He was a very busy man on the days leading up to the first race at Miami Bayside and had to eventually leave his seat for the green flag on Saturday. Either way, there were still some burning questions we had for the Latvian Junior Locomotives leader. We caught up with him on the following day, asking about his perspective on the test race and how he sees the rivalry between LJL and Italczech:

Leading up to the first test race yesterday, there were a lot of talks about the battle between LJL and Italczech, especially on the daily Spark Plug series, where you battled it out every day. So far you are only a few points away from each other. What can you tell us about the battle between you and Tallarino and will the second pre-season test prove once and for all, who’s faster and more consistent?

To me, this is not even a rivalry. The results in the past speak for themselves – I believe he is nowhere close to my level. I’m faster, more consistent and I don’t need to prove anything to anyone besides myself, especially not because of some rumors in the paddock.

you have seen the replay of the Miami Bayside race by now. How do you think your team did and do you even compare the team stats with Italczech?”

I don’t look at competition like that. Obviously we want to be fast and achieve good results, but for me the most important thing always is mine and my teams performance and we do not want to mentally limit ourselves. If we focus too much on the pace of ItalCzech, I believe that would just slow us down. There is great potential in LJL. We have already done a post race briefing with one of our drivers and discussed, what could be improved in the future and how we are planning to develop looking forward, so regarding our results, I am not worried.

Bathurst will be next on the calendar in the coming week. Will LJL be complete and what are your goals for the second Pre-Season test?”

At the moment, we are prepared to enter 2 cars in the race next weekend. Mount Panorama is a very unique circuit, so I believe this won’t do much in terms of showing the raw pace, but, with its tricky turns and length, Bathurst will without a doubt show the composure and mental resilience of the drivers. Taking into account all of the factors, we should be aiming for a clean finish with both cars in the top 10 and, after that, go into full training and preparation mode for the season opener at Baku.

Has your team started training on Mount Panorama yet?

Yes, we have already started experimenting with the setups. Will be interesting to decipher, what works best on this rather special circuit.

Anything else you like to add about the race yesterday?

Shame I could not make it there yesterday. It definitely was an exciting (and chaotic) event at another pretty unique circuit. Overall, it showed, that there are positions and places to be fought over and it seems like the championship of TWS is not going to be free for anyone on the grid which is a very good thing for the longevity and the future of this series.