June 20, 2025 • 42 mins
Toto Wolff, team principal, CEO and co-owner of the Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, joins the show to talk about George Russell's recent win in Montreal, Kimi Antonelli's driving future, and missing Lewis Hamilton. Plus, he talks about producing the F1 Movie and why Mercedes won't join the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm Matt Miller and I'm Hannah Elliott and this is
Hot Pursuit.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
We had an awesome weekend.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Hannah, My goodness, that was I think the most fun
I've had at a car event ever.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Yeah, it was so fun. I would I would wholeheartly agree,
actually for sure at an event for cars and maybe
even in motorcycles, that was, oh wow, the coolest for me.
I mean, the star studded guest list that we had
was just insane.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
I know, everything came together so well, and I have
to say the access I thought was incredible, both for
us as media but also for spectators. Yep, I mean
it felt it made an F one race feel a
little bit difficult to navigate. Like the access I thought
at Lamal was just really good.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
Yes, we should explain for you know, people who aren't
regular listeners what we're talking about. So Hannah and I
went to Lamal, France to see the twenty four hour
race last weekend, and we had a star studded guest
list of CEOs and market movers. We had Tom Wagner,
(01:29):
who runs Nighthead, which owns the team there Hurts team
Joda Cadillac. He also owns Singer as well as Revology.
Obviously Hurts what we had the CEO of Hurts, Gil
West join us. We had the CEO of Ford, Jim
Farley join us. We had the CEO of Aston Martin
(01:51):
Adrian Hallmark. By the way. So, and in terms of
the race results, right, Ferrari one, everybody was telling us
the whole time they were sandbag and it turns out
they kind of were.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
They would all say, we're not allowed to tell you this,
and we don't. We're not allowed to talk about the
balance of power. Butt.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Yeah, Ferrari sand bags, and so does Toyota.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Well, no, Toyota got sand bagged. So Toyota was given
an eleven kilogram penalty, right because they won so much
at the beginning of this decade, and Ferrari was just
given a pass. And I think the impressive thing was
that Porsia took second, Ferrari was first, third, and fourth.
(02:33):
And then this is.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
A third year in a row Ferrari one. So three
years in a row.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
Yeah, and amazing their driver Robert Kubica, right, who is
basically one handed.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, unbelievable story.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Truly an amazing story. But if you think about it,
Cadillac Actually, if you take out the Ferraris, which they
were given a huge advantage, then Cadillac comes in. I
think third. They were they were no. Second because they
were fifth the number twelve. Yeah, car finished fist.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I have to say, Cadillac is really developing into a
fascinating story and it was so great to be, you know,
around that team in their hospitality, around some of their
drivers Jensen Button of course, and some of their executives
Mark Royce. Because the vibe is good. The vibe is
(03:28):
really good. I think there is a nice little ground
swell happening, and of course that's great timing going into
Formula One as a race team next year. That is
a team to watch just out of a human interest
story alone.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Yeah. Absolutely. I also think I can't remember who which
media outlet wrote collection of the winners and losers, and
they included Aston Martin as one of the winners, even
though Aston Martin's hypercar team was one of the biggest losers.
At the end of the race, they only beat Pougeot,
which was really the biggest loser. But I also agree
(04:06):
that Aston was a winner because they're new to this right. Also,
they were the only non hybrid entry and for me,
like watching the race, it was the sound again that
was the most important thing, and the Cadillacs were the
most amazing, like deep rumble. They made everybody else sound
(04:29):
like nothing except for the Aston Martin Valkyrie. That thing,
the v twelve screams.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Screaming is the right word for it. It is unbelievable
to feel that. I mean, you hear it and you
feel it in your body when it goes by. It
was so so cool, and I think for me, the
takeaway is that Lamon is it's about the racing. Really,
It's about that moment that you just described feeling when
(04:57):
a Valkyrie goes by. There were no not a ton
of like influencers and just hordes of celebrities at this race,
which was I thought it was really nice. You know,
F one has become all about status and really bringing
you know, Hollywood stars and musical stars and all of
that is really great, but Lemon doesn't have that quite yet.
(05:22):
I think it probably will in a couple of years.
I think we're headed in that direction. And that's great,
that's totally fine, but it's it was nice to be
at this old French race in this little old French
town and not have a total like Instagram influencer circuit.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
Yes, it was pretty cool. I actually went over to
the Portie Hospitality looking for you. At one point I
was there. Well, I didn't see you, and I stopped
out on the patio because Mark Weber was giving a
talk about how you know, WEK works and how endurance
racing strategy. And then he went inside and sat down
(05:59):
next to I thought his twin brother. I didn't know
Mark Weber had a twin brother, and I realized it
was Eric Banna.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Yeah. You know what's really funny is I was sitting
behind them. I actually went upstairs in hospitality to sort
of hide out. This was after we'd wrapped taping and everything,
and I was just like, I just wanted I honestly
just want to watch the race. I don't want to
have to talk to anyone. I want to sit and
watch the TV and watch the race. So I went
upstairs and Portia Hospitality. This is after the race had started.
(06:26):
There was no one there because everyone moved closer to
the track, and I just sat down behind these two
dudes and it was like the three of us and
a couple other folks in the room. That was it
for an hour, and then eventually some other people came
into the room, some Porsche executives and puffers, and they
get the guy to turn around and I realized it's
Mark and Eric.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
Yeah, and I had.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
No idea and they were just chilling it was. It
was actually really cool.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
Yeah, it was very very cool. I watched most of
the race upstairs in the in the Cadillac Hospitality and
just because there was a collection of bros there that
knew so much about racing. Dario Franchiti was sitting up there.
Rajnaire formerly a Ford, was up there now, the CEO
of singer Brian Burke was up there. He's an executive
(07:16):
vice president at Multimatic. There were just a ton of people.
Gil West was there, so like every time I had
a question, and I had so many, I would just
lean over and be like, yo, Dario, what's the pitting strategy?
You know? And then he would like explain to the room. Yeah,
it was awesome, so cool.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
I love I love it, I love it.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
I also think we should give a shout out to
David Clark, who really made a lot of this happen.
David is kind of a king. I feel like he's
kind of a king maker in this world. And we
sort of.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
I saw him.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
We saw him in Cadillac, we saw we kind of
saw him everywhere.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
That's another one that like when you're listening off these names.
These are people who have been in the business forever
and they know everyone. There's nobody they can't call to
get something done or you know, just to talk to
her whatever to get insight from It was really cool
to be a part of that, and yeah, I definitely
hope we can do it again next year.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Speaking of kings, we have one on this program today,
truly a king if his kingdom is not having its
best year. In twenty twenty five, we're gonna talk to
Toto Wolf, who is the CEO and co owner of
Mercedes their Formula One team Mercedes AMG Patronis. He's the
(08:33):
team principal. He's a billionaire from Austria and I mean
speaking of highly connected, this guy is married to Susie Wolf,
so she started the Formula Academy.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Yeah, yeah, they talk about a power couple. Also, Toto
has transcended motorsports become famous in culture, I think in general.
And I know that's true because my gay best friend
who doesn't care for motorsport at all but loves music.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Like he loves Toto.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
You know, I've got some girly friends who are not
involved in cars at all, they all know all about
Toto and are big fans. So he has transcended cars
and he is now on another level. So we're excited
to have him.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Let's talk about race weekend, because you guys had a
good one. Tell us what happened.
Speaker 4 (09:27):
Yeaha was a good one. We finished first and second
wonder Race with George Russell and excitingly with eighteen year
old Kimo Antonelli. We finished third, So double podium.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
And how did you get there? Because it's been a
tough it's been a long slog, right.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
Well, it hasn't been such a slog. I think you're
being a bit harsh with us here because we've won
of a bunch of races last year, we've been dominant
in Las Vegas, but we haven't competed for a championships
since a while, and in that respect, this this season
we had many podiums but no victories, and yesterday it
was on complete merit. We've been strong throughout the race
(10:05):
on all tires. There was not you know, the lack
of a safety cow, so it was us really, you know,
being the being the benchmark.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Then Jimmy is I think the third youngest driver ever
to take a race podium, which is huge.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
Can you tell us just.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
A little bit about what you see in him as
a driver and what you see as he develops, what
you can expect for the future.
