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Max Takes His First Win in 2025 and Puts Himself Back in the Hunt for the Championship! - 2025 Japanese Grand Prix Review · The Undercut

• 0:00
  Speaker A: Foreign.
• 0:07
  Speaker B: Thanks for tuning in to the Undercuts review of the 2025 Japanese Grand Prix. Please rate, review and subscribe wherever you get your podcast and enjoy the episode. By being a racing driver, you are at risk all the time. By being a racing driver means you are racing with other people. And if you no longer go for a gap that exists, you're no longer a racing driver. All right, guys, so we are back for the 2025 Japanese Grand Prix. Round three, I believe. Seems like a lot has happened already, but, yeah, Round three, I think last year was the first year that it was moved back to the beginning of the calendar. Right, Nick?
• 0:52
  Speaker C: Yep. Yeah, it was. It was September. It was always September. And then last year they moved it forward to April, which is good because that coincided with our spring break, and that's how we made it out there. So a whole year's gone by since we were there. We had an awesome time. It's a great place. Suzuka, the Japanese fans are a highlight. They always have their crazy hats. And did you see the three little kids that. They're like 4 or 5 years old in the little, like, Charlotte, Lando and Lewis outfits, was it? No, Charlotte, Max and Lando outfits, like, stealing the show. They're about three foot high. And, you know, there's all the. Of course, all the jokes about which one's Yuki. But, yeah, they're just. They're just very, very passionate, a lot of fun. And, you know, a classic track.
• 1:41
  Speaker B: We saw. I mean, we don't want to talk about it too much because I. I briefly touched on it, but Martin kind of made a joke in our chat, like, how are there any bets out there for potential red flags because of fires on the track? Which was, yes, really strange. I mean, we've seen fires before. I think it was China last year. This happened, but it doesn't happen very often.
• 2:05
  Speaker C: But There were like two red flags in P2 pre practice two, and they had red flags in qualifying. Just, you know, sparks flying into the grass and just igniting the turf. Okay. And that's the second one. Yeah, the Second one in FP2, they had a camera on it, and you could see how fast it was spreading. When you see the fact that. How windy it was in practice two on Friday and the effect that that was having on the grass, that caught fire, man, it really, you know, it kind of shows how. How quickly that stuff can move. We did, thankfully, didn't have to worry about that too much for the race because there was some rain in the morning and I didn't see any of the, the, you know, the Junior series or any of the other races that were. They don't have, they don't have F3 and F2, but I know they, they had like, like Porsche, Porsche supercars, supercar, and they definitely have the Ferrari challenge. Okay. But I don't know, they were probably weather affected, but I guess being so far away, they don't do F2 and F3, so that probably didn't count too much for the FIA series, but thankfully, a bit of dampness on the, on the grass.
• 3:24
  Speaker B: Yeah. And take the fleece away. Yeah. We expected that to mean potential rain in the race and to bring. I mean, we haven't. We've seen rain in. At the Japanese Grand Prix many, many, many times. Obviously, like we said, it was in the past at a different part of the season, but still we've seen crazy races happen with rain at the Japanese Grand Prix, so you would think that would make for an exciting race. Right.
• 3:54
  Speaker C: But it was. We were hoping. We were hoping so, but it didn't, it didn't really turn out like that. It was a bit of a. It was a bit of a. I don't say snooze fest, but not, not a whole lot happened. I mean, I don't want to ruin the entire podcast for our listeners, but if you watched the cool down room.
• 4:17
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 4:18
  Speaker C: When they were in there and obviously they, they were watching what was happening and Lando and Max were bouncing off each other a little bit. But then Oscar Piastri goes. Is that. That was it?
• 4:34
  Speaker A: That's all the highlights.
• 4:35
  Speaker C: That was all the highlights.
• 4:37
  Speaker A: Yeah. I think they were saying. Yeah. There weren't any overtakes or anything.
