Latest / Full Credit to the Noise / FCTTN: Redemption, drama & intrigue in Ipswich

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FCTTN: Redemption, drama & intrigue in Ipswich · Full Credit to the Noise

• Speedcafe Team: Yeah This week on Full Credit to the Noise, Will Brown uses a 58mm air restrictor to great effect. Blando emerges victorious from the Dutch oven. And we have a huge announcement. Welcome to Full Credit to the Noise. Well, hello. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, and welcome to full credit to the noise. You can find this podcast on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook at FCTN Podcast. You find me on Instagram, Twitter, Blue Sky, and Facebook at Former underscore legend. You can find the bike across me on Twitter at AVL underscore motorsport. He's on Instagram at AVL dot motorsport. He's a man who this week has been revealed as the face of Ipswitch tourism. He's been named on an extended bench for the Swans first final game in a fortnight's time. And tonight He's wearing his favorite cosplay uniform of Osorro mask and a cape. Welcome to Speed Cafe's Andrew Van Lewen. Thank you, Former. I definitely do not want to be associated with the Sydney Swans in any way, shape, or form right now. I can I can assure you of that. You'd seem to be back into cosplay. It's ⁓ yeah, it's ⁓ it's rare that something, particularly with everything going on in supercars at the moment, it's rare that something non supercars related was the biggest talking point in the paddock over the weekend. But ⁓ yeah. That whole very sad debacle definitely ⁓ was definitely a talking point. Let's put it that way. How's their no dickheads policy going anyway? Not great, I would imagine. No. all right. Do you want to do the big announcement now? Sure. So we're gonna drip feed this because we've got to lock some things in place, but the ⁓ Wednesday of the Bathurst Week, we will be doing a live show. And we've spoken about it for a long time, but It's actually happening over here. We're doing it. We are finally doing it. We've got a venue. ⁓ we've got tickets on sale already. We've given ⁓ early access to our Discord members. Yep. ⁓ and we've got sold a few as well. Yeah, I'm actually surprised how many we have sold and they are limited. That's the other problem. So we might have gone too big too early in the Discord. But anyway, that's the benefits of being a member. So ⁓ we have two guests. That we will announce in due course, but they are definitely going to be worth the price of admission alone. It is a no-phones ⁓ venue, so you cannot bring your phone in. If you bring your phone in, we will take it from you. We'll hold it for you securely. We'll go and see what we can get for it at Cash Converters. We will not do that. And then we will ⁓ give it back to you at the end. It's all secure. It's how we used to do our shows for ⁓ for another show I used to work for. ⁓ and never had one issue, so. But it's no phones. So that gives our guests the opportunity to speak their mind. And believe me, these two have a got will have a lot to say on the night AVL. Is there anything I've forgotten? Well, it won't be recorded either. So it won't be recorded, it won't be released as a podcast. ⁓ no one will be able to record it and send it to their mates and say, Hey, did you hear this wild thing that Motorsport Personality X said? so if you want to be there, you have to be there. And that's really w how we wanted to build this is something that it's an in person show. That's what it's all about. So it's ⁓ it's gonna be a lot of fun, I reckon. I think we've I've already been asked can we do a show at Sandown and at Gold Coast? Let's just get through let's just get through the first one first. ⁓ but ⁓ but yeah, Wednesday well did we got a time on it? I haven't even looked at the doors will open at six. We expect the show to start at six thirty. Yeah. ⁓ because we have to have people tucked in bed. That's what we'll say. Yeah. ⁓ we definitely do. And not the guests, they can keep raging as long as they like into the night. But ⁓ but and it's in a pub, like what a perfect place to do it. So it's ⁓ super exciting. And there's ⁓ yeah, it is in a pub. And there's also some ⁓ can we say about authentic? ⁓ yeah. No, well well, this is a joint venture with authentic collectibles, so there'll be some cool stuff. We will give you your phone back so you can buy things as well because you're gonna want to do that. You might have to sell your phone to buy some of all the stuff that we that you'd probably want to buy. But yeah. ⁓ I think that's as much as we can say at the moment. We we will have links to tickets ⁓ on our socials coming forward and also on speedcafe.com. Yep. I think that's about it at the moment. Yep, we'll try and get that up in the next ⁓ couple of days, I think. So people can get in there and ⁓ and get buying. Package. Really excited. Really excited. So all right. How was your week at Ipswich or how has your w week been at Ipswich? You went to the Su Super 440, obviously. ⁓ It was good. It was a great event. Like it's it really is it's something that's been a a a a big topic in the paddock and and even between like, you know, ⁓ Steph and my colleague and myself in the last couple of days. Like it'll be so interesting to see what happens from here because obviously there's all this talk around the future of the event. Is Philip Island gonna come in and replace it? ⁓ or you know, can the TRC Contracts be ⁓ negotiated for 15 rounds or whatever. But if we end up in a scenario where this event drops off, it will be a sad thing for a number of reasons. Because firstly, it just has a great buzz about it. It really does. For a it has this sense of almost being a marquee event for something that's not a marquee event, and by that I mean, you know, like your big street circuit events and that sort of stuff. It really felt like ⁓ on the Sunday night, the way Triple Eight was celebrating that sort of ⁓ unexpected and come from behind win in the sprint cup. It feels like that means something, even though Brenton Grove probably in hindsight rightly spent the whole week saying that it didn't mean anything. ⁓ so it felt like someone had won something special. There was a whole bunch of people around ⁓ this their facility looks fantastic. I don't care how many times you tell me how boring the layout is, it just creates fantastic racing. ⁓ probably better than anywhere else in the country. So Yeah, i if if we lose this event, that would be a great shame. And I understand the realities of it. It's not as easy as saying that. It all comes down to how you fund these things. and that's the problematic part in terms of the fact that it doesn't have Queensland government support. But you would just hope there's some way to keep this