Speaker 4 (10:33):
So, Kimmy has been in our junior program since he
was eleven, and you can today recognize talent, I would
say from the age of ten when the kids start
to compete in the International Go Cutting Series and we're
having a good group of scouts. You know, I'm a
City Spen's junior program and that's important in a way.
(10:57):
It works like the soccer, soccer or tennis academies that
they identified talent very early on and for a young driver,
you you know, they start winning races and the really
best ones win championships and the great ones do do
that every year. And that's why we saw that Kimmi
was different from the age of eleven or twelve, and
(11:19):
then he's continued.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
What do you see it in winning championships already.
Speaker 4 (11:25):
Yeah, already in katting, you have these age groups eight
to ten, ten to twelve, twelve to fourteen. And if
a kid starts at the age of eight and is
already competitive against two year elder children, that's already a
good indication. And if that child wins a championship a
year younger than everybody else, that's another good indication. And
he has been winning through these throughout these categories, and
(11:48):
that's very exceptional.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
I wonder I always think about this kind of feeder
program that you have, and I think about I've lived
in Germany for a long time, so I'm familiar with
the soccer feeder to they have how many women or
how many girls are in this Because if we learned
anything from Lamar this weekend is that you don't need
to have this kind of dominant alpha male strength to
(12:12):
win a race like Kuvisa has an injured arm and
still took the victory over the factory team, So clearly
women could compete at the top level.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
Yeah, Robert is A is a is an exceptional driver,
great talent. He had him. He had a Ferrari consigned
Ferrari contract before he had the rally accident, so he
would have been a world championhip, no doubt about that.
And also the resilience that he's shown because he's driving
with one hand. But in terms of young female is
(12:44):
just a number game, you know. We when you look
at Cocating ten years ago of Adred, of one hundred kids,
there would have been two girls. Now there is fifteen
or twenty. And that's why we're eventually gonna have young
females comp think being able to compete in Formula one.
So we have a young lady in our program. Her
(13:04):
name is Luna Fluxa, who's winning races, who's winning championships.
She's going to step into cars in one year, and
she has she has the talent and the ambition and
the character to be successful. And the obviously the program
that my wife manages, the Formula one Academy, which is
an old female series, has been inspiring for young girls
(13:28):
suddenly seeing being a racing driver as a career because
on the past they went no role models. It was
Susie was in the last one in Formula one. And
now suddenly there's a Netflix series around Formula one Academy
that has just dropped, and more girls are starting to
have an interest.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
You know, last week I was with Frank Wallacer with Bidley,
you know, Frank the former head of Portion Motorsport, and
we were talking about how long it takes to develop
young drivers. I'm curious for Antonelli, for instance, how many
years do you think he would need to really get
him to the top of his game and maybe at
(14:09):
the top of the podium. Is that a three year game?
Is that a five year game or is it shorter
than that?
Speaker 4 (14:15):
So that has changed in the last few years because
it is so difficult to manage the tires. It's not
only about speed, how fast can you go on a
single lap boy in a race, but not sturing the
tires to drive as fast as you can in the
same time, not sliding them and not making them overheat
(14:37):
because it loses you lose tons of lap times and
that is the limitation for young drivers coming up. A
good example is Piastre who is leading the championship. It
took him a year and a half actually to kind
of catch up to London Norris and it's been the
first year that he has an edge on him, and
that is I think just the tire management and with Kimmi.
(15:00):
He doesn't know all of the circuits. It was the
first time in Montreal, so you start with a massive disadvantage.
But the car was good and he was able to,
you know, be fast. But coming back to your question, yes,
you probably need to look at the three year program
and say that's the time it needs for a young
driver to you know, to challenge the more your more
(15:22):
experienced teammates that are also super fast. I mean, George
today is among the among the best drivers in form
of one and that's something you need to give them time.
You need to accept that there's going to be more
difficult weekends underperformance, but that's just part of how it
goes now.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
So do you have a take on whether or not
a team should have two drivers for the whole season
and they stay there because a lot of people have
been talking about this since Jack Dowan was removed, or
do you think that a team should be able to revolve,
you know, like occasionally you could use Valucherie and take.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
I think when you take the right decision in terms
of talent, you must be very conscious about who you're
putting in the car and if that young driver shows
a lot of promise, you also need to give them
time to develop, and that's what we are doing with Kimi.
There were lots of voices that said, how can you
(16:21):
put an eighteen year old in a car, especially in
the Mercedes. You know, it's not like you're competing in
a smaller team and you're under the radar, but literally
you're being cutapulted in a seed where people expect you
to be on the podium or win races. So that's
been our philosophy. We wouldn't give anyone a seed if
we didn't think that can be a champion of the future.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
What does Voucherie do for you guys? Because he put
out a pretty hilarious video on special where he's like
drinking a lot of espressol and hanging out right. But
he's obviously an incredibly talented pilot, so I guess he
can add a ton of value, right.
Speaker 4 (16:59):
Viter is just awesome guy. He's a super talented driver
and he's kind of found his you know, he's being
authentic now. I met Viter in two thousand and eight.
He was a young driver without any financial backing, and
he was dominating Junior Series. I remember seeing his first
race in a really competitive feeder series called Former No.
(17:22):
There was forty four starters. He was on pole and
at the end of the race he was leading by
a margin of ten seconds. So outstanding driver then came
into Formula One and unfortunately ended up with the most
successful driver of all times. Louis Hamilton has a teammate
in his peak and vity was a wise world champion
(17:43):
many times. He's won many races, He's been dominant some
of the circuits and also against his teammates. When he
went to Sauba, he you know, he just basically crushed
them all. But then he ended up without a seat
and for us a huge opportunity to take back as
a reserve. I know that if one of our drivers
would have a fish poisoning, have the best guy, we
(18:08):
would have the best guy in the car to actually perform.
So that's positive. And on a different note, he has
kind of found his you know, his his brand. He's
an extremely cool guy. He always was, but he's a Finn.
He was introverted and he's in a way he breaks
(18:28):
free of the Mercedes environment. And you know he has
this mustache and the hair and how do you call
that the mullet, the mullet and he's he's.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
A business in the front party in the back exactly.
In German it's called a focal.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
Language. Like in the front, you know efficient, and in
the rear you're fashionable, stylish, and Vitry is an individual
that can take a mickey out of himself, which is
so important. You need to be able to laugh about himself.
And Vitory has the ambition and the talent to come
back into Formula one and if that doesn't fly, he's
(19:08):
going to make a career in Lamon that you like,
or in Indy cars or whatever, because he's so good.
But on top of that, he's a laugh I mean,
I saw that video and you really really great content.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
You know. That really makes me think about this conversation
we had with Jensen Button this past weekend at Lamar
and Jensen made the comment that Formula one drivers are
very selfish. They're the most selfish drivers in any series
we were talking about, of course NASCAR and endurance racing.
And I'm wondering if you if you agree with that,
(19:41):
and how do you manage these personalities The egos will
be honest that you have to have a pretty good
opinion of yourself to put yourself on the line like that.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
How do you manage that as team principle.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
So there's two things you cannot expect from a one driver,
to be a lion in the car and the puppy outside.
These guys are traumatized little six year olds because they've
been put in a go card as basically toddlers. That's scary.
You know you're being told drive fast. These cards go
(20:19):
one hundred kilometers an hour. It's raining, you have accidents
and you need to rely on yourself. You find out
that you are alone in this go card and you
just need to survive, and only the best to There's
many kids that eventually drop out because of fear, pressure
or running, lack of talent. So if you make it
(20:40):
in formula one, you know that you can only rely
on yourself. It is you need to be selfish. You
need to beat your teammate. So that is a key ingredient.