• 4:42
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, there were a few, but.
• 4:43
  Speaker C: They were mostly just Drs. Right.
• 4:45
  Speaker B: Yeah. I made the one overtake maneuver that was the most exciting was Lando trying to overtake Max coming out of the pit lane and there was no use. There was nothing happening there.
• 4:58
  Speaker A: There was nothing there. I mean, fair play to. What was that like? Lap 21. They'd been following each other around. I mean, McLaren maybe made a mistake not leaving Lando out just to try and put in a hot lap, you know, whilst Max had cold tires. But, you know, McLaren did their job. I think their pit stop was marginally quicker, just by a fraction of a second, which they were able.
• 5:22
  Speaker C: Second faster.
• 5:23
  Speaker A: Was it a full second?
• 5:25
  Speaker C: Full second faster.
• 5:26
  Speaker A: So they're able to release him, but he was always behind Max. It was a pipe gym that he would get out in front and then yeah, there was.
• 5:36
  Speaker B: I mean, yeah, in the moment I definitely was upset, but once I saw a highlight, I realized that I had no reason to be. I mean, Max could. There was more room for Max to move over, but he doesn't have to do that because he was in the lead. They have that whole lane. He can take whatever side of that he wants to take, so.
• 5:57
  Speaker C: But he just needs to stay to the right of the white line.
• 6:00
  Speaker B: Yeah, right.
• 6:00
  Speaker C: That's the thing.
• 6:01
  Speaker A: Right. He just stayed straight. Yeah. And didn't give him any room. And he didn't turn into towards Lando at all or anything. Just.
• 6:08
  Speaker B: No.
• 6:08
  Speaker A: Left his car there. I mean, Suzuka's a quite a tight track as it is. Right. And these cars are bigger now than they. Are they bigger than they've ever been. Wider. Longer.
• 6:18
  Speaker C: Oh, yeah, yeah. And I think obviously last year there were quite a few overtakes and I was trying to cast my mind back, you know, like Lance Stroll overtook people like going up the S's. Yuki did the same at one point, and that was really driven by the tire offset. And when they brought the three hardest tires in the range and it had rained just before the start, which meant that you go offline and you're going to lose a whole lot of temperature in your tires, it kind of let me, you know, going into it, I was thinking, this is probably not going to be as exciting as last year. Although even, you know, saying that last year Max just disappeared into the distance and won it. And as I was filling out my coops, F1 picks on Friday night, I was thinking, well, first of all, part of me was going put Yuki.
• 7:19
  Speaker A: That's your heart talking there.
• 7:20
  Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. But then I was also very torn because Max has won Suzuka the last four years. Three years. Four years. However, like a long time.
• 7:35
  Speaker B: Three years coming.
• 7:37
  Speaker C: Seeing how dominant they were in the race last year, I was like. I was getting swayed a bit. You know, obviously McLaren have the fastest car, but Max Verstappen is the man. And I should have gone with my first instinct to put Max in there because this is his kind of track. You know, going up through those S's, you know, one's overtaking and then the own. There's only one DRS zone, and that's down the main straight. I don't know, it's. It's, it's an iconic track. But outside of last year, I can't really think of too many amazing races here.
• 8:17
  Speaker A: Yeah. And this one certainly won't be remembered for very long. It was getting Panned. I mean, it was just. No, no, I think they said that you had to be like 0.8 of a second faster on a lap to even have a shot at overtaking, which is. Which is a massive amount of time in Formula one.
• 8:38
  Speaker C: I mean, or you get them off the start.
• 8:41
  Speaker B: Right.
• 8:41
  Speaker C: But no one got anyone really off the start.
• 8:44
  Speaker A: Yeah. Or somebody makes a mistake in everybody. But it looked like the. From what Oscar said as well, he said it was pretty much flat out the whole time, which means that they were able to push on the tires. The tires weren't going off. The surface had been redone, I think.
