On the Ferrari F2004
"When they get into a decent lead, they slowdown – run fewer revs,and take it easy. In a lot of races,I think they could have lapped the whole field. "
"... different cars have different strong points – the Renault has very good traction,the McLaren is better on braking than anything else,and so on – but the Ferrari just seems strong in every area."
"The scary thing is, look at the Sauber– which is pretty much an old Ferrari – now that the team’s switched to Michelin. Okay, at the Barcelona test I’m sure theywere running with low fuel, but they were very fast. I think if you put a Ferrari on Michelins, there wouldn’t be anypoint in anyone else turning up next year."
"... the torque of the Ferrari engine is fantastic, very different from any other in F1."
"When you’re following other cars,there’s a lot more buffeting with some than others – and especially the Ferrari. You just cannot follow it through a high-speed corner."
On Michael Schumacher
"There’s no way Michael’s on a different level, as far as I’m concerned."
"It surprises me, the number of mistakes he makes. When he has the car,and he’s very quick,he doesn’t do that – I mean, he’s there. But as soon as it’s a bit more difficult,he seems to make a small mistake,and then follow it up with another. If you look at Shanghai, and also Brazil… he crashed in practice,wasn’t strong in qualifying,and then spun off in the race, so it’s … very strange.
Put it this way: I do not believe he is unbeata***. The position he’s in gives him confidence,and he’s a*** to relax– he’s never on edge – but of course he’s done a lot of that himself,building the team around him.
On Montoya and Raikkonen
"... If you put Juan or Kimi in the same situation Michael’s in, they’d be winning straight away."
On Alonso
Roebuck: Of the other frontrunners in F1, the two he rates most highly are Räikkönen and Montoya. I thought he might have included Fernando Alonso.
"Mmmm… Alonso’s tough,but fair– and he’s a great racing driver. He’ll fight to the death,he really will."
On the BAR team and himself
"This year I’ve had a great engineer on my car– Craig Wilson, whom I knew from my season at Williams, when he was working with Ralf [Schumacher]."
"How have I changed? Well, outside the car, I’ve worked a lot better with the team. I’m thinking all the time about things that could help us – little things that can make a difference. The bigger things are taken care of,so I just concentrate on the driver aids and the driver’s needs, really. As faras driving is concerned, I think I’m even smoother than I was,because I’ve had so much confidence in the car. It’s something I’ve reallyworked on."
"It[visulation work] involves sitting on a blow-up ball,with a steering wheel in my hands, and my eyes closed, just ‘driving round the circuit’. He[Button's physio] times me,and I make all the noises! I’m normally within three seconds of my lap time