But and here's the caveat. I believe that the best
ones also have social intelligence, emotional and intelligence, and they
know how to maneuver a padoc. They are career focused
(21:04):
and driven, but they are not selfish because they understand
that in order to be successful and Informula one, you
need to have the good people around you, whether it's
in the team or whether it's in your management, and
you need to look at it from a long term perspective.
The short term optimization will not make you the most
successful driver. And we've seen it in the past that
(21:28):
people missed out on great careers because they were acting
arrogantly or selfish optimizing every single opportunity rather than being
a team player. Louis Hamilton is a fantastic team player
and he's been the most successful of all time. Michael
Schumacher was able to assemble the team around him and
being hugely successful. So you see that with the best
(21:52):
so talent, ambition, but also consciousness that it doesn't all
revolve around yourself. There is other people that are part
of your success. And how I've been managing this from
the first day that I have been in Former one
is that I make no difference between the two drivers
and the rest of the company. And I've been telling
them that there's two and a half thousand superstars in
(22:15):
this team, whether they work in the machine shop and
the cleaning, in aerodynamics or driving the car. I'm not
going to treat you any different than any of the
other people. If you a selfish and you put our
joint success at risk or or you damage our brand,
then I'm gonna be and then I'm going to be
ruthless about it. You have no part in this team.
(22:37):
And that's that philosophy worked because our drivers have understood,
they respected, they care that everybody you know is part
of the success, and they realize that when they crash
into each other. For example, people can't pay their mortgages
because they don't they don't earn their bonus.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
I get it. I get that, and I love the
egalitarian take. But there's obviously an importance having someone as
good as say Lewis Hamilton to help lead the team.
You do what you do, but he also must have
contributed a lot in that sense. Do you miss Lewis?
I mean, I'm sure personally you can still hang out
with him, but do you miss him in that sense?
As such an experienced leader, as such a champion.
Speaker 4 (23:18):
You always have to miss a person like Louis Hamilton.
And as you say, we're still close friends. We have
given our word to each other that we will stay
close friends. We're fighting hard on track with the gloves
off of our because we need to fight for respective
teams and that's the kind of rule we have. But
(23:40):
off track, we spend some time with each other. We
travel with each other, and I don't want to miss
the friend that I've been, that I've that I've that
I've gotten for so many years, the longest ever drive
a team relationship in Formula one twelve years. He's rarely
see that in any other spot. And when it comes
to developing the car, obviously he has a lot of experience.
(24:02):
He seed it all and to replace someone like Louis
Hamilton is always going to be difficult, you know.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
With Lewis, obviously he probably hasn't been finishing as high
up this year as he wanted. But also I've read
plenty of his comments in the press that he is unconcerned.
He is this is a long process, this is a
new team, a new car, and of course anyone would
be foolish to count out a champion like Lewis Hamilton. Ever,
(24:33):
I'm just wondering how you see that now from your
side of the track, so to speak, as he is
learning a new car and a new team and taking
some time to do it.
Speaker 4 (24:46):
I fully agree with that you know, you don't learn
driving that quickly. In twenty twenty one he was great.
Than the regulation changed and it got a little bit
more difficult, but he was still performing on a very
high level. And just by changing teams suddenly you don't
lose your skills. I think everybody needs to have a
period of adoption, different car, different DNA of how how
(25:12):
that vehicle drives, new engineering team that you need to
start to work together then be involved in the continuous
development in the car so it suits your driving style.
It's an all Italian team, you know, he's a British
guy parachuted in there and uh and that takes time. Also,
we have seen a little bit of a pattern that
(25:34):
lewis at the beginning of the season. You know, he
needs to come into to find that mojo, and the
second half of the season has been always very strong.
So don't ever write Louis Hammerton off.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
Can I just point out that Mark Marquez did not
need any time for that. Do you watch one of
the other leagues or sports that you're I know you're
super busy with Formula one so you probably can't. But
Moto GP, Mark Marquez has been so insanely dominant, and
he is old and broken and switched not only to
(26:08):
a different team, but he's working for the Italians who
really don't like him.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
Yeah, I think there is the exceptional athletes that that
clearly outstanding in that category. And he has shown that
switching manufacturers hasn't hasn't affected him. On the contrary, he's
he's great on the on the Ducati as well. I
don't know how many word championships did Mark Marcus win.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
He's got eight now.
Speaker 4 (26:35):
So it's like Lewis, right, yeah, true, and these are
the greats and some adopt easier, some some take a
little bit of time. But I mean Louis Hamilton is
one of the greatest goals of course all time.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Of course, he's up there on that level with a
Rossi as well.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Speaking of Lewis, obviously he was the producer in this
F one film. Toto were how involved were you in
this in the filming? The production? The film's coming out
very soon. I'm actually going to see it tonight in
a press screening.
Speaker 3 (27:09):
Is there a total in this in this movie?
Speaker 4 (27:11):
Yeah? About them? Actually, I mean I'm really I'm really
really proud. Yeah, And he's taken a lot of interest
in the role, so and say how does it work?
He spent some time with me at the race, had
him in the garage listening to the intercom. Exceptional, exceptional
guy also to be so keen and understanding, trying to understand.
(27:32):
And yeah, we've been involved from early on. Obviously Lewis
was the main one guiding the team in in the narrative,
in the storyline, what's realistic, what's not? I can only
take a mini credit in it. I'm an executive producer
and I was told when that's on the screen, that's
pretty good. But other than that, you know, we have
(27:53):
we helped to build the cars. So we built f
two cars that are cars that that are racing in there.
We we pointed bread that racing drivers schools to learn it.
And obviously there were meetings where you know, we were
asked of our opinion is that realistic or not? Is
that what you would do? And so we had a
(28:15):
we had a contribution and that and you know, I've
seen them. I've seen the movie in premiere for the
team principals and drivers in Monte Carlo, and I don't
see a mistake. There's nothing that I would not see
us being uncompletely unrealistic. I mean you have the drivers
Sonny who is a who is who is older than
(28:35):
what you would think, but not much more. All of
all of the the all of the storyline is realistic,
and even for us racing insiders, we couldn't find anything wrong.
Speaker 3 (28:49):
We actually asked Jensen Button over the weekend, like, what
is the difference when you're forty five as opposed to
twenty five? I mean he still has in incredible reflexes, right,
And what makes younger drivers better because they do always
have a few tenths on the guys, even the champions
(29:10):
who are twenty years older.
Speaker 4 (29:13):
I think that the true champions can compensate some of
the sharpness that you lose. I mean cognitively, all of
us becoming elder, you lose some of that. I think,
what your reactions, what your eyes see, motoric capability, that's
(29:34):
something that's getting slower. But you can compensate that by
the better, right amount of training. So that's one thing.
The other is that the courage. You know, young drivers
are sometimes you know, not thinking too much about the
risks of the spot, and the older you get, you
may realize that a little bit more. But again they
(29:57):
are the outstanding ones are keep a bit of compensating
that in you know, different training for example. So you
know Alonso's going to be forty forty yere and he's
still an exceptional driver.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
Yeah, that's incredible.
Speaker 3 (30:12):
We were talking to Matt Brown about him. He could
he could help them.
Speaker 4 (30:16):
Uh, I mean, Zach Brown is in his early fifties
and he he still thinks of himself as being a
great driver.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
He may need to lose a few pounds.
Speaker 4 (30:27):
Yeah, I need to be. Zach is a friend of mine,
so I got to be. I need to be careful.
But as you have said, you know you can get
him in. It's just a matter of how quickly you
can get him out again. But wow, that's really nasty.
But he's a good friend. He's going to take that
with a with a pinch.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
So that did make the point back to the drive
that being an elder driver, you do have more to lose.
Potentially once you get married, you have children, you start
(31:03):
to have more at stake.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
You recognize your mortality.
Speaker 4 (31:08):
You know, I can just tell it from my personal career.
I think I was never afraid of the mortality thing.
