Pedro de la Rosa Q&A

The Arrows team has yet to launch it's 2001 challenger, but improvements are expected after the potential shown by last year's nimble, but under-powered A21. The Leafield-based squad has secured an engine supply from Asia Motor Technologies for this year. The AMT V10s are based on last year's Peugeot engine, which powered the Prost GP squad, but the deal with Arrows is the closest Tom Walkinshaw's team has come to a works engine deal in a number of years.

De la Rosa is suitably cagey about how the team will perform in 2001. He talked exclusively to Autosport.com's Jake Sargent at the Autosport International Show about motivation, pressure and the worries of the F1 staff merry-go-round...



"The car is due to be finished at the end of January. Jos [Verstappen] will shake it down at Silverstone and then if everything is ok we will go to Barcelona. We only have one month testing the new car before [the first race in] Australia."



"It's always a race to get things finished. The earlier you have the new car the better, because in Formula 1 it's all about time. The quicker you can get everything ready, the more testing you can do and you create time. But we have to cope with things as they are and make the maximum use of the time. I would have liked the car to have been ready before Christmas because then ideally the team has the Christmas break to modify things that are wrong. That way you can find out early on where the weak points are and start in January with two months testing before Australia. The other way round you only have one month and if you have any big problems you are delayed - it's always very tight."



"Basically the main differences are to do with the reliability. They [AMT] are trying to make the engine more reliable and so far it's been ok in that area. Performance wise - once we have reliability, then we can concentrate more on the performance because there's no point having a really powerful engine that just breaks all the time."



"In terms of power and driveability, it is very similar to the Supertec, it's just that it's more reliable. Now we have to push for the performance."



"The team wants to maintain it's seventh position in the constructors' championship, but I do not know where we will be because I haven't driven the new car yet. For me it's unrealistic to start talking about what I want if I haven't even driven the car. I'll tell you at the beginning of February. We are at the stage of the season when you hear so much crap. Everyone thinks they're going to be world champion, which is of course not possible. It's not good because you are not only lying to the people you are lying to yourself. You have to be realistic and that is why I'm saying I don't know where we will be and I won't set any goals until I drive the car."



"I think the best guys out there in terms of being realistic and playing down their expectations are the people at Williams. Last year was a prime example. All through the winter they were saying the BMW engine was not good enough and the year would be a learning season. Then it comes to first race in Australia and Ralf [Schumacher] finishes third. I'd rather do that than the opposite: like saying that you're going to beat McLaren and then being nowhere."



"It's difficult to say. We expect to be in the fight with Jaguar, Jordan, BAR and Sauber and maybe even Benetton. McLaren and Ferrari are going to be in a totally different league again this year, and Williams will probably have caught up a bit. After that there will be four or five teams which will be very close, like last year."



"They are much, much stronger because they have had more money, better organisation and manufacturer support for longer than anyone else. All of this means stability, continuity, and they can pick up the best people to work for them over the years and that's where the strength comes from."



"People don't realise how important it is to keep a working group together, right from the driver line-up to everybody in the engineering department. The moment you start making big changes, maybe for the long term they are better but they always affect the short term. Even if you bring a better person on board they maybe want to do things differently and at the end of the day you are slower on the track - initially."



It is. When you are in a team where important technical staff are leaving, from a driver's point of view it doesn't make you feel very comfortable."



"It is very easy for teams to blame their drivers because they are an easy target. But then that only increases the pressure to perform and pressure is always a good thing. If you make it to Formula 1 then you should be able to handle the pressure. The best way to make a driver perform is to make sure he has a quick team mate. If you are closely matched to your team mate then you push each other without even realising it and you get to limits you didn't think that you could reach. The level is higher and if you don't have the pressure, you may not think so, but you can lose a little bit of your edge. And when you are not in a winning team, you need that. When the chance of victory is very close, you don't need the pressure because you are already really motivated by the prospect of a win, but when winning is miles away, you need to keep up the competition in the team."



"Well I was quicker than him over one lap last year and beat him in qualifying. In the races it's difficult to say because I had a lot of accidents and retirements. I'd say that I am quicker than him, but he would probably say the same about me, so I'll leave it for you to judge."