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The Motorsport Brief | Monza F1 Musings · Rusty's Garage

• 0:02
  Listener.
• 0:03
  We've made F1 the focus for this edition of the Shortcast.
• 0:06
  The motorsport brief with Monza just days away.
• 0:09
  And there is a bit to talk about ahead of round 13 as well.
• 0:11
  Matt Hickey from Code Sports will join us to do that in a moment.
• 0:15
  G'day everyone.
• 0:15
  Rusty here for this edition of the Garage Shorty.
• 0:18
  Good reaction to last week's chat too with Toby Price and Hayden Padden.
• 0:22
  who actually went on to finish second in the WRC event there in Portugal.
• 0:26
  Great result for the Kiwi.
• 0:27
  Hopefully that helps him get another call-up from Hyundai there.
• 0:30
  You can find that in all the usual places.
• 0:32
  Toby talking, rallying ahead of the Sunraiser Safari this weekend, and more is also on our YouTube channel.
• 0:38
  Have you listened to Penrite Racing team owner Stephen Grove?
• 0:43
  Two-parter, over an hour of conversation.
• 0:45
  His gritty recovery from a crash at the Bathurst 12-hour...
• 0:50
  Getting ready for Le Mans again in a very short period of time.
• 0:53
  Not stopping to savour what he did with the Bathurst 1000 win last year as a team for very long.
• 1:00
  He gets focused on the next goal at hand.
• 1:03
  And putting some context around what he meant by that headline, we're here to dominate.
• 1:09
  We hope you enjoy that.
• 1:10
  Now to the Italian Grand Prix.
• 1:12
  Can Kimi Antonelli win at home?
• 1:14
  What chance of a Ferrari victory ahead of the Tafosi AGM?
• 1:20
  Their CEO, Matt Hickey, do we say buongiorno?
• 1:23
  What do we say?
• 1:23
  Hello, mate, how are you?
• 1:25
  G'day, it's fine, but I'll run with buongiorno if you want to as well.
• 1:28
  The primary school Italian just kicking in a little bit there.
• 1:31
  Why don't we start with that?
• 1:34
  Do you reckon Kimmy can do it this weekend in great shape in terms of the championship?
• 1:38
  What, you know, for this absolute superstar of the future to win at home would be mighty if he can do it?
• 1:47
  Yeah, if he can do it.
• 1:48
  So from what I understand, he's going to be starting from the back of the grid.
• 1:52
  That's a pre-planned look from Mercedes for an engine changeover.
• 1:57
  They think that Monza is a great place where he can make up a lot of those spots back up.
• 2:02
  but we know how much of an effort it would be.
• 2:04
  It would be remarkable if you could.
• 2:06
  The crowd would be losing their minds.
• 2:08
  But, yeah, it will be difficult, and he'll be in damage control from the outset with that back-of-the-grip penalty for an engine changeover.
• 2:15
  So I'll be intrigued to how many spots he can make up.
• 2:20
  We know with the long straights and their power unit that he'll be able to clear the back markers pretty quickly, I would have thought, but obviously that gives a lot of the time for the front runners to gap him a little bit.
• 2:31
  Among those front runners are the mighty red combo.
• 2:34
  What about Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton?
• 2:39
  Your words a moment ago were they'll go mad.
• 2:41
  If Antonelli does it, they'll equally do that if either of those two bring home the chocolates.
• 2:46
  Yeah, they certainly will.
• 2:47
  And I think you can never say Ferrari's crept up on you, but you have a look at the driver standings now, and Lewis Hamilton is on equal points with George Russell.
• 2:57
  And I think if you spoke to a lot of fans who may be keeping an eye on things but aren't locked in, that would surprise a few people because most of –
• 3:05
  I guess the narrative through the first half of the season has been the gap that Mercedes has on everybody.
• 3:10
  I don't think that that exists as big as it did at the start of the year.
• 3:14
  It definitely doesn't.
• 3:15
  And Ferrari with Lewis Hamilton, we know what Charles Leclerc can do.
• 3:18
  Ferrari, I believe, are bringing an engine upgrade as well to Monza.
• 3:22
  So I think it'll be eyes on the red car.
• 3:26
  They always are, but definitely this weekend.
• 3:29
  If memory serves, he's got another year left on that deal there with Ferrari.
• 3:34
  I know it's new regulations and so on, but with that group of people around him, he's had a fantastic year in many respects.
