Tyrrell Festival in Down Under - Interview with Mr.J

This interview was held by Reh on Monday 7th November 2011.

Question: Mr.J, congratulations to your victory. This must have been an outstanding weekend for you, please tell us, what was it like from your perspective?
Mr.J: Well, the weekend couldn't really have gone any better personally. I am very pleased. The team's expectations were to finish the race first and second. Sadly, Cristiano Bohessef's engine blew up on the formation lap and there was obviously no time to fix it. Considering Bohessef's speed in QF and the overall pace of the Tyrrell team I am pretty sure he would have challenged me for first position. Winning QF is harder as it is easier to flunk there. To be honest I only managed to do one fast lap in QF due to technical problems but it was good enough.

The margin of victory was really surprising. The car worked great but I made some silly errors. I thought both the Mclaren and RedBull would have been faster. Maybe the track doesn't fit their car. The next few races will tell.

Question: There were rumours quite early that you would join the PGR F1 World Championship, is there something we don't know that was crucial for your dominating victory and pole position? ;)
Mr.J: The PGR F1 Championship looked very professional and tempting so therefore I was interested to join.

Question: Though you were in contact to Rudy, so it seemed, you joined the championship quite late with Tyrrell. Why so late, and why Tyrrell?
Mr.J: The first talks were held with Ferrari but those talks sadly fell through quite close to the start of the season. As I am contracted by ECOlogic Racing Team we did the team talks within that team and it was decided that Bohessef and I would team up. For some time being it looked like we wouldn't get any seats for this season. Fortunately Ken Tyrrell decided to bring Tyrrell back to F1 and decided to contract the top two drivers from GRF1 2011.

Question: What does Mika Salo mean to you?
Mr.J: Smoke, crashes and DNFs...

Question: Back in the time you raced with Majortom and Rudy, tell us about that time. How developed your career since then in general/ly?
Mr.J: Those were the days. The driver who truly deserved to win that season was FogoRJ. But as he couldn't compete in all the races he didn't win. The season was decided in the last race of the season - Masters of Apasta. The well hidden secret was that I drove that race with a dislocated shoulder from an ice hockey accident. I'm not really for racing driver excuses in general but now years after the truth needs to come out. Nevertheless Rudy deserved that title but the 3 point difference was just too close Haha :) .

Question: The next race is taking place in Sepang, which is a special track. What are the key elements of the driving to get a good lap together there in Qualifying, how fast do you think will the pole position lap be?
Mr.J: The crucial corner in Sepang is the first corner(s). Other than that the track is quite easy and it will be a tight fight for pole. Tyrrell hasn't done any laps on Sepang yet so I can't say anything about pole-times.

Question: Well, thank you very much for the interview, I hope we can get you for an InsideGP article some day, I think thats gonna be interesting. Good luck for the upcoming races, Mr.J!
Mr.J: Big thanks. I wish a good season for everybody.