You know, nobody will survive anyway. And if you can
say that you had you know, you're doing what you want,
you love what you do, you have a great family,
then there's point is eventually going to come. So there's
not a thing in time in a car that I
thought about mortality. But you start, you kind of start
(31:34):
looking at things that you haven't in the past, you know,
with me, particularly in in rallying, suddenly I saw trees
that I have never seen before that I would have
not looked at before or under in the Rasky. You know,
when it's when it's raining and there's aqua planning, you
think about lifting as a twenty five year olds, I
(31:56):
would have never thought about lifting over acua planning. It
is what it is, you know, So that changes. But
it's not being scared. It's just that I hear you
realize I hear you.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
I don't know if you saw this news, but Caring
is naming Luca DeMeo from Renault it's next chief executive officer.
And you are very fashionable, very stylish in an elegant way.
What do you think about this potential to if you're
a great leader in automotive or in racing, that you
could do something and also in luxury or fashion, you know,
(32:28):
I mean this kind of shift. Have you thought about that?
Speaker 4 (32:31):
So, first of all, Luca is a star for me,
and I've texted with him this morning and congratulated him
and said, it's a shame. You know, we've worked in
Formula one together. I'l beIN he's gonna have say this
engine next year, next year, but he's not around and
he was fundamental in making that happen. So I really
really rate him as a manager. And I think when
(32:55):
you have an understanding for an organization and he's not
under an no around, I mean massively. Yes, he was
great at Sayad, he was exceptional at Volkswagen before. If
you have an understanding for an organization, if you are
able to motivate people, if you have empathy, but at
the same time you create the right amount of pressure,
(33:15):
you can succeed in any industry in my opinion. And
I mean, I think for caring is a coup to
have someone like look at me as a CEO.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
It's just cool, that is. I mean from engineering to
fashion there's a huge difference, right, one of them is mathematical,
methodical and the other one is just an innate sense
that you have.
Speaker 4 (33:38):
But as a car guy, you also have a sense
of you need to have a sense of esthetics. Cars
need to look good. People look you know cars Always
people say I'm buying a car because it's you know,
it doesn't burn a lot of fuel, or it's it's
you know, it looks good, has a lot of power.
But all these things are just disguising the real reason
(34:02):
we're buying car. Buying a car is an emotional act.
It's how I want to be perceived, not how I am,
but how I want to be perceived. And a proper
car guy and I see that we're all a Calanius
who runs Mercedes, they understand that very well. What is
it the customer wants to have? What's the aesthetics of
the car of the future. It's not about what you
(34:24):
like today, it's about what this is going to be
in three years. And I remember having been shown around
the next generation of Mercedes is a few years ago
by all a Calanius and Gordon Vagano is the chief
design of Mercedes, and he said, so he's shown Louis
and I around. He said, how do you like the
cars that are coming in three years? And we said, well,
we don't like them. He said, I'm glad that you
say that, because if you would like the cars in
three years, I know it would have done it wrong
(34:44):
because you will like them in three years.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
But not now.
Speaker 4 (34:47):
So sense of aesthetics, Look, Luka's going to do just fine.
He is designed been part of designing great cars. He's
going to be part of designing great Cuci clothes, finding
the right story, finding the right people that are kind
of designed the closes.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
Okay, So what for you is the most beautiful car
ever made?
Speaker 4 (35:10):
WHOA? I would say spontaneously the three hundred s L call.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
I mean, you're not wrong, but it just since you
work for Mercedes, it's but.
Speaker 4 (35:22):
It is the car. I mean it could you could
You could also say, you know, to fifty gto ferraris
a spectacular car. But looking at the way that non
Mercedes head, I think the most amazing car is also
the one that was the most expensive car of a
SOULD is the unhaut could Pey, you know, the pre
three hundred s L. You look at that car and
(35:43):
it's just the beauty in itself with the technology that
was unseen in those early years. And then the three
hundred was the development of the road car, which then
became a race car. But these are just the best
cars in the world.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
I mean, Hannah's written about that car extensively.
Speaker 4 (35:58):
I was there, you there when it was sold. I mean, congratulations.
I think this was an event that does a car person.
You can be proud that you've been part of it.
But also, you know, I'm driving the three hundred is
LS and it's a fifty to fifty six car, nineteen
fifty six car, and that thing drives two undred fifty
kilometers an hour. It breaks like a modern kite even
(36:21):
with the old tires. You know, you can you can
swish around the corner and you can see how far
advanced Mercedes was in terms of the developing high performance
cars back in the day and again or in hardcopy,
it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
I would also like to have a three hundred sl.
How much time do you have to hang out with
cars to enjoy, you know, the aesthetics of or the smell,
the vibrations, like the good old stuff, since you're so
busy at work with the new stuff.
Speaker 4 (36:50):
Not enough, unfortunately, But I you know, I'm so lucky.
We I have Mercedes company cars and I get driven
around with Mercedeses to and from the races. That's really great.
And I appreciate that I was giving a company car
in the UK new s class S sixty three, and
(37:10):
I wrote and I wrote an email to the head
of Mercedes Spence you Can. I said, I'm so thankful
and grateful that you're giving me a company car like
the S sixty three because seeing it, stepping into the car,
driving it or being driven is just pure joy. And
in the same way driving some of the some of
the vintage cars around, it's it's you know, I need
(37:34):
to pinch myself sometimes being able to have this Mercedes cars.
Speaker 2 (37:40):
I want to ask a little bit about motorsport in general.
Matt and I are all hyped up on Lamont because
we were just there. Would Mercedes ever run a factory
team at Lamont?
Speaker 1 (37:53):
Would you join join?
Speaker 2 (37:55):
And obviously there's so much branding potential for you.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
Where do you see motorsports?
Speaker 3 (38:00):
We're told us a bargain total thirty forty million for
the season. What a bargain.
Speaker 4 (38:03):
It's a bargain, yeah, uh define bargain. No, But I'm
you know what I'm I'm looking at it. Lamar. I'm
a racer. Lamar twenty four hours is one of the
greatest races in the in the world Formula one. For me,
obviously my bias is the best there is. It's the
(38:25):
best driver's quick as cars, the greatest tracks, and then
there is a long time nothing. But if I would say,
what's next Lamar twenty four hours and if I found it,
and that is really one for insiders in the notch life,
the new book in twenty four hours. That for me
(38:48):
is you know, the top of the top. And when
I'm not having a Formula One weekend, I can watch
Lamar race pretty much through the night. You know, I'm
following the live feed and some of the drivers have
a personal interest. And as Mercedes, it's something that we
did in the past. We aren't particularly you know, that
(39:10):
wasn't our happiest place. We had a very bad accident
in the fifties when we when we exited and and
then some of our prototypes have been flying taking off
in the nineties and early two thousands. I think it
was in the nine nineteen nineties. But what it is
for me today is we are concentrating on you know,
(39:30):
the main platform and that is Formula one. It's what
we want to do. Right. This captures ninety nine percent
of the audiences and and everything else is you know,
comes second. Now we have entered with Mercedes in it,
with the GD three car. That's something which we are
looking at. That is our customer program.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Speaking of aesthetics, I think it was probably the best
one in the g T three s.
Speaker 4 (39:54):
Yeah, it looks really great. Yes, and then there is
the little you know, caveat all the Collanius and of Mercedes.
We are raising people and we don't like bops. We
don't like balance of performance. We don't like somebody assessing
your power, your energy consumption, you wait, your driver's skill.
Speaker 2 (40:16):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (40:16):
And then you know I'm being harsh.
Speaker 3 (40:19):
Now it's you that won't survive. I think you're right.
I don't think that's going to survive after this. It's
just not fair.
Speaker 4 (40:26):
Yeah, you know, you spend so much time and money
and effort in developing the quickest car and then you're
being put in kilograms of balanced into this car. And
I don't want to be I just want to, you know,
build the quickest car, and Formula one has shown how
it goes. Give us a cost cap. You know, dou
lamt give everybody a cost cap. You cannot spend more
(40:46):
than achs whatever you said thirty forty million, and we
didn't this thirty forty million, that is what. Then you
can do what you want. I mean, still there's regulations,
but nobody needs to bleff in pre season racing or
in qualifying. But it's war, it's you know, gloves of
PA racing. If that was to happen Lemar, absolutely would
(41:08):
you know, it would be something that we would be
looking at. But at the moment, BPE having some officials
judge whether whether you're quick or too quick putting ten
kilograms in your car taking it out from someone else
the next day, not for us at the moment.
