Colnaghi says he and MP are ready to achieve ‘podiums’ ahead of return to Europe

Mattia Colnaghi is confident that he and MP Motorsport have learned their lessons from Round 1 and are ready to challenge for podiums, starting in Monte Carlo from June 4-7.

The Argentinian driver had a mixed opening weekend in Melbourne, as while he qualified in sixth, he scored just one point after finishing last in the Sprint and 10th in the Feature Race.

Since then, Colnaghi has spent a lot of time working with MP and also at home preparing for the European leg of the campaign.

“It's been a break, but it's been quite busy at the same time,” said Colnaghi. “We now have a lot of rounds back-to-back, Monaco, Barcelona, and more.

“There has also been a lot of sim work preparing for all of the rounds, not only for Monaco. But it’s mainly been sim work, then helping out MP a bit in the lower categories, like in F4. I was happy to join them for one of their Valencia rounds.

“Then I spent a bit of time at home, still training and also spending some time with the family. On top of that, also studying for A-levels, doing as many exams as I can before we go racing in June. So that's been good.”

Colnaghi spoke after Melbourne about the need for he and MP to learn and to improve and says he is excited to show their improvement on track at the Spielberg in-season test.

“We obviously went into a lot of detail analysing what didn't go our way in Melbourne and what we did well,” he said. “Some would say we went into maybe too much detail.

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“The simple things work, so we try to keep it simple. But I have definitely gone into a lot of detail. I’ve looked at all the specifics of where we are strong and where we are weak.

“I am ready for the Red Bull Ring test to put into practise what we've learned on the simulator and in the workshop, and then Monaco as well.

“I feel like we need to use this test at the Red Bull Ring to our advantage and then we can keep working on ourselves.

“Also we don't really have time from round to round from Monaco because it's back-to-back. So, it's good to have this test pre-round.”

Looking ahead to Round 2 in Monte Carlo, Colnaghi spoke of his delight at taking to the streets of Monaco. “I'm very excited for the drive around Monaco. I'm quite a fan of street tracks like Macau and Monaco falls into that category.”

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The 17-year-old is confident that he will not be at the Principality just to make up the numbers and that he and MP can fight at the front.

“I think there's obviously some points where we've proven to be strong and some points where we obviously have proven to be quite weak still.

“So, there's going to be a lot of work to do on that, but I think that it's just about making things click and then we'll be ready to go for the podiums.”