Turkey: Nick Fry on dampers, Willis and fairness.

By Phil Huff
August 25 2006

Honda Racing F1's team boss, Nick Fry, sat down in the Friday Five press conference today, and chatted about mass dampers, the GPMA, Geoff Willis, winning, and fairness in the sport. Here's all he said...

Congratulations on three weeks ago, what sort of effect has it had on the team?

Obviously there was a huge elation and it was something we doggedly worked towards, I think we always knew we would get there and until you've done it, it's not so easy to say. It's great teamwork and it really is the tip of the iceberg. We are trying to work this as a global effort. We've got two locations in the UK and the R&D centre in Tochigi in Japan. To get quite a large number of people to work together is a big effort, but it's working quite well now and we can go from strength to strength. Everyone has been hugely determined and never let their chins drop. They've just kept working at it and Honda has been very supportive of allowing us to make mistakes, as long as we've learnt from them and not made the same mistakes too many times. So we've had a lot of encouragement and I think we were the best prepared on the day, the conditions were difficult but we did our homework quite well and the execution was absolutely impeccable. Everyone celebrated but it was quickly back to work and we are still very humble. We have won with this team, one grand prix. 72 for Honda and for us at the moment, just one. There are lots of teams who are better than that, but we've got to keep our heads down and hopefully we'll be competitive here this weekend and continue to be for the rest of the season.

Jenson was warning against any optimism...

Yes the conditions fell into our lap. Some other competitors dropped out and I think we had the best teamwork and best car of the day. We might not have had the fastest car, but we will continue to develop the car until the end of the year. So we are not counting our chickens and one swallow doesn't make a summer. We're headed in the right direction and today was another indication that just on a plain dry track, all three cars were pretty competitive. So we're going to continue to work at it and who knows, we might be able to do it again.

Geoff Willis has now officially left the team, will he be replaced?

No, we're not going to replace Geoff in exactly that role, I think like some of the other teams, we've taken the decision to have a much flatter type of organisation and it really is just a global effort and we have a large number of people. Geoff did a sensational job on improving the engineering standards of this team over the last three years, but we see our team and Formula One having moved on into a different era, so we won't have one person. Nakamoto-san will be the technical director in words, but it's more of a co-ordinator role. He'll ensure that our substantial number of people actually work together. It's more of a choreographer's role rather than standing at the drawing board, drawing the whole car role. I know other teams have different approaches on this, but that is the route we're going down.

Do you think the GPMA is finished?

No, I think the role of the GPMA will evolve over time and I can see many different facets to it. Hopefully it will end up as a group that isn't so much focused on the day-to-day issues like engines, but will be more a group that supports the development of grand prix racing, because what we all want is a bigger and better sport. So I think it is something that evolves over time and the membership coming and going might be a reflection of that and the expertise that is required in the GPMA.

I would like to ask you about the FIA's decision on mass dampers: if you think that it's fair, in a way, to change the rules during the championship and if you think the FIA's decision could manipulate the championship as Briatore told us this morning?

Maybe I will start answering the question in a slightly different way and maybe circle back. We've not used the mass damper in a race situation. We have, like Gerhard has alluded to, we've tested mass damper devices. If the mass damper had not have been banned there's a very high probability we would have been using a mass damper in this race and beyond because it's taken some time to develop. I think mass dampers were developing in a way - and maybe what you've just seen from us this weekend would have fulfilled the worst fears of the FIA in that they were developing in a way that probably wasn't very fruitful so personally I think the FIA decision is a good one, despite the fact that we spent quite a lot of money developing such devices and were on the verge of using it and it probably would have given us a competitive advantage. But I'm not quite sure what use a mass damper is elsewhere in the world, as it were, and I think we do need to keep an eye on that type of thing, so I support the decision.

As far as is it fair? I don't subscribe to the theory of manipulating the championship. I think it's a matter of making the best decision based on the information available at the time and the mass damper device and what it does to a car is very complicated, which is why Gerhard said 'sometimes it seemed to work, sometimes it doesn't.' We had the same problem and we spent a lot of time evolving it. I think it is a complicated thing and I think the best decision was made, based on the information earlier in the year and that subsequently changed, so I think it's just part of how life evolves. I think it's similar situation to our situation in 2004 with the so-called FTT, the front torque transfer device, which, actually, when we look back, actually gave us quite a big advantage and because it was towards the end of the season, we voluntarily agreed to drop it but life has to move on and I'm sure Renault will have something else which will take its place and be equally good.