Aitken credits the amazing Campos team effort
We recently caught up with Mr. Aitken to discuss the current triple-header in Spa and this double Italian Grand Prix fest in September.
Jack returns to Monza following a win last year, that was dedicated to his late friend and rival Anthoine Hubert.
Monza is all about speed, it is dubbed as the ‘Temple of Speed’ to many. This means more DRS action similar to that in Spa. However, the circuits have their own version of events when it comes to the use of this pace.
While Belgium required craft and skill through many of the corners; a lap of Monza is dominated by long straights, meaning that cars are set up with the lowest downforce settings of the season to maximise straight-line speed. This shift in style means good tracktion out of the corners is essential to create enough of a gap for the inevitable DRS challenge from behind.
“Yeah I think being in the lead at Monza is one of the hardest things, so unless you have got a lot of pace its can almost be better to sort of wait and bide your time because it can be pretty difficult to defend if you don’t have that pace advantage.”
“You take pretty much all the downforce off, so the car can feel a bit hairy round the corners: you just have to find a good balance so that you can get the confidence you need to do the lap times.”
I asked Jack about how you can strategize for that and what his general plan is for Monza, “I think it’s to really just to focus on the issues that we have got, and to try and get back on the top step. It’s as simple as that.”
“The guys at Campos have shown we can have the car to do that. I’m pretty confident in how i’m driving this year and we have plenty of opportunities coming up, so we’ll take it race by race.”
The Campos team like all of the others travelled directly from Belgium to Italy ahead of this weekend. So there really isn’t much downtime for anyone involved during a triple-header. Jack wanted to credit the amazing efforts the team and personnel are making this season;
“I really want to thank them for all their efforts, which are massively appreciated.”
It’s not all work though, as with anyone travelling to the Italian peninsula it’s important to find time for those things the Italians do best, “I did at least get to sample some Italian food too, so it wasn’t all bad news…”
Jack will be looking to replicate last year’s form and we are sure he would love to be defending those DRS lunges while out in front this weekend.
Let us know your thoughts @F2inside on Twitter and join our ever growing community of Formula 2 fans!
* Image Credit: Formula Motorsport Limited / Campos Racing