• 8:59
  Speaker B: I heard, or a section of it.
• 9:00
  Speaker C: The second sector.
• 9:02
  Speaker A: And maybe the early morning rain changed the track enough that it wasn't as abrasive or the tires were cooler so they weren't degrading as quicker, I don't know. But, yeah, it didn't make for a very exciting race. I mean, it looked like Oscar was behind Lando and could go quicker, but he wasn't quick enough to overtake. And, you know, Lando couldn't get close enough to Max to even put the moves on. It was never even. They were never even a shot at outbreaking him or anything like that. So.
• 9:32
  Speaker C: Yeah, so it's interesting because obviously with the. The track being kind of wet like you looked the first few laps. Yeah, as they were getting into the first corner, they were splashing through a couple of puddles there. You know, it wasn't standing water or anything, but it just meant that certainly in the laps, the early laps when everyone's closer together, no one really wanted to get offline, but nobody was able.
• 9:58
  Speaker A: To take advantage and find, you know, more grip or, you know, make it a differentiator.
• 10:02
  Speaker C: Well, because the one person who knows how to go hunting for grip offline is Max Verstappen. And he was out front. He's already in the lead. He's already in the lead. So no one's really going to be trying to come through because that guy's got to a sixth sense for the. For the grip levels like no one else does. And there were a couple of things, you know, moving around further back, but, you know, there weren't really too many overtakes or even attempts, which is really unfortunate for the. For the viewer. Right. Yeah, you know, they were. You know, I watched some of the onboard Alex Albon because my little guy was watching Alex's on board and in the midfield there were a couple little tussles through the first couple of corners, but when they all Came out of, you know, they've gone around the right handers and then you go to the turn three, which is a left hander. Everyone was back in order again. And so it largely just kind of kind of stayed like that.
• 11:01
  Speaker B: Yeah, I remember Anthony Davidson said before the race that really, whenever you see any overtaking, it's because of a disparity in the. Where people are pitting and because of the lack of degradation on the tires, it was just everyone pitting at the same time. And all the cars are so close in the different sections that they're all essentially going like the same speed. So there's just.
• 11:27
  Speaker C: Yeah, it's almost like, it's almost like the graining problems that they've had in the, in the last couple of races. Not being a problem here was the problem with the race. Right, because everyone's tires held up. No one really, no one's tires fell off a cliff. And everyone kind of just did the strategy that they decided before the race even started. So it kind of, it kind of went according to plan for pretty much everyone. And the reason, and then the fact that it went to plan for everyone meant that nobody really moved up. I think there was only, you know, if you look at the top 10, it was only Hamilton getting past Hajar, which was. That's the only difference. And that was driven by a tire offset. Lewis starting on the hard tyre, went long and then he was on a medium tire that at the end was actually the faster tire wasn't getting any degradation and he, you know, he made that spot up and. But everyone just kind of stayed where they were, which kind of, you know, when you look at obviously a call out to Kimi Antonelli, the youngest driver ever to lead a Formula one race.
• 12:42
  Speaker A: Yeah, pretty cool.
