Toro Rosso driver Carlos Sainz is aware that the 2017 Formula 1 cars will be more difficult to drive than their predecessors, but the the highly rated young Spaniard is adamant that its never easy to drive an F1 car on the limit.
Sainz said, “Formula 1 cars, even if they were slower in recent years, they’ve never been easy in terms of the physical strain they place on drivers. They have different demands and it could be easy one year and a bit more difficult the next.”
“You always need to be at a very high fitness level. It’s true that probably this year, they’re taking us to another extreme level that we don’t even know about at the moment. I’m preparing for…expecting the worst. I’m expecting that after five laps in the first test in Barcelona, my neck is going to be gone and I’m going to be at 180 heartbeats per minute!”
“If I make that assumption and train accordingly, then of course that will not really be the case. So that’s why I started earlier than usual and I started pushing early. It’s impossible to be too fit and too strong. At the first test in Barcelona the team will naturally be expecting me to do more than 100 laps a day and I plan to be ready for that.”
Sainz spoke of his vacation during the festive season and New Year, “Towards the end of December, I went on holiday for a week to the Dominican Republic with my girlfriend and I spent the Christmas holidays with my family here in Madrid.”
“Then I started training fully after Christmas in Madrid, immediately on the 26th. Normally, I would start training on the 2nd or 3rd but this year, I wanted to sneak in an extra week because we all know the physical demands of next year’s car could be quite tough, so I wanted to anticipate this part of my training campaign a bit earlier.”
“It meant that on New Years Eve, I couldn’t party as hard as I did in other years, but you have to make these sacrifices every once in a while!”
He also revealed that despite the breaks between seasons, he never really switches off, “In Formula 1, the only breaks you get are in summer and in December but at the end of the year you always have in the back of your mind the fact that you’re about to start your training for the new season.”
“The week I went to the Dominican Republic, it’s true that it was a bit more of a holiday but still, I was opening my emails, seeing some stuff to do. It was not a proper disconnect.”
“Formula 1 is like that – 365 days a year always thinking about your job…but I like it!” declared Sainz who will be lining up for his 41st grand prix on 26 March.
Read the full story at GRAND PRIX 247
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