event alive because it does deserve its place on the supercar's calendar. It looked good too on on screen. The crowds were good. Like they looked strong. It was busy. Like it was busy in the paddock. I I didn't get out to the to the crowd area as much as I would have liked to. I'd only like to take a wonder down to turn one because actually watching down watching cars go into turn one is pretty spectacular as well. But I didn't get a chance to do that over the weekend. So I couldn't sort of get a sense for what the the crowd was like out in the wild, but it felt busy in the paddock, which is usually a pretty good sign. Yeah. No, it looked good. ⁓ just to recap on Saturday, ⁓ race one, Maddie Payne put it on pole, but Brody went out and won it. On race two, Maddie Payne put it on pole again. Will Brown went out to win. And then race three on Sunday, Will Brown put it on pole. ⁓ Brock Feeney got the win. ⁓ Maddie Payne and Chaz Mostett again had engine issues. Well, Chaz anyway. ⁓ and Feeney won the Sprint Cup. So it was a it was a decent weekend. He's really getting a lot of retribution from the racing gods, Brock Feeney, with ⁓ with engine issues helping him win the JR trophy and now the sprint cup. ⁓ I'm sure he'd rather something like that would be paid back in October or in November. But ⁓ yeah, he's scored a couple of trophies this year based on other people having issues and ⁓ you might say he deserves that after what played out in Adelaide last year. Yeah, I think I think that's only fair. ⁓ Right, after every round we do do the Champagne and Shizen and we'll start with Champagne from the round and it's pretty hard to go past Will Brown and I guess in some way triple eight AVL. ⁓ it's not it's hard not to be happy for him, like given what you know what has happened, ⁓ for him to then come out and perform the way he did after all the air restrictor controversy. ⁓ yeah, I I love the fact that he cut a deal to get his hands on the infamous air box restrictor that ⁓ He's now made into a makeshift champagne flute of all things, but you could tell it meant something to him. And there must have been times where in you know the dark of night he must have thought, Is it is it me? Am I you know, is the is the fault really at me? And I I don't think you can rule out that at times it has been. Like to be perfectly honest, because there were there there were times last year where there were no issues with the engine, you know, with that Chevrolet engine package, that triple eight package was the fastest car in the field. And he had sort of dips in form, like it's a thing that happened. So I think that the one thing that is important to note is that and he spoke about it and Andrew Edwards spoke about it. It wasn't just the restricter. That obviously helps. And that was kind of the storyline of the weekend. And never more so than when he's up on the sh on the podium drinking champagne through the thing. ⁓ but There was a lot of work that's gone in. That team in general has struggled to get its head around the Ford package. They've had tough rounds. Look at Townsville and that sort of stuff on both sides of the garage this year. So ⁓ I think there were times where and we know that Will was sort of put through this process of trying to sh sharpen up his focus on racing over the offseason, long before the restrictor was ever an issue, based on some of the the the problems he was having last year. So ⁓ He might have been thinking at times this year, wow, can I still do this? But all of what we saw on the Saturday in particular, and even on the Sunday with that pole position, given the fact qualifying has been his weakness, was actually a whole lot of things coming together in terms of the work they've done as a team to get their head around the Ford package, the work that Will's done to be better focused. He knew, and he spoke about this, he knew coming into the weekend that he had to perform this weekend because of the spotlight that was on him with the restricted stuff. So He had a really focused, hardworking week getting prepared for the event. And all this stuff comes together and he wins a race and scores a pole position. So it's a lot of things. And then the restricted thing is just that last final bit of, all right, well, there's that last deficit that we don't have anymore. Like we worked so hard to get the car in the right window. I've worked so hard to be fitter and more focused than ever. And now we take out that last little issue and bang, right at the front. So yeah, like an incredibly impressive weekend, no matter how you look at it. ⁓ and he just had an incredible bounce in his step from Saturday morning onwards when he outqualified Brock Feeney twice. Again, something he struggled to do well back into last year, not just this year. So ⁓ and from that point on he was just up and away. And it was ⁓ it's ⁓ it could really set up a very important second half of the season for him. Is it just me that thinks that It's now on between those two? ⁓ yeah. No, definitely. Definitely. And I think I do think that made Sunday mean a fair bit more for Brock as well, because he hasn't necessarily been accustomed to having a great challenge from the other side of the garage, particularly in qualifying. So ⁓ he was out qualified by Will in all three races. And I I reckon that would have ⁓ I reckon that would have stung because Brock is just so competitive. Both of them are. ⁓ and ⁓ I think that win would have felt even better than usual. A because obviously it yielded a trophy, but B because he did get that one back up on the other side of the garage. And he was the first to admit on Saturday night that he was really happy to see Will back in form. ⁓ happy and all that sort of stuff. Yeah. But I think ⁓ but that yeah, it doesn't go far. And I think by Sunday he was ready to ⁓ to get back on top and in qualifying he he didn't, but in the race he got his elbows out Not that they really touched too much in that first lap, but he pulled off a big move at turn three and that set him up for a win. And I reckon that would have felt pretty good as well. So it's gonna be fun to watch the dynamic between those those two sides of the garage for the rest of the season for sure. Hey, my next champagne, and this is a little bit of left field think thinking here, but while everyone else is looking for oil companies and sports betting and energy drinks for sports sponsorship, has there ever been a t better time To hit up a caravan company for some cash. I was just looking around the paddock on the weekend. You got Snowy River, you've got JB caravans that are with TW, you got vacation at caravans with Egleston, J Co are in the super ute. Where's the there must be money in ⁓ caravans, Avial? I reckon. Have you ever seen the price of one of those things? Well, it's