• 12:45
  Speaker C: The youngest ever to hold fastest lap. Nice. For a good chunk of the race. Carlos Sainz had the fastest lap. So when you look at what was actually happening at the front with Verstappen and the McLarens towards the end, it's like they were on low fuel, but they weren't setting the fastest times out there, they were happening further back. So, you know, first of all, good on Carlos Sainz. Even though he finished, what was it, 13th, 12th in the end. But again that was just because no one moved. Antonelli finished where he started, but he led, I think nine or so laps after, after the leaders pitted. But then it kind of made you think, well, he managed to go longer than even Lewis Hamilton on the hard tyre in the Ferrari. Antonelli was on the medium. So he went longer than, than Hamilton. McLaren missed a trick here that, yeah, they tried to fake out the Red Bulls on lap, was it 18, 19? Whenever it was, it was like, I think it was maybe 19 because they just put up the graphic on the screen, pit window open laps 19 to 25 or whatever for those on the medium tire. And then immediately like, all right, pit to cuff of a Stappen or whatever. And they're like, yeah, okay. And then they didn't. But then the following lap, George Russell pitted and then Piastri was at the risk of being undercut by Russell. So they pitted Piastri first, even though Lando was ahead on the, on the racetrack, which usually gives you the first choice of strategy. But they covered, they covered George for Piastri and then as soon as Piastri pit, they knew that they were going to pit Lando. Red bull knew that McLaren were going to pit Lando and so they pitted Verstappen. On that next lap, seeing Verstappen come in, why did McLaren not say do the opposite of what Verstappen does? Because you pit on the same lap as the guy that you're racing. Well, you're back on the same piece of track again. Granted, McLaren had a 1 second pit stop quicker. I mean, Red Bull had a slow pit stop, a second slower. But again, you're never going to get any different offset. You're not undercutting because they lost the undercut because they pitted Piastri so they couldn't pin both together. But then having done that when Verstappen came in, if, if Lando would have stayed out in clear air, and they've been saying all season that the McLaren runs really well in clean air, but doesn't run too well in dirty air. Why did they not just leave Norris out? Yeah, I don't get it.
• 15:53
  Speaker B: They were just playing it safe. I think they're just trying to pick up as many points as possible. I think you're right. That's what they, they should have done. But I think they thought, who knows how far we could drop back if we leave him out and it doesn't work out or. I don't know. It was bad. It was bad all the way around from McLaren's strategy and when they do these fake dummy calls that Ferrari is famous for. But now that we're trying to do this, it makes me sick because it never works. Has it ever worked?
• 16:28
  Speaker A: It doesn't ever seem to work. And I agree with you, I don't like it either. Like box, box Box. Box. You can almost tell way they say it, it's like it doesn't seem real.
• 16:38
  Speaker B: Like you're not gonna say box to cover someone. Like you would try and hide that in some way. If you're gonna say it out loud like that on the radio that everyone can hear, you're obviously lying. So what is the point?
• 16:49
  Speaker C: Everyone? The Red Bull pit wall going. McLaren are trying to fake us out.
• 16:53
  Speaker A: Yeah, they used to have people running out into the pit lane. Right. With all the tires and stuff. And I think they changed that and they, they said you can't. If you're not going to pit, you can't have people running in and out.
• 17:04
  Speaker B: Of the well, I think they did. McLaren did go out.
• 17:07
  Speaker A: I seem to remembering that, but I.
• 17:09
  Speaker B: Don'T know, I think McLaren did go out for like a fake pit stop because I think Ted Kravitz said during the broadcast, like McLaren is going out. Maybe, maybe when they called that for Lando, that was the lap Oster pit. I can't quite remember, but they did have people come out in the pit lane during that call. But yeah, I mean, I don't think there's anything else to really talk about for a race, is there?
• 17:33
  Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, the only other thing you said, I think I thought with the tire length, the tire stints. You said Antonelli went 31 laps on the medium and then he switched to hards. But I just see that Sainz actually went medium soft, as did Lawson. They went medium soft. So I guess these tires lasted a bit. Didn't really work out for Lawson or Sainz massively.
• 17:58
  Speaker C: No, but they made up some time and Sainz actually overtook a few people towards the end and Lawson kind of followed him a little bit.
• 18:08
  Speaker A: But they were on softs.
• 18:10
  Speaker C: That was on 33. Was it? Was it about lap 33 that Sainz came in?
• 18:14
  Speaker A: Yeah, and they were on softs for the remaining 20 laps, whereas everybody else was on hards pretty much, except for Hamilton who sort of did the reverse right. Hards first and mediums. But yeah, it just didn't. There just didn't seem to be any differentiators anywhere. Right. It just. Nobody could get any. Make any difference.
