Davidson: “You Have to Reshift Your Focus”

Photo: Toyota

Despite not being able to fight for victories, Anthony Davidson has remained upbeat on the remainder of the 2015 FIA World Endurance Championship season.

Development of the Toyota TS040 Hybrid has been halted, in order to focus resources on an all-new car for 2016, which has left the defending World Champions with little hopes of taking the fight to LMP1 rivals Porsche and Audi this year.

“Since Spa, we knew where we were and there was no way we were going to compete for the race wins,” Davidson told Sportscar365.

“But we’re committed to this championship and I’m still enjoying driving the car, even though we’re not getting the results we want and had from last year.

“I’ve got absolutely no problem with the motivation at all. I really enjoyed qualifying, when you’ve got a good couple of teammates to fight against, it always spurs you on.

“That’s all we can do, really. It’s almost like every knock you take, it just motivates you even more for next year to come back stronger. I’m not struggling with motivation at all.”

The Englishman and co-driver Sebastien Buemi currently trail points leaders Andre Lotterer, Benoit Treluyer and Marcel Fassler by 53 points, meaning they’ll need a miracle to repeat as World Champions.

Nonetheless, the ex-F1 driver has found a potential silver lining.

“We’re not in the fight to win races this year on outright pace unless it’s wet,” Davidson said. “We seem to have a pretty decent car in the rain and so far, we’ve been to Silverstone, Spa and Nurburgring and haven’t seen one drop on race day.

“It doesn’t bode well for the rest of the year in that respect, but there’s always Fuji!”

While today’s forecast calls for no rain, Davidson still expects the race to be grueling, from a traffic standpoint.

“This will be a very grueling six hours,” he said. “We’ve already seen a Porsche collide into a GT car in practice.

“It’s going to be relentless pace at the front and risky overtaking moves on a very narrow track. It’s difficult for everybody in every class.

“Our aim is to try to get one car on the podium for all of the upcoming races. That’s what we can realistically aim for.

“You need a bit of luck but it’s the same if you’re in an underperforming car in F1 looking to score points. You have to re-shift your focus and that’s the way you keep motivated.”

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John