• Robert Kubica Q&A

'A car with high potential'

The day before his testing debut in the brand new Renault R31, ESPNF1 caught up with Robert Kubica to discuss the car's radical design and the 2011 regulations

Robert Kubica will get his first taste of the new Renault on Wednesday © Sutton Images

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• Drivers:
• Robert Kubica

• Teams:
• Renault

Do you like what you've seen of the new Renault?
The car looks good, but of course how it looks doesn't really matter, what is important is how competitive it is. It is a car with high potential, but it's far too early to say. Right now everything is looking OK, but after running tomorrow [Wednesday] I will have a bit more of an idea. But it's still very early stages of testing.

There's a lot of talk about the Renault's radical exhaust design and Eric Boullier has said the team has taken a risk. Is that a concern for you?
To be honest I don't know where the risk is. But I think our team has enough experience, enough good engineers and designers to make sure that is the best way to go and I think they have done it. I think it's difficult for me to judge how high a risk it is and what kind of risk they have taken. Of course there are a couple of things that are quite radical in the car, which we hope will work very well. But definitely the competitiveness of the car does not depend on the single bits, it's a package that has to work and we hope that altogether this car will be quick enough to give us a chance to fight at the top. If this is not the case I will still, from my side, try to deliver precision driving and a good performance for the team.

Do you think that taking a different approach to car design is the only way to break into the top three, which were so dominant last year?
I don't know. There are some reasons why some cars are quicker than others, there are reasons why some teams are stabilised on top and some teams not, and it shows that it's not so easy to be on top. Formula One is currently an extremely tough sport, especially for the teams. There are many teams that are really pushing a lot and working very hard. In the last few years the [performance] level of the cars has increased a lot and they are much closer together pace wise, so it's very, very difficult to judge where you'll be or whether you'll be on top.

I think every single team is trying to discover new things and introduce new things onto the car, to be braver and to be quicker than the others on development and ideas. I think that every year we have had something really interesting like last year's F-duct, but that doesn't mean that that will guarantee you will win because in the end McLaren didn't win. But the F-duct was definitely very brave and a very powerful system, which was giving a lot of performance and everybody copied that idea off of McLaren.

You've said that last year's car was very drivable and you could take it to the limit, are you confident that the new Renault will be as easy to drive?
I think so, yes. This year it will be even more crucial [that the car is driveable] because of the KERS, which is a system that can create a few problems and can create a worse balance - or let's put it this way, can make setting up the car in a good window for the balance problematic. So if we have a car that is easier to drive we have a wider window and this will help.

The other major change for 2011 is the moveable rear wing, but there are some questions over whether it should be used in qualifying when it is a concept designed to improve overtaking in the races...
To be honest, I think it was FOTA and the teams that agreed to use it in qualifying. I don't see the reason [why it should be used in qualifying], but maybe there were reasons with the teams that were pushing because it will definitely decrease their drag level. So if some teams are struggling with the drag they can take an advantage out of it, because it is reducing a lot of the drag. But I think now is too late [to start talking about it], everything is decided. I think drivers unfortunately do not have a lot of say. But that's how it is, so we have to make sure we understand the system well, make it work as best we can and we have to move forward.

Nico Rosberg reported that it felt a bit weird turning the wing on and off. Do you think it could be a problem if people start taking risks?
Yeah of course, I think safety-wise if we have failure of the system we have to make sure that emergency systems will bring it back [to the normal level] otherwise it can be very dangerous, especially in the race situation if you have a car in front of you or something like that. For sure, safety wise the FIA, the teams and ourselves have to really watch out, especially in the beginning when the reliability might not be perfect.

But, as I say, these are things we knew already - that it would feel strange. I think now there is no point to talk about it, it is done, we have to move forward and the regulations are like this. We just have to take the profit from what the regulations allow us. But during the race it might be very tricky and it might be - I won't say dangerous - but definitely it will increase the risk that something might happen.

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.