1 – Lando NORRIS (McLaren)
2 – George RUSSELL (Mercedes)
3 – Kimi ANTONELLI (Mercedes)

PARC FERMÉ INTERVIEWS
(Conducted by Giedo van der Garde)

Q: Lando, you are on pole position for the Heineken Dutch Grand Prix. You must feel happy about that?
Lando NORRIS: Yeah, it doesn’t get any better. A little surprised, honestly, but just a decent lap. I was pushing because you’ve seen how close it is, so every one-hundredth, two-hundredths can make a big difference in the end. But just a good turnaround from earlier today, where I felt like we struggled a little bit. Today we certainly felt very strong, so the team did a good job. Credits to them on trying to get a little bit more out of the car, and it certainly helped me today.

Q: Did you modify a lot with the car today towards qualifying from the Sprint race?
LN: I mean, we had to try something because what we had before wasn’t going to be enough. So, we made some small changes, nothing that was going to make us gain two tenths or one tenth even, but enough to maybe give me a little bit more confidence. And on a track like Zandvoort, you need good confidence in the car and you want to attack a lot, so I felt like I could do that more today and it paid off.

Q: George, P2. Yesterday pole position, you had a win earlier today. Are you happy with second place?
George RUSSELL: Yeah, I mean, Lando did a great job, so congrats to him and McLaren. It was a strong session. I thought we had it in there just to fight for pole, but P2, I’m pretty satisfied with, especially after going back after such a tough last few races before the break. Sort of get in my groove again and, yeah, try and fight with them tomorrow.

Q: It looks like the summer break and the engagement helped quite a bit, no?
GR: Yeah, maybe so. As I said, I feel in a good place and just sort of feel myself again, which is really important. It was really nice to drive around here, and these cooler temperatures made the track feel really fast, so it was a real joy for us all to drive. Looking forward to the race.

Q: Kimi, P3, back in the top three. Are you happy with your performance?
Kimi ANTONELLI: I mean, it was a difficult session for me overall. Always found myself on the back foot, and then the last lap, did a mistake in Turn 1, lost a couple of tenths. It was my mistake and a shame for that because we had a real shot for pole.

Q: Do you think you could fight for pole position today?
KA: I mean, in Q3 I thought we had a shot, we had a chance. But yeah, when I started the last lap in Q3, I saw I was two tenths down in sector one and I was like, “You know, this is going to be difficult.” But then I was able to make it up throughout the rest of the lap. So yeah, shame for that, but all to play for tomorrow.

Q: Lando, you have a lot of Dutch fans here. Do you have a word in Dutch?
Lando NORRIS: Yes. Dank je wel. That’s all I know.

Q: And you’re looking forward to the race tomorrow?
LN: I’m looking forward to the race tomorrow. It’s always one of the best events here to come and see all the fans. They make a lot of noise, they’re always very enthusiastic. It’s a lot of energy, so hopefully we can put on a good show for them tomorrow and make it a good final race here in Zandvoort. We’re going to miss everyone, so party well, enjoy the music and enjoy the show tomorrow.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Many congratulations, Lando. That was a stunning pole position from you. Just how special was that final lap when the rain was coming down?
LN: I mean, I don’t know how much the rain affected things. Certainly, the lap time was a bit better than I expected, and honestly maybe it just cooled the track a little bit and actually the tyres performed better through the lap. But I wouldn’t say it affected anything in a bad way. Only my Turn 1 was pretty shocking, was probably my worst Turn 1 of the weekend. Otherwise, it wasn’t a lap that felt mega. It was just one where I just had to commit through everything because I knew how close it was going to be. We saw how close it was, but it’s one where I just kind of committed a lot more through moments and almost made more mistakes. But because I committed a lot more through some of these mistakes, I kind of seemed to gain more than I seemed to lose at times. So, it’s always hard to know because I don’t know my delta, so I don’t know where I went quicker or slower. But it was a lap where I just thought, “I have nothing to lose,” and it paid off. So those are also nice laps to have.

Q: How surprised are you to be on pole? You said after the Sprint this morning that the car wasn’t fast enough. How have you managed to turn things around?
LN: Yeah, good question. We’ve not changed that much. There wasn’t a lot we could change. We’re pretty happy that we’re getting everything out of the car. We’ve tried to hint it into a direction that would help. It seemed to, I guess, in terms of lap times. Certainly, the car didn’t feel that much better in the places we were struggling. Our biggest losses were still the same places, the same corners as it was this morning. It’s just new tyres, low fuel, it just seems to mask quite a few of our issues, and that was probably still the case today. And I just drove well. I just put a lot of things together. I got more out of my lap than I did yesterday. Still wasn’t a perfect lap, but I’m driving well. And like I said last weekend, when the car can be in a place where I have a little bit of confidence and I can drive to the level I can drive at, then we can be on pole.