• 3:40
  And I think that is also indicative of the kind of radio chat that we've heard from him at times because he wants to maximise that, doesn't he?
• 3:49
  He does.
• 3:50
  I mean, do we dare call it the Kim Kardashian effect?
• 3:52
  I don't know.
• 3:53
  I'll leave that to you, Rusty.
• 3:56
  He's very happily now in his relationship, and maybe it's reflecting on the road as well, but he is having a fantastic year.
• 4:03
  I mean, we look at the—I hate to use the phrase old fellas of the grid, but—
• 4:08
  The things that Fernando Alonso is doing at Aston Martin now that they're starting to turn the corner as well.
• 4:15
  And then we have Lewis, of course, too.
• 4:17
  And what he's been able to do is I was having a discussion with somebody the other day, a little bit new to F1, going, at what stage do they retire?
• 4:24
  And I'm like, well...
• 4:25
  Depends who you're talking about because these two look like they could drive to about 50, everyone else maybe 35 is where the limit is.
• 4:32
  But they're two true champions and it's going to be interesting as the grid progresses and we see drivers get locked away, what the grid for next year and the year after will look like.
• 4:43
  It doesn't happen in many – you cover a lot of other sports there, right?
• 4:47
  It doesn't happen in many other codes.
• 4:49
  Golf, you could immediately sort of talk about longevity, right?
• 4:52
  But it doesn't happen in many other games.
• 4:53
  And even most forms of motor racing now, even in supercars, you're kind of late 30s.
• 5:00
  They're looking for you to be kind of heading to co-driver territory, aren't they?
• 5:04
  Yeah, they certainly are.
• 5:06
  And you mentioned golf is probably a bit of an outlier, but sports like tennis, if we're looking at individual sports, where you might have somebody like a Roger play deep into their 30s, but seemingly maybe not able to get to the lofty heights that they were able to get to previously.
• 5:23
  You look at team sports like AFL, NRL, cricket, basketball, and at about 33 or 34, after then is when the drop-off
• 5:33
  is supposed to start happening.
• 5:34
  Now, there are some superhumans out there that are able to, I guess, deny father time.
• 5:41
  We only have to look as far as the likes of LeBron James, but these are two guys who are in that realm when it comes to athletes.
• 5:48
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 5:48
  To have those kind of reflexes as they age is pretty impressive.
• 5:54
  Lando Norris puts pen to paper for a further four years.
• 5:58
  He's in hot form, good time to re-sign.
• 6:03
  A month or two ago with Tom Clarkson, who does the official F1 pod there, Beyond the Grid, about he could really only see himself at one other team.
• 6:13
  His love, his focus, his McLaren, I mean, realistically, right now, you couldn't see him going anywhere else, could you?
• 6:21
  No, I mean, you really couldn't.
• 6:23
  And we know the story in terms of him coming up through the classes and his relationship with Zac Brown, which I think most Australians would be slightly too overly familiar with, having sat through it last year.
• 6:35
  But, yeah, signed until the end of 2030.
• 6:38
  Really exciting, obviously, for Lando coming off the back of that World Championship, starting to turn the corner, the McLaren.
• 6:44
  at the moment off the back of the break.
• 6:47
  And I think they will win more races before 2026 is done.
• 6:51
  What this now means for Oscar moving forward, I guess we can have that discussion.
• 6:57
  Well, let's go there.
• 6:58
  I mean, Andrea Sellers talked about the unique nature of the car this year and perhaps what
• 7:05
  Oscar might need to do in that regard and learning how to extract the best out of it.
• 7:10
  We mentioned there before, Lando's in great form, right?
• 7:14
  So they're, I think, trailing Ferrari by 75 points in the Constructors' race at present.
• 7:21
  If you just break it down for a little moment, I know people are trying to analyse his performance and so on.
• 7:27
  There hasn't been...
• 7:28
  the most perfect pit stops.
• 7:30
  And then he had that gearbox issue in Hungary as well when he was in contention for a race win.
• 7:35
  So for me, there are, I'm trying to drink as always, Matt Glass half full, but I feel like there are some positives and a win may not be that far away for him.
• 7:43
  Yeah, there's obviously been things that have been out of his control.
• 7:46
  As you mentioned, that slow stop at the Dutch Grand Prix, we don't have to go back very far to look at something that was out of his control.
• 7:52
  Screaming at the TV, mate.
• 7:54
  I don't think you were the only one, to be fair.
