“Zak Brown just gave me a gift that I can never I’ll never be able to repay him for to be honest with you,” said Andretti after his first drive in the car. The McLaren boss made an offer to get the racing legend behind the wheel, but it wasn’t firmed up until Brundle’s Miami gridwalk, when Andretti mentioned the “bucket list” item, Brown said that he’d make it happen at the US GP and Andretti looked stunned, saying, “Wow” before laughing. But driving such a machine, which has a KERS hybrid system, was still the stuff of dreams for Andretti - as for millions of fans - until a meeting with Brown at Goodwood two years ago. In period, the MP4-28a rarely got the same level of praise from Jenson Button and Sergio Perez, who campaigned it with limited success in 2013. And when you have experienced that, you want more more and more.”īrown speaks to Andretti as he tries out the cockpit You know, that’s what a driver looks for and that’s what you dream about. And you get this just great acceleration when when when you’re in the power curve, and the car really really performs so well, so unbelievable. It’s an exhilarating experience for any driver to get that type of performance. It was what I really wanted to be honest with you. That role helped with the physical demands of driving the McLaren in corners, which Andretti said that he relished: “I expected that. He said that he hoped that some of the issues would be resolved for his run on Sunday where his hunger for every racing driver’s goal - the perfect lap - remains undiminished: “I’m really looking forward to see if I can put a proper lap together.”Īndretti is also hoping to drive it at the the Circuit of the Americas, ahead of next Sunday’s US Grand Prix.Īlthough his last top-level single-seater race was the 1994 Indy 500, he has kept his eye in with Indycar’s two-seat demonstrator, in which he still offers hair-raising 200mph speedway rides. You just cannot move the steering wheel column where I would really need it.” I would get three, four corners, right and then all of a sudden I’m coming off the wrong gear and just one gear would make a difference. “But at first I didn’t have the information on which gear I was in, especially on the downshift, and it’s so important to have the correct revs coming off a corner otherwise you’re off the range: the engine has a very narrow power curve. The car did everything that it’s supposed to do as far as the chassis and the handling. “There’s quite a bit that I left on the table,” said the 1978 Formula 1 world champion, who didn’t have time for a full seat fitting, so was sat close to the steering wheel with limited visibility of the gear indicator. However Andretti - ever the racer - saved his praise for the car for after he had explained his frustration at not being able to drive at the limit of his ability. “I haven’t had that pleasure for, many, many years as you can imagine. I drove the Ferrari when I substituted for Didier Pironi in Monza, ’82, and there you probably had some equal because the qualifying mode, there was like 1100 horsepower. “It was similar, to some degree, when the turbocharged era came, in the late ’70s and early ’80s. It gives me more life, probably again another 10 years.”Ĭomparing the V8’s power to that of the turbocharged Ferrari 126C that Andretti raced in 1982, he said: “I was so satisfied to see what I was hoping: the power and the sincerity of the chassis, I mean it was so nimble… the braking, all those qualities, just tremendous. At this stage of my life, to have this chance is huge. “No-one will ever understand how much I love driving a racing car. “I was in seventh heaven since May, and now it’s finally here,” Andretti told Motor Sport from his trackside motorhome, shortly after stepping out of the car on Saturday afternoon.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |