Latest / Pit Talk / Will Mercedes pay for its unreliability with the championship? British GP Review

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Will Mercedes pay for its unreliability with the championship? British GP Review · Pit Talk

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Pit Talk, brought to you by Shannon's.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: On today's episode, char Leclair is the second non Mercedes
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: winner of the season, after claiming victory at the British
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Grand Prix and after another scoreless Grand Prix for title
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: leader Kimmie Antonelli. Could unreliability cost Mercedes the championship. My
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: name's Michael Lamonado. It's great to have your company and
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: the company of my co host like you. He knows
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: that Regulation B five thirteen five B says that unless
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: the race director considers the presence of the safety car
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: remains necessary, once the message lap cars may now overtake
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  Speaker 1: has been sent to all competitors in accords with Article
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  Speaker 1: B five thirteen four C the safety car. We'll return
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: to the pits at the end of the following lap.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: It's Matt Clayton.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: I might have written that regulation Michael and Robisty because
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: of the lack of complete sense that it makes from
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: start to finish. But yes, diving into the depths of
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: the F one rule book at about what one forty
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: am on a Monday morning not anyone's pastime. But I
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: just wanted to point out before we got any further
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: on this, so I thought it would be appropriate that
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: we probably congratulate the podium finishes at Silverston for the
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: non British drivers, just to balance things out a little
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: bit with the coverage. So I'd like to congratulate Charlock
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: Cliff and winning the British Grand Prix. Is that Hadjua
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: for finishing second and Liam Lawson with a fantastic podium
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: in third place for racing balls. So well done to
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: all those three, and I hope that balances out a
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: little bit of what you heard over the course of
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: the weekend.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: Very good. It's only fair that some other drivers get
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: to mention over the course of the weekend. Yeah. Less
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: of course, if you're a Fox Sports or Chao subscriber,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: you can listen to the f on TV commentary for
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: your Grand Prix viewing experience. It's totally up to you.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: You can find the options in Eatier set top box
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: with the Fine app or the cho app. But che Leclair,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: as you mentioned, he was the winner, you might have
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: missed it for Ferrari, first win of the season, first
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: win since late twenty twenty four, first British Grand Prix
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: victory as well, and that's really only significant the context
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: of him coming so close in twenty twenty one and
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty two and not being able to get it done.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Breakthrough though for him more than just that victory drought,
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: because of course last year no Ferrari driver was winning anything.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: It's not really on him. Is the last month or
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: so in which Lewis Hamilton has been really resurged. We've
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: talked about it for the last couple of weeks, leaving
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: mclaire in his dust a little bit. He spoke a
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: lot about having to change his approach this weekend to
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: try and rediscover that form, as well as working with
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: the team, and it certainly seems to have worked well.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: I suppose it'd be probably unfair to say blue Lewis
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: Hamilton way because it's not the case, certainly not from
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: the start of the weekend. This was a very assured,
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: almost old fashioned Charlotte Clair performance.
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, isn't it funny? We were only talking about this
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: in the context of Austria a couple of weeks ago,
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: when we were pretty shocked to discover it had been
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: thirty something racist since he'd actually won one. But what's
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: interesting for me there were two stats that stood out here,
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: do you realize he now is on the same number
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: of race winds Asoscopyastre That sink in for a second,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: that's absolutely crazy. When you let that sentence.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: Sing in, I've been thinking for more than a few seconds.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, indeed, but this sort of felt a bit like
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: old school Lacler and that you were saying that since
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: he's been like after he got the better of and
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: had the beating of Sebastian Vattal, he's always been the
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: number one Ferrari and you know, for much of his
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: tenure at Ferrari, being the dumble one Ferrari is just
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: a passport to more misery, let's be perfectly honest. But
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: it's been interesting this year that he's had to respond
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: from this position of being the second best Ferrari a
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: couple of times because of how much better Lewis Hamilton
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: has been this year than last. So it felt like
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: an important win in and of itself, but it also
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: felt like an important win as far as I wouldn't
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: say changing the narrative, but maybe reestablishing the narrative within
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: that team, because as good as Hamilton has been this year,
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: there's just you know, there's a date on his birth
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: certificate that indicates that he is not going to be
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: the future of Ferrari. He's not on the Great Superannuation
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: Tour Trey Bar Kimmy Reichen, but he is getting towards
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: the end of his career, and anything that Lewis does
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: in twenty twenty six is seen as being almost a
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: bit of a bonus, like, oh, isn't this great? That
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: this has come good a little bit now we don't
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: obviously know where it ends, but Leclaire, because of his
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: bridge to the past and the fact that he's signed
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: on for so long and he's going to be Ferrari's future,
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: this was an important one for him personally, but also
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: just re establishing where he's been in that team for
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: quite some time. I guess you have to. I don't
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: like to apportion asterisks to these things. But we never
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: really got to see the end of the race that
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: was being set up through the opening stint for both
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: he and Kimie Antonelli because of what happened to Antonelli.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: But it would have been really interesting to see what
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: would have happened when inevitably Antonelli came upon Lacler towards
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: the end of the race, how long towards the end
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: that was, and what Leaclerk was able to do. But
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: given the circumstances, and you know, he made the best
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: of every situation he could over the course of the weekend.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: And finally we don't have to keep referencing Austin twenty
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: twenty four any more, do we.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's good news for him, especially obviously, and it
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: really did feel like the monkey was off the back.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: That's essentially get when you hurt him. In the post
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: race press conference that it was weighing on him, probably
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: more than you would have guessed, more than I guessed.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: It was clear in the last couple of races when
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: things weren't coming together, it was a bit frustrated. But
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: he spoke about a bigger narrative than that, So clearly
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: every significant for him in his own personal journey this season.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: We will talk about Kimmie Antonelli in Mercedes a little
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: bit later in the podcast, because there's a bigger story there.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: We had an all impact on the championship than simply
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: not winning this Grand Prix, But let's stick with Ferrari
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: for now, because this isn't a race. I mean, only
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: last week I'm pretty sure it's going to be awful
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: for Ferrari. That's because it was awful in Austria, keeping
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: up with the trend of no team other than Mercedes
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: having two Grand Prix in a row that are successful.
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: Still Ferrari hasn't. But this felt much more like the
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: Ferrari we thought we were going to get after Barcelona,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: where Lewis Hamilton robbed to victory there. Ferrari, though, also
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: found it quite unexpected on Thursday, and I, you know,
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: sometimes teams work hard to downplay expectations, but I didn't
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: get the sense on Thursday that they were doing this
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: as a form of gamesmanship. Lewis Hamilton talked about them
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: expecting to be twice as far off as they were
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: in Austria, and they're already extremely far off in Austria
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: because this is such a power sensitive circuit. Silverston is
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: so flat out, all the bends are high speed. There
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: are only four breaking zones. Only one of them is
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: a big breaking zones That means you can't charge the
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: battery up very much, and that's the weakness of Ferrari
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: in a nutshell, And yet here we are. The team
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: was extremely competitive sprint pole position in the mix for
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: pole position for the Grand Prix, and then Charlotte Glovesy
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: led most of the race and then won it. I
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: think we were messaging that over the course of the weekend,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: and we said pretty much as much last week. I
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: don't really get Formula one at the moment. It's hard
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: to read the form guide. But at least at least
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: Ferrari doesn't get it either.
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: I don't think they're the only ones quite frankly. I
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: mean you mentioned before you've gone Cataloonya to Austria and
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: Silvestone the last three and they've been they've overachieved into
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: a massively underachieved in the other one. And so what's
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: the real story here? And this is the confusing nature
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: of Formula one in twenty twenty six, they were clearly
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: much better than they expected and than we expected. I
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: think maybe a slightly underrated part of the equation here
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: is that we know Mercedes are going to be up
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: and near the front. We've said this the past couple
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: of podcasts, that they're the one team you kind of
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: feel that you can run on. Actually there's two Aston
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: Martin's the other one. There's two teams. There's two teams.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: I go into most week kids having a pretty fair
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: idea of where they're going to be, and then the
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: rest of it you don't really know. So I wonder
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: if this was a situation of yes, they were better
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: than expected, both you and Iron everyone within Ferrari quite
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: frankly than they expected. But the other teams in the
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: Big four, if we're get to segment the grid into
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: Class A Class B here, McLaren pretty underwhelming, red Bull
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: pretty underwhelming. So I wonder if Ferrari comparatively to the
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: other two potential challenges and I use air quotes around that,
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: to Mercedes this year, they were the best of that
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: next group, so maybe it looked a little bit better
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: than it actually was. I still, you know, he said
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: we'll get to Mercedes and A will and second, and
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: we will. But this still felt like a race that
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: someone had to be there to potentially put pressure on
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: Mercedes or take it to Mercedes in case of a
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: potential failure or someone being out of track position. The
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: fact that that team was Ferrari was the surprise, but
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: someone needed to do it, and I wonder if it
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: says as much about red Bull and McLaren at this
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: particular track as it does Ferrari without downplaying what Ferrari did.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: I think there is a there is a percentage of
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: the performance pie, which I've just created as a concept
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: that needs to be attributed to some of these other
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: Big Four teams. I don't know what the slice of
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: said pie is, but I don't think it's one hundred
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: percent Ferrari. I think there's it's probably a majority, but
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: there's other sections of pie that you might like to.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: Slice, perhaps an element of that pie or absence of pie.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: Not sure exactly where I sit in the analogy just yet,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: really work on it a little bit more perhaps, But
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: is also that George Russell wasn't really in the mix either. Yes,
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: it wasn't really quite a straight team versus team fight.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: It was more in fact, it boiled down to Leclair
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: versus Antonelli. But Hamilton was also there early enough to
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: hold up Leclaire for the first twelve or so laps.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: I think it was, whereas Russell was completely ineffectual in
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: terms of that lead battle did recover a second, but
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: that was also pretty fortunate, So that I think is
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: definitely part of it. The fact that Ferrari is the
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: only team taking it to Mercedes, which means they can
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: afford to only look forward rather than have to worry
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: about whether they're risking a podium by being ambitious or
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: whatever the case is week by week. I think there's
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: also I mean, what I found very interesting about this
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: weekend was that when you looked at the telemetry traces,
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: that engine of Ferraris seemed to be pretty much just
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: as good as the Mercedes, which is the exact opposite
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: of what we saw in Austria. Now, there were reasons
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: for the undperformance in Austria, which we alluded to last week.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: I think as well, though remained speculative because no one
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: seems certain. But there's the altitude element, there was the
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: heat element. Obviously it was extremely hot in Austria. Some
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: circuit readings were suggesting more than sixty degrees track temperature,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: which is a lot. I don't need to tell you
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: that in Britain that have all died if that was
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: the case. So it clearly wasn't that hot. That helps.
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: And then maybe something about this layout. You know, there's
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: been some reports from those who are a little bit
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: more engineered minded that just the way that the Ferrari
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: car generates its downforce is just a little bit happier
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: in the circumstances and conditions of Silverstone. So it's sort
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: of a reminder, I guess, in trying to understand why
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: this season has been so variable, that we are in
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: this era of massive regulatory change the first year of
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: these cars. It's not just about the engines. There's so
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: much we still need to understand about how these cars
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: work relative to one another. Perhaps Ferrari as well, despite
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: owning and building the car, have more to understand about
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: their own carr and how it works. But it does
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: just I think, also illustrate that there is uncertainty looking forward.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: You know, we have a very rough form guide. We
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: know the teams that can be in the mix occasionally,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: but it's so hard to say whether that's going to
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: remain the case, because even the teams themselves don't really
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: seem to be one hundred percent certain of it.
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think once you get into a weekend that
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: form guide holds true. But then where the form guy
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: begins as the confusing part. I think as you were talking,
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: then the thing I kept thinking back to and something
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: that we maybe should have considered a bit more leading
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: into Silverston was as good. Ferraro is fantastic a Catalunya,
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: and we know that there are a lot of not
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: as many as Silverston, but there are a lot of
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: high speed corners there. And I think it was that race,
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: wasn't it when Lando Norris was saying, like Ferrari actually
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: had an engine, and then how good would they be?
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: And so maybe the Casalodia is one of those tracks.
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: It's one of the sort of truisms of Formula one
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: is if a car works well there, it tends to
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: work well in most more places than not. Cataloony is
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: kind of the you know, the baseline for car performance.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: So perhaps we should have seen a little bit more
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: of Ferrari's prowess in the high speed stuff coming. But
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: I think the memory of just how just dire Austria
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: was the fact that it was a back to back,
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: it was only a week before, and it was too hot,
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: and it was the alta, the air was too thin,
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: and it was all just a bit too hard and
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: they look absolutely dreadful. So you do you know, it
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: led us to question, well, which one's the outlier here?
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: Is Castaloonia the outlier, or is Austria the outlier. I
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: don't see them being in the mix for race wins
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: on the same level as Mercedes week in week out,
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: But of that chasing pack, they are reliably the safest
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: bet of the others, I think, and that bodes well
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: for you know, if they can find perhaps some more
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: consistency in the performance. The peaks are clearly good enough.
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: We've seen that too. It'll pass through Grand Prix. It's
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: just flattening out the performance curve a little bit. But
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: it certainly bodes well for the remainder of the season.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: And just from a narrative point of view, I think
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: it's good that both Ferrari drivers have a win each now.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: I mean, Leclaire is still a fair way back into
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: points table because he's had some DNFs and what have you,
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: But it's starting to look a bit more realistic because
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: the gap in the points table between Hamilton and Leclaire
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: didn't feel to me like it was completely representative.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I did wonder whether there would be This
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: is probably my mind getting ahead of the reality of
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: the circumstances, but as Hamilton might have been approaching Leclair
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: late in the race, whether there was a little thought
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: about the championship picture. Given the margin I think was
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: closer to fifty points, wasn't it before this weekend? Now
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: it's thirty nine off the top of my head between them.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Hamilton's still closer, just north of thirty points behind Antonelli,
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: but Ferrari only seventy eight points behind Mercedes, which is
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: extremely achievable if we're assuming the Barcelona Silverston Ferrari is
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: the true one and not the Austria of Ferrari, but
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: that remains to be seen for now. Before we get
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: to back to Mercedes and what's going on to that team,
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: let's just look through the other fronts very quickly, because
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: as you mentioned, none of them really turned up, and
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: this very much tallies with the one on one off
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: trend at the moment. Red Bull Racing, of course in
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: victory contending form only a week earlier in Austria, and
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: let's start with Red Bull Racing. Max Forstappen crashes for
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: the second week in a row. Last week it was
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: in qualifying. This weekend it was in the Grand Prix,
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: and he said fundamentally the same problem, not exactly technically
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: the same problem, but fundamentally the same issue of the
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: rear wing losing its downforce. I thought, though, Matt, more
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: than just the incident, which obviously speaks to a car
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: problem and they may change that rear wing for the
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: next race. Is the way Max talked about it afterwards.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: And he's never been afraid to speak his mind. Obviously
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: we've known that very well about him. But the way
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: that he described the team building a dangerous car, the
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: way that he complained I suppose or vented that the
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: team hadn't taken his advice to take the car off
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: the grid, start in park fer may for engine change
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: regions and other set up reasons, I thought was probably
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: more important part of this incident.
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the word dangerous, that was the one that jumped
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: out for me. That's a big, big word for a
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: driver to say about the machinery that he's in, and
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: not a word that too many drivers, quite frankly, would
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: actually utter. So that's that's very interesting. So if we're
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: going back to the what's real and what's not in
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: terms of the outlies to these things, you do wonder
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: about something like Austria now where a it's a track
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: he's very very good at historically and no Formula one
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: track is easy, but Austria is a relatively uncomplicated layer
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: in a lot of ways, and perhaps if you've got
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: a car that does have some pretty stark deficiencies in
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: more inverted commas normal type of tracks, somewhere like Austria
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: masks some of those and you combine that with Verstapan's
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: brilliance around there and maybe that's why we get the result.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: And it's the thing we've been trying to do for
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: the past few years with Red Bull in that looking
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: at maxa Stappan's results purely as a indicator of how
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: the good the Red Bull is probably is unrealistic because
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: the drive of the second card everyber he seems to
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: be able to fire a shot and look is that
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: Cajus having a perfectly acceptable year. But I do wonder
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: if the true performance of the Red Bull is closer
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: to where Hadjar is that wherever Stapping can take it,
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: And that's maybe the lens that we need to look
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: at what Red Bull are doing. But you know, obviously,
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: by the time he gets to the media pen after
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: the race, he's pretty forthright at the best of times,
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: and when you're you know, when you've been thrown backwards
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: at a fence, at a fair rate of knots as
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: he was there coming into in. Just that's that's a
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: pretty frightening accident to have, and the fact that it's
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: happened twice in eight days. Yeah, it's little wonder that
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: his patience was pretty thin afterwards.
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, just the way he didn't even really want to
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: engage much with it after saying his piece, so obviously
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: was interested enough to vent, but then sort of acknowledged.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: I think at one point it seemed that if he
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: kept talking, he might say something that he would regret,
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: even he might regret saying saying that. He needed essentially
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: a couple of days to digest this. It's going to
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: be very interesting to see how these last two races
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: before the mid season break shake out for Red Bull Racing.
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: We've talked a lot about his contractual situation. He will
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: get that exit clause by the mid season break. He's
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: not going to finish in the top two in the
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: divers Championship before then. We don't expect there to really
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: be any openings room in any other front running team.