not for me, I'm not gonna lie, but You're a big man to roll around in a caravan, maybe I don't know they make beds long enough for you to sleep. ⁓ I'd have to I'd be laying in the front seat and out the back. But yeah, it's ⁓ i ⁓ it's crazy. I well it's not crazy, but it's fantastic that it's I wonder whether it's this thing of once you get one group in, you can't afford not to be in it as well. Yeah, maybe. Yeah. ⁓ my next champagne goes to well, just Ford Mustangs. They just dominate on the weekend. ⁓ top five. Top five in race one, top four in race two, nine out of ten in the shootout on Sunday. There was no chefs. It's coming up to Bathers David. Did someone say parody? Yeah, I reckon there might be a bit to play out in that space in the not too distant future. Yeah. It's a good time to ⁓ to have a bit of a parody trigger, to be honest. We saw that last year with some changes to the Ford Mustang before the band that ⁓ worked out pretty well. If you're writing for a motorsport news website, it must be just manna from heaven. ⁓ The the reaction, the whole thing. My final champagne, it's got nothing to do with supercars, but my God, did you see last night Gabriel Bortoletto spinning as he got onto the main straight of Lap One ⁓ in Zanvoort and then Nico Holkenberg avoiding him and it was something out of Days of Thunder. He just drove towards the smoke. And yeah, I it was unbelievable. If you haven't seen it, go and have a look. Max Verstappen had his own bust up. turned his car into a basically into a canoe button. Well Liam Lawson did quite well to get around him as well, to be honest. ⁓ but I'm not sure I mean in these cases you can talk about how amazing the driving was. It's pretty much dumb luck in most cases at night or whatever. Your reflexes kick in and you go, Well I'm going here and hoping for the best. And particularly in Holkenberg's case, I think that's exactly what happened. Yep. ⁓ my shizen, AVL. I'm gonna put it down to KO and Fox and not the Supercars broadcast team, but two cameras on both Friday and Saturday just kept freezing. One was at turn three, one was at turn six. I got so many messages in my inbox and it also was on Discord. Everyone was complaining about it. ⁓ it was a weird thing 'cause it seemed to be isolated to those platforms. Because even on the screens they reckoned. Big screen wasn't an issue. ⁓ I know in the commentary booth it wasn't an issue. So it was something that potentially took longer to identify ⁓ because it wasn't actually a universal issue. It was just but the KO stream was definitely doing it. It was doing it the same in our office at the track where we had KO in it. So it was definitely a thing that was happening. Driving me crazy. ⁓ my next Shizen is BJR's big dollar screwdriver. On Friday, if you didn't get to see it on the TV coverage, they caught a screwdriver falling at the front of the super of Macaulay Jones. It cost the team seven bucks so it's super ⁓ cheap for a new screwdriver, but also a fine of five hundred dollars. So all up, it's about five hundred and seven dollars, which is about the price you'd probably pay for a screwdriver at one of Super Cheap Auto's competitors, AVL. Yeah. ⁓ bad blue. Very good. Yeah, no, it is that they're always awkward, those things, when ⁓ stuff gets left in cars. ⁓ I think it kind of fell down into one of the side skirts or somewhere down there and couldn't couldn't they couldn't retrieve it. So the car goes out and ⁓ and out it comes. Next Shizen is the Toyota B spec engines. I think we'll touch on this later on in the show, but but the famous Bartholomew spec engine ⁓ in the Supras doesn't look to be any more reliable than the AVL spec engines, A VL. ⁓ with Chap Mossad having a DNF on Sunday. Refreshingly, it wasn't Woody. That was one thing, I suppose. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know that Stefan wants his name ⁓ attached to that engine right now as well. But but no, there's been a fair bit of work going on. We just ⁓ published with as we record on on Monday evening, we just ⁓ published a story with an update on this. So basically what happened this was obviously deeply concerning for the team because there's been so much made about the reliability upgrade of this B spec engine. ⁓ there was four of them out there on the weekend ⁓ and one of them in Chaz's car failed. And you know, given that there's just a it's a bit bigger issue than like it would always be a big issue, right? Heading to the injuries r reliability. But obviously when you're racing as the factory Toyota team, a brand built on reliability, this is something there's probably an additional urgency to get on top of. So ⁓ because the teams have stayed in Queensland for the tests. I'll say today being Tuesday. Yep. ⁓ they pulled Chaz's motor out on the Sunday night. It was sent to Craig Haste's workshop in Brisbane. He runs the supercar's engine program. Every engine and every supercar goes through his dyno before it's sealed and ⁓ and goes in the cars. And he also works very closely with the HTS on on the spec of their engine and helping getting them to where they need to get to. So he's a pretty important part of the process for all of the manufacturers. So They took that motor to his workshop in Brisbane ⁓ on Monday. It was obviously torn down. They've found a bottom end bearing failure. ⁓ so as a precord well, they they need to they need to pull all the motors apart, all the B spec motors apart now and see if there's obviously signs of similar wear and tear that could lead to failures in the other ones. So as we sit here and record on Monday night, I'm guessing it's pretty busy out at Queensland Raceway because ⁓ there's four supers that had the A spec motor gun. back into it. Good weekend to be to be a crew on Macaulay Jones's car because he ran the A spec the whole time. They didn't have to put one in for the race weekend and they don't have to now take one out and put another one back in for tomorrow. So ⁓ a big win for the guys on Macaulay's car, although I dare say they would have been drafted in to help with the other two cars. But they will ⁓ go back to the A spec for the test ⁓ because you obviously just can't you can't run the risk as much as there is some risk attached to the valve train issues in the in the A spec. You can't run the risk if this is a wider ranging issue of getting half an hour into Tuesday's running and having an engine failure and then missing that day 'cause it's such an important day of running. So ⁓ so that's what's happening. But the team has said that they the plan is absolutely to have all the B specs in across all five Supras for the Bend. ⁓ and then you'd I would think by Bathus, if not by the Bend, then by Bathurst, obviously ⁓ two engines per car, so there's a spare as well because ⁓ At the end