• 18:34
  Speaker C: Now, like I said, the only change in the top 10 was that Hamilton on that offset strategy got past Hajar, who showed. He's actually. Of all the rookies, he's been the most consistent. Obviously the racing bulls have conspired against him a little bit in terms of some of the strategy. Obviously in China where they did a two stop and no one else did. They tried to undercut people and no one else fell for that. But he's had a deal other than throwing it off at the first corner of the formation.
• 19:09
  Speaker A: You're talking yourself out of your point here a little.
• 19:12
  Speaker C: No, no, I'm saying it's like through all the practice sessions, all the qualifying sessions, the races as a driver's performance, obviously China, they messed him up on strategy and he didn't participate in the rate in Australia because he dropped it in the formation lap, which is a bit of a rookie error. He's actually looked pretty good. The thing that made me chuckle because when we were watching qualifying, it's like something's going on with Hajar's car. He's, like, really not comfortable in the car. He's complaining about this situation in the cockpit and who knows what's actually going on. But what it was, his seat had shifted and it meant that the crotch strap on his seatbelt was. Every time he braked, it basically put a large amount of pressure on his gentleman's area.
• 20:04
  Speaker A: Oh, no. Is that what it was?
• 20:07
  Speaker C: That's what it was. So every time he braked, he was. It was like getting kicked in the nuts. And, you know, fair play to the boy. He made it around and got it into Q3.
• 20:21
  Speaker B: Well, I mean, what else are you.
• 20:22
  Speaker C: Gonna do with all of that? You know, he sucked it up and just got it done despite the extreme amount of discomfort around, you know, with the genitalia. So good for him. But not notwithstanding. Obviously, he's the one guy in the top 10 that did get passed in the race by. By Hamilton. Offset strategy, but a solid race, solid race for Hajar.
• 20:47
  Speaker B: I mean, we've had some. We've had a couple rookie drivers that have been consistently not good. Hajar has just been the consistently okay doing. And Lawson have struggle every single chance they can get, essentially.
• 21:07
  Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, in the case of Lawson, he's in the same boat as Yuki in that they've jumped into an unfamiliar car and they've had practice sessions and a qualifying in a race to just get to understand the vehicle that they're driving.
• 21:23
  Speaker B: Yeah, Liam did drive the car last year and I'm sure that there are.
• 21:26
  Speaker C: But it's a different car.
• 21:27
  Speaker B: Some similar characteristics.
• 21:29
  Speaker C: There probably are, but I think there's a lot of, you know, obviously the confidence element. I think Yuki was an interesting case because he started out in the free practice sessions really close to Max, but as the weekend went along, Max pulled ahead. I don't know what that says Maybe I'm just reading into it more, but are they just gearing everything around Max's setup and all of everything that they both learn cumulatively across both sides of the garage just goes into making Max's car faster at the expense of his teammate? I don't know. But at the end of the day, I was. You know, I would have liked to have seen Yuki get a point. He got a point last year in the. In the V carb. But jumping into an unfamiliar car with everything that's going on at Red Bull, I don't judge him too harshly for the fact that he came in, what, 12th? You know, it. It'll take time.
• 22:29
  Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, the other two rookies, Barman, like you said he was, he was at the bottom. Yeah. Bottom of the top 10. He didn't move anywhere. But he was able to stay in the points and get a point for.
• 22:42
  Speaker C: Haas because he got into King. Struggled. Right. And yes, he did for the first time where you're not getting. You're not getting any easy overtakes. You've got to qualify. That's Yuki's. The problem with Yuki. He missed out on a corner in Q2. Forget which corner it was. But that was the difference between making it into Q3 and not. And he started in 15th. But that's all around confidence and comfort in the car and that'll come.
• 23:15
  Speaker B: Yeah. And then not much really to talk about Bordelletto. We didn't see much from him. Think he's a good driver. Just. We didn't. The car is not very good and he was in the back. So I think that the only person.
