Chasing The Dream | 2026 Pre-Season Testing - Barcelona | F2 Behind The Scenes

I won the team's championship in F3 last year. It feels good, just because I've done all my career with Campus. And we're more than just a team, I believe we're a family. One, two, three, go! No racing. No, no. But we're back here, that's why I'm excited, eh? I'm good. I think I'm relaxed and reset. I had a nice time off with family and friends. Went to a couple of different places. Enjoyed some warmer weather than what we have at home. So, yeah, I'm feeling good. I mean, this feels home. I have really good memories in here. I'm still living my dream. For sure, my goal is to reach F1. But now I'm in F2 and if I am enjoying, that means I am doing a good job and it's the right thing to do. Yeah, it's good to see that a lot of drivers that I know from last year in F3 has stepped up into Formula 2 this year. So, yeah, all familiar faces, racing some new guys from different championships this year, which I think is quite cool to see. Well, I think the level in F2 is always quite high. Some of the fast guys last year staying, like Alex, Dino, Joshua, obviously. You want me looking down the barrel or you? OK, yeah, I think it's still kind of surreal to me. Like, it's six months ago if you said, like, welcome to F2, I'd be like, what are you on about? So, no, it's cool. Looking forward to working with everybody, getting to know the style of racing, the styles of cars, and hopefully kind of best position and prepare myself to step into Formula 1. Yeah, to be honest, I'm not really, say, afraid or, you know, scared to race anyone, you know. Everyone is fast and everyone is here to win. And action. Just no gesturing. Not with the... You say it's cold. For everyone in Europe, this is quite warm. Well, yeah, I mean, you're more used to the cold than me. It has been quite nice, to be honest. Spending time, especially on Christmas and New Year, with the family, with friends, just disconnect a bit of the motive for the world and enjoying nice hot weather, nice summer, has been amazing. So, but anyways, I miss racing already, so I'm super happy to be back now. Even though it's cold, I'm super happy to be back in Europe and soon to be racing again. Yeah, yeah, it's been a busy day. I haven't been able to look at one thing, racing, actually, so it's been media, media, media. I'm going to be a rookie this year, so I need to learn as much as possible. Dino's a great driver. It'll be his second year, and so he'll be good to learn off, also being a Ferrari junior, you know, he comes with a lot of experience. And just to prepare myself as best as possible for Melbourne. You're cold? No. It's a lovely day here. You need to spend more time in the park. Action. And reset. Racing is such an intense sport. We do so, you know, so much, it's always so crazy, but it's also quite nice, you know, sometimes to relax a little bit, but, you know, the main focus is being, getting in shape and being as prepared as possible for this year. I just want to get in the car now, you know, it's been a full day of media, so I want to drive. At the end of Abu Dhabi, I think I felt like a break was nice to have, because it had been so full on for so long. But I think after three or four days, I was already bored and wanted to get back in the seat again, so I kept myself occupied with Sim, but I think now to be back here again and finally driving and having three days out on property as well, it's going to be really nice. Martinis and I have known each other since we were 12, pretty much, and we're very good friends, so, you know, pretty much every week when I'm at home, I'm always on the Sim with Martinis, either playing Sim games or just normal games. We do Sim racing together and we game other games as well, so, yeah, we have a lot of fun. Very good feeling to be back, finally starting the season again, just trying to be as ready as possible for the beginning of the season, and then, yeah, now in Barcelona, now it's time to put everything in place. Being working now with a team that won the championship twice in a row now, it's a huge privilege, and to get to know these guys, to see how they work is amazing, and I just can't say that I'm super happy to be with them. I feel like a family already with them. They're super nice, super friendly, hardworking, so for sure it's going to be a great season with them. It will be good as well to learn from him, and I think both together, working now for the post-season or the pre-season, we can start in a good way for Melbourne. We are all really young. We have all the same objective and the goal since we are really young to reach F1, and we know the best thing to reach is the win, and the win is only for one. So inside the cockpit, the feeling is kind of, I wouldn't say a full 180, but it is very different to kind of the style of American racing. We're all waiting for the same, you know, just go out, just go flat out, and kind