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: But it's nonetheless it's clearly some kind of live option.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: It's hard to get a read on whether the idea
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: of him leaving the sport is still in play, or
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: whether he might just use it as leverage to get
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: some extra concession from Red Bull Racing. It continues to
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: build cars to try and throw themto the fence, but
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: clearly my impression was that there's still something to be
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: decided there, just judging by the way you talk, notwithstanding
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: his Max mistaff And finally it's got to McLaren. Now,
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: really awful weekend for them, despite some reasonable results for
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: Lando Norris a sprint podium and then fourth in the
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: Grand Prix. But even he said he didn't really deserve
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: them on pace. He deserves them on effort, I suppose,
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: and for the sake of the commentary to have something
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: to talk about. But the pace of the Claren car
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: continues to get worse. Not entirely surprising considering they haven't
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: brought a major upgrade package in a while. That they
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: did bring upgrades to Silverston, so it wasn't as if
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: it was a totally, you know, weeks old car. This
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: was revised. This team just seems to keep moving backwards.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: And the vibe I got this weekend was it was
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: very much just brace and hold things together until the
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: next big upgrade rives in Hungary, so another race after
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: the next one. This this for me, I mean, we've
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: we've talked about it before and it's been fairly obvious realistically,
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: but because of the changes in form guide, it's hard
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: to want to say definitively. But this weekend somehow felt
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: like the one for me where it was rammed home
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: that it's not happening for McLaren this year. I think
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: it's I'm almost willing to just say it's done and
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: dusted for them.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I completely agree. I mean Norris after the race,
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: his quote was the pace was pretty shocking, and you
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: know he looked as surprised as anybody to get the
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: results that he did, you know, reward for perseverance if
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: nothing else. But as you know, I like to come
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: armed with statistics to illustrate a couple of points that
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: I'd like to make. So here's two that I've got
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: for you. After nine rounds the equivalent stage last year,
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: Oscar piastric one hundred and eighty six points. McLaren as
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: a team has one hundred and seventy nine this year,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: so that's an interesting one for you. And the other
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: stat that i'd like to throw at it is that
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: McLaren has had three more liveries this year than they've
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: had wins. Ah And I guess the helpful part of
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: them running the sixty year tribute livery of their Monaco
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: car in nineteen sixty six in white over the course
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: of the weekend is that it blended into the background
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: and became completely anonymous, because that was what they did
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: performance wise over the course of the Silverstone weekend. At
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: least in other races this year when they've been dogs slow,
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: we can go, oh, look, there's the orange slash Papaya
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: car as a speck in the distance. I wonder what
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: position they're in this year. This weekend you couldn't even
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: tell where they were, and when you look at the
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: time sheets, they were now any of the top. So
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: I agree with you right now they seem to I
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: mean even mentioning the ver stap in fact that I
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: mentioned before, and that it's hardest to get a read
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: on where the red Bull is simply because of his
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: ability to transform the machinery he's in. This thing looks
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: completely lost and I'm not sure or where it's going.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Quite frankly with McLaren at the moment. The performance just
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: isn't there. Oscar Piastre had a very compromised race, unfortunate
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: clash on the first lap, where as he said, you know,
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: three into one doesn't really work. But what I thought
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: was really interesting and you probably picked up on this
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: as well, was that the having a sprint weekend, it
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: was really interesting to see the qualifying performance of the
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: cars between the sprint qualifying and the qualifying for the
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: Grand Prix itself. Both Norris and Pastre were slower in
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: Grand Prix qualifying than they were in sprint qualifying, and
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: that's armed with twenty four hours more data and being
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: more bettered into the track. That is not the sign
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: of a team that's going anywhere other than sideways or backwards.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: And if nothing else, I think that illustrates where they
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: are right now.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: Happened in Canada as well. I'd have to go back
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: and look at the other sprints, and that, I think
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: you're absolutely right, speaks to a team that gets to
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: a certain point doesn't know where to keep going, or
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: I shouldn't say, at least with this car, we know
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: from previous years the team can normally kick on, but
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: it's actually criticism Norris has had for a few years,
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: hasn't it that they're really good at rolling out of
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: the box quickly, but then just can't advance from that
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: Visas he said, that's actually because they roll out of
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: the box and just achieve the maximum and then they're
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: just constantly butting up against the limit for the rest
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: of the weekend. Maybe that's still the case, in which case, well,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: that almost says more than anything else, doesn't it, that
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: they just cannot get any more out of that? And
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: I'm inclined to believe that because usually this year Norris
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: and Piasta have been quite closely matched, at least on
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: qualifying pace, which usually suggests that that's all the car's got.
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: Correct.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: The slide backwards, I just think is really concerning. And
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: also you probably would have heard this weekend that Andrea
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: Stalon in one of his debriefs, suggested for the first
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: time as far as I've heard, that the concepts that
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: the concept they'd gone in on this year perhaps wasn't
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: the right one, or some of the concepts rather, if
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: not the overall one, and some of the delay in
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: getting parts of the car and the slip backwards is
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: the team trying to unpick some of those problems. So
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: that does speak to probably concern for the outcome of
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: this season. But considering we've got stable regulations next year,
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: any progress they do make this year can be attributed
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: to the next year or kicked forward into next season,
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: so it doesn't have to write off the era for them.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: Will make me concerned considering mclan's recent history, but this
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: year is certainly not looking great. Let's move on now,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: though to Move of the Week, brought to you by Shannons.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: I mean, Matt, there was a lot of overtaking over
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: the British Grand pre weekend. I'll put overtaking with an
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: asterisk if you like, because that's the way I certainly
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: felt after the sprint. Maybe not a popular opinion at
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: least for the one's making highlights of the race packages,
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: but made me that be uncomfortable. You've means you've got
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: a lot to choose from we do.
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: Whether we decide to discuss what happened with the safety
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: car at the end, is move for the week or not.