• 7:56
  I think there might have been a collective voice heard from Australia all the way over to the Dutch Grand Prix.
• 8:02
  But, yeah, a number of things outside of his control that have happened.
• 8:06
  We know in this sport that these things do happen.
• 8:09
  He's contracted...
• 8:10
  with McLaren until the end of 2028.
• 8:12
  But as everybody in professional sports knows, contracts really don't seem to mean much at all anymore.
• 8:20
  I guess to pose it to you, Rusty, you've been around the caper for a very long time.
• 8:24
  Do you see him making a move anytime soon?
• 8:28
  Because the more I watch this play out, the more it seems like he's sinking now more and more into the second driver role, even though McLaren seem to be pretty sure that they don't have one.
• 8:38
  My heart says that he'll come back from this.
• 8:44
  What transpired at the end of last year was immensely tough.
• 8:47
  Okay, it hasn't been inch perfect.
• 8:49
  We saw that at the Australian Grand Prix at the start of the year and so on.
• 8:53
  I think he's got this great inner ability to get on top of those things.
• 8:59
  That'll be a big test of this.
• 9:00
  There's no two ways.
• 9:00
  Yeah.
• 9:02
  about that.
• 9:03
  They need him.
• 9:03
  They need him in the game here from a constructors championship standpoint, right?
• 9:07
  So, yeah.
• 9:10
  Do I see him leaving there?
• 9:11
  I mean, the form that Lando's got with that car at the moment shows you how competitive it is.
• 9:17
  I reckon we need to wait some more races in the 2026 season, really, before casting that sort of argument.
• 9:26
  What was it?
• 9:26
  Did I read in news.com.au in the last maybe 24 to 48 hours?
• 9:31
  Was it Riccardo Betrezi that said he's angry at the world or something along those lines?
• 9:36
  It's interesting.
• 9:37
  So he's at the back end of...
• 9:39
  a bunch of drivers that, you know, he's in that top seven with the names that we are consistently mentioning.
• 9:44
  So both the Mercedes drivers, both the Ferraris, Max, and then Oscar.
• 9:49
  Oscar sits eight points behind Max.
• 9:50
  The thing, I guess the follow-up question to would he go anywhere is where would he go?
• 9:56
  Yeah.
• 9:56
  Because...
• 9:58
  If you head over to Red Bull and Max is still there, then you have that conundrum which no one seems to come out of in a very good state aside from Max Verstappen.
• 10:08
  You've got Kimi and George.
• 10:10
  Kimi could very well after this year be the reigning world champion and you've got George Russell who's nipping at his heels or has been for majority of the season.
• 10:18
  And then you've got arguably the GOAT and then...
• 10:22
  the poster boy in Charles Leclerc.
• 10:23
  So it's hard to see where he would go unless one of the other teams pop up and comes into the battle.
• 10:31
  But it's an interesting thing to keep an eye on.
• 10:34
  You've gone there from a silly season perspective, which really hasn't amounted to as much silliness as we thought.
• 10:40
  Can we get you to hang on there for a brief moment?
• 10:42
  And we'll have a bit more here on the short cast very shortly.
• 10:47
  This is the Motorsport Brief, some F1 convo ahead of this weekend's F1 race at the legendary Monza circuit near Milan in Italy.
• 10:53
  Matt Hickey, who's been good enough to come on the pod several times this season and in 2025, is back with us for this convo.
• 11:01
  And we were talking just a moment ago there about silly season, right?
• 11:04
  So that naturally leads us to Liam Lawson.
• 11:07
  I thought he did a great job.
• 11:09
  in the Red Bull at Zandvoort in that last minute-ish call-up for Isaac Hadjar.
• 11:16
  What did we see from Will Buxton the other day?
• 11:17
  If it had been a tough or not a great run for him in that Red Bull this time around, maybe that would have put paid to his chances.
• 11:26
  I reckon he's done enough to stay in that Racing Bulls car, don't you reckon, for 2027?
• 11:31
  Yeah, I would suggest so.
• 11:33
  He is trailing Isaac Hadjar in that battle, but he's only one – he's directly behind him in the driver's standing.
• 11:40
  So Hadjar's eighth on 68 points.
• 11:43
  Lawson sits ninth on 49 points.
• 11:45
  He's got a little bit of a battle ahead of him with some of the others.
• 11:49
  But, no, I like the look of him.
• 11:51
  Yep.
• 11:52
  I mean, you mentioned Aston Martin as well there before.