Q: So, what does this mean for the long-run pace tomorrow? Are you worried that there might be a return of some of the issues you had in the Sprint this morning?
LN: Certainly. We’ve not changed those things. The car is still not our car. It’s certainly the best in high speed, no doubt, or I have the biggest balls, I don’t know! But it’s very, very strong there, and in low speed we just really still struggle too much to be confident about everything. We definitely made maybe a little bit of progress, but it’s still going to be the trickier side of things tomorrow.

Q: Well, very well done today. Good luck tomorrow. George, if we could come to you now. Just a tenth of a second behind pole. Just talk us through Q3. Can you pinpoint where you lost that time to Lando?
GR: Yeah, I was on a very strong lap, to be honest, and then I just had a small oversteer in Turn 8 and the tyres maybe got a little bit hot, and I stopped improving from there on in. Usually, those sort of Q3 laps, you keep on improving, so I was a little bit disappointed because the potential was definitely in there. The last sector wasn’t good. I didn’t improve in the last sector because of that small mistake. But nevertheless, to be on the front row, good qualifying yesterday, Sprint win this morning, front row today, so it could be worse.

Q: Was the potential always in the car today? Because Q2, you were a little bit off, or was it all part of the plan?
GR: It definitely wasn’t part of the plan. I had a lock-up at Turn 1, so I didn’t get the chance to improve. But the car felt great and I felt in a good window with it. And just similar to what Lando says, when I’ve got that confidence, and when he’s got that confidence, you can sort of extract the performance out of it. And just trying to find this feeling a little bit more consistently. The feeling I’ve had this weekend is more used to the feeling I’ve had earlier in the season and my years gone by in Formula 1. So, I’m glad that is the case. I hope that can continue. But it definitely brings me a lot of confidence because I know the potential is still very much there.

Q: Now, you were in the press conference this morning. You heard Lando talk about his issues in the Sprint after your win in the Sprint. How confident are you that you can win the Grand Prix tomorrow?
GR: Yeah, I think we’re in a great place, to be honest. Obviously, we’ve got Kimi and I in P2 and P3, so it gives us a bit of an opportunity to put Lando under a bit of pressure strategically. And I think we probably have a slightly faster race car than those guys. I think, as Lando said, they look very strong in the high-speed corners, and on a track like this with high tyre degradation, you can’t really utilise that performance as much in the race because it just puts too much stress in the tyres. So, I think it will come towards us. Ferrari a little bit further down the order than we would have expected. I think they would have been the biggest threat. So yeah, it’s game on.

Q: Thank you, George, well done to you. Kimi, well done as well. You said in parc fermé that it was a difficult session for you. Can you just talk us through why it was difficult?

KA: Just struggling with the balance, to be fair, throughout the whole session. Mainly Sector 3, was struggling in the chicane. And then just made a couple of changes and the feeling came back. But obviously, in the last lap I did a mistake in Sector 1. Took it a bit too easy seeing the rain on the visor and just, yeah, was a really poor Sector 1. And shame because I think we had a shot for pole, but still starting P3 tomorrow and all to play for.

Q: And can you talk us through the weekend so far? Just how comfortable have you been in the car? How much work has it required to get the car in the window it’s now in?
KA: I mean, to be fair, in FP1 I felt very good. Then obviously yesterday in quali I did a mistake, and that definitely took some confidence away. Also, today in qualifying, mainly because the feeling was not really there with the car, I still struggled to find my rhythm and to put the lap times together. But luckily in Q3 we were able to put things a bit more together and to be on the second row.

Q: You talk about rhythm. Are you confident you’ll find it in the race tomorrow?
KA: I think our race pace was good today. Just difficult with the dirty air, but we’ll try to get a good start tomorrow and try to bring home a good result.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Carlo Platella – Formula Passion) George, you said earlier that the feelings you had this weekend are closer to the ones you had earlier in the season. Do you think you have found something, maybe tried a different approach or anything else?
GR: No, I think the truth is, obviously Kimi’s been doing an amazing job this season, and clearly the two of us have quite different driving styles. That was apparent last year, and it is really working well for him with this car and these tyres. And just trying to implement something similar into my driving style. I kind of describe it as, like, if you change your golf swing, you’ll probably take half a step back before making those improvements. And I think the break just allowed me to put those learnings into the back of my mind, come here this weekend, not fixating on what I want to try and achieve with the car and the tyres, but knowing in the back of my head what I need to achieve and just drive more freely. And yeah, I’m really, really proud of that because it’s just sort of building that toolbox of experience for me that’s going to allow me to be even better in the years to come. Who knows, maybe next year the technique is totally different again. That’s the beauty and challenge of Formula 1. Every year it’s different.

