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Watch live coverage of round one of the 2007/08 A1GP season this weekend on Sky Sports Xtra

This weekend sees the start of the third season of A1GP, with the self-styled 'World Cup of Motorsport' taking in 11 rounds between now and next May.

Once again Sky Sports will provide full coverage, with commentators John Watson and Ben Edwards reunited as the action gets underway at Zandvoort in the Netherlands.

Prior to resuming his duties in the commentary box, former F1 star Watson - a winner of 5 grands prix in a career spanning 12 years - spoke to Skysports.com about the new season, the series as a whole, and its place within motor sport.

Judging by the number of countries featuring in pre-season testing, can we expect the third A1 GP season to be the best yet?

I think it's going to be awesome! At Silverstone (A1GP's pre-season tests) there were about a dozen cars covered by about three-quarters-of-a-second. All I can look and see at Zandvoort this weekend is that there's going to be an awful lot of nations all capable of putting their car on the front row of the grid.

(Great Britain driver) Oliver Jarvis reckoned there were eight cars capable of winning...

Yes, I would say there's certainly eight driver/car combinations out there, and there may be one or two more we don't know about; you always tend to get that little bit of a surprise and circumstances like weather can always be a factor.

So who do you think will be at the sharp end of the grid?

Oliver Jarvis has identified eight teams and Great Britain, clearly, are going to be one of the leading teams. And, in fact, with the driver line-up that they have, with Robbie Kerr and Oliver, they've got, I think, probably the strongest driver line-up of anybody. Both have won, both know how to win and going to Zandvoort it would be no surprise to me to see Great Britain come away with a victory.

And what about Ireland?

Ireland will do - probably not so much in this particular race because the driver that they're hoping to announce, Adam Carroll, is doing other duties this weekend (racing GP2 in Valencia) but thereafter, if and when Adam gets into that car, then absolutely 100 percent - Adam Carroll is going to be a winning driver for Team Ireland.

Can you tell us more about Zandvoort?

I can't wait for Holland because, as a racetrack, it's got a very critical corner coming onto the main straight, and then at the end of the straight it's got a very attractive corner called Tarzan hairpin, where you can use a multitude of lines to overtake - you'll find people diving down the inside, round the outside, people on the racing line. It's a corner with a history of great overtaking manoeuvres. It's what I would call a busy race track: there's a lot going on at any one time. Around the back of the racetrack there aren't many straights, it's one corner flowing into another...so it's an attractive circuit from a racing perspective as well as from a viewing perspective.

The 2007/08 season sees qualifying changed, in that it now determines grids for both the sprint and feature races. In other words, results from the sprint race no longer determine the feature race grid. Can you explain how the changes might be reflected on track?

The significant change in the sprint race is that it's now much more of a stand alone event and not a feeder into the feature race, so the value of the sprint race has risen significantly. There was a feeling sometimes (prior to the change) that a lot of people were overly cautious in the sprint race, in order to ensure they didn't jeopardise their starting position for the feature race. I think people will go out and race much more and I'd expect to see each race now become very much more a challenge in itself.

And the new points-scoring system? (Points will now be awarded 15-12-10-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 in both the sprint and feature races)

It's 15 (points) for a win now and what they're trying to do is, if you're not winning the race, then there's still significant value to be gained by picking up points. And by having a broader number of points available it offers up much more opportunity for drivers to think 'Well, it is worth making the effort' rather than saying 'Well I can't score any points, I'm not going to try'. I want to see every driver trying his maximum.

There's also an extra pit stop during the feature race now?

There was a mandatory pit stop in the feature race and it would come between laps eight and 20. But very quickly the teams calculated that if they could stop at the first possible opportunity - at the end of the eighth lap - and make their tyre change, then if, let's say, there was a safety car procedure, then they wouldn't be out of sync. Whereas if they said 'Maybe we should stop on lap 15' - which as a calculation was maybe the right thing to do - and if there was an SC intervention and you hadn't made your stop, then you'd lose out. It was almost de rigeur that, as soon as the pit stop window opened, then everybody would dive into the pits.

The (new) second pit stop is going to be a much less predictable situation and therefore some people will get caught out - although teams will eventually find a way of mitigating those circumstances to their advantage. But it will go away from predictability and I think that predictability is not what's in the interests of providing an entertaining show.

Click here for part two of our exclusive interview with John Watson.