards achieving that. It will be an interesting challenge for the car and for me, as it's a real test of what heat and humidity can do to both of us! On my side it's the tougher races like this that make all the physical training worthwhile and it really brings home to us why we push ourselves so hard. For the car I think Bahrain was a good test of the cooling and we don't expect any problems. I'm looking forward to my first Malaysian Grand Prix."

Nick Wirth, Technical Director: "We're looking forward to Malaysia as it provides us an early opportunity to put to the test our continual development of the VR-01. It's been quite a challenge with the quick turnaround from the Melbourne race - for instance we had just five hours to strip the cars and the garage after the last race before the freight departed, which meant that we had to work quickly to diagnose the issues.

"Nevertheless, we're ready to start Sepang with further revisions to our car to cover the recent problems, with the total focus on getting to the chequered flag, via a smooth weekend on both cars. The track itself is very different to the first two races with a different demand on car performance, so it'll be interesting to see how we get on in this respect. As ever, we've prepared our drivers well on the Wirth Research Simulators, although their driving skills may well be tested to the limit with the prospect of afternoon rain for qualifying and the race."

Previous article Q & A with Pedro de la Rosa
Next article Chandhok not expecting to match rivals

Top Comments