in the garage for around half an hour to find out what had happened. The TV coverage of it had stopped, we’d lost radio contact with Simon and it was all a bit scary.
“You’re reminded in a very dramatic fashion just how dangerous this sport is. All of us in our line of work, whether that’s being stood in the pits in our fireproof suits with cameras in our hands or behind the wheel of a sportscar, we forget how dangerous it is and it opens your eyes a lot to what you’re actually dealing with. With all the rules and regulations, the right equipment and the good team and the professionalism, everything feels very safe, so we were all reminded quite dramatically that it’s still not a risk-free sport.”
A strong podium finish among the WEC regulars at Spa and a competitive showing at the test day last week mean that with their proven car, Jota are sure to be in the mix and Fantelli has every confidence in the team to deliver the goods.
“Jota are a fantastic team in many respects, they’re a fantastic bunch. Harry is so excited to be there, he’s a breath of fresh air and Marc is the consummate professional; he’s got a real spark and a suave about him and he’s a fantastic guy to work with. And Simon, he’s hugely talented and one of the most driven people I’ve ever met in everything he does. He doesn’t do anything half-hearted and that’s something I admire hugely about him. It shows in his driving as well; he’s undoubtedly one of the quickest silver drivers out there and the more he works with the Audi drivers all he will do is take that and keep improving. I’m very excited to see what they can do.”
Now, we wait.
Driver’s Eye: Harry Tincknell
This season has had a bit of everything so far; the big disappointment from Silverstone, jubilation in victory at Imola and all the rest. We’re also doing a few bits back at home with our preparation physically, mentally and with the boys in the workshop as well. Hopefully it will give the general public a really good idea of what goes into the Le Mans 24 Hours; I’ve certainly noticed this year that more people who aren’t too informed about motorsport have heard about it than Formula 3. Hopefully it will capture the imagination quite well. It’s been a slightly unexpected spin-off from signing with Jota that I didn’t expect at the start of the season, you never know I might end up in Celebrity Big Brother or something like that!
Charlotte does a very professional job and knows when we have to focus on our stuff and when is a good time to do the interviews and extra stuff we need for the film. The whole idea is that it’s a fly-on-the-wall sort of thing, so they do a very good job of merging into the background quite well. You’ll be having a debrief with the engineers and the microphone will appear above your head, but they do a great job of following the action without getting in the way or interfering too much. I’ve seen a few clips and it all looks very high quality, the TV production guys and cameramen they’ve got working on it are all very experienced. It’s going to be fun and hopefully it’s a big success and we’ll do our best next week to make a good end to the story next week by getting a good result in the actual race that will top off what I think will be a really good film, so I’m really looking forward to seeing how it looks at the end.