Palmer: Monza one of my best tracks
Jolyon Palmer is feeling positive ahead of the Italian Grand Prix, while Nico Hulkenberg is looking forward to tucking into a decent pizza.
Nico Hulkenberg: “[Monza is] a very unique place; incredibly special and holds a lot of history. In terms of the actual track, it’s a high-speed layout which means a low downforce configuration for the car, to favour top speed. Having such low downforce becomes uncomfortable sometimes as the car feels light and quite floaty, which can be a bit of a struggle. Monza features a lot of hard braking zones and boasts some legendary corner combinations such as the Lesmos and the Parabolica. You can really feel the history, which is something I enjoy. Italy has a really good buzz, and that gets even better during the Grand Prix weekend in Monza. It’s a really special atmosphere. I love the whole park and area surrounding the track too. I like my food and, of course, eating a good pizza is mandatory during the weekend! The Italian lifestyle is really cool there and you can feel their passion around town.”
Jolyon Palmer: “It’s a very special track, and one I absolutely love. It’s one of those races which carries so much history, especially when you think of all the great races and all the great drivers who have won there. The crowd carry so much passion – you can hear the fans when you drive round. The track itself is very old school and enjoyable to drive. We take off a lot of downforce so parts are flat out and there can be a lot of overtaking. I won and took pole at Monza in GP2 plus I’ve won twice in F2, so it’s been a good one for me. I think it’s actually one of my best tracks. Things didn’t quite go to plan there last year but hopefully I can do better this year. Monza has some long, fast straights so naturally you need good straight-line speed and then stability under braking. Combined with the speedy straights there are some very slow corners so you need to balance out the low downforce with the need to be late and hard on the brakes. It’s all about finding a good top speed, with the optimum downforce level for the chicanes.”