Speaker 3 (41:23):
Hey man, it's been really great spending some time with you.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (41:26):
Thank you, and I really enjoyed it. And you know,
it's good to have a chat with the two of
you so enthusiastic about cars. Having been in Lemont. There
won't there wouldn't be many Americans. I guess that you
would have found in Lemont this weekend. So great that
you have been.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
There more with Cadillac more right, So.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
Yeah, true, true, I mean, we love it.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
And I know you won't remember, but we last spoke
in Las Vegas at the F one Race in Vegas,
and I always very much appreciate you taking the time
for Bloomberg, So thank you, very pleasure for me all.
Speaker 3 (41:59):
That's how we have for this. We'll be back the
same time, same place next week. Thanks so much for
joining us. I'm Matt Miller, I'm
Speaker 1 (42:04):
Anna Elliott, and this is Bloomberg.
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm Matt Miller and I'm Hannah Elliott and this is
Hot Pursuit.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
We had an awesome weekend.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Hannah, My goodness, that was I think the most fun
I've had at a car event ever.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Yeah, it was so fun. I would I would wholeheartly agree,
actually for sure at an event for cars and maybe
even in motorcycles, that was, oh wow, the coolest for me.
I mean, the star studded guest list that we had
was just insane.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
I know, everything came together so well, and I have
to say the access I thought was incredible, both for
us as media but also for spectators. Yep, I mean
it felt it made an F one race feel a
little bit difficult to navigate. Like the access I thought
at Lamal was just really good.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
Yes, we should explain for you know, people who aren't
regular listeners what we're talking about. So Hannah and I
went to Lamal, France to see the twenty four hour
race last weekend, and we had a star studded guest
list of CEOs and market movers. We had Tom Wagner,
(01:29):
who runs Nighthead, which owns the team there Hurts team
Joda Cadillac. He also owns Singer as well as Revology.
Obviously Hurts what we had the CEO of Hurts, Gil
West join us. We had the CEO of Ford, Jim
Farley join us. We had the CEO of Aston Martin
(01:51):
Adrian Hallmark. By the way. So, and in terms of
the race results, right, Ferrari one, everybody was telling us
the whole time they were sandbag and it turns out
they kind of were.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
They would all say, we're not allowed to tell you this,
and we don't. We're not allowed to talk about the
balance of power. Butt.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Yeah, Ferrari sand bags, and so does Toyota.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Well, no, Toyota got sand bagged. So Toyota was given
an eleven kilogram penalty, right because they won so much
at the beginning of this decade, and Ferrari was just
given a pass. And I think the impressive thing was
that Porsia took second, Ferrari was first, third, and fourth.
(02:33):
And then this is.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
A third year in a row Ferrari one. So three
years in a row.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
Yeah, and amazing their driver Robert Kubica, right, who is
basically one handed.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, unbelievable story.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Truly an amazing story. But if you think about it,
Cadillac Actually, if you take out the Ferraris, which they
were given a huge advantage, then Cadillac comes in. I
think third. They were they were no. Second because they
were fifth the number twelve. Yeah, car finished fist.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I have to say, Cadillac is really developing into a
fascinating story and it was so great to be, you know,
around that team in their hospitality, around some of their
drivers Jensen Button of course, and some of their executives
Mark Royce. Because the vibe is good. The vibe is
(03:28):
really good. I think there is a nice little ground
swell happening, and of course that's great timing going into
Formula One as a race team next year. That is
a team to watch just out of a human interest
story alone.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Yeah. Absolutely. I also think I can't remember who which
media outlet wrote collection of the winners and losers, and
they included Aston Martin as one of the winners, even
though Aston Martin's hypercar team was one of the biggest losers.
At the end of the race, they only beat Pougeot,
which was really the biggest loser. But I also agree
(04:06):
that Aston was a winner because they're new to this right. Also,
they were the only non hybrid entry and for me,
like watching the race, it was the sound again that
was the most important thing, and the Cadillacs were the
most amazing, like deep rumble. They made everybody else sound
(04:29):
like nothing except for the Aston Martin Valkyrie. That thing,
the v twelve screams.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Screaming is the right word for it. It is unbelievable
to feel that. I mean, you hear it and you
feel it in your body when it goes by. It
was so so cool, and I think for me, the
takeaway is that Lamon is it's about the racing. Really,
It's about that moment that you just described feeling when
(04:57):
a Valkyrie goes by. There were no not a ton
of like influencers and just hordes of celebrities at this race,
which was I thought it was really nice. You know,
F one has become all about status and really bringing
you know, Hollywood stars and musical stars and all of
that is really great, but Lemon doesn't have that quite yet.
(05:22):
I think it probably will in a couple of years.
I think we're headed in that direction. And that's great,
that's totally fine, but it's it was nice to be
at this old French race in this little old French
town and not have a total like Instagram influencer circuit.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
Yes, it was pretty cool. I actually went over to
the Portie Hospitality looking for you. At one point I
was there. Well, I didn't see you, and I stopped
out on the patio because Mark Weber was giving a
talk about how you know, WEK works and how endurance
racing strategy. And then he went inside and sat down
(05:59):
next to I thought his twin brother. I didn't know
Mark Weber had a twin brother, and I realized it
was Eric Banna.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Yeah. You know what's really funny is I was sitting
behind them. I actually went upstairs in hospitality to sort
of hide out. This was after we'd wrapped taping and everything,
and I was just like, I just wanted I honestly
just want to watch the race. I don't want to
have to talk to anyone. I want to sit and
watch the TV and watch the race. So I went
upstairs and Portia Hospitality. This is after the race had started.
(06:26):
There was no one there because everyone moved closer to
the track, and I just sat down behind these two
dudes and it was like the three of us and
a couple other folks in the room. That was it
for an hour, and then eventually some other people came
into the room, some Porsche executives and puffers, and they
get the guy to turn around and I realized it's
Mark and Eric.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
Yeah, and I had.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
No idea and they were just chilling it was. It
was actually really cool.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
Yeah, it was very very cool. I watched most of
the race upstairs in the in the Cadillac Hospitality and
just because there was a collection of bros there that
knew so much about racing. Dario Franchiti was sitting up there.
Rajnaire formerly a Ford, was up there now, the CEO
of singer Brian Burke was up there. He's an executive
(07:16):
vice president at Multimatic. There were just a ton of people.
Gil West was there, so like every time I had
a question, and I had so many, I would just
lean over and be like, yo, Dario, what's the pitting strategy?
You know? And then he would like explain to the room. Yeah,
it was awesome, so cool.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
I love I love it, I love it.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
I also think we should give a shout out to
David Clark, who really made a lot of this happen.
David is kind of a king. I feel like he's
kind of a king maker in this world. And we
sort of.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
I saw him.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
We saw him in Cadillac, we saw we kind of
saw him everywhere.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
That's another one that like when you're listening off these names.
These are people who have been in the business forever
and they know everyone. There's nobody they can't call to
get something done or you know, just to talk to
her whatever to get insight from It was really cool
to be a part of that, and yeah, I definitely
hope we can do it again next year.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Speaking of kings, we have one on this program today,
truly a king if his kingdom is not having its
best year. In twenty twenty five, we're gonna talk to
Toto Wolf, who is the CEO and co owner of
Mercedes their Formula One team Mercedes AMG Patronis. He's the
(08:33):
team principal. He's a billionaire from Austria and I mean
speaking of highly connected, this guy is married to Susie Wolf,
so she started the Formula Academy.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Yeah, yeah, they talk about a power couple. Also, Toto
has transcended motorsports become famous in culture, I think in general.