of the day, Bathurst is the big one. And that's where you need everything working. But yeah, definitely. I'm sure there's some relief that the issue has been identified. I guess there'll be more relief when these additional engines have been inspected. If if there is, you know, if they can find out that this was any sort of one off. But until then, pretty concerning given the work that's gone into getting this B spec engine ready. My final shizen and look, this isn't a pile on AVL. But when a black with two hundred and fifty six starts under his belt is racing with and on Sunday being beaten by drivers making their debuts in wildcards, I don't think something's right. and Maca Jones, whether it's an engine thing, a car thing, a driver thing, I don't know 'cause I'm not in the team. And from all reports, a tremendous young bloke. And so it's not a personal shot, but geez, it's not a good look when you got two wildcards in front of him and one r ⁓ Lapping at his heels. So and I can tell you, of all the drivers in the field, for some reason, Maca Jones gets more in in my inbox than anyone else. Yeah, look, I mean, ⁓ for starters, there it wasn't a great weekend for the Toyotas in general. Chaz seemed to drag some speed out of it. ⁓ but I don't think we're talking about a Queensland raceway specific sort of thing here. Like ⁓ you know, ⁓ ultimately Macaulay generally does race closer to the back of the field than the front of it. But you motorsport is just a different sport. That's the reality. It might be frustrating, but it is not across the board in any category, in any part of the world, purely a performance based sport. There's just more to it. And this is nothing new that there's drivers out there that aren't necessarily the perfor I I guess it's no different to the footy team. There's good players and and and players that Aren't as good as those other players, right? Like it's a it's a tough thing to talk about. But or Martin Slabershane. It's just ⁓ yeah, it's just a it's just a very unique sport and and Macaulay has his place in it for a range of reasons that aren't necessarily driven purely by performance. Because if they were, it's a fair comment to say that he wouldn't necessarily have spent this long in the championship. Like that's just the reality of it. But motorsport doesn't work the same as other sports, it is just what it is. And You have different conversations about drivers at the front of the field because it is a different kind of model up there in terms of the way the employment of the drivers works. And it's a bizarre sport like that. Like it really is. But it's nothing new. It's nothing new. I get that. And you're probably right. And then we actually got a conversation in the Discord that touched on that and then one or two other drivers and people calling out them as well. But as you sort of are aware and we're all aware that it's Some of these drivers bring or the sponsors are quite in love with them, so getting rid of the driver may well get rid of the sponsor. And I don't know many dri teams that can afford to do that. Well, that's exactly all right. Let's go to the shift cut because we'll touch on the Dutch Grand Prix. And we'll start with ⁓ sprint qualifying on well, Saturday, where George Russell took his third sprint pole this season after pipping Lando Norris in ⁓ in the qualifying ⁓ and then in the sprint race, I tell you, that was a tough watch, AVL. ⁓ he led from start to finish. There were two changes of position in the entire top ten for the entire race. And that race would dec basically it would have put a glass eye to sleep. ⁓ there's more excitement trying to catch a train to the track, apparently, because there were thousands of fans left stranded at Zenfort ⁓ train station due to cancellation and delays. If you haven't seen, have a look around for some social media, but just the crowd numbers. It's incredible the amount of people that were there. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, some of the T V pictures were amazing in those grandstands. Just full of orange. It it does look very cool. Saturday Grand Prix qualifying. Lando Norris stuck it on pole from the hall monitor. Kimmy was third, Oscar was fourth. ⁓ and then the Ferraris and so on and so forth. ⁓ in the Grand Prix last night, Norris got the jump from pole ⁓ before a massive crash on lap one, as we touched on before. It red flagged the race. Max had the mother of all power snaps that led him. Head on into the wall. And as we said, Bortiletto then had his own spin and was unbelievably missed by his teammate Nico Holkenberg. The field actually did a remarkable job to miss both those bikes given the way the smoke was hanging around and everything else. From there was a real strategy heavy race AVL. Lendo Norris led throughout. I kind of gave up on it. ⁓ Antonelli grabbed second from the Hall Monitor, the Ferraris and Oscar. Liam Lawson was seventh in his guest appearance in the Red Bull, which was a pretty good drive. And adding to that, the Aston Martin revival continues with Alonso. Getting points running in ninth. I know you celebrated at your place about that. Yeah, for sure. I think it was better than a than a decent drive for Liam Lawson. I think that was he did everything that w he could have possibly done. I think a car looks like that's where it's at, right? Yeah, he was very close to max in qualifying, really. Yeah. For someone who hasn't been racing that car all year. And then kind of went toe to toe with him at parts on that first lap anyway before the before the crash. And then or was that in the sprint race? Maybe no, that was in the race. That was in the main race. So in the race, yeah. Yeah. ⁓ so I think that was a really good drive. Like he really needed to be ahead of the RBs, which is easier said than done, particularly Arvid Lindblad. And it kind of felt like 'cause you'd sort of you sort of go, well, if if Lindblad's the golden boy, why didn't he get the call up? But maybe that's because it it was probably seen as a bit of a hospital pass to go and do it. And they sort of went, Well we'll we'll get we'll get Liam to do it. And he did a fantastic job. So I reckon he would have taken immense satisfaction out of how that that race played out because he did a really good job there. So I think that was one thing worth noting. And the other thing is that like just an unbelievably tough race for Oscar Piastri. Again. Like ⁓ yeah just just bizarre lack of pace compared to his teammate who's out there winning the race. ⁓ I could not follow what strategy that would they were trying to play out. Like with the when they went to Hards after the red flag, it's like, are they going to try and run to the end? And then the next thing you seem to be trying to set a world record for amount of pit stops in one