Spanish GP: Interview With Pole Winner Mark Webber

Question: Mark, it is not your team-mate for once. Your first pole of the season and your first since Belgium 2010. How did you do that?

Mark Webber: Well it was a good session. I think it was pretty clear going into qualifying we might have had a bit of margin so it was going to be probably down to Seb and I, maybe, for the front row. Without being arrogant, but it just looked like that. You can never underestimate these guys but we thought we were probably going to battle for pole between ourselves. We got through on the first set of hards so that was nice to do that. Some other people did as well. Then coming to the crucial part of qualifying it was just getting the lap right for Q3 so that lap was pretty good. I was just praying my number went above number one when I crossed the gantry over the start-finish line and it did. It was a nice lap. It was a good battle with Seb and today was my day.

Question: Was it important for you to be second out on the track to Sebastian so you knew what you push for, what you had to achieve?

Mark Webber: I don’t have a clue what time Sebastian does. You don’t know if he makes a mistake or if he does a phenomenal lap or whatever. You have just got to take control of yourself and get the job done.

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Question: Mark, pole last year and winner here last year. I am sure you would love a repeat?

Mark Webber: Absolutely, yes. I can go and relax tonight, have a good sleep, and come back and do the best job I can tomorrow. I am looking forward to it. It should be a good race. As you say, a lot of changes from previous years with the tyres and the rear wing around here but in the end I have got a lot of experience already from the first few races and looking forward to trying to get the victory tomorrow.

Question: Mark, from what you were saying a couple of days ago we must assume all has gone perfectly so far?

Mark Webber: Yeah, it was a pretty good Friday. Nice build up this morning and got a reasonable lap in the end there. It was nice to get a clean lap and get a reasonable lap time down. You never know if it was quite enough but today it was. Obviously Seb did not have the smoothest of days so that can happen. I have had plenty of those. That’s the way it goes sometimes. We are both on the front row so great for the team. We didn’t bring any developments here but we just brought the new spark plugs but it seems like everything is working in the right direction. The guys have done a great job at the factory. Again it is a credit to all the team. We can get very, very blasé with these type of performances but it is down to a lot of hard work from everyone at Milton Keynes and also Renault, endless effort from them as well at Viry. Seb and I are working reasonably hard as well so in the end good result for the team and we’re in reasonable shape for tomorrow’s race.

Question: Your seventh pole position and last year you were again on pole here and you became the 10th winner from pole in 10 years.

Mark Webber: I hope we make it 11. I think it is a different Barcelona grand prix tomorrow, like we have not seen before. For sure there will be a few lead changes, here and there maybe. I hope not too many, but if I am in this position coming round the last corner then, of course, I will be happy.

Question: Talking of the last corner. Another journalist asked, did you use the wing in the last corner. Was it open?

Mark Webber: Yep.

Question: It is thought that perhaps you were the only team to do that.

Mark Webber: Yeah, it is not easy. I don’t know if I opened the lap with it but I think I might have closed the lap with it, but you have got to concentrate. The car is good, no question about it. We have a good car aerodynamically, there is no secret about it, and we know how to get the car to perform well in most conditions. This is what we decided to do today and we won’t leave much change on the table in terms of performance wherever we can. We try to give the maximum. If the corner is a corner which you can take in that style then we will try.

Question: Lots of people complained yesterday about the harder tyre. From what you learned today, do you expect a better performance during the race or rather similar?

Mark Webber: I think it will be similar. We’ve been testing those tyres for a few events now and it was pretty clear, in Sepang, that they behaved a bit differently because the track temperature in Sepang is different to here, even though the track here is nice and warm. It’s a bit of a dangerous game with that tyre because, particularly if McLarens and Red Bulls want to put an option on in Q1, then we send maybe two or three teams home so that’s maybe not ideal for some people. So we need to keep an eye on that. And also, we need to be careful in Formula One with our long run pace that we don’t get too close to the other categories in terms of lap times. We still need to be (the) pinnacle, we need to be able to push the cars to the limit throughout a grand prix and have very strong lap times in grands prix, man against the machine, and push the car to the limit. So as long as we can keep doing that then that’s good, but I (don’t) think the long runs on Friday were particularly impressive for a Formula One car round here. If you look at a GP3 lap time, I think they did a 1m 38s and some of my laps at the end of my long run were 1m 30s, so eight seconds, and I think the budget’s a little bit different. We need to keep an eye on that. Pirelli are working hard but we need to make sure the degradation and pace is still of a sensible magnitude and the cars can be put on the limit and not get too far to the showbiz side of things.

Question: Mark, we saw you waiting in your car after your lap. Were you thinking of having another run or were you waiting in case Seb was going to go out?

Mark Webber: They were thinking of another run with Seb, so we waited to see and then they said no cars will go again because it was pretty clear that… I mean, Lewis is a phenomenal driver, but I think it was going to be pretty difficult for him to get us from there, so we were pretty confident that we would still have the front row, so we decided not to go again. That’s why we waited in the car for a minute or so, it wasn’t too long, didn’t get straight back out.

Question: Mark, what happened that you came back, fighting for pole position? Do you understand how to use the tyres better over one lap or is it a question of adaptation to the circuit?

Mark Webber: Probably a little bit of both, actually. I’m getting a better understanding of the tyres more and more. Obviously, they’re new for everybody and it’s up to everybody to get on top of them. Also, I wasn’t particularly slow in Sepang and also in China, but we didn’t have the smoothest of weekends in terms of the car, technically, so, whether it was not the best qualifying strategy in terms of tyres or blah, blah, blah, then you’re at the back of the grid, or you don’t have KERS at the start - all those little things add up. Seb’s also done a good job. Turkey was a fair weekend and I wasn’t as close as this. Obviously, Seb didn’t have the smoothest day today but also there’s still an improvement from my side. I don’t mind the track here so I hope that I can start being a bit more competitive now. A few things together have added up, it’s small margins as we know. It doesn’t take much and before you know it you’re back in the ball game.

Question: Mark, do you agree with Lewis that victory is for a Red Bull tomorrow?

Mark Webber: I hope so. Obviously, we need the cars to run well. Eventually, we can see that with these regulations, the fast cars can still get through, whatever sometimes happens in the first part of the race. It’s not like the old day when if you lost 10 seconds somewhere in the race, then you could maybe get stuck behind someone. If all goes well and smoothly, then of course we should be able to go for the victory, but you never, never know. We had Turkey last year: there were a few races last year when Lewis was maybe not as strong in qualifying and in the race I couldn’t get rid of him. But I hope it’s not like that tomorrow.

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