And I know that's true because my gay best friend
who doesn't care for motorsport at all but loves music.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Like he loves Toto.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
You know, I've got some girly friends who are not
involved in cars at all, they all know all about
Toto and are big fans. So he has transcended cars
and he is now on another level. So we're excited
to have him.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Let's talk about race weekend, because you guys had a
good one. Tell us what happened.
Speaker 4 (09:27):
Yeaha was a good one. We finished first and second
wonder Race with George Russell and excitingly with eighteen year
old Kimo Antonelli. We finished third, So double podium.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
And how did you get there? Because it's been a
tough it's been a long slog, right.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
Well, it hasn't been such a slog. I think you're
being a bit harsh with us here because we've won
of a bunch of races last year, we've been dominant
in Las Vegas, but we haven't competed for a championships
since a while, and in that respect, this this season
we had many podiums but no victories, and yesterday it
was on complete merit. We've been strong throughout the race
(10:05):
on all tires. There was not you know, the lack
of a safety cow, so it was us really, you know,
being the being the benchmark.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Then Jimmy is I think the third youngest driver ever
to take a race podium, which is huge.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
Can you tell us just.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
A little bit about what you see in him as
a driver and what you see as he develops, what
you can expect for the future.
Speaker 4 (10:33):
So, Kimmy has been in our junior program since he
was eleven, and you can today recognize talent, I would
say from the age of ten when the kids start
to compete in the International Go Cutting Series and we're
having a good group of scouts. You know, I'm a
City Spen's junior program and that's important in a way.
(10:57):
It works like the soccer, soccer or tennis academies that
they identified talent very early on and for a young driver,
you you know, they start winning races and the really
best ones win championships and the great ones do do
that every year. And that's why we saw that Kimmi
was different from the age of eleven or twelve, and
(11:19):
then he's continued.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
What do you see it in winning championships already.
Speaker 4 (11:25):
Yeah, already in katting, you have these age groups eight
to ten, ten to twelve, twelve to fourteen. And if
a kid starts at the age of eight and is
already competitive against two year elder children, that's already a
good indication. And if that child wins a championship a
year younger than everybody else, that's another good indication. And
he has been winning through these throughout these categories, and
(11:48):
that's very exceptional.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
I wonder I always think about this kind of feeder
program that you have, and I think about I've lived
in Germany for a long time, so I'm familiar with
the soccer feeder to they have how many women or
how many girls are in this Because if we learned
anything from Lamar this weekend is that you don't need
to have this kind of dominant alpha male strength to
(12:12):
win a race like Kuvisa has an injured arm and
still took the victory over the factory team, So clearly
women could compete at the top level.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
Yeah, Robert is A is a is an exceptional driver,
great talent. He had him. He had a Ferrari consigned
Ferrari contract before he had the rally accident, so he
would have been a world championhip, no doubt about that.
And also the resilience that he's shown because he's driving
with one hand. But in terms of young female is
(12:44):
just a number game, you know. We when you look
at Cocating ten years ago of Adred, of one hundred kids,
there would have been two girls. Now there is fifteen
or twenty. And that's why we're eventually gonna have young
females comp think being able to compete in Formula one.
So we have a young lady in our program. Her
(13:04):
name is Luna Fluxa, who's winning races, who's winning championships.
She's going to step into cars in one year, and
she has she has the talent and the ambition and
the character to be successful. And the obviously the program
that my wife manages, the Formula one Academy, which is
an old female series, has been inspiring for young girls
(13:28):
suddenly seeing being a racing driver as a career because
on the past they went no role models. It was
Susie was in the last one in Formula one. And
now suddenly there's a Netflix series around Formula one Academy
that has just dropped, and more girls are starting to
have an interest.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
You know, last week I was with Frank Wallacer with Bidley,
you know, Frank the former head of Portion Motorsport, and
we were talking about how long it takes to develop
young drivers. I'm curious for Antonelli, for instance, how many
years do you think he would need to really get
him to the top of his game and maybe at
(14:09):
the top of the podium. Is that a three year game?
Is that a five year game or is it shorter
than that?
Speaker 4 (14:15):
So that has changed in the last few years because
it is so difficult to manage the tires. It's not
only about speed, how fast can you go on a
single lap boy in a race, but not sturing the
tires to drive as fast as you can in the
same time, not sliding them and not making them overheat
(14:37):
because it loses you lose tons of lap times and
that is the limitation for young drivers coming up. A
good example is Piastre who is leading the championship. It
took him a year and a half actually to kind
of catch up to London Norris and it's been the
first year that he has an edge on him, and
that is I think just the tire management and with Kimmi.
(15:00):
He doesn't know all of the circuits. It was the
first time in Montreal, so you start with a massive disadvantage.
But the car was good and he was able to,
you know, be fast. But coming back to your question, yes,
you probably need to look at the three year program
and say that's the time it needs for a young
driver to you know, to challenge the more your more
(15:22):
experienced teammates that are also super fast. I mean, George
today is among the among the best drivers in form
of one and that's something you need to give them time.
You need to accept that there's going to be more
difficult weekends underperformance, but that's just part of how it
goes now.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
So do you have a take on whether or not
a team should have two drivers for the whole season
and they stay there because a lot of people have
been talking about this since Jack Dowan was removed, or
do you think that a team should be able to revolve,
you know, like occasionally you could use Valucherie and take.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
I think when you take the right decision in terms
of talent, you must be very conscious about who you're
putting in the car and if that young driver shows
a lot of promise, you also need to give them
time to develop, and that's what we are doing with Kimi.
There were lots of voices that said, how can you
(16:21):
put an eighteen year old in a car, especially in
the Mercedes. You know, it's not like you're competing in
a smaller team and you're under the radar, but literally
you're being cutapulted in a seed where people expect you
to be on the podium or win races. So that's
been our philosophy. We wouldn't give anyone a seed if
we didn't think that can be a champion of the future.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
What does Voucherie do for you guys? Because he put
out a pretty hilarious video on special where he's like
drinking a lot of espressol and hanging out right. But
he's obviously an incredibly talented pilot, so I guess he
can add a ton of value, right.
Speaker 4 (16:59):
Viter is just awesome guy. He's a super talented driver
and he's kind of found his you know, he's being
authentic now. I met Viter in two thousand and eight.
He was a young driver without any financial backing, and
he was dominating Junior Series. I remember seeing his first
race in a really competitive feeder series called Former No.
(17:22):
There was forty four starters. He was on pole and
at the end of the race he was leading by
a margin of ten seconds. So outstanding driver then came
into Formula One and unfortunately ended up with the most
successful driver of all times. Louis Hamilton has a teammate
in his peak and vity was a wise world champion
(17:43):
many times. He's won many races, He's been dominant some
of the circuits and also against his teammates. When he
went to Sauba, he you know, he just basically crushed
them all. But then he ended up without a seat
and for us a huge opportunity to take back as
a reserve. I know that if one of our drivers
would have a fish poisoning, have the best guy, we
(18:08):
would have the best guy in the car to actually perform.
So that's positive. And on a different note, he has
kind of found his you know, his his brand. He's
an extremely cool guy. He always was, but he's a Finn.
He was introverted and he's in a way he breaks
(18:28):
free of the Mercedes environment. And you know he has
this mustache and the hair and how do you call
that the mullet, the mullet and he's he's.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
A business in the front party in the back exactly.
In German it's called a focal.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
Language. Like in the front, you know efficient, and in
the rear you're fashionable, stylish, and Vitry is an individual
that can take a mickey out of himself, which is
so important. You need to be able to laugh about himself.
And Vitory has the ambition and the talent to come
back into Formula one and if that doesn't fly, he's
(19:08):
going to make a career in Lamon that you like,
or in Indy cars or whatever, because he's so good.
But on top of that, he's a laugh I mean,
I saw that video and you really really great content.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
You know. That really makes me think about this conversation
we had with Jensen Button this past weekend at Lamar
and Jensen made the comment that Formula one drivers are
very selfish. They're the most selfish drivers in any series
we were talking about, of course NASCAR and endurance racing.
