Rachel's Diary: A social affair

I flew out to Malaysia early as we had the opportunity to join Mercedes sponsorship events. It was their home race as their title sponsors Petronas are based in Malaysia.

We arrived at a petrol station in Kuala Lumpur on Wednesday morning and waited for the drivers to arrive. I knew there was to be a pit-stop challenge but my plan was just to film the drivers while they took on some fans but when Hayley from Mercedes arrived she said that she had told Nico on the way there that he was taking me on and he was looking forward to battle! Being ridiculously competitive I had to go through with it so agreed to take part. I have only once before held a wheel gun at a Ferrari press event and it wasn't a great success, plus I had only had two hours sleep thanks to jet lag so I was more than a little worried about carrying out a pit-stop on camera.

Nico arrived and was in good spirits, I would even describe him as 'bouncing'. We had a couple of practice runs and then we were against each other. We were both on the wheel gun and some of the other Mercedes guys were taking the wheels on and off for us. When you operate the wheel gun you have to be quite forceful with putting it on so that it covers the wheel nut fully. Any slight angle and it won't rotate and release the wheel. Once you have pressed the trigger the first time you pull the gun away, move the switch across so it reverses the rotation, and hope that in that time the guys have taken the first wheel off and put the second one on, then force the gun back on and press the trigger. Easy! The first timed go was a dead heat so we went again, not that I am competitive! This time I beat him, and it was recorded at 2.08 secs.

Nico joined us afterwards for a quick chat and said it was Formula 1 standard which was generous of him as in a real race situation with a moving car I think I would still be trying the fire the gun now, two weeks later!

After the pit-stop challenge we moved to the Petronas towers for our sit down interviews with both drivers. Lewis was first and as Martin Brundle has mentioned in his column this week, Lewis starts interviews cold and defensive but relaxes as it goes on and is engaging and illuminating. Nico follows and teases me about my new profession on a pit crew. Nico doesn't give anything away. He is polite and cracks jokes, but he very rarely shows you anything except what he wants you to see. If it works for him then who are we to criticise? He still refuses to entertain the notion of being a world champion, on camera at least, and still continues to say he only focuses on the race at hand.

After the interviews we go to the science museum where some very excited children are waiting to see the drivers. There are some between 10 and 12 years old who will be designing a race suit for Lewis to judge, and a group of 15-17 year olds designing a race track for Nico to judge. Interestingly the younger children are almost all Lewis fans while the older ones are rooting for Nico. When they arrive excited cheers go up and a phone appears from every pocket for a selfie. A short while later the two Mercedes drivers are sat on beanbags laughing and joking with each other and looking at something on Lewis' phone. Once the prizes are awarded the pair are whisked away to yet another sponsor appearance.

Since I have been doing this job the Malaysia GP has been in March/April time so I wasn't sure what to expect weather-wise. It was still very very hot but it wasn't actually as humid and we didn't have any rain during any of the sessions. On Friday night I presented the F1 Show with Simon and we ended up in the McLaren hospitality unit which had been turned into an English pub for the night to celebrate Jenson Button's 300th GP start. They did a fantastic job and it was great to see all the drivers come down. A few even tried their hand at darts! These moments are always interesting as you see who the drivers genuinely laugh and connect with each other when not in enforced situations. He obviously has a great friendship with Danny Ricc but is popular with all the drivers.

On Saturday morning as I waited to present P3 with Johnny I was sheltering in Force India's hospitality for some much needed air con when Nico Hulkenberg's trainer emerged from the kitchen with his race suit. It's crumpled and stiff and I realise it's been in the freezer! Some use ice vests, some use cold towels, Nico freezes his race suit! Genius! 

On Sunday I was hoping for no early retirements as it was very hot again and as soon as someone retires I have to stand in the interview pen and wait. If there are no retirements I can watch from air-conditioned hospitality. No such luck this week unfortunately and I wait for retiree after retiree. But it's the one on lap 41 that stirs up the most interest. Lewis walked into the pen and came to me first. Just before I had walked up to the pen someone in the paddock passed me and said "I don't envy you your job right now!"

What do you say to Lewis when that happens? I decided to just let him talk and see where it went so I started with how do you feel? You will have seen where it went from there.

I have only once been able to see the podium celebrations for myself and not on TV, but in Malaysia this year my driver interviews finished early and I could still hear the podium interviews being carried out. I stepped down the tunnel and stuck my head out and got the chance to see the Shooey's for real. Even five years in, there are always new experiences to be had. It might sound strange but I see so much of a race weekend on a TV screen it's nice to see some of it for real.

I was back in the pen for the top three interviews and it was lovely to see Daniel Ricciardo celebrating a win after so long. I love that Red Bull let them race and I am looking forward to watching him and Max battle it out not only for the rest of this season but for what will hopefully be a great 2017 with the new regulations. Then Daniel dedicated his win to Jules. The two were good friends and Daniel told me had been waiting to dedicate a win to him. It may seem as though Formula One has moved on but there is not a person in the paddock that doesn't think about that day in Japan two years ago.

