Q: Michael, it’s been a while since we’ve see you conducting the Italian national anthem on the podium. How does it feel?
Michael SCHUMACHER: Yeah, great. What else can you say? We had an amazing weekend. We’ve had a lot of work. We made some mistakes in the last races, very obviously, and to come here and perform the way we performed – although there was obviously some struggle at some moments – but in general, over the weekend, we were very competitive and that’s thanks to a lot of us, our many partners, starting with Shell who came up with a completely new fuel, some more horsepower; Bridgestone working very hard on the tyre side and obviously the team itself with new bits for the cars. On the engine, there has been a big push from everybody and as you say, that’s the result and it paid off. Q: Great start from the pole, great first stint and then it looked as if you had to work very hard to sustain the pressure from Fernando. What was the car like at two thirds of the race?
MS: It started off OK after my first pit stop and then I ran into some trouble, I don’t know what it is, we obviously have to check the car. It was some graining but not a big issue, honestly, but the car never came back (improved) and never really performed as it was in the beginning and it was quite a bit of a struggle, but luckily this is a circuit where we know from another year – last year – that overtaking is almost impossible unless you make a mistake so obviously you study who is behind and in that case it was Fernando, and where are the moments where it could get critical, and to prepare yourself just for those areas and it worked out.
Q: And of course, it was the reverse from last year. What was the traffic situation like for you today?
MS: Pretty good. No complaints, the guys did a good job out there.
Q: Michael, returning to you. After a great start in the first race, a couple of problematic races as you said, now the championship for you is well and truly alive.
MS: Yeah. It hadn’t really gone away, honestly, even with two difficult races, but points-wise it’s looking two points better now, but there’s a long way to go.
PRESS CONFERENCE
Q: Michael, a sunny afternoon, an adoring crowd, victory; do Sunday afternoons get any better?
MS: No, certainly not. That’s the maximum you can have.
Q: Everything seemed to go pretty well today, even off the grid. We saw your guys doing a major clean-up operation…
MS: Yes, there was some incident this morning so there was oil on my grid position, so that’s what was going on, removing the oil.
Q: And did it feel OK?
MS: It felt pretty slippery initially, to pull away, but probably I cleaned enough off to be OK. It finally worked OK.
Q: How hard was Fernando pushing, or was it a matter of controlling, or a bit of both?
MS: In a way it was similar to what it was last year honestly, because you had very little opportunities, and if you close the door and you do the job in the right way then you don’t give a chance, really, to the driver behind. In the middle stint, I had to work a bit harder and in the final stint I just drove the car at a nice limit, not to over-push anything and just controlled what was necessary.
Q: I think all the cynics in here remembered the irony of last year.
MS: Yes, it was funny, just the other way around in a way. Interesting.
Q: You mentioned the graining of the tyres in the second stint; did you have it also at the start of the third?
MS: No, I obviously drove in a way that this wouldn’t happen. Obviously Fernando was behind me, so all I had to do was keep him behind me, whereas in the second stint, I really needed to keep the race alive and it was a different way to attack. But that wasn’t really the issue honestly, why we went so slowly sometimes and even at the end we were probably not as competitive as we were initially, so we have to look at the car to see what happened, because you ride very heavily over the kerbs so it’s easy that something might not be at 100 percent as it was before the race.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe), Michael, How did you leave your last pit-stop, with your feelings?
MS: Pretty straightforward. We saw that they (Renault) changed their strategy and came in early, so at this moment all there is to do is push hard, so I could get a good pit-stop and hope to stay in front. It worked out much better than I thought. Excuse me, I was just watching that on tv. It was a big deal to come out in front and it was clear then that we should be in a good position to win the race.
Q: (Ottavio Daviddi – Tuttosport), Michael, do you think that Ferrari have closed the gap to Renault with all the work the team have done on the car?
MS: As Fernando said, they feel less competitive here than elsewhere. We were very competitive except for at one point when I think something was wrong with the car. We’ve had good testing in Barcelona and I think we should be pretty good from now on honestly. It’s honestly getting very close between the top teams for maximising their performance so it should be good.
Q: (Livio Oricchio – O Estado de Sao Paulo), Michael, on your second stint, were they new or old tyres?
MS: New. The second and third stint were new tyres.
Q: (Anthony Rowlinson – Autosport), Michael, does this result have an effect on your feelings for the future?
MS: No
Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe), Michael, were you scared a bit when you saw Fernando coming back?
MS: No. The moment I saw my lap times falling out of the window, it was clear that he was coming. There was nothing to do.
Q: (Ottavio Daviddi - Tuttosport), Michael , are you confident for the next race considering that the track is very different from Imola and also the weather could have a big effect?
MS: As I said before, we should be competitive everywhere from now on, but it is always the same - at the end of the day, who maximises their opportunities will be in front.
Q: (Juha Paatalo – Financial Times Deutschland) Michael, was your second pitstop planned this way or did you have to react to what Renault did?
MS: I didn’t ask that question yet because I wasn’t watching what lap I was on – I was just watching what the team was telling me, and the team told me to get in and I didn’t have time to check what lap it was.
Q: (Federica Ferri – Il Nuovo Diario Messaggero) You know there will be changes to the Variante Bassa next year. Do you think next year it will be possible to overtake more on the track? Will Bassa changes reduce overtaking?
MS: If you have a longer straight with the right combination of starting the long straight and finishing it, then you get an overtaking opportunity. The way it is now, it’s almost impossible.
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