• 23:30
  Speaker C: Behind him was Lance Stroll, our favorite.
• 23:32
  Speaker B: Well, yeah, yeah. Take of that. What you will, I guess.
• 23:36
  Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. I mean, Ferrari. A bit of an anonymous. Well, an anonymous P4 for Charlotte Claire. Did we even see him on TV the whole. The whole race? He was just on an island himself.
• 23:50
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 23:50
  Speaker C: You know, there was nothing really happening. The battles were in the, you know, the teens as people were trying to move through and when people came out the pits trying to get back up again. But this was a great race for the sponsors of Haas and Alpine and Williams because that's where all the action was. So. But Ferrari, man, he really didn't see much of those guys at all. And if you would, if you were to. I had to look at the race result to realize that Charlotte Claire came fourth because he just had such an. He had a George Russell of a race just like George Russell in fifth. Right.
• 24:35
  Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, if something had happened at the front on those last few laps. He would have been the one to take that podium position. I guess so. Just trying to stay out of trouble. But I guess lastly, we didn't really talk about the ramifications from the race. I guess a great race for Max, as we. We talked about, but he's only one point away from the lead of the driver's championship now. It's tight.
• 25:02
  Speaker A: Yeah. It's making things more. More complicated. Not. Not less complicated. Right. The, the early season McLaren dominance of the first two races didn't continue. Although obviously they're second and third. But they're not going to have it all their own way. I mean, it was just a great drive from, from Max. Yeah. You know, he's doing things that great drivers can do. He makes a worse car better, so he should be super happy. I don't think it's a death knell for McLaren. They had a. They still had a decent weekend. But hopefully for the real winners, even though the race wasn't great, is for the fans that this is going to go on for a while. So the championship isn't going to be over by the autumn. Right. We're going to get a full season of. Because it's been different. Three races, three different winners. Right.
• 25:52
  Speaker C: Yeah. I'm just hopeful that it isn't like the track that suits a particular car and we get boring races. I want.
• 26:00
  Speaker A: Right.
• 26:01
  Speaker C: More to happen in the races. But I, you know, to your point, Martin, I think the. They've definitely got a bit of a wake up call. I think that the race really was there to be won by McLaren. If that had just been a little bit more aggressive in the strategy. On the commentary, Jacques Villeneuve was giving them a bit of a panning for not splitting the strategies on their car on their cars and both basically putting them on the same strategy, which I do kind of get. Obviously when you're playing a team game and you just want to accumulate as many points as possible, you're not really in it for wins, which sounds kind of stupid. You just want to get as many points as you can. Then you just like, what do you. You don't want to take a risk. But why would they not, I mean, leave someone out and you know how much time you have to figure it out and you know, a point at which you've got to bring him in to get the, to get the tires changed because then you'll fall down into fourth.
• 27:11
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 27:12
  Speaker C: So I don't know, it just seemed a bit conservative and they should really have tried a bit harder on the strategy to go out and win the race rather than just thinking we've got the fastest car and we're going to make it happen. So I think they've definitely got a bit of a wake up call on this one that they can't just rest on their laurels and say we've got the fastest car. We actually have to go out and win races. They're not going to get given to us.
• 27:36
  Speaker B: Yeah, well, hopefully it is. Hopefully it is a wake up call and they get more aggressive because what we had was not an enjoyable race to watch overall. Let's see anybody else that we really miss. I guess we didn't talk about Williams much but I mean there wasn't. There's not much to talk about I would say, other than Albon was able to stay out of trouble and stay in the points and yeah, he wasn't.