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: I'm going to literally I'm going to literally get that
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: can and just hook that thing down the road in
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: case you would like to use it. I am going
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: to go to the sprint here, and I'm talking specifically
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: about Kimi Antonelli's lap eight pass of Lewis Hamilton for
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: the lead in the sprint, when it felt like he
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: was probably doing eighty kilometers an hour faster down the
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: Hangar straight. I mean, Hamilton may as well have been
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: standing there thumbing for a lift at that point that
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: the ease that Antonelli went past him. And it was
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: all because of the least everyone's least favorite word in
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty six deployment that had used all of his battery.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: Antonelli had plenty in reserve, and we have an overtake
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: in asterisks. And it's move of the week for me
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: because it was the most obvious demonstration, because it was
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: a pass for the race lead and therefore the win
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: of the sprint. It's move of the week because it
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: showed what an absolute nonsense we've got ourselves into with
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: these Formula one engines for twenty twenty six, and why
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: moving to change them and perhaps go away from them
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: all together before too long is the first thing that
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Flo's probably got right in a while. It was just
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: so unedifying to watch that sprint. I felt a little
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: dirty watching it afterwards, like need a shower or something,
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: because it was just as you said, fantastic for highlights packages,
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: fantastic for oh look at this clip of so and
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: so going into the league. But we know what's going
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: on here to the degree that if you're an informed fan,
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: you know what you're watching, as much as the lack
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: of battery graphics on the screen is a constant source
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: of frustration because quite frankly, we don't know what is
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: a legitimate pass and what is not anymore because we've
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: got no idea how much battery drivers do and don't
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: have left at the moment. But that lap eight pass
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: for the lead, yes you get pass us for the lead,
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: but the manner in which it was done, it was
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: just a complete drive by that required very little skill
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: on behalf of both drivers. Was in one overtake summed
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: up everything that was wrong with the Formula one in
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty six, and perhaps the best move of all
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: is that at least it has been acknowledged and there
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: are steps being made to try and fix it. But
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: we're going to have to suffer through some more of
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: those overtakes before we get there. Unfortunately, yeah.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: I think not only was it difficult to watch at
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: times that was very much in the same wavelength, but
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: some of the cheerleading for it, Oh oh my god.
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, I know if you're a commentator, you're not
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: going to tell the viewers that, oh, look at what
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: you're watching. It's awful. And you know, look, if you're
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: just tuning in and you just want to see a
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: little bit of cars going against each other, then fine.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: But I did find it particularly unsatisfying in a weird way.
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: I actually found the Hamilton ant Nelly battle the least
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: unsatisfying part, because I find with these rules, when it's
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: just two cars, you can kind of understand what's going
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: on a little bit better because you're only looking at
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: two cars and their relative performance from this corner to
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: that corner. You kind of get it. And in a
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: past that's I mean, it was an incredible speed pass
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: Hamilton alarming even But then in my mind I was like,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: well that could be drs. You know what I mean?
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: For me, The thing that I found much less appealing,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: weird least, probably the more highlights worthy part is all
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: the battling behind them. Norris Vestaffa and Russell piastre Leclair
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: then less so Norris Mafuri broke away a little bit
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: because a I think, to quote Oscar Piastri, I thought
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: it parts could have been dangerous because the speed differences
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: they had at various points. It's not just people are
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: easy to criticize that as a criticism because you often
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: think about the cars when they're side by side hack
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: hack Can closing speeds be dangerous in that sense, But
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: it's not that it's when another car is following another one.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: We've seen that before. We saw it in Suzuka with
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Oliver Bhman's crash. But it was also just that the
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: more that racing in inverted commers went on, the more
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: what you realized it was meaningless that no one was
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: doing it because they were lining up great moves. They
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: were doing it because they were pressing a button on
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: the steering wheel getting past, knowing that they would be
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: passed again unless the other driver accident who ran off
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: the road essentially I got caught by a different driver,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: was doing it. That the race was in the end
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: decided in that little battle pack anyway, by which drivers
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: managed to avoid having to race other drivers and therefore
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: could break away. A little bit. Norris finished third because
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: he broke away early enough because Charlie Clair got involved
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: in the party and slowed down. I think it was
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: Oskapiastrian time or whatever it was that for me, Look,
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: the only positive I can draw from that is that
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: it did seem relatively limited to the sprint, and given
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: the sprints feel sign and important anyway, then that's fine. Like,
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: if that's where you want to park that stuff, I
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: guess I could.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: That's a really good point. Actually with the sprint, that's
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: probably the best thing that sprints have ever done Formula One,
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: quite frankly, because it was it was such a nonsense
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: that Silverstone on Saturday that I think all of the
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: team's probably got their deployment a little more sorted because
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: of what happened in the sprint, because I was fearful
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: that the actual Grand Prix was to be the same.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: When you're actually dealing with a meaningful race for meaningful
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: World Championship points. Perhaps what the sprint was so farstical
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: that perhaps some of the team's got their deployment maybe
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: a little bit more even in terms of how they
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: were going to use it on Sunday, and that made
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: the race far more satisfying as a spectacle as a result,
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: because we had to suffer through the sprint on Saturday.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: That might be the best thing sprints I've ever done,
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: quite frankly, I think so.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: I think it was similar memory Serves in Miami, wasn't it,
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: which was also a sprint weekend and also a track
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: that was a little bit difficult with the engines, and
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: they learned on during the sprint and the race was
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: a bit more standard. You could argue that on any
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: other given weekend practice just serves that purpose, but you
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: just have more sessions to do it. Maybe that's the case.
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: But at least the Grand Prix didn't look ugly, I thought.