race. Like he was just in and out of the pits. And yeah, very, very strange and and I'm guessing ⁓ pretty disappointing ⁓ from his side of the garage because in both cases you've got Lando Norris either on pole or winning the race and Oscar not in the press conference for the top three, which is always a bad sign. Yep. it was like you say on that strategy, he was on a hard. George Russell goes in, so they go and cover him off by sicking him on on a on a medium. It's like what what are you doing? Like he had a hard and he was actually setting he they asked him only moments before how's the hard and he said but it doesn't feel any different to the medium to be honest. Yeah. So yeah it was hard to that strategy was hard to follow in general. It was a difficult race. It was it was a much better race because you're right. The the sprint was just woeful in terms of a racing product. It was a better race than probably I was expecting, but it was very complicated to try and follow it. Yeah. ⁓ during the week, James Vowell revealed that he feared Williams would lose both Alex Alwan and Carlos Sainz after his difficult start to the twenty six Formula One season, with both drivers having now committed to the team for twenty seven. He said I was concerned about losing them both because they are world championship. material drivers ⁓ that deserve the opportunity to be fighting for podiums or more and we haven't delivered that. ⁓ and geeze, I wouldn't want to be holding my breath waiting for that to happen either. AVL, I was talking to someone else about this. Carlos Sainz. Is this really where he's at? In a Williams? Well he's made the longer of the commitments, right? I think he's made the longer of the commitments. So I I think I think Albon's keeping his options open a little bit but kind of just taking on the next season. ⁓ but Carlos is kind of all in on it. So It does it it is kind of Williams biggest strength at the moment is the fact they got two pretty good pretty good Grand Prix drivers ⁓ in those cars, in a car that doesn't seem all that fast. So it is actually ⁓ a ⁓ great coup for for the team to keep them both. It seems like James Vows is very good at selling the dream. You know, like even the fact they got Carlos to come there compared to going to like a factory Audi program is pretty impressive. So, ⁓ he's kind of done it again and ⁓ We'll see where they go, but it's i it it'll all come down to whether they can ⁓ make that car better because ⁓ at the moment it's just yeah, not overish. And then they collided with cars in it. They collided with each other. Well, they did too, that's right. Yeah, I've forgotten about that. Tremendous look. Yep. ⁓ just one thing after another. ⁓ back to supercars and the prodigal son, David Couchy, will make a surprise return to Triple Eight after ⁓ taking over engineering duties on Will Brown's Ford Mustang moving forward after this race, just gone. The move will come as Brown's existing race engineer, Andrew Edwards, takes a promotion to a head of performance role. For those that don't know, Prodigal's Son is a story where a son leaves his family, gets sued by his family, works for another team against his own family before returning to his family, getting one of the other sons moved out of his job and going back to work on a part-time basis. So pretty similar to what's happening here. AVL. Triple Eight managing director Jamie Wincup said the team was keen to ⁓ snap up Cauchy who had worked outside the sport since leaving Grove Racing at the end of 25. Cauchy's previous in at Triple Eight was from 2007 to 21, including engineering Win Cup to two championship titles. We've been looking to build engineering depth at Triple Eight for some time now, and when you have the opportunity of someone you know is 100% the person for the job, then you have to make that move. Life is about taking those opportunities. Couchi's departure from Triple Eight was tumultuous, let's not forget, with the team taking legal action following his arrival at Grove amid a dispute over gardening leave. But he was excited for a return to the House of Eights. He said, I spent fourteen years at Triple Eight with J Dub as his engineer, experienced many incredible highs and, of course, some lows along the way. I'm both excited and grateful for the opportunity. It'll be a bat piston of fire going to the injuries cup part of the season, but I can't wait to work with Will as some as well as some of the new and many old teammates. All right, AVL. Time for our weekly questions from the cheap seats. Gotcha. I'll ask you this first. Does the timing of this seem a bit off given the recent events around the restricted kerfuffle? The timing was definitely really strange given how the weekend played out. And the timing of the announcement actually changed because it was meant to be announced on Saturday evening, but there was just so much going on that the idea of like having this remarkable victory and having Will Brown and Andrew Edwards so emotional about it and then immediately announcing that they're not going to be directly working with each other as in that ⁓ race engineer driver relationship anymore would have been really strange. But to be honest, it wasn't that much less strange at eight o'clock the next morning. Cause like so so the timing of it from the an announcement point of view was absolutely bizarre. The general timeline, because I think that's what you you you're sort of talking about. It doesn't match up with it being a direct response to the restrictor issue in terms of we found this issue and we're making changes to the team based on it. But it was it's clearly related to the performance issues that Triple Eight has faced so far this year and particularly on the on the car triple eight side of the garage. So the line from Triple Eight is that it needed to fill the void left by Jeremy Moore in the senior technical management. But the fact it's a mid season engineer shift does suggest that there's just something more to it than that. And there was obviously a lot of Will Brown and Andrew Edwards love after that win on Saturday, but breaking up a partnership like that in any circumstance is a is a big deal, particularly midway through the season. And it's difficult to fully believe there wasn't a sense somewhere that perhaps that partnership wasn't working. So even though The the funny part is the results on the on the weekend just gone suggest that it definitely was working. and that there was this external issue issue that was playing a reasonably significant role in why they were underperforming. So it's all really interesting. Stefan and I actually broke down some of the nuances of the whole thing in the Sunday daily pod that we did, the Sunday night pod. So that's worth a listen for anyone looking to understand