Q: (Luke Smith – The Athletic) Lando, just to pick up on what George was saying there, you’ve spoken in recent years about maybe not feeling completely comfortable with the McLaren car and not suiting your driving style. How have you made those changes, and was that something you still had to do even through last year and at all this year?
LN: Yeah, I don’t know why. It’s just been a thing with our car, and everyone that’s driven our car has said a similar thing. But it changes a lot every year, that’s for sure. And I guess probably a similar story from what George is saying now to what I had last season. It’s easy to overthink things. It’s easy to kind of overcomplicate stuff at the same time. And at the end of the day, you kind of just got to believe. You’re in Formula 1, you’re one of the best drivers in the world. Have some faith that you kind of know how to automatically change things rather than really consciously digging too deep and overcomplicating at times. So, I certainly had that fair share. It’s now become just the norm of driving a McLaren. Seems that every year, even if it’s a pretty similar car, it’s just forget last year and try and start like it’s my first year in F1 again. So yeah, always a challenge, and like George said, it’s part of Formula 1 and it’s part of the challenge you have to overcome. Of course, this year again it’s been quite a big change compared to last season, both from a quali point of view and from a race point of view. He seems to have taken a step forward and that’s a good thing to see.

Q: (Laurence Edmondson – ESPN) A question for George. How confident are you that this can be a real kind of turning point, a game-changer for you in the season? Or is it circuit-specific at all, maybe played to your advantage?
GR: I’m just going to take it race by race. I’m not going to come away from this weekend and say all issues are resolved. I do think I made some big changes going into the Barcelona weekend, and as I said earlier this morning, I had some good races, Barcelona and Austria. Then Silverstone and Spa, we had the PU issue, and Budapest was just not a competitive weekend on my side. So, I think it just hasn’t been a clean run this season. It has not been a clean season whatsoever with all of the issues that we’ve had. But I just feel, I think after the break, I just feel way more relaxed. I don’t feel like I’ve got anything to lose. The pressure’s off. I’m just going to go out, enjoy it, and I don’t even really feel in a fight. It’s not mine to lose, it’s mine to gain. So that’s the mentality I’ve got, and I feel it’s going to help me. I’m just enjoying driving.

Q: (Graham Harris – Motorsport Monday) A question to Lando and George. Given the deficit you have to Kimi and the end of the season, and looking back to last season and the points that Lando and Max picked up, how confident do you feel that you can make this an actual title run, both of you?
GR: Well, there’s more points on offer from this point until the end of the season than we’ve had so far. It changes so, so quick. We already saw it early in the season. At one point I was almost 70 points down, got within 25, went up to 60. It ebbs and flows, and it’s far from over. So, long way to go. I think the Ferrari is looking great. Lando’s been on pole for the last two races as well, so you can’t count anybody out. And we’ve got these upgrades coming. We’ve got to hope that they work. It only takes one issue with an upgrade and it doesn’t work as you expect, and before you know it, you’re not fighting week in, week out, and there can be big points missed.
LN: Yeah, similar, I guess. Obviously, we were on the not-so-good end of it last year. But there’s no point thinking about it. It’s just like George says, just focus on tomorrow. I honestly don’t care what I’m doing next weekend or the weekend after. It’s nice to know that it’s a possibility, and of course I’m hoping both Mercedes get a double DSQ in Vegas like we did and decide not to box in Qatar for a free pit stop. So as long as they make the same mistakes, it’ll probably be just as easy. But yeah, every year is different. So, I mean, for me, we’re still trying to play catch-up with certain things, but I’m getting everything out of it for now, and that’s all I can be pleased about. So, I’m happy. It’s still a very long way to go. I’m optimistic, I still believe that it’s possible, and that’s all I need for now.

Q: (Laurence Edmondson – ESPN) It’s a question for Kimi. It seems like every other driver is saying it’s your title to lose and the pressure is on you. Have you felt any pressure coming into the second half of the season, and how do you deal with it? How do you kind of just get your head in the right place?
KA: No, I don’t feel any extra pressure. But it was a very good wake-up call this weekend, that you can never lower your guard because when you do that… I did a mistake yesterday and today I did a mistake in Q3. So, it’s not that I’m driving more tense or anything, but I just feel this weekend is a good wake-up call, and to just again put things in the right place at the right time and just deliver the result when it counts.