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: But you know, I think it's also frustrating. I was
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: thinking because Silicon normally is a good racing track. It's
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: one of the tracks where you don't really need all these
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: extra assistances. It's one thing official. Yes, yeah, if it
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: had managed to improve the spectacle in Monaco, I would
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: have been the first to say, well, that's good. I
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: guess yeah, that's helped. But at Silversen it does it
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: needed and in my opinion, I think it just it
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: felt to be uncomfortable, but at least it was only
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: the sprint. I'm going to move us on here and
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: pick my move of the week. I'm going to choose
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: a classic Ferrari move, which is making a pit stop
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: at the most logical time. Even in the form up
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: swing of this team, there's still a little bit of
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: Ferrari and it's hard Lewis Hamilton four laps to the
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: finish when the safety car came out, all right, Ferrari said,
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: and they are right. They thought the race was going
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: to get going. But at four laps to go, mat
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: that to me felt I even as soon as I
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: saw it, I was like, this is a huge risk
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: because there's every chance it's not going to happen. We
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: all know after Abu Dab twenty twenty one that the
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: safety car needs an extra lap when the lapped cars
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: are sent out of the way. It just felt so needless.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: You know, they okay, they were all on old tires.
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: Maybe Russell would have pitted, who's to say, but for me,
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: that felt like the wrong side of the coin toss
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: to have chosen. As a result, Hamilton finishes third, Russell
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: finishes second. Not the end of the world, I guess
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: one it would have been Ferrari's first one two in
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: almost two years thrown away.
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: Ferrari's first one two at the British GP, it would
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: have been since I think two thousand and two. I
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: heard someone say I think it was shot back at
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: Barricalo back in those days. I did hear that in
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: the coverage when they weren't talking about British drivers for
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: five minutes. But yeah, an interesting one because if anyone
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: knows what happens with the late race safety cars, it's
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: Lewis Hamilton, isn't it. But in my mind, when Maxwstappen
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: was in the fence and given how few laps there
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: were to go and the hole in the barriers, to
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: get that car behind the barriers was quite a long
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: way away. I don't know if you clocked that from
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: the overhead shot where the tractor was taking the car
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: quite a long way to get it behind the fence.
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: It struck me at the time I thought there's much
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: more of a as a higher percentage chance of this
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: finishing behind the safety car than not. And you know
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: how this works in the F one press room. When
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: there's a late race safety car, it's going to finish
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: under safety car. Everyone furiously writes their race reports because
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: they know the order is probably frozen at that point.
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: So I'm furiously writing away to go, hey, got a bit,
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: They're busy, Give what's going on? It's yeah, I just
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: hope that should we somehow, I'll get some crazy World
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: Championship fight that gets to aber Dhrby. And I hope
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: Lewis Hamilton doesn't lose the title by three points. That's
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: all I'll say about.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: That, especially not to George Russell. Wouldn't it also just
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: and I want to be on obviously Mercedes, there's a
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: big talking point there. But just to wrap up on
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: the safety car element, the rules are clear, the race
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: doesn't have to be restarted. I'm not of the opinion
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: the race has to be restarted. It happened so rarely.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: I think it's not necessary to start hand rigging over
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: whether or not the rules need to be changed. But
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: I do think that if we're in this era of
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: we do want to we do want races to end
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: under green flag, which I do also get. You know,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: there were reports that the cheapest way to get a
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: Silicon Grandstand ticket was a horrendous amount of money. So
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: if you paid to go there. I get you, you
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: want a green flag conclusion, then surely you don't need
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: that extra lap to unlap yourselves because there's only going
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: to be one lap of racing. They're not going to
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: catch the back markers, yes, or at a minimum. I'm
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: surprised that if it was that line baller call, they
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: didn't do that. We did what they did in Australia
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: a few years ago, and you just read flag it
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: because if you're going to run out of laps, that's
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: a guaranteed way to be sure you won't run out
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: of laps. So just found I felt like the sport
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: got caught between what it wanted and what the rules said.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: And maybe just no one wants to touch that rule
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: because of the controversy around it. But it did feel
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: just a little bit. The whole thing felt a little
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: bit unnecessary, I thought. But I'm not concerned that the
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: result was the result.
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: No, I agree. I'd prefer let the lap cars go,
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: and as you said, they're not going to catch them
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: up in one lap. I don't necessarily like the idea
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: of a one lap. We had that one in back
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: of a few years ago where it was literally like
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: a one lap shootout. It's like, you know, deciding a
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: Grand Prix like that is like deciding a match in
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: the World Cup with penalties too soon. But it just
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: adds an element of unnecessary randomness to things where it
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: doesn't really encapsulate the picture of the entire race. But yeah,
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: I just look, you can't the rule. The execution of
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: the rule was clumsy, but the rule was followed to
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: the letter, and so in the end it was the
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: right outcome with the rock process to get to the outcome,
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: if you know what I'm saying. So there wasn't the
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: controversy there the broadcast droning on that it shouldn't happen,
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: And I wonder if they would have been slightly different
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: about the whole thing if say, I don't know, Lewis
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: Hamilton or George Russell Orlando Norris was leading the race
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: and they were possibly susceptible on the last lap, But
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: there you go. I need a good old British winner
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: for the good old British crowd that's under the good
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: old British son. But there you go. I just don't look.
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: I think it was as unsatisfying as it was. It
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: was done the right and way at least I think,
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: just think the execution of it was a bit clumsy.
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: Yes, And is there that much difference to having the
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: cars cross the line in order than having Charlotte Clair
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: A cross the line twenty seconds ahead of George Russell
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: order for from Yeah, exactly, you know, it doesn't make
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: that much difference. It is what it is. But certain
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: a little bit less breathlessness from the post race review
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have been a bad thing. Let's go down to Mercedes,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: which did not win the Grand Prix for the second
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: time in three races. Can you imagine form slum I
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: believe is what they call it. But and dre Kimi
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Antonelli was the story here, seemed on track to win
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: this race. He'd pitted later than Charlotte Clair, he got
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: a tire off so that he was closing the Claire
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: in at a rapid rate of knots. My rough math
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: says they would he would have caught him round about
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: four laps after he retired or after his problem rather
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: on lap forty one. So what's that, Let's say forty
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: six out of fifty two? Yes, exactly like that? Yeah? Seven?
