Here it is!! I’m back on my blog, sorry for not posting for so long,I was just so busy racing and traveling around the world. Now I’m back in Japan and finally have some time to sit down and do this! Wow I have to go way back into my schedule… I already had 4 races!!!

Enjoy!A bit of today, I took a little trip to Kyoto, nice country side views from the Shinkansen, I call it sleepkansen… cause I always sleep in it…

Welcome to A1 GP. The world cup of motorsport! 

It’s was a great opportunity for me to take part in this race! I really enjoyed it, it was very refreshing for me to race outside of japan after 6 years of not racing in europe. A complete new challenge! Thank you A1 Team Germany!

I learned so much during the hole weekend, I wish I could start the race now… it’s not easy to join a championship that is already running at full speed since a few years! So basically everything was new for me, also quite new to our team, it’s the second time they race with this car. Unfortunately we couldn’t show out real performance, free practice went well, was p7! After that I was pumped up to do better cause it was just the beginning! Unfortunalty we had bad luck in qualifying when Australia went off the track in front of me and I had to slow down, made me be p7, I think P2 or p3 was realistic looking at the sector times. But that was with the boost which u can use only once. So for the 2nd race qualification my boost was gone and in general 70% of the drivers use it for the second time, we picked the first one to have a shot at being on the front. This means that without boost I qualified 14th… not great but that’s the way it goes, the boost is a second faster per lap.

The first race which is a sprint was also unlucky, Lebanon took me out of the race and there was not much I could do honestly. It’s a shame, we had a good potential to do something good.

The team did a great job repairing the car in the short available time! 

Race 2, called feature race was a real eventfull show, drivers in this series drive like crazy! I got realy surprised many times and manged to survive although it was real close a couple of times.

Anyways, was doing well, hanging in there, was around or p7 before I got a drive thru penalty for overtaking under saftey car, the problem was at the restart, somebody at the front braked and messed everything up, I didn’t even realize passing a car cause we were 4 guys side by side. Apparently it was half a car lenght before the line… So with the penalty I ended up 9th. We had a look at the data after the race and without penalty it would have been a 4th place in the end. A lot of people retired so it would have been a lucky start to A1…

Also, I had 5th fastest lap which is not bad for a beginning I think

My next A1 race will be in the new A1GP season, starting in Australia at Surfer’s paradise.

This was a great experience, one of the best after driving a F1 car for the first time.

Nurburgring is just such a magical spot for me! When you go there you can really feel a lot of racing atmosphere! For me it due to the huge and legendary racing history the place has!

You can also feel this in Spa, Monaco, Le mans, Suzuka,..

I came in preparation for the 24 h race which will be held in may. I have never driven on the old track before and I have to say it was great, you get nice adrenaline kicks and lots of speed effect! I managed to learn the track pretty well, not so easy because the elevation is aleways changing and there are more then 100 corners, each one of them is different!!

 I will do some more testing in the week before the race, cant wait!

 One of the cars I used to get familiar with the track.The new Lexus IS-F

Toyota’s garage located 5 min from the circuit.

One of my learning laps on board of the old but still good Toyota Supra! fun fun

Our race car! I love the mate black finish!

My buddies came to see my formula Nippon race @ Fuji

Unfortunately they haven’t brought me any luck for the race…

Actually Its been four years in a row that the first Formula Nippon race gets messed up for stupid reasons…

 2006 in Suzuka, I was leading then I had to urgently pit because my tire blew up.

2007 My clutch burned 1 lap after the start, was 3^rd.

2008 was doing well in 2^nd place and then I had to retire due to paddle shift failure.

2009 was in a good position to win the race cause we were super fast but I had to serve a unnecessary penalty.

 The guy on the left is Cedric from France, he’s a photographer, he came to do some pro portrait shots of me, here a little preview!

The guy in the middle is Rob, one of my best friends!