it a bit more. But yeah, it does feel like there's elements of this That are more complicated than what's kind of being presented on the surface. Next question from the cheap seats. Will Groves think much of this? And what will ⁓ will they be overly concerned about IP? Well, in the Gen three world, there's less engineering IP, I guess, but in you know, in terms of designing uprights and things like that. But yeah, you would think that Groves would would prefer someone with intimate knowledge of their well performing race team wasn't standing in the garage next door. I think that that's a pretty natural reaction to something like this happening. And is there any sort of hangover from the previous ammo animosity between Triple Eight Couchy when Cauchy went to the Groves? Well it's clearly not if they've come to this arrangement because ⁓ it's obviously something they've moved on from ⁓ with you know his departure and the legal staus over the gardening leave and all that sort of stuff. So it was an issue at the time but Memories can be short in motorsport when it comes to making moves that you feel can improve performance. So it's obviously one of those one of those cases. And as as you touched on before, like he like David Couchy was Jamie Wincub's race engineer for seven years and w at the team for 14 years. So there's a lot of history there that can't necessarily be entirely dissolved by one flash point of of friction over the gardening leave thing. So ⁓ I don't think that's gonna be an issue. There's there's a f just a few interesting things about it. And one of them is the the ⁓ the part time nature of it. So he's gonna stay in his role as in in in a ⁓ in a C O O role for a business that manages a whole ⁓ eleven Bridgestone retailers across Queensland. ⁓ and then do the race engineering as a part time thing. And it's a very untriple eight model to do it that way. Triple eight's always been a live and breathe this kind of organization. ⁓ and yeah, it's it's It's interesting to think that you've suddenly got a dynamic and obviously you've got Andrew Edwards overseeing both cars, but you've got dynamic where you've got one engineer that will be effectively a weekend warrior and phoning in for debriefs and pre briefs. And then on Brock Feeney's side of the garage, there's Marty Short who wakes up every day and thinks about nothing except making Brock Feeney's car go as fast as it can possibly go. So maybe it doesn't matter. Like maybe it makes no difference. I don't know. I've never worked at a team. I'm not a technical person, but it's ⁓ to me, that's just a another interesting part of this whole thing. Yeah. I've I mean it sort of I don't know when you guys found found out about it, but it sort of jumped up pretty quickly over Saturday and it was like, What? And I'm thinking that can't be right. ⁓ before before too long, and I'm talking it was kind of broken in the Discord, someone sort of mentioned it. And then within the space of probably an hour it was almost official. So yeah. Yeah, it's ⁓ it was yeah, it was just the whole It was just the most bizarre thing to come out of that Saturday. Like it was the most biz like it was the most unexpected thing that could possibly have emerged out of the ⁓ there was you again. You promote you you promote another podcast. That was strange. Yeah, well, yeah, of course. That's all. Or or rising tide floats all boats for them. That's ⁓ that's good cool. Fair enough. ⁓ but ⁓ we'll see. Yeah, it was certainly and obviously it wasn't the work of sat it didn't happen on Saturday night. None of this happened on Saturday night, but If you had to pick what announcement would happen or something that would happen after the way Saturday played out, boy, that just was not it. Hmm. Strange. ⁓ New Zealand's next F one hope for Louis Sharp, who I met over summer, lovely young fella, has conceded his season is over and he's left Premier with two rounds remaining in the FAA Formula Three Championship after the two parties agreed to end his campaign early. ⁓ there's more questions and answers on that. Well, I mean I I don't know much about it, but ⁓ It's an expensive business that FIA lattices. Like you think I hear you. You think Super 2's expensive, like go over there and have a crack of that. ⁓ let's go to Kiwi's Aussies overseas. We'll start with IndyCar, the Grand Ballroom 250, ⁓ at the Washington Supercross track, from best I can tell. Did you see any of this? No, I didn't see a bit of it. ⁓ mate, it's wild this track. ⁓ it's got it's it's like a supercross track in a couple of the corners. Cars were just getting spat left and right under brakes where it just looked like there was no driver error. It was just the way the track was configured. And qualifying, Scotty McLaughlin was third. Marcus Armstrong fifth. Will Power 13th and Scotty Dixon 14th. The race got underway with the Don ⁓ limply waving a green flag. I'm not going to lie. Scotty McLaughlin walled it, ⁓ going for the lead with a dozen laps to go. Will Powell grabbed third coming from 13th. And another remarkable drive from Will. Scottie Dixon was seventh and Marcus Armstrong 17th in a race won by Kyle Kirkwood. If you do get a chance, go and have a look at the highlights, mate, because that track is crazy. NASCAR in the terrace for Dummies 400 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Shane Bean Gisberg and qualified fifth. His equal best over spot in qualifying. And he led the opening stands of the race before fading to finish 20th. Ryan Blaney got the win. In Motocross AVL, I know you've been asking for it. Hunter Lawrence dominated the weekend's round at Buds Creek to reclaim points, a lead, and set up a ⁓ winner-take-all championship showdown with his brother Jet this weekend at Indiana. ⁓ the brothers have won every round of the ten rounds this year to date. So ⁓ and finally, I thought I'd play this with you. I'm gonna give you four quotes from Stefano Domenicali. ⁓ well, you tell me which one's an actual quote from the president and chief executive officer of Formula One, and if one Two, three, or four are made up. So three so three are fake and one's real? ⁓ four might be fake. Two might be fake or none might be fake. ⁓ okay. So I've got to pick which ones are real. Yes. Gotcha. ⁓ this one. There are diehard motorsport fans who talk about clipping during a Formula One weekend, but there are also many who think ⁓ of a clip as something to put in your hair. That one is definitely true. Number two. No one is interested in how you drive your car. I had an interesting discussion with George Lucas in Hungary. It's true. It's true. ⁓ no, there's no every there's no better like example of an every man than George Lucas. If he can't speak for the masses, then who can? When I want to talk Formula One, I ring the bloke who made