F1
To win in F1 you need the right driver and the right car. But you also need the right race engineer.
In modern times the dominant partnership between driver and engineer has been that between Sebastian Vettel and Guillaume Rocquelin. Entering their fifth season together, Rocky’s modest in victory and annoyed in defeat – but never anything other than the calm centre of the storm.
Are the pair of you still open-minded, or do you go to a track knowing exactly what you want from the car?
There really isn’t much room to experiment! We know what Seb needs to be quick and if the car isn’t there from the start of the weekend, we know what to do to give him what he needs.
Does Seb look at the whole lap, or does he concentrate on one section?
It’s a good question! Sometimes the lap time will be good but he won’t be happy because one aspect of the lap isn’t quite what he wants – he does home in on particular aspects of a corner. We’ll argue that he doesn’t need to change anything because the times are good, he’ll tell us he thinks it’ll be better if we fix something. He’s usually right.
Trevor Carlin, one of Seb’s old team principals, said he’d make a good race engineer. Would he?
Seb? No! I don’t think that’s true. He’s way too young. As a race engineer you need to detach yourself to make rational decisions. Seb’s too passionate. Maybe in 20 years, when he’s my age…
Who makes the big race calls? Him in the car or you on the wall?
Whoever has the best information at the time and the other takes it on trust. Sometimes it’s our call because we can see more of the race from the pitwall. Other times it’s up to the driver.Brazil was a good example of that. It was wet at different part of the circuit and we can’t make the call on when it’s good enough to change tyres. That’s Sebastian’s call and he has our complete trust.
Whenever we hear you on the live broadcast, you’re usually pleading with him to stop trying to set lap records…
It’s been like that since he first started driving for us – he’s an absolute bugger like that. If it’s only been broadcast recently that’s because it’s what TV wants to use. After the race I’ll give him some more stick about it too!
Are the races where he’s started at the back and had to push all the way more satisfying than those where he spends the second half of the race defending a big lead?
From an engineering point of view, we like the races from the front where we’ve driven away from everyone. For Seb – actually for most drivers but especially Sebastian – he loves racing from the back. He knows we’re not going to get on his case. He might do 50 laps at qualifying pace and not have to think about anything but pushing as hard as he can. Yeah, he likes those – and they’ve been some of our best races over the years.
Guillaume Rocquelin has been Sebastian Vettel’s race engineer since Seb’s first day at Red Bull Racing. He’s the calm voice on the radio that’s guided Seb to three World Championships and the man who often makes the big calls during the race.
