Do you fly?
No, no. I have a chequered history with aircraft, so I fly as a means to an end. My father had a light aircraft when I was growing up, so I had the chance to take the controls when I was a teenager, but I only ever found the take off and the landing fun. It’s hardly surprising, given that I’m a racing driver, you know. I need something fast and furious to keep my attention.
You are semi-retired now, so how do you get your adrenalin fixes these days?
So far it hasn’t been a problem. I stopped racing in November, then two weeks later my first child was born, and that’s been a kind of adrenalin rush, because it’s all, ‘Is he still working? Is he still breathing?’ I raced for 26 years, all told, from karting right through to Formula One, so I’ve kind of had that part of my life.
How does a boy from Scotland become a successful F1 pilot (is that the right word?)
Yeah, certainly in central Europe they refer to you as a pilot. I started karting, started winning, kept progressing, moved into cars – I just kept winning, and if you win at any sport and have the desire, doors open and opportunities present themselves. I’ve always looked upon racing as a hobby as opposed to a profession. As a professional sports person you get paid to do promotions or whatever, but I always drove for fun and for pleasure. I think that’s why I was able to have such a long career, because it wasn’t dictated by financial or commercial reasons. It was just an opportunity to get into a car and drive quickly.
Can you give us an idea of what someone might expect from their fist grand prix?
I’ve just been over theAbu Dhabi track in the plane, and I think it’s going to be an amazing facility, with Ferrari World and the state-of-the-art hotel. It’s going to be a grand prix track probably like no other. Formula 1 represents the fastest vehicles around a closed circuit. That’s fact. They are the quickest cars you can put round a race track. It’s loud, which gives a sensation of speed and power, but you really need to go and see it, and smell it, and hear it, and see if it gets you going or not. The other extreme to Formula One would be balloon racing, I guess. Slow, silent, peaceful, and you can watch the competitors drift off into the distance.
Is that something that appeals to you?
Nah! I went up in a glider once, and honestly, I just wanted to go to sleep. Even driving on the road for me is a little bit boring.
Get a lot of tickets, do you?
No, I don’t, because I hardly ever drive. I travel to a country, get in a taxi, head to the hotel or the track… I never drive. It’s just not fun. Racing, on the other hand, is.