Star Wars. Exactly. ⁓ number three. F one has not had any problems. F one's in great shape, just to make sure that's clear to everyone. And the vast majority of fans have been since the beginning very positive about this new series, what they see in terms of race action. Yeah, that one's gotta be true, I reckon. All right, number four. The traditional tracks will never lose their place in our calendars, that's for sure. ⁓ I'll go with that one being not true. No, it's true. Don't change the true yet. ⁓ he's got the yeah, anyway, it's it's what what he says next. It makes that Muhammad bin Salaam look well normal, let's be honest. Except for the when he strokes your hair, he'd love your hair. Look at it, it's beautiful. It's a it's a heck of a combo running this whole deal, isn't All right, we'll come back from a break and we'll do what's the forward headline from the weekend. Credit to noise. Winter could spell bad news for your vehicle's battery. Here are three maintenance tips from the battery gurus at RNJ Batteries. 1. Avoid frequent short trips to keep your battery at a healthy state of charge. 2. Keep the battery terminals clean and corrosion free. 3. Avoid running your accessories with the engine off for too long. If your battery is three years or older, it might be time to get it tested for free. At your local R and J Batteries. R and J Batteries power like nothing else. Yeah, welcome back now. Let's do what's the forward headline, AVL. If you haven't heard this before, I'm gonna give you a topic. You just give me a forward headline, and I don't reckon any of mine are forwards, so so strap yourself in. Go as hard as you want. My first topic, Will Brown. What's your headline for Will Brown? ⁓ triple A garage dynamic one to watch. Hmm. Okay. Mine is new Billet Wine Glass line set to dominate merch sales. If he doesn't turn that into a decanter or something, I'm telling you, he'll sell a hundred of ⁓ Yeah. ⁓ Matt Payne. Ugh, poor Matt Payne. What's your forward headline? ⁓ Lucky Groves didn't care about the sprint cup anymore. I got the same. I didn't want the trophy anyway. Just a dust collector. You don't need it. Yeah. ⁓ Premier Racing. What's your forward headline? I hope that was a parody play. 'Cause if it wasn't that was not a good one is imagine if they imagine if they weren't at their home track. Yeah. Yeah. Not that home tracks really mean much these days either. No, I get it. What about Ryland Gray? Thought he had a good weekend. Yeah, heading in the right direction. ⁓ apart from turn apart from turn three, obviously in whatever race it was where he speared off. I think it was the straight on second race in ⁓ on the Saturday. Yeah. I just rate the progression continues. I I think it hasn't been ⁓ as fast as what Ryan Wood was doing, but just there's some good signs. Yeah, I the Ryan Wood and Kai Allen set a pretty high bar for sort of coming in and And getting up to speed pretty quickly. So ⁓ it's they're tough acts to follow and Ryland's definitely not on that immediate trajectory, but there's certainly some ⁓ promising signs. Yep. Bailey Hall, what's your forward headline for the super chat? Loves a super soft loves a super soft tire race because he drove forward in that ⁓ in the super soft race on the Saturday evening. ⁓ so that was definitely the the big positive for him to take out of the weekend. I wrote looks like he could do with a test day. One test day short, probably. Yep. That's a pretty fair pretty fair one as well. What about Brock Feeney? ⁓ see the Will Brown answer. It applies to both of ⁓ I wrote, ⁓ that's right. The other guy's good too. Yeah. He definitely is. Yeah. ⁓ he was kind of forgotten after the whole ⁓ the whole Will Brown thing, but ⁓ Sunday there was a big reminder. Toyota Racing, your foreword headline. In terms of like the Toyota's in general, like the Yeah, if you want. Like, well, I think it's just ⁓ yeah, plenty of nerves. Like it's it'll be a nervous time for those guys at the moment in terms of getting these engines sorted. That was B spec Bartholomew's donk blows bits. ⁓ and so it is that they're back with the A's. Finally, I love this from last night. George Russell, what's your forward headline? Even on a good weekend he gets beaten by Kimmy. ⁓ my god. Mate, did you see him w I don't know about you, and I'm you know I'm not an apologist for George Russell. Would you have let Kimmy through? Yeah, that was odd. Yeah. I would have said I don't think so. That did seem very he seemed weirdly upbeat for the fact he just dropped more points as well after the race. Obviously he would have been pretty G'd up by that defence at the end there and and and kind of how well he did drive, but It was a good weekend and he still dropped points. Yeah, my forward headline was Timu Barrichello, a good solid rear gunner. Yep. Because that's where he might be going. But yeah, I I thought that was odd and I thought that he would have said, I'm not letting him through, just so you know, you if he wants to come through, he's quite welcome to have a crack. ⁓ all right, go to a break, we'll come back with rear of grid and credit shredded. Yeah, welcome back to Rear of Grid. I seen there was at one stage on the weekend there was something like 60 active people in the Discord at any one time. ⁓ had a lot of recent sign ups as well, which is awesome. I seen that. So there's more people coming in, there's more good discussion, and there is things like early access to tickets to the live show because yeah, there is a surprising chunk of the allocation already gone. Just based off the fact that we've ⁓ we've released it in the Discord. So many benefits to getting involved and ⁓ yeah, it's just good fun. You learn you learn things before ⁓ others out there, let's put it that way. If you're part of the Well that's true. Yeah, that was true on the weekend. ⁓ if you haven't seen it, go to FCTN.com and sign up from there. ⁓ you get an email and it'll give you all the directions. All right, six credit or shredded. So I'm gonna make a statement, you agree with the credit or disagree with the shredded, we'll revisit ⁓ after we've done all six. Number one. The poor and ongoing issues with the T V product is in danger of turning supercar fans off the series. Shredd it. Credit. Number two, Oscar Piastri is now a clear number two at McLaren. Credit. Credit. Number three, the new Ford LMDH hypercar is the greatest sounding race car in history. ⁓ I have to say Shreddit. I'll say Shred it, but I'm I'll tell you what, it's it's in the final, put it that way. Number four, Triple Eight as a collective would have rather not made public the whole restricted debacle. And Will Brown's results of the weekend only make it worse for the team. Credit with a butt. I'll say credit. Number five. Here we go. Premier are no better