Do you have a point to prove on your Formula 1 race return? Hopefully I’ll prove many points. I’m extremely motivated after a whole year away. I’ve been sitting on the sidelines during the races for so many weekends and I’m hungry to come back and prove my worth. I’ve raced my whole life and I’m extremely hungry and keen to get in a race car again and even more so with Renault Sport! How well prepared do you feel ahead of the Australian GP? I feel ready for Melbourne. We’ve had some good days of testing, with lots of laps: more than 100 every day and more than 500 in four days. Putting in the mileage was the main thing as I needed to get back up to speed after some time out of a car. I really couldn’t have asked for more. I’ve been through systems checks and feel comfortable going to Melbourne and doing a race. At the moment I think we are just outside the top ten but if all goes well then who knows. You can never definitely hope for points, but if we leave Australia with points we can be happy. How do you feel within the team? It’s a good place to be. Renault’s ambitions are big and that’s the most important thing for a driver; to be in a team that aims to win world championships. Renault, Viry and Enstone – it’s a good combination and they have won championships not that long ago. I have a lot of confidence that they have not forgotten how they did it. The guys at Enstone had tough years but stuck together and came out of it. Now they have a long term plan and backing, it creates a buzz. It’s the perfect place for me as a young driver. How have you found the car so far? We have a good platform to start with and are comfortable with what we have. We are not entirely happy with the performance but we are comfortable with where we are and what we have achieved in the short space of time we have had. It’s good and we know that it can be better. It’s not yet the best power unit or the best car, but we know how to improve and need to get our heads down, work hard and get to the top. We need to keep working, keep together and it will come good. You had a great start to your F1 career in Melbourne, so you must have some good memories. What are your thoughts ahead of your 2016 debut? I enjoy going to Melbourne. In 2014 I had a brilliant start with the podium, but I went again last year and it wasn’t as good as the first time! Hopefully we will complete the race this year and get some points. That’s my aim. If both myself and Jolyon can come away with points, it would be a massive achievement!

What is your approach to the season? To be as prepared as I can be and deal with the challenges as they arise. It’s been good to have the winter break to get myself in a very good place mentally and physically. My winter training’s been really intense and positive. When you’re unable to drive the car it’s good to be able to work on your fitness. Unfortunately I’ve had to contend with the British weather so I’ve done quite a bit inside in the gym! I’m a bit of a fair weather player, but I have been outside running when it stops raining! How would you sum up your winter testing? We had some frustrations but in the end we managed to get some good performance running in. I was unlucky in that every day I picked up a problem, which has cost us a few hours. It’s not what you want when you’re a rookie, but all the same I have done a reasonable amount of laps and Kevin has had four very good days so we have been able to gather a lot of information on the car. We know it is a strong basis to start from and we’ll keep working to deliver more performance. How important do you think last year’s free practice outings are for you? It’s important as there are a lot of procedures and the cars are very technical to drive so it has been a big help to have the experience of last year to fall back on. Even though I did not get the greatest amount of laps in testing, I don’t feel too behind and know that when we turn up in Melbourne it will be OK. What are your expectations for Melbourne? I am really looking forward to Friday when the 22 cars are out on track pounding round. I think everything will be ready. We always keep working on performance but when it comes to a race weekend you give it your all to achieve a good result. It will be busy for us in the race but I feel I’m in an OK position right now.

How have you settled in to the job? It’s been a relatively easy transition. I knew a lot of the people and the organisations so it has been quite straightforward. We have a mountain of work ahead of us so I am not under any illusions, but initially it’s been highly positive. Talk us through the next stages of your master plan… We are in the process of re-resourcing Enstone and part of the road map is to be clear how we build up the resources over a two year timeframe. The head count is around 470 now and needs to be close to 650 in the long term, but it will take us up to 18 months to do it. At Viry it is less about resourcing and more about restructuring to make it mesh with Enstone and fit for purpose in the coming years. In parallel we need to think about the design of the car and consider our priorities. We need to ascertain where we will find most gains for 2017 but also look forward to 2018. It’s a reasonably protracted process to get to where we need to get, but we still need to show good progress and move forward in all areas in the meantime. What kind of personnel are you looking for? In truth, recruitment is about finding the right mix of people. We need fresh, young inexperienced blood mixed with older hands. It’s about getting that balance right and it’s very important not to rush it and take people because they are available or because we have a slot. We need to make sure we have the right mix. The first manifestation of how Enstone and Viry are working together is the car we have seen on track. What conclusions were you able to draw from testing? The first and most obvious conclusion is that we have a strong and dedicated team who are able to bring a car together in a short space of time! It naturally does not represent the pinnacle of integration we would aspire to but we will get there. First and foremost we know that the team has strength and depth, and we will go even further in the future. We are actually in good shape and were able to do fairly thorough checks as the car we brought to Barcelona is pretty much what we will run in Melbourne. We were pleasantly surprised. Although we are down on aero and power, the car is nicely balanced, consistent and good to develop. We didn’t need to chase a lot of time finding the balance so there’s a lot confidence we can get up to speed relatively quickly. If we can sneak into the top ten in Melbourne we’ll be pleased with that. What will you change on the car going forward? We have to balance resources, but we need to improve in every area. That said, it’s much easier to do this when you have a well-balanced car as we know that real performance can come from balance and driveability, and we have already made some good steps in this area. Ultimately we need to concentrate our efforts on where we get the most bang for buck.