Lindblad is looking forward to his first home Grand Prix: “It will be incredibly special”
- Bo Helmus
- 5 hours ago
- 4 min read
Written by Bo Helmus
The Racing Bulls are absolutely flying. They’ve scored double points in three consecutive races. For rookie Arvid Lindblad, this will be his first home grand prix. He will go into Silverstone on a high, and he will want to continue this streak.
“I’m extremely excited,” Lindblad begins. “It’s going to be a very special moment for me. I remember being here in 2013, when I was five, and was sitting in Maggots and Becketts with my dad, and as I was watching the cars go past, when I was really sort of learning about my love for the sport and asking him questions, you know, “Is it possible to be there one day? Could that be me?” And yes, 13 years later, to be coming here as a Formula 1 driver will be incredibly special.”
Little boy’s dream
A first home grand prix, that calls for a special helmet design: “Yes, so I’ve got a special helmet this week. It’s quite different, but yeah, I wanted something that really reflected my journey to this point, almost like a map of it, as such.
“As I’ve said before, when I was five, six, I believed I could be in Formula 1. So I wanted the images to be almost like me envisioning my journey as my five-year-old self. So I’ve got lots of these little sketches on the back of my helmet of pivotal moments that have helped me get here and the phrases of sort of like “Dream big” and that sort of stuff. So I think it’s really cool and looking forward to get using on track this week.”
Continue the streak
The team has a good momentum going. Lindblad is confident that the Racing Bulls can continue this streak in Silverstone: “I think the team have done an amazing job to bring upgrades, to bring performance to the car over the past few races. You know, it wasn’t that long ago we were in Miami and it wasn’t easy to get out of Q1, and we’ve showed in the past few weeks how strong the car is.
“So they’ve done an amazing job. Hopefully that’ll stay the same this week. As Lewis touched on, we need to see what the deployment’s like, what things are like in quali and the race. But so far we’ve been reasonably decent on the straights, so hopefully it should be OK.”
Pressure of being a home hero
With a home race, there will be extra attention. The fans will expect you to do well, and that creates extra pressure. Arvid doesn’t know what to expect: “It’s going to be my first experience. It’s hard to really comment on it now. But as these guys said, the fans here are amazing in Silverstone. I think it is a record highest attendance. And even for me in F2 and F3, it’s always been amazing.
“You know, when you’re driving on the straights and you see the Union Jack, and even more so you have the grandstands, but the fans have also filled the grass and it’s just full. And I think it’s really amazing to see. It probably will push me on a little bit. So far, for myself, I haven’t really felt any pressure. I’ve been enjoying living my dream, so I don’t think that will change this weekend.”
Dreaming big
As a British karting driver, obviously Lindblad looked up to Lewis Hamilton. Now, they’re sitting side by side in the interview room. Lindblad comments that he would like to achieve the same statistics at some point in his career: “Yeah, I think all of us would love to win seven World Championships. It was a long time ago that I was sitting in Maggots and Becketts, so just to be here for myself is very cool. But I’ve always dreamed of wanting to achieve a lot in the sport, so we’ll see what happens.
“At the end, it’s my rookie year, I’ve got a lot to learn, a lot to improve on. So I’m focused on that for now, but for sure I want to do well, and winning a World Championship is definitely part of the dream.”
Doing damage
The most exciting part of this grand prix weekend isn’t even the Formula One race itself. A repetition of last year’s LEGO race was announced. Lindblad is definitely excited for that: “Yeah, I was also very excited when I heard that we will be driving the LEGO cars. For me, I don’t think that race is going to be about winning. It’s just about having some fun and maximum damage.”
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