• 28:03
  Speaker C: Too happy with nothing on the radio. He wasn't very happy this today. I mean he, yeah, he somewhat panned the team for the strategy but the team basically came and said, yeah, you don't know what you're talking about. He actually did really well. I don't know quite what that means. Carlos. Qualifying didn't get it done. But again, his familiarity with the car in the same way as Yuki, in the same way as Lawson. Not that we can continue to forgive Lawson but he's in a different car again now. So, um, it's when you look again like Leclerc and Hamilton, when things are a bit tricky and the setups a bit questionable. Guys who've been in that team longer understand the car better. They can communicate and understand what needs to get done and how to use the car that's under them. The guys that have been moving around, they've struggled. I don't want to say Bearman versus Ocon, but Ocon was obviously in a different car last year and where he finished relative to Ocon. Sorry, where Ocon finished relative to Bearman. You kind of go, yeah, I guess. Bearman's come in with no real preconceived notion of what the car should be like and so he managed to get more from it than Ocon that was expecting something and needed to react to what it was. So I think I've not done anything too technical on it. But just off the top of my head it feels like the people that are more cemented in the teams have done better than the people who've moved into the teams this season.
• 29:34
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I mean, is that really all that uncommon in other seasons either. Usually takes a little bit of time for guys to get up to speed. Yeah, I don't really think there's much else to talk about from the race other than coops. Unless there's something I'm leaving out that you guys can think of.
• 29:56
  Speaker C: No, that's pretty much it.
• 29:58
  Speaker B: There was a. Yeah, yeah.
• 29:59
  Speaker C: Not a whole lot happening. I don't know what my actual coup's picks finished up like, but I wish that I'd have listened to my heart and, you know, listened to my head rather than my heart, I guess. With Verstappen, I knew he was going to win. I just knew he was going to win. I knew he was going to get Poland. I knew he was going to win, but I just didn't want to believe it.
• 30:18
  Speaker A: Our friend Vijay, he's a big AI proponent and he sent me his AI prediction for the race and it had Max winning and everything else pretty much the same. And I sent him back. I was like, I'm not so sure about this AI stuff. Like Max has had good races at this circuit, but this year he's just off the pace. It's just not going to happen. And of course this morning he sent me some gloating screenshots of the result. But yeah, maybe there is something in this AI thing. I mean, from a coupe's F1 perspective, better scores, you know, where there was no retirements. Right. Everybody finished, so nothing too crazy happened at the front as far as you know, all the main contenders were up there. Kevin B with the top score, 268 points, followed by Cole, Mario and then overall. Yeah, Kevin B with the top score this week, jumps all the way up, 82 places to first. Just nipping out our own Jason by one point for that top spot. So. But you know, you're there or thereabouts.
• 31:28
  Speaker B: I'll take it.
• 31:29
  Speaker A: There's a long way to go. Um, Nick, you went up 42 places to, to 34, so looks good, 203 points. But yeah, you, you put Hamilton, so you put Verstappen in fifth. Nick, in your prediction in the end you could.
• 31:44
  Speaker B: I put him in third at least. Yeah.
• 31:47
  Speaker A: And I think I, I moved up as well, I believe, but I'm still. Yeah, I actually went up 85 places, 31st, so I'm still trying to crack the top hundred, but that's a big jump. I'm down there with, with mark. He's in 129th, so still a long way to go. Another race, another race next week.
• 32:09
  Speaker B: Yeah. Oh, My God. Bahrain. That's right.
• 32:13
  Speaker C: Bahrain. Next, a different track. This one is Bahrain. The one high tire de.
• 32:24
  Speaker A: Is that the one where they were playing chicken for the, for the line that Bahrain a few years ago when they were trying to like get the drs.
• 32:31
  Speaker C: That was Saudi Arabia. Oh, that was Saudi Arabia.
• 32:36
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 32:37
  Speaker C: There's a, there's a DRS line just before the last hairpin in Saudi Arabia.
• 32:43
  Speaker A: That's the difference. That's the week after. Yeah, we got, yeah. This is three, this is the first of three weeks in a row, right. Bahrain, Saudi.