off with Roland Dane at the team. Shredd. Credit. Number six. Queensland Raceway is the best track for racing and spectating in Australia. ⁓ credit, yeah. Yeah, I'll say credit. All right. You say the TV product is not in danger of I don't think you I don't think you stopped being a fan of supercars because of niggling T V issues. I don't I like I don't ⁓ I yeah, I don't I don't buy that as a theory. I'm telling you on Friday and Saturday it was so frustrating, ABL. So frustrating. Because you're just watching the cars. Well, I know one guy, only one, messaged me and said, I'm watching the cricket. Yeah. which probably many was back watching the supercars boy about three o'clock in the RB because that didn't last long either. So Exactly. And and to be honest, like ⁓ race one was Not a ball tearing race by any stretch of the imagination at Queensland Raceway. But like if you're turning off races two or three because of some of those issues, then I don't think you're a car racing fan in the first place. Because they were that was great theatre and they were they were fantastic races. They were. ⁓ we could talk about that all day. Oscar Piastri is now clear number two at McLaren. He can't argue it. Like Lando has a massive edge on him in pace at the moment. It's just it's a pretty undeniable trend. Yep, I agree. It's unfortunate. ⁓ the new Ford LMDH hypercar is the best sounding race car in history. I doubt that. So I've got no idea what it sounds like. It's unbelievable. It's a tough one for me to answer. I'll send you a link. It's great. It's very Cadillacish. If it sounds as good as the ⁓ the Dark Horse Mustang that I was ripping laps around Queensland Raceway in last Friday night, then ⁓ it's definitely in with a shout. I'll send you a link. I think you'll you'll be impressed. ⁓ Triple Eight Collective would rather not made public the whole restricted debacle. Yeah, this is a really interesting one. A really interesting one because like would they have been better off not saying anything? What happens then? Well dep okay, so it depends what side of the fence you're sitting on here, right? Like so as a journalist, ⁓ I'm so happy it rolled out the way that it did. It was great. If I was a comms person working for the team, I would definitely have been suggesting to say nothing until after the weekend. And I think within the garage there were different opinions on what would have been the better approach. But ultimately the s the they decided to go public. ⁓ I feel like that's something that Will Brown did actually want despite the pressure it brought. I think he needed that kind of he he needed He needed that to be out there that there was this had been this issue that been holding him back. And to be honest, he fed off that pressure and fed off the kind of attention around that and put it to incredible use. so, you know, they decided to tell go public with this whole thing, and we got the amazing storyline that we got. So it's it's again, I think it's I think there's different opinions in the garage about whether it was the right approach or the ⁓ or the wrong approach, but it was an approach and it kind of paid off okay. as for the results as in terms of Will's results making it worse, I don't know if it made it worse, but I think what probably did make it worse for both the team and supercars was all this parading of the restrictor on the podium and all that sort of stuff that we've kind of referenced before. Again, great fun for us, great theater, great TV, all that sort of stuff. But I reckon there's people on both the supercars and triple eight side that would have loved to have never seen that thing ever again. let alone how tens of thousands of people watching will drink champagne through it on TV and and and at the circuit. So ⁓ that that was a that was a really bizarre thing. The whole presentation of the trophy, lots of fun, not against it, but it was certainly it was certainly a a a weird look for for the sport. I've thought about it since it all happened and the whole thing. And the only reason I can think That they did release it to the public. Well, two reasons. Maybe it would have got out, which would have might have made it worse. But two, I think I reckon Will Brown has said, I want people to know. I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. Yep. Yeah. I would not be surprised at all. Premier are no better off with Roland Dane at the team. I'd still rather I'd still rather have him there. I'd say results say that that's true, but Yeah, but like We're still pretty early in this in this whole thing. And to be honest, some of ⁓ Jaden Ojada's results have been fantastic this year. it was obviously a really tough weekend. These things take time. ⁓ so if I if I was running if I owned Premier, if I was Peter Zibris, I would much rather have Roland there than not have him there. I think that's a that's too short a term view. Okay. What's being proposed there. saying that I'd I think we were in discussion in the Discord last night. Be interesting to airdrop Roland Daniel and a couple of other teams and see what would happen, what he made of their ⁓ the way they ran. But you can find that in the Discord if you want to go back and have a look. Number six, Queensland Raceway. I mean, just unbelievable on the weekend. ⁓ I think we spoke about it last week and we actually said that people will bag the joint, but there's been some fantastic racing there and on the weekend we see more of it. Produces great racing. It just does. Time time and time again. It's ⁓ we talk about there being great driving circuits and great racing circuits. And that is definitely a great racing circuit. And ultimately, that's that's what we want to see. Because you look at something like Zanford, that's ⁓ a great driving circuit. But then we get races like the Sprint Race, which was really, really ⁓ pretty boring. So it is QR is a great racing circuit. It has all the ingredients to create racing and we just saw so much of it. Race one, like I said, was not an absolute thriller. ⁓ but those other two races just absolutely fantastic. Yeah, and I think the crowds there that you saw reflected that. I thought like it just look the hill up the top, look, it wasn't l early two thousands, but I'll tell you it wasn't far off it. There were lots and lots and lots of people. So ⁓ Yeah. Alright, let's have a rest. You've got stuff to do. that'll about do us for this episode of Full Credit to the Noise. You can find this podcast on all the socials at FCTTN Podcast. You read ABL's excellent work over at speakcapay.com where they do break all the big motorsport news first. Until next time, I've been Formal Legend. He's been ABL. This has been Full Credit of the Noise, and we'll see you, the Muscle Car Masters. See you there. Full credit to the Noise.