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: Or yeah, I think you're right, And then you know
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: it's up to him to pass him, of course, but
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: he managed to pass Hamilton the sprint, pass Hamilton as
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: well earlier in the race, I think you would have
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: won the Grand Prix. Add the astrisk there that, of
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: course Max was stapp and crashed with four laps to go,
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: so perhaps he wouldn't have got the move done before that,
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: in which case we should probably remember that Charlot cler
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: did everything he needed to do to win this Grand Prix.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: But the story really is another unreliability issue, befalling a
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: Mercedes car that was in contention to win or is
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: at least in the top two second time. From the
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: last three weeks, this has happened to Antonelli. His points
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: lead slashed from a high of sixty five points to
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: Lewis Hamilton sixty eight to George Russell. It's at the
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: moment the more relevant stat anyway, just twenty five points
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: ahead of Russell now who managed to cruise through to
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: second quite fortunately in the race, and it's only thirty
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: or thirty odd back to Lewis Hamilton. Very achievable for
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: both drivers. How the complexion has changed. But for Mercedes
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: it's not just engine problems. It's the wheel shield. The
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: first time I've heard this phrase. Yes, the caked in
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: or the brake ducts, it's that part of the car.
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: It's more than a trend. Now this feels it feels chronic.
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: It is, and this feels very much like a world
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: championship that Mercedes can win and Mercedes can lose. At
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: the same time, I'm not necessarily sure it's going to
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: have a lot to do with anybody else. Quite frankly,
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: I mean, I find that points gap right now. The
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: fact that it's twenty five points between Antonelli and Russell,
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: given what it seems like the performance skulf is between
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: those two, feels a little bit unrepresentative. Just like when
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: it was sixty eight points it also felt a little
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: bit unrepresentative. It's probably somewhere in the middle feels like
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: a pretty fair number, but it has. I mean, look,
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: I agree with you. I think Cantonelli would have had
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: ample time to pull the overtake off to win the
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: race had we have proceeded as it looked like it
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: was going. It was because of the tire offset. It
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: was all set up to be a really interesting finish,
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: wasn't it. But yeah, look, Mercedes what's weird about this
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: is that these are not mistakes being born out from
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: being necessarily under a massive amount of pressure a lot
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: of the time. So you do wonder whether this is
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: just the chase of performance or whatever it may be.
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: But the fact that it's happened a couple of times
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: now to Antonelli. Obviously Russell had the failure in Canada
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: as well, so fast but fragile, which is probably not
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: a surprise in the first year of a new regulation set,
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: because no one really has the reliability built in at
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: this point. That's something that happens with a greater maturity
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: and a regulation set, I suppose. But it does offer
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: hope for everyone else in the short term. You do
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: wonder whether they can sacrifice a little bit of a
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: performance just to build a knowed in a little bit
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: of more reliability in there. But you know, running wide
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: and damaging a particular part of the car, and then
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: obviously the fact that the car was handling like an
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: absolute pig by the end of the race and Antonelle
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: got a five second track libits pedalty because he couldnt
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: keep the thig on the road. I actually felt a
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: little bit of sympathy for him. There because the car
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: was clearly pretty evil at that point, and obviously with
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: the fact that it finished under the safety car dropped
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: him completely out of the point, so he was probably
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: going to scrounge a point or two to get up
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: the gut of the afternoon end up being classified fifteen.
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: So everything that could have gone wrong did in those
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: last fifteen laps. But yeah, it is you know what's
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: the saying like it's happened twice now for Antonelli, So
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: it's a coincidence. So what point does the coincidence become
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: a trend? I think that's what Mercedes will be looking for.
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a piece written up on the Fox Sports website.
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: I won't buy you with all of the numbers, but
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: there's some interpretations of the unreliability here for mine. I
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: think that this has because it cause a big part
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: of the story so far. This has been George Russell
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: saying how unlucky he is, lamenting how much misfortune has
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: befallen his campaign this season, particularly after Monaco, where the
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: drive through penalty completely undermined his attempt to score any
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: points whatsoever. Even though based on the speeding penalty we
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: now know probably shouldn't have been awarded at the time.
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: We've done a little bit of maths for the website,
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: and if you'd expunged all the bad luck for George Russell,
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: the gap after Monaco would have been about twenty five points.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: In fact, exactly twenty five points according to my mats lo.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: And behold after two failures to score for Antonelli, where
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: at exactly twenty five points again, so I think the
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: luck part of this championship is now completely expunged. I
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: think that's all evened up, which I think is interesting.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: It does also prove that old idea that like he's
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: in swings of roundabouts, it's going to even out over time,
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: especially with the season this long, So itsself interesting. But
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: then when you compare it to the fact that Ferrari
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: has had virtually no reliability issues, the only one read
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: is Charleckla's power steering problem in Barcelona. The engine certainly
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: seems bulletproof, maybe because it hasn't been fast enough so far,
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: but nonetheless it hasn't added the issues yet. That seems
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: like And it's funny because it almost feels like it's
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: crept up as a narrative point ahead of the season
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: we'd be talking about how much of a big deal unreliable.
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: Unreliability would surely be with such big rule changes. First
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: quarter of the season more or less, actually things seemed
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: relatively smooth. Now it feels like we've got a Ferrari
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: it's very reliable, maybe a tenth off the pace or
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: so depending on the circuit, and a Mercedes, as you say,
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: fast but fragile Tota Wolf said, that's the way he
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: likes to run it. That's an exciting proposition. I think
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: if that's the way the title is going to go,
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: it's how long can the Mercedes stay on the road
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: to score the points well?