And I'm wondering if you if you agree with that,
(19:41):
and how do you manage these personalities The egos will
be honest that you have to have a pretty good
opinion of yourself to put yourself on the line like that.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
How do you manage that as team principle.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
So there's two things you cannot expect from a one driver,
to be a lion in the car and the puppy outside.
These guys are traumatized little six year olds because they've
been put in a go card as basically toddlers. That's scary.
You know you're being told drive fast. These cards go
(20:19):
one hundred kilometers an hour. It's raining, you have accidents
and you need to rely on yourself. You find out
that you are alone in this go card and you
just need to survive, and only the best to There's
many kids that eventually drop out because of fear, pressure
or running, lack of talent. So if you make it
(20:40):
in formula one, you know that you can only rely
on yourself. It is you need to be selfish. You
need to beat your teammate. So that is a key ingredient.
But and here's the caveat. I believe that the best
ones also have social intelligence, emotional and intelligence, and they
know how to maneuver a padoc. They are career focused
(21:04):
and driven, but they are not selfish because they understand
that in order to be successful and Informula one, you
need to have the good people around you, whether it's
in the team or whether it's in your management, and
you need to look at it from a long term perspective.
The short term optimization will not make you the most
successful driver. And we've seen it in the past that
(21:28):
people missed out on great careers because they were acting
arrogantly or selfish optimizing every single opportunity rather than being
a team player. Louis Hamilton is a fantastic team player
and he's been the most successful of all time. Michael
Schumacher was able to assemble the team around him and
being hugely successful. So you see that with the best
(21:52):
so talent, ambition, but also consciousness that it doesn't all
revolve around yourself. There is other people that are part
of your success. And how I've been managing this from
the first day that I have been in Former one
is that I make no difference between the two drivers
and the rest of the company. And I've been telling
them that there's two and a half thousand superstars in
(22:15):
this team, whether they work in the machine shop and
the cleaning, in aerodynamics or driving the car. I'm not
going to treat you any different than any of the
other people. If you a selfish and you put our
joint success at risk or or you damage our brand,
then I'm gonna be and then I'm going to be
ruthless about it. You have no part in this team.
(22:37):
And that's that philosophy worked because our drivers have understood,
they respected, they care that everybody you know is part
of the success, and they realize that when they crash
into each other. For example, people can't pay their mortgages
because they don't they don't earn their bonus.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
I get it. I get that, and I love the
egalitarian take. But there's obviously an importance having someone as
good as say Lewis Hamilton to help lead the team.
You do what you do, but he also must have
contributed a lot in that sense. Do you miss Lewis?
I mean, I'm sure personally you can still hang out
with him, but do you miss him in that sense?
As such an experienced leader, as such a champion.
Speaker 4 (23:18):
You always have to miss a person like Louis Hamilton.
And as you say, we're still close friends. We have
given our word to each other that we will stay
close friends. We're fighting hard on track with the gloves
off of our because we need to fight for respective
teams and that's the kind of rule we have. But
(23:40):
off track, we spend some time with each other. We
travel with each other, and I don't want to miss
the friend that I've been, that I've that I've that
I've gotten for so many years, the longest ever drive
a team relationship in Formula one twelve years. He's rarely
see that in any other spot. And when it comes
to developing the car, obviously he has a lot of experience.
(24:02):
He seed it all and to replace someone like Louis
Hamilton is always going to be difficult, you know.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
With Lewis, obviously he probably hasn't been finishing as high
up this year as he wanted. But also I've read
plenty of his comments in the press that he is unconcerned.
He is this is a long process, this is a
new team, a new car, and of course anyone would
be foolish to count out a champion like Lewis Hamilton. Ever,
(24:33):
I'm just wondering how you see that now from your
side of the track, so to speak, as he is
learning a new car and a new team and taking
some time to do it.
Speaker 4 (24:46):
I fully agree with that you know, you don't learn
driving that quickly. In twenty twenty one he was great.
Than the regulation changed and it got a little bit
more difficult, but he was still performing on a very
high level. And just by changing teams suddenly you don't
lose your skills. I think everybody needs to have a
period of adoption, different car, different DNA of how how
(25:12):
that vehicle drives, new engineering team that you need to
start to work together then be involved in the continuous
development in the car so it suits your driving style.
It's an all Italian team, you know, he's a British
guy parachuted in there and uh and that takes time. Also,
we have seen a little bit of a pattern that
(25:34):
lewis at the beginning of the season. You know, he
needs to come into to find that mojo, and the
second half of the season has been always very strong.
So don't ever write Louis Hammerton off.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
Can I just point out that Mark Marquez did not
need any time for that. Do you watch one of
the other leagues or sports that you're I know you're
super busy with Formula one so you probably can't. But
Moto GP, Mark Marquez has been so insanely dominant, and
he is old and broken and switched not only to
(26:08):
a different team, but he's working for the Italians who
really don't like him.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
Yeah, I think there is the exceptional athletes that that
clearly outstanding in that category. And he has shown that
switching manufacturers hasn't hasn't affected him. On the contrary, he's
he's great on the on the Ducati as well. I
don't know how many word championships did Mark Marcus win.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
He's got eight now.
Speaker 4 (26:35):
So it's like Lewis, right, yeah, true, and these are
the greats and some adopt easier, some some take a
little bit of time. But I mean Louis Hamilton is
one of the greatest goals of course all time.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Of course, he's up there on that level with a
Rossi as well.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Speaking of Lewis, obviously he was the producer in this
F one film. Toto were how involved were you in
this in the filming? The production? The film's coming out
very soon. I'm actually going to see it tonight in
a press screening.
Speaker 3 (27:09):
Is there a total in this in this movie?
Speaker 4 (27:11):
Yeah? About them? Actually, I mean I'm really I'm really
really proud. Yeah, And he's taken a lot of interest
in the role, so and say how does it work?
He spent some time with me at the race, had
him in the garage listening to the intercom. Exceptional, exceptional
guy also to be so keen and understanding, trying to understand.
(27:32):
And yeah, we've been involved from early on. Obviously Lewis
was the main one guiding the team in in the narrative,
in the storyline, what's realistic, what's not? I can only
take a mini credit in it. I'm an executive producer
and I was told when that's on the screen, that's
pretty good. But other than that, you know, we have
(27:53):
we helped to build the cars. So we built f
two cars that are cars that that are racing in there.
We we pointed bread that racing drivers schools to learn it.
And obviously there were meetings where you know, we were
asked of our opinion is that realistic or not? Is
that what you would do? And so we had a
(28:15):
we had a contribution and that and you know, I've
seen them. I've seen the movie in premiere for the
team principals and drivers in Monte Carlo, and I don't
see a mistake. There's nothing that I would not see
us being uncompletely unrealistic. I mean you have the drivers
Sonny who is a who is who is older than
(28:35):
what you would think, but not much more. All of
all of the the all of the storyline is realistic,
and even for us racing insiders, we couldn't find anything wrong.
Speaker 3 (28:49):
We actually asked Jensen Button over the weekend, like, what
is the difference when you're forty five as opposed to
twenty five? I mean he still has in incredible reflexes, right,
And what makes younger drivers better because they do always
have a few tenths on the guys, even the champions
(29:10):
who are twenty years older.
Speaker 4 (29:13):
I think that the true champions can compensate some of
the sharpness that you lose. I mean cognitively, all of
us becoming elder, you lose some of that. I think,
what your reactions, what your eyes see, motoric capability, that's
(29:34):
something that's getting slower. But you can compensate that by
the better, right amount of training. So that's one thing.
The other is that the courage. You know, young drivers
are sometimes you know, not thinking too much about the
risks of the spot, and the older you get, you
may realize that a little bit more. But again they
(29:57):
are the outstanding ones are keep a bit of compensating
that in you know, different training for example. So you
know Alonso's going to be forty forty yere and he's
still an exceptional driver.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
Yeah, that's incredible.
Speaker 3 (30:12):
We were talking to Matt Brown about him. He could
he could help them.
