Q: Pat, the last two races must have been rather disappointing for Williams. What was the problem?

Pat Symonds: Well, true, Budapest and Spa were not really what we wanted. I think in Hungary, it’s certainly a circuit that is a bit more difficult for us to perform well at. Nevertheless Valtteri was in a good position before his collision with Daniel Ricciardo – and had it not been for that he very likely was on for a P4 or P5 finish. And P4 or P5 wouldn’t have been too bad. But unfortunately we ended up with a hard weekend. In Spa it was different. In Spa we had multiple problems. In Budapest we were a bit unlucky. In Spa the configuration of the car was not right for the circuit all weekend - we simply didn’t get the set-up right. If that were our only problem we could have had an average weekend, but we had a very specific problem on the first set of tyres on both cars. We started on the soft tyres and went to the medium, as on both cars the soft tyres were not performing. If you have two things that aren’t great and then you make a mistake at the pit stop – there you go. If one thing goes wrong it costs you a lot – but three things are simply too high a number.



Q: So what do you do here to get away from that number three? Clearly not all things are good that come in threes…

PS: The set-up thing is rather easy to tackle. We actually know what we need to do. The problem with the pit stop is down to procedures and training and discipline, and we have been working hard on that. You need good people for that. If we see that they are not good enough we move them somewhere else so there have been changes there. The tyres not getting to temperature in the first stint is a much more difficult matter. You have theories – but it is very difficult to prove them. We are always working very hard trying to understand the tyres – and we need to continue doing it. Here in Monza we’ve got our tyre management perfect. All four tyres on both compounds were working really well in qualifying and I am pretty confident we’ll get them good for the race as well.



Q: What are you reading out of qualifying?

PS: We are in a position where we pretty much expected to be. I had hoped that we would be a little closer to Ferrari, but I know that they’ve had quite a good engine upgrade – and more power helped them quite significantly on this circuit. We know where we are relative to Mercedes. When we don’t perform very well, as in Spa, we find Lotus, we find Red Bull and we find Force India close to us – and I don’t like that situation. We’ve got to be in front of them – and here we are. We are back to our normal place. So the reading of today is: we are back to situation ‘normal’! And all indications show that we should have a very good race. Improving our position and fighting with the Ferraris will be difficult - but not impossible!

Q: In the past you have been in the situation that Mercedes is in now: being the leader of the pack – but still not free of mistakes. How big is the pressure level when you sit at the pit wall?

PS: It is enormous! It is that kind of pressure that keeps you awake at night. But for me it’s the pressure I enjoy. I enjoy having to make decisions – and making them quickly. Good decisions - I hate bad decisions! But that’s my life – I have been in motor racing since I left university. I don’t know the ‘real world’! (laughs)



Q: Nobody makes ‘good’ decisions all the time. What do you think is your percentage of bad decisions? Fifty-fifty?

PS: I would not be here if fifty percent of my decisions were wrong. Yes, I have made some bad decisions. But with all my grey hair I am still in F1 probably because I have made quite some good decisions.