New starts 'a big change' - Rosberg

Nico Rosberg says the new start procedures are set to be "a big change" for drivers and is likely to open up many more opportunities to errors.

The FIA has announced new start procedures which limits how much aid can be provided to a driver when they arrive on the grid. While the idea was raised earlier this season, Rosberg believes the example of both Williams drivers getting the jump on Mercedes in Silverstone shows what is more likely to happen as a result of the change.

“It’s pretty obvious why those rules have come about, because they realised in Silverstone that it could make the racing more exciting when there’s a bit of variety at the start," Rosberg said at the launch of a flagship workshop for Mercedes' technical partner Petronas in Hamburg. "I like it because it gives me an opportunity to do better than others, so I always like that.

"But it’s going to be a challenge, it really is, because up to now it was so controlled by the engineers who were doing the settings and everything. Now to be completely on your own it’s a big change, so it will be good.

"It will be interesting. We need to maybe even have some notes on the steering wheel, I don’t know what, because there’s so much we need to remember!”

With Mercedes having been dominant so far this season and team-mate Lewis Hamilton having the upper hand in qualifying, Rosberg says he supports any move which puts more influence in the drivers hands.

"I like [the change] because it gives me the opportunity to try and beat Lewis in that area, whereas until now it’s difficult because it was not really in the driver’s hands."

And Rosberg expects to see repeats of the sort of variations in starts which were evident at Silverstone.

"More of that will happen, because there will be more variables and it will be more difficult to predict."

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