of enjoy the first days here of the year, testing. Not a huge amount of push laps. We had a couple of issues in the morning, and then a lot of aero running in the afternoon, testing things. But yeah, super good to be back in the car. How are you feeling with the new team? Yeah, really good. Really enjoy working with them. There are a couple of guys I've worked with before, which is cool, but then, yeah, mostly new guys. For us, tomorrow should be a lot more fun, I think. We're getting out on the softs for the first time, which will be cool. I mean, yeah, just a lot more push laps than today. First year I've ever done two years in a car, everything else we've done previously. F2, we've always only done one year, and then skipped on to the next. So, yeah, it should be good. So, yeah, we'll see what it brings. Everything comes a bit more natural, driving the car and stuff, compared to, like, even when we compare the kind of overall data from, like, last year's test here to today, it was kind of, obviously it was quite a bit better, and you don't really realise the kind of improvement you've made until you kind of look back at it. It's been good. Very happy to be back on the car, and driving again, you know, going on the Insta-lap, I was like, finally I'm driving again, I was so happy. It has been a good day, you know, I mean, we don't get this chance during the race weekends just to try different stuff and just to play a bit with it. I would say I'm quite comfortable. I think I'm a pretty calm person and I deal with the pressure quite well. But, yeah, for sure it's a new challenge and I'm up for it. I think the main thing about this test is to kind of get into rhythm, make sure everything's right, try a couple of things, just kind of see where you're at. OK, to be honest, I'm a bit weaker on the race runs, but we know where we have to work on and where I have to work on. Obviously I've known Ritomo for a couple of years now through our sort of links with Toyota, and he's finally with us, which is nice to have him sort of back in the high-tech family. I'm excited to work with him. You know, having a guy that has that experience level in these cars, and really as a whole in open wheel racing, it just kind of brings it to a new level. We like to be winning racers, competing up front. And today our long-run pace showed that, I mean, we have a competitive package, but we've got some work to do in qualifying as well. So, yeah, we'll be hard at work on that tomorrow. Happy about the support of Aston Martin. Really grateful for them, for the opportunity. And, yeah, now I'm feeling in a really sweet moment where I will try to do my best. Top of the times again. Good team, eh? Yeah, it was a nice day, for sure. And it's looking good from the inside, so we're happy, and it's always fun to drive. Yesterday was a great day. It was coming great, but, yeah, I have a little bit of a snap, and I ended up on the wall. But, yeah, the team is doing an amazing job to recover the car and be able to run in the afternoon. But, yeah, so far, so good. Loving life in F2, I must say. It's quite cool. Learning a lot with a new team, new car. First time this car, this track for me as well, so definitely can't complain. I mean, we know the baseline car is very good. Of course, we're still trying some different stuff just to see if it can work or not. Some stuff works, some stuff maybe doesn't work. So it's a bit like just try and error. But generally, quite good, quite confident. So with Rafa as well, he's very quick, and he gives, of course, also very good feedback. So the teamwork we're doing, I think it's working very good. Feeling very good with the car. Obviously, it's still a test, so you cannot really compare yourself with the others. You don't know what they are doing, but with my car, it's been a good feeling. Definitely feel like we've made improvements. This track last year was one that was a bit more difficult for us in qualifying, and now it seems to be really strong. And Martinez is quick as well, so we've got both cars up there at the minute, which is good. Trying to figure out a few more things on the car, a few things with driving, and just making sure we're comfortable and ready for Melbourne. The boys are doing well, I have to say. They didn't know each other so well before, and now they start to have a good feeling. And, you know, it's good they're sharing information between them. And, you know, so far everything is quite positive. Prema is obviously a great brand in the sport, and there's a lot of very high-quality people in the garage. So now I'm looking forward to finding a way to win together this coming season. Still a little bit of, you know, my mind having to tell my body what to do a lot more than I'd like. It's not coming as natural as maybe the IndyCar is, and that's just something that's going to take time to get done. But, you know, day by day I'm making pretty big leaps, so I feel good about that.