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Black Coffee
“I’m good, got a bit of sleep on the way, so I’m cool
And how are you feeling being at The Belgium Grand Prix?
This is my first experience and I’m blown away; I mean we just saw a pitstop with the McLaren Team, it’s really out of this world.
And how popular is F1 in South Africa?
It’s actually quite strong, I believe they are trying to bring it there, I think that'd be amazing, there’s a lot of petrol heads in the country, there’s even a car racing school, my son is in one of them, so there is an interest, I just met a South African upstairs actually. There’s a great interest in the sport and people travel from there to see it everywhere.
You mentioned your son, is he aspiring to be a driver when he grows up?
Definitely, he’s been driving for almost 4 years now, he’s 8 years old, he says he wants to be a driver, so hopefully he will follow through.
And how does he feel being here surrounded by superstars in the sportHe’s been so excited, I told him about the trip, I didn’t mention this trip, so I only told him 2 days ago, and that’s all he wanted to do. He didn’t even want to go even to Spain, he wanted to come straight here, so he’s really excited to be here…
And who is his favourite driver?
Louis Hamilton!
As a father how do you feel about your son taking on a career as a racing driver?
I mean doing what I do, I love seeing that in him, I love him following whatever his passion is, I want all my kids to do that, of course school is important, but I’d really love for them to really follow through with what they want to do and I’ll give them any kind of support that I can.
We know you do a lot of work with young aspiring musicians in South Africa, how does that programme work?
We do different things, right now we are working on a school for fashion art and music, it’s called FIRM, I’m working with two other fellow South Africans who are also my friends, Nelson Makamo who is an artist and Laduma who owns a brand called Maxhosa, we've been working on finding premises now, we initially found premises, but we realised what we wanted to do is much bigger, so we are working towards the project, it’s going to be called FIRM, it’s an institution for fashion, art and music.
You know what it’s like to support and mentor young artists and aspiring musicians, can you transfer that into the motorsport world and give any advice to any young aspiring drivers much like your son?
For me it’s always about following your dream you know, I think all of us we have that inner voice, that kind of like leads us and I think it’s the most important thing: it could be in music , it could be in racing, just doing the best that you can, no matter where you come from. I myself come from a very small town, you know, in a very small country, not so small, but you know, it took me believing in myself so much to get to where I am, and that’s what I try and instill even in my kids you know, to really believe and push as hard as you can for whatever you believe you are supposed to be.
And finally, are you excited by the rumours that F1 could be coming to South Africa?
I’m very excited, and with my son being so interested, it's such a big thing, hopefully it really comes, I know the people that are trying to bring it and I’ll give them as much support as I can.
