2019 Round 2 Race 2 quotes

FIA Formula 3: Robert, first of all congratulations on another win. You looked untouchable out there. How was it from the car?

Robert Shwartzman: I can't say I was untouchable. Pedro and Jehan were really fast and at one point I was a bit worried that they would catch me up, but I was quite happy with my tyre saving. I saw they'd started to degrade a bit so I pulled away. Generally the race was really interesting. From the start I gained two positions and we had a quite close fight with Liam Lawson I think, but then I got past and was P5. My target was to go slow and steady and not kill my tyres like I did in Race 1, to progressively get past when I saw an opportunity, and that's basically what I did. I got past step-by-step and then I remember I was P3. Then there was Yuki Tsunoda and Alex Peroni and I was catching up with the tow. We went three wide like yesterday. I got past Yuki and I knew that I didn't want to do the same thing that happened in Race 1 so I was waiting, looking for Peroni, and then I saw him flying by and I was like 'woah'! I had to back off and I was lucky not to break my front wing off him. I went to the curb and slid a little bit but controlled the situation, and I was P1 basically from that moment. Then my target was just to build the gap from the guys while they were fighting and that's what I did. I was pushing the limit until the end and I think the team did a really good job. The car was feeling really good the whole race. It's quite noticeable how me Jehan and also I think Marcus Armstrong were really fast. Big thanks to the team.

FIA Formula 3: What will you do now in the short gap between now and next weekend's event in Austria? What can we expect from you there?

Robert: Now it will be two or three days of relaxing and then straight back to work again. I hope we can push exactly the same way and then we'll see where we end up. It's my standard point to just do the best I can with the team and then hopefully it's going to be the same result.

FIA Formula 3: Pedro well done on P2 today and another podium this weekend. You fought hard for this one and it was a brilliant race. Can you tell us about it from your point of view?

Pedro Piquet: I was a big step compared to yesterday. Yesterday I felt that I didn't really have the speed to go to the front, I could only maintain position, but today we improved the car a lot. In the end we were really fast and also in the beginning of the race we had the speed too, which is what I worked for. Again, we had a good start. The warm up was really good with some very good first laps, and immediately as I saw the three guys in the front fighting, all rookies, I knew to back down a bit because especially here the Pirelli tyre really goes away. I backed out a bit and unfortunately Robert passed me. In the end we were maintaining the tyres and we could overtake the rookies in front, Peroni and Tsunoda. After that I was trying to keep up with Robert but Jehan was really fast in the middle of the race and he overtook me. I tried to close into the close into the DRS and in the last two laps I could overtake him because the car was much faster than his at the end of the race. I'm really happy for the team because we started the year on the back foot, not only in Barcelona but also in the tests. We were struggling a lot but now with the work of the engineers and our team manager we improving the car quite a bit and we can see that in the races we have the same pace as the PREMAs. I'm really pleased with the weekend.

FIA Formula 3: Does it feel like your season has officially started?

Pedro: I don't know. Usually Barcelona has not been a really good track for me over the years. It's been pretty bad laughs. I want to take it a race at a time and there's a lot of races close together, so it's a case of forgetting what happened, focus as much as possible on the next event, and try to get the maximum number of points and bring the result home.

FIA Formula 3: Jehan, P3 today after a brilliant win yesterday. It could have been a PREMA 1-2 today, but in the end it was first and third. What do you think was missing today to have kept second place?

Jehan Daruvala: To be honest from the team side, nothing. The car was great. It was been since testing. From my side I could have done better in the first couple of laps. Both Robert and Pedro actually made positions but I dropped back, I think I was 10th. I could see Robert in the front making progress so my goal was not to push too much at the start and then I started to slowly chip away and get cars one by one. There was a bunch of us and then a big group in the front, so after I got to P6 my focus was to catch the group at the front. At that stage I think I maybe pushed a bit too much. I did two quick lap times for that stage of the race and when I got there I still had a bit more pace so I was going for the win. My main target was to push for the win. I didn't stop because I thought I could keep pushing and hoped that the tyres would last until the end. I reached the stage where the tyres went off after I overtook Pedro, but to bring the car home and get two podiums in one weekend is a great result.

FIA Formula 3: It's very early in the season but it seems that at the moment the two drivers fighting for the championship are yourself and teammate Robert Shwartzman. How do you handle that being in the same team?

Jehan: Me, Robert and Marcus all get along pretty well. It's good that we all push each other and progress together as a team. Like I've said, I'm not really going to think about the championship until the last race. We help each other off the track to improve the car, but when we go on track it's each to their own.

FIA Formula 3: What can we expect from you next week?

Jehan: We'll travel back together to Italy as a team, the drivers and the engineers drive back. We have a meeting tomorrow with some simulator work for the Red Bull Ring and we'll decided where we can improve, what was good, what was bad. Most things were good laughs. From my side I think I can still work on the start and the first lap, and we need to just keep pushing and keep moving forward together.