• 11:57
  Do you reckon they've turned the corner?
• 12:00
  Look, from where they started, you'd have to say yes, right?
• 12:06
  I think you'd have to say yes from where they've started.
• 12:09
  I think the break did them a world of good, and I would expect them to continually improve.
• 12:14
  Now, whether they're going to be at a point in which we were hoping they would be at, considering all the personnel changes and all the money that they've spent heading into this season, I don't know.
• 12:24
  I get the feeling as well, their attention, yes, making sure that the car is...
• 12:29
  you know, in competitive, I guess, this year, but their attention is going to quickly shift to next year because this year, I guess we're marking it off as kind of done and dusted from an Aston Martin point of view.
• 12:39
  They're going to try and scrap some points together towards the back end.
• 12:42
  We know Fernando will get as much out of that car as he possibly can, but I dare say focus will quickly shift to 2027.
• 12:50
  Franco Colopinto stays at Alpine, and we saw before the Dutch race that the Williams Combo are locked away.
• 12:57
  They're staying.
• 12:57
  I kind of admire that, that they sound as though they're going to see that project through.
• 13:02
  There's a bit of noise about Carlos maybe and Audi and so on, but that's –
• 13:06
  Yeah, that's cool.
• 13:07
  I'm a big Franco Colapinto fan.
• 13:09
  I think there are lots of questions over Alpine heading into this season considering the year prior, but they tested really well and they've been able to follow that up with some pretty good race performances.
• 13:19
  You know what you're going to get out of Pierre Gasly.
• 13:22
  He's a consistent performer.
• 13:24
  He's going to be able to deliver you points and he's going to be a good driver.
• 13:28
  I think Colapinto has a chance as his career progresses to maybe go a step further.
• 13:33
  Yeah.
• 13:34
  whether that occurs, whether he has the car to be able to do that.
• 13:37
  I'm not too sure, but I think he rightfully gets that seat for next year.
• 13:41
  59 championship point lead for Kimi Antonelli.
• 13:43
  Mathematically, George is still in the game, but we're into kind of single figures for the remaining races in the championship.
• 13:49
  How do you reckon Mercedes are going to play this?
• 13:52
  I think the gap is big enough now, unlike last year where McLaren...
• 13:57
  I guess we're able to have the excuse to kind of go hands-off, let these guys race.
• 14:01
  I think the gap is big enough now where if you're not protecting that, especially considering Lewis Hamilton is equal on points with George Russell.
• 14:08
  George, yeah.
• 14:08
  So it's not like you've got those two drivers who have a big gap to the rest of the field.
• 14:13
  I think...
• 14:14
  Kimi will be looked after through the back end of the year.
• 14:17
  He will be the priority, as he should be, because if at this point of the season you've got a close to 60-point lead in the championship, I'd believe you deserve to have the priority heading into the rest of the year.
• 14:28
  What's your email address for George Russell fans?
• 14:30
  Yes, and I won't be sharing that one publicly, but please, please.
• 14:34
  I mean, look, I'm happy to be wrong, but I would be shocked if it, you know, is open slather.
• 14:40
  Unless George can put a really big dint in that at Modza.
• 14:44
  In the coming races, yeah.
• 14:45
  Yes, especially with Kimi starting at the back of the grid.
• 14:48
  So if Kimi at Monza can only pick up a couple of points and George is able to win and all of a sudden that gap goes from around 60 down towards 40, then maybe things start to open up a little bit.
• 15:02
  But I'd be shocked if it was played like McLaren played it last year.
• 15:07
  Well done.
• 15:08
  Good footnote to that story.
• 15:09
  Just looking at the kind of remainder of the calendar, do you reckon that we will get the Middle Eastern finish that is scheduled or will we see something like what Bahrain is doing with that race now being staged in Malaysia?
• 15:22
  Could Las Vegas maybe be the chequered flag on the air?
• 15:26
  I mean, what chance of going to Abu Dhabi?
• 15:30
  Yeah, it's a very, very big question and I'm not sure one that –
• 15:35
  my thoughts will be taken into account by those that run F1.
• 15:38
  That's for certain.
• 15:39
  But look...
• 15:42
  At the moment, I personally would lean towards I'd be a little bit surprised if we finish the season in the Middle East.
• 15:50
  But it's obviously a long time between now and then.
• 15:53
  We're recording this at the start of September, end of August, and that last race is scheduled for the start of December.
