Canadian GP winners' press conference

Q Well, Damon your first win in Canada and after the last two races you must be absolutely delighted to have won here today? DH I am completely delighted. It was a great race. It was very important for me to do well here because I've ...

Q Well, Damon your first win in Canada and after the last two races you must be absolutely delighted to have won here today?

DH I am completely delighted. It was a great race. It was very important for me to do well here because I've had two non finishes and Jacques is right behind me in the championship and he was motivated this weekend, he put pressure on me the whole way and of course we have Michael, but he dropped out early, but it was a tough race right from the word go. We had to go flat every lap, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and I'm really, really pleased to have won.

Q You stopped twice while Jacques only stopped once. What was the sort of strategy behind that?

DH Well we looked at it and it looked quicker, but it was always going to be close because there's never been more than a cigarette paper's width between us all weekend.

Q Jacques, you were pushing very hard there at the end and with your home crowd behind you, did you think you could have caught Damon at all?

JV Well I knew he was very far ahead but I kept on pushing just in case he had some back markers or made a mistake and I could get very close to him because he wasn't far enough in the front for me to just lift, so I kept pushing and the track was better at the end anyway and the car was handling really well.

Q At one point I think we saw you lap Johnny Herbert and then he retake his position. Did you have any sort of problem?

JV Yeah, I saw the yellow flags. I wasn't sure, so I just let him take the position back. It was better to do that than to get a 'stop and go' after.

Q On reflection would you have preferred maybe to have gone for the two stop strategy?

JV No, I think the one stop was pretty good. It was very close at the end. I wasn't quick enough on the opening laps. I was saving the brakes because I thought they were going to go away but actually I could have pushed and they wouldn't have gone away.

Q Jean, you were a winner here last year and after a good fight with Gerhard Berger, you must be very happy to be on the podium?

JA Yes, of course. Our team make a good effort to give us a better car. On Saturday I had a huge crash because of brake failure. I was a bit worried this morning because I was full of pain but actually the third place is perfect for me, for the moment.

Q You've been second twice this season and third position twice this season. Can we expect a victory in the near future?

JA Of course I am looking for a win quite quickly, but I have great friends (points to DH and JV), I have to fight a lot and it's like that for the moment. I have a very good team working hard and I believe it can happen.

Q Well Damon, we're half way through the season, you're 21 points ahead and you've got five victories out of eight races. What can we expect at Magny Cours and beyond?

DH I'm looking forward to the last part of the championship, or the next half. It's going to be very, very tight and I expect a lot of challenges between now and the end of the season but I'm really, really pleased for the moment to have won in Canada and put myself back on target and back on track.