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: And is Ferrari going to be the ever present car
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: in the rest of Class A to be able to
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: put the pressure on and get those wins when the
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: Mercedes falters, Because the last thing Ferrari need right now
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: is for McLaren to randomly have a good weekend or
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: for Maxim Stapping to go win a race. So if
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: Ferrari can establish itself was the clear number two team
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: out of that top four and be there to swoop
• 37:25
  Speaker 2: when Mercedes inevitably has its problems as we go along,
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: then yeah, sure, but the bad luck element. I wasn't
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: a massive fan of George Russell leaning into that because
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: it happens. I mean, Fernando a lotso will tell you
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: he's had one hundred and seventy nine points worth of
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: bad luck. Can he be leading the World championship if
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: he was driving for somebody else? So there's only so
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: much you can There's only so much you can really
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: lead into that as well. This is why things are happening.
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: Everyone has bad luck to a degree, and you know
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: it's interesting. Antonelli almost came out and said, well, you know,
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: he'd be leading a bit of a charred existence before
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: these couple of reliability issues that he'd had. Yeah, it
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: is interesting, but it is a narrative that you know,
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: if you were to not really look at the points
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: table and you were just watching the races purely based
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: on a performance through a performance leads for the first
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: ten rounds this year, you would just be thinking, well,
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: how far are these Mercedes guys ahead of everybody else?
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: Because you know, they have been the ever present, as
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: we've said, and they clearly have a performance advantage. The
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: fact that it is this competitive and it's this close
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: and another team has actually won a couple of races.
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: That's almost the biggest surprise to me because we were
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: talking after a few rounds, I thought, is this going
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: to be Red Bull twenty twenty three all over again?
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: Are Mercedes going to win every race? And the answer,
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: you know, twenty percent of the season soever are the
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: answers No.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: The concerning part from Mercedes in following on from that
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: bo is that they've led all this unreliability through and
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: who knows, maybe they've solved it all. They think they've
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: solved the engine problems, just the Wheelshield problems, Yeah, who
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: knows what else that's all happened in the opening third
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: of the season, whatever it is, at exactly the time
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: Ferrari has been struggling to be as competitive as it
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: wants there. What if the new normal, if you liked
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: He's a phrase that I sort of hoped I'd never
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: saved my life, is that Ferrari is as competitive as Mercedes.
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: What if this unreliability is just ensure that Ferrari's Mountain
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: to climb isn't the one hundred points it probably could
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: have been. But he's actually only the seventy odd points
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: for the teams and only the thirty odd points for
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: Lewis Hamilton. I think that's very interesting because if you
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: look at the average pace, yes, it's clear that Mercedes
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: is the top car of the season. But if you
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: look at the trend, Ferrari is closing at a reasonable
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: rate of knots. Two wins from the last threes and
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: so bad, and that's it. You know, to go back
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: to where we started this podcast, Silverston a track that
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: shouldn't have been a Ferrari circuit that should have brought
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: out all of its weaknesses. Spa Is I mean, I
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: hesitate to say anything, to be honest, because I was
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: completely wrong about Silverston. But you would think Hungary is
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: certainly going to be a Ferrari circuit right from what
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: we know of that car. They should be a Hungry circuit.
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: After that, we've got zandwort Mon's a big question mark,
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: but they do tend to perform well.
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: There.
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: No one knows anything about the new Madrid circuit. You know,
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: we're looking at a run of five races in which
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: Ferrari could probably look at a few of them and
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: go I think we can close the down and maybe
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: start the last ten Grand Prix of the year. The
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: Flyaways really comfortably within striking distance. I think that's quite
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: an interesting prospect. And then also to go back to
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: another point we raised earlier, where does George Russell figure
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: in all of this? Because I thought it was at
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: least candid of him, admittedly after getting a fortunate second
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: place in sending on the podium, so feeling a bit
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: better about himself to say that, well, twenty five points
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: probably is accurate. He's decided to try to say it
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: could be as low as ten though I guess it
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: could be if you want to stretch the numbers a
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: little bit. But because he wasn't performing well enough, he
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: continues to be behind anton Elli. What role might he
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: play in either slowing down for Ari's rate of score
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: or perhaps we need a title for himself.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting that the thing you said there that
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: makes me really think is you've got this what until
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: you get to that last ten. It's crazy to think,
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: by the way, that SPA is like the halfway point
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: of the season in twenty twenty six for here we are,
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: and of all the teams that might be cheering for
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: Bahraid in Saudi Arabia to come back up, it might
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: be for Hurri because it might give. It might just
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: give them the extra couple of races they need if
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: they have a little momentum behind them. So Ferrari waving
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: flags cheery for bar Raid in Saudi Arabia. You and
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: I working at four o'clock in the morning and got
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: so much.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: I groom my outcome. But certainly Ferrari may be excited. Yes,
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: that's a good point. I hadn't thought about that. What
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: might a changeable last round of the calendar is at
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: a time we know that it seems Portermow will be
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: the backup if in fact the opposite happens, and we
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: can't even have Katar and Abu Dhabi, God forbid that
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: which true? Who will that favorites? It's an interesting way
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: to end the season, certainly, but it was an interesting
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: British Grand Prix for non British reasons, even which is
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: very exciting to think a week off now and then
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: to Belgian Grand Prix in a couple of weeks, the
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: last doubleheader before the mid season break. And I mean
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: it's been brave to predict what things are going to
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: look like, even in two racest time. But that's all
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: the time we have for pitt talk this week. You
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: can subscribe to bittalk wherever you get your favorite podcasts,
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: and you can leave us a rating and a review
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: as well. This weekend is the Supercars Townsville five hundred,
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: with racing at four fifteen on Friday and three oh
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: five on Saturday and Sunday Australia Eastern Time. That's followed
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: by the German Motorcycle Grand Prix at ten pm. You
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: can keep up to date with all the LATESTEP one,
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: Moto GP and the Supercars news at foxsports dot com
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: dot Au. From Match Paton and me, Michael Lomonado, thanks
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: very much for your company. We'll catch you next time.