• 32:50
  Speaker C: So yeah, a lot to contend with in, in Bahrain. Again, this is the track that's never been resurfaced. It's the same surface. It's very abrasive. It's very hard. So it's, you know, tires are always very limited. I, I, I don't recall whether this is front or rear limited. I. E. The front tires going off first, which suits some people versus rear.
• 33:15
  Speaker B: But there's a lot of high corners.
• 33:18
  Speaker C: It's sandy. There's always dust on the track, which can have a bit of stuff. It can occasionally be windy, which can catch a few people out.
• 33:27
  Speaker B: Sure.
• 33:28
  Speaker C: But it's a track that the teams know well. They were obviously just there at the beginning of the season preseason doing their testing. So it's one that's familiar to all. But I like the fact that they've had three races between the pre season testing and the Grand Prix coming to town so that they're not just automatically rolling everything that they just learned the last couple of days into the race. So hopefully there'll be a little bit of something more unexpected or less expected, should I say, with the race this time around.
• 33:59
  Speaker B: Yeah. And like you said, with the high dag, we should see some differences in strategy, hopefully. And that'll make up for some passing because there's three DRS zones, I think two or three DRS zones on this, on this track.
• 34:18
  Speaker C: So there's definitely two. There could well be three.
• 34:21
  Speaker B: I think maybe that last straight isn't, might not be, but it's long.
• 34:26
  Speaker C: So two last straights of the last straight before the first straight, which is the start and finish straight. And then there's that straight just after the crazy double left left hander, which always catches me out. I've never been able to figure that one out on F1 24. And yeah, but when you think, you know, Max after the race today was saying the cooler temperatures helped them out because it was a little chilly in, in Japan this week. Yeah, that helped them out from a tire deck perspective if the temperatures are up there. Obviously when the. When they were there in pre season testing, the temperatures were really unseasonably low. It rained even, but normally you expect the temperatures to be higher, the tire deck to be higher, which could play maybe into McLaren's hands a little bit more than into, say, Red Bull or Ferrari. Interesting to see what Ferrari do with their tires this year because I don't think we've really had a representative race that's really shown what the Ferrari could do yet. And Australia, they had their ride height all messed up. In China, everything looked great and then they changed it again and got disqualified anyway, so who cares? And then today they just seemed like in those conditions and they were cool and it was wet a little bit and no one really did anything anyway. They were kind of anonymous, so. Still don't really know what Ferrari's car is really going to be like.
• 35:52
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I mean, tell me if this is my or my papaya tinted glasses on, but I would say that McLaren is probably still the favorite going into this race, Although Max is. Can do anything at any time, so who knows? But it would seem that McLaren and Max are probably the top three favorites to. To win this race.
• 36:15
  Speaker A: Yeah, no, you're, you're not wrong there. But we, we live in hope that maybe somebody else can. Can pop in and get a fourth. Yeah, a fourth different winner. But Kimmy. Yeah, I mean, Kimmy has been my rookie year this season so far for sure. He's. What has he been on the podium or in the top?
• 36:34
  Speaker C: He's not been on the podium yet.
• 36:36
  Speaker A: Oh, no, he's been on the podium, but he's been in the points every race.
• 36:39
  Speaker B: He scored every race.
• 36:40
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, that's what I was trying to say. Yeah. So maybe he can get him on the podium would be awesome because he's not allowed. Not old enough to drink in a lot of places, is he?
• 36:49
  Speaker C: So. Yeah, so get him out of the podium where you're not allowed to drink and everything's fine.
• 36:54
  Speaker A: Yeah, Bahrain be fine.
• 36:57
  Speaker B: He has to give up the corner.
• 36:59
  Speaker C: I had the nose ahead. What is wrong with these people?
• 37:03
  Speaker B: Thanks for listening to the undercuts review of the 2025 Japanese Grand Prix. Please rate, review and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and join us next week for our review of the 2025 Bahrain Grand Prix.
• 37:16
  Speaker C: We'll see you there.