We arrived in Suzuka just a few days later and even without Daniel's reminder, the memory of the crash weighs heavy on everyone's minds. There are flowers at the barriers where it happened and banners for Jules in the crowd. He will always be remembered here.

On Thursday afternoon it was the usual drivers' press conference and as you know now, it formed the basis for much of the talk over the weekend. I have moderated those press conferences in the past and attendances vary. Sometimes there are just a few local written press in them.

As moderator it is your job to ask each driver two questions and then open it up to the room. Sometimes you get as few as two or three questions from the floor before it wraps up and the drivers head outside to tv crews. When you think that on a race weekend a driver can be interviewed by the same person at least four times then you can begin to understand why they might get fed up. Personally I don't have a problem with Lewis snap-chatting from the press conference as long as he doesn't ignore someone asking him a question or cause disruption while someone else on the panel is answering one. Plenty of drivers have taken pictures during the press conference before without any fuss. Some of the written media took exception, and that is their right, but when he decided to opt out of his usual written press briefing on Saturday night I understood his stance. Lewis carried out all his compulsory FIA obligations at the weekend, but chose not to give time to some people who he felt had been unduly harsh about his behaviour. That's his right and if his employers don't have an issue with it, why should we?

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In this day and age when anyone is accessible via social media it is far too easy to criticise and personally attack people from a distance. Hiding behind a keyboard and sending vitriol is the sadly the norm for some and standing up to it is somehow seen as a weakness. We all have the right to block out such attacks, whether literally by using the block feature on social media or in person by refusing to answer questions at a voluntary press conference.

It is fairly clear Lewis polarises opinion like no other driver on the grid. I have had difficult interviews with him, you've probably seen them, but I have never taken offence. He wears his heart on his sleeve, his emotions are evident but you generally know what you are going to get with him. If I have ever felt unfairly treated by him, I have told him. It's only happened a couple of times. On one occasion I went and sought him out after I felt his interviews with me had been difficult and awkward and I wanted to know if there was an issue. He apologised immediately, explained what was going on with him that weekend and then repeated his apology and that he hadn't meant to appear that way. Apology accepted and he was pleasant and chatty for the rest of that weekend. That is not the same for some other drivers on the grid. So whether you like him or not I have always found him incredibly fair and that's all that matters to me.

Another story unfolded over the weekend in Japan. On Friday evening we had finished the F1 Show and were heading back to our hotel while our Italian colleagues recorded their show. They had Maurizio Arrivabene on as a guest and he spoke about Sebastian Vettel's need " to focus on the car". He went on to say "sometimes you have to re-focus him, remind him to be focussed on the main job," and that "anyone, no matter who it is, earns their place and their salary." Seb hasn't seemed totally comfortable in the car this year and trails his team-mate in the drivers' standings. Even so, there was a fair amount of surprise in the paddock at Arrivabene's comments.

In contrast, on Saturday after qualifying I got to speak to Kimi and he was the chattiest and most cheerful I have seen in a while. He seems to be really enjoying driving this season and I am sure beating his team-mate helps. He is out qualifying him too on occasion, more often than Seb would like, and it almost seems like a revitalised Kimi. He even took his sunglasses off for his post-qualifying interviews! It's a shame he had to take a gearbox penalty on Sunday.

On Saturday night I went out to run the track with Anthony Davidson. I am fairly sure it was his slowest ever lap of Suzuka but I always try and run the track in Japan. It's one of the hardest because of the elevation. Just as you think it can't go up anymore, it does. Around every corner it seems to rise and rise to allow for the crossover. Unfortunately the decline is over a shorter distance and so it's only really at the very end of the lap when you can step up a gear and sprint home. As we arrived back to the start-finish straight we saw the grandstand was packed with fans. It was dark but the lights on the grid had been turned on and the drivers were all coming out in turn to wave to the fans and in some cases meet them and take selfies. It was well into the evening but everyone took part. As we crossed the finish-line Kimi was walking in the opposite direction to go and do his bit.

I guess that's what it comes down to: The fans. One driver has more fans than anyone else, he is using social media brilliantly, whether you like it or agree with it or not. Instagram followers are now a commodity, in some areas more than Twitter followers. People wants pictures and videos, not 140 characters. He, or someone on his team, has seen this and run with it to great effect. Daniel Ricciardo now does more with his social media and others are cottoning on to it too.

For some it is the only way to see their drivers except on TV. Fans buy tickets to races, but their chances of seeing a driver in the flesh seem to get more and more limited. I wrote at the start of the year how only three drivers showed up to wave to fans during the pit walk in Australia and those fans had paid a lot of money. If they get more access to drivers on a race weekend via social media than if they go to the track in person then hasn't something got to change?

RB