• 15:59
  So we've got a few months to play out from that point onwards.
• 16:02
  I'm guessing F1 will probably look to leave it as late as they possibly can when it comes to a decision.
• 16:09
  It could go either way.
• 16:12
  But, you know, they do have Las Vegas, which is their new bright shiny toy when it comes, well, newish shiny toy when it comes to the calendar and the event, and we know that the popularity in the US is growing.
• 16:22
  So I dare say they wouldn't be too displeased if that did end up being the final race of the season.
• 16:28
  Two to finish and sort of with a little bit of F1 in the background of what I'm about to ask.
• 16:34
  Firstly, have you seen the new look Adelaide layout for the forthcoming MotoGP race there?
• 16:41
  Mixed opinion on this.
• 16:41
  Obviously, we need it to be very safe for the MotoGP competitors and so on.
• 16:45
  And there's a quick turnaround between the Adelaide Grand Final for supercars and that event.
• 16:49
  next year.
• 16:51
  Some love the brutal closeness of the walls, the traditional Adelaide layout.
• 16:58
  What do you make of the renderings we've seen or the mock-up that we've seen so far?
• 17:04
  Yeah, I'll be intrigued.
• 17:05
  Obviously, you don't know until they're actually out there on the track, right?
• 17:08
  So we can make all the judgments in the world.
• 17:10
  We can, you know, pontificate, I guess, in terms of what we think the layout should look like and things like that.
• 17:16
  But you don't know until they're out there.
• 17:18
  Obviously, it's somewhat intriguing that, you know, you talk about the closeness of the walls when we're getting into an era where more and more, you know, safety, as it rightfully should, is becoming more and more in the conversation compared to potentially 20 or 30 years ago.
• 17:34
  Look...
• 17:35
  Great spot for it.
• 17:36
  I am a Victorian, so I'm a little bit sad that it's leaving Phillip Island.
• 17:41
  So, you know, I take it all.
• 17:42
  I'm excited for Adelaide in the state of South Australia, but a little bit sad that it is leaving, dare I say, the great state of Victoria.
• 17:49
  But, again, wait and see for me.
• 17:52
  It's hard to pass judgment right now.
• 17:53
  We will try and do something special here on the Rusty's Garage podcast for the final one at Phillip Island 2.
• 17:59
  Now, Tom Cruise and Anne Hathaway jumped on socials to say that days of thunder –
• 18:05
  is making a sequel.
• 18:07
  I have watched the original countless times.
• 18:09
  I can give you Harry Hog lines, you name it, I can do all of that stuff.
• 18:15
  I loved the original.
• 18:17
  Off the back of the F1 movie, which did some awesome things around capturing the speed, the intensity of the sport.
• 18:25
  There was so much in the way of learnings around new cameras and technology and so on.
• 18:31
  This has the potential to be something really cool for NASCAR, and we know how Tom Cruise loves to sink his teeth into a project like this, hey?
• 18:39
  Yeah, you beat me to it there.
• 18:40
  If it's anything to do with action and it involves Tom Cruise, you know it's going to be legit.
• 18:44
  I mean, you only have to look back as far as Top Gun 2, which everyone was in awe of.
• 18:50
  So if Tom Cruise is involved, the action is going to be done properly, and I think we've seen the F1 movie set the standard in terms of what motor racing in movies can look like, although...
• 19:00
  Dare I say, Cars the movie may have set the original standard, but we've seen now what the bar is, and therefore it's good because it's going to set a precedent for everybody else who's going to follow up in the space.
• 19:14
  And as I said, Tom Cruise involved.
• 19:17
  It's going to be a good one.
• 19:18
  Matt Hickey updating his IMDB profile as we speak and sending it off for a cameo in Days of Thunder 2.
• 19:25
  We look forward to that, mate.
• 19:26
  Thank you for joining us on the Shortcast today.
• 19:28
  Always a pleasure, Osteen.
• 19:29
  There he is, Matt Hickey from Code Sports, and we'll talk to him before the end of the Formula 1 Season 2.
• 19:33
  That is it for this edition of The Shorty.
• 19:35
  Hope you've enjoyed it.
• 19:36
  I am off to the World Time Attack Challenge at Sydney Motorsport Park this week.
• 19:39
  Something different.
• 19:41
  And we'll be catching up with a couple of people there for the podcast too.
• 19:44
  We'll catch you next time.
• 19:45
  Bye for now.