Speaker 4 (30:16):
Uh, I mean, Zach Brown is in his early fifties
and he he still thinks of himself as being a
great driver.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
He may need to lose a few pounds.
Speaker 4 (30:27):
Yeah, I need to be. Zach is a friend of mine,
so I got to be. I need to be careful.
But as you have said, you know you can get
him in. It's just a matter of how quickly you
can get him out again. But wow, that's really nasty.
But he's a good friend. He's going to take that
with a with a pinch.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
So that did make the point back to the drive
that being an elder driver, you do have more to lose.
Potentially once you get married, you have children, you start
(31:03):
to have more at stake.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
You recognize your mortality.
Speaker 4 (31:08):
You know, I can just tell it from my personal career.
I think I was never afraid of the mortality thing.
You know, nobody will survive anyway. And if you can
say that you had you know, you're doing what you want,
you love what you do, you have a great family,
then there's point is eventually going to come. So there's
not a thing in time in a car that I
thought about mortality. But you start, you kind of start
(31:34):
looking at things that you haven't in the past, you know,
with me, particularly in in rallying, suddenly I saw trees
that I have never seen before that I would have
not looked at before or under in the Rasky. You know,
when it's when it's raining and there's aqua planning, you
think about lifting as a twenty five year olds, I
(31:56):
would have never thought about lifting over acua planning. It
is what it is, you know, So that changes. But
it's not being scared. It's just that I hear you
realize I hear you.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
I don't know if you saw this news, but Caring
is naming Luca DeMeo from Renault it's next chief executive officer.
And you are very fashionable, very stylish in an elegant way.
What do you think about this potential to if you're
a great leader in automotive or in racing, that you
could do something and also in luxury or fashion, you know,
(32:28):
I mean this kind of shift. Have you thought about that?
Speaker 4 (32:31):
So, first of all, Luca is a star for me,
and I've texted with him this morning and congratulated him
and said, it's a shame. You know, we've worked in
Formula one together. I'l beIN he's gonna have say this
engine next year, next year, but he's not around and
he was fundamental in making that happen. So I really
really rate him as a manager. And I think when
(32:55):
you have an understanding for an organization and he's not
under an no around, I mean massively. Yes, he was
great at Sayad, he was exceptional at Volkswagen before. If
you have an understanding for an organization, if you are
able to motivate people, if you have empathy, but at
the same time you create the right amount of pressure,
(33:15):
you can succeed in any industry in my opinion. And
I mean, I think for caring is a coup to
have someone like look at me as a CEO.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
It's just cool, that is. I mean from engineering to
fashion there's a huge difference, right, one of them is mathematical,
methodical and the other one is just an innate sense
that you have.
Speaker 4 (33:38):
But as a car guy, you also have a sense
of you need to have a sense of esthetics. Cars
need to look good. People look you know cars Always
people say I'm buying a car because it's you know,
it doesn't burn a lot of fuel, or it's it's
you know, it looks good, has a lot of power.
But all these things are just disguising the real reason
(34:02):
we're buying car. Buying a car is an emotional act.
It's how I want to be perceived, not how I am,
but how I want to be perceived. And a proper
car guy and I see that we're all a Calanius
who runs Mercedes, they understand that very well. What is
it the customer wants to have? What's the aesthetics of
the car of the future. It's not about what you
(34:24):
like today, it's about what this is going to be
in three years. And I remember having been shown around
the next generation of Mercedes is a few years ago
by all a Calanius and Gordon Vagano is the chief
design of Mercedes, and he said, so he's shown Louis
and I around. He said, how do you like the
cars that are coming in three years? And we said, well,
we don't like them. He said, I'm glad that you
say that, because if you would like the cars in
three years, I know it would have done it wrong
(34:44):
because you will like them in three years.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
But not now.
Speaker 4 (34:47):
So sense of aesthetics, Look, Luka's going to do just fine.
He is designed been part of designing great cars. He's
going to be part of designing great Cuci clothes, finding
the right story, finding the right people that are kind
of designed the closes.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
Okay, So what for you is the most beautiful car
ever made?
Speaker 4 (35:10):
WHOA? I would say spontaneously the three hundred s L call.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
I mean, you're not wrong, but it just since you
work for Mercedes, it's but.
Speaker 4 (35:22):
It is the car. I mean it could you could
You could also say, you know, to fifty gto ferraris
a spectacular car. But looking at the way that non
Mercedes head, I think the most amazing car is also
the one that was the most expensive car of a
SOULD is the unhaut could Pey, you know, the pre
three hundred s L. You look at that car and
(35:43):
it's just the beauty in itself with the technology that
was unseen in those early years. And then the three
hundred was the development of the road car, which then
became a race car. But these are just the best
cars in the world.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
I mean, Hannah's written about that car extensively.
Speaker 4 (35:58):
I was there, you there when it was sold. I mean, congratulations.
I think this was an event that does a car person.
You can be proud that you've been part of it.
But also, you know, I'm driving the three hundred is
LS and it's a fifty to fifty six car, nineteen
fifty six car, and that thing drives two undred fifty
kilometers an hour. It breaks like a modern kite even
(36:21):
with the old tires. You know, you can you can
swish around the corner and you can see how far
advanced Mercedes was in terms of the developing high performance
cars back in the day and again or in hardcopy,
it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
I would also like to have a three hundred sl.
How much time do you have to hang out with
cars to enjoy, you know, the aesthetics of or the smell,
the vibrations, like the good old stuff, since you're so
busy at work with the new stuff.
Speaker 4 (36:50):
Not enough, unfortunately, But I you know, I'm so lucky.
We I have Mercedes company cars and I get driven
around with Mercedeses to and from the races. That's really great.
And I appreciate that I was giving a company car
in the UK new s class S sixty three, and
(37:10):
I wrote and I wrote an email to the head
of Mercedes Spence you Can. I said, I'm so thankful
and grateful that you're giving me a company car like
the S sixty three because seeing it, stepping into the car,
driving it or being driven is just pure joy. And
in the same way driving some of the some of
the vintage cars around, it's it's you know, I need
(37:34):
to pinch myself sometimes being able to have this Mercedes cars.
Speaker 2 (37:40):
I want to ask a little bit about motorsport in general.
Matt and I are all hyped up on Lamont because
we were just there. Would Mercedes ever run a factory
team at Lamont?
Speaker 1 (37:53):
Would you join join?
Speaker 2 (37:55):
And obviously there's so much branding potential for you.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
Where do you see motorsports?
Speaker 3 (38:00):
We're told us a bargain total thirty forty million for
the season. What a bargain.
Speaker 4 (38:03):
It's a bargain, yeah, uh define bargain. No, But I'm
you know what I'm I'm looking at it. Lamar. I'm
a racer. Lamar twenty four hours is one of the
greatest races in the in the world Formula one. For me,
obviously my bias is the best there is. It's the
(38:25):
best driver's quick as cars, the greatest tracks, and then
there is a long time nothing. But if I would say,
what's next Lamar twenty four hours and if I found it,
and that is really one for insiders in the notch life,
the new book in twenty four hours. That for me
(38:48):
is you know, the top of the top. And when
I'm not having a Formula One weekend, I can watch
Lamar race pretty much through the night. You know, I'm
following the live feed and some of the drivers have
a personal interest. And as Mercedes, it's something that we
did in the past. We aren't particularly you know, that
(39:10):
wasn't our happiest place. We had a very bad accident
in the fifties when we when we exited and and
then some of our prototypes have been flying taking off
in the nineties and early two thousands. I think it
was in the nine nineteen nineties. But what it is
for me today is we are concentrating on you know,
(39:30):
the main platform and that is Formula one. It's what
we want to do. Right. This captures ninety nine percent
of the audiences and and everything else is you know,
comes second. Now we have entered with Mercedes in it,
with the GD three car. That's something which we are
looking at. That is our customer program.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Speaking of aesthetics, I think it was probably the best
one in the g T three s.
Speaker 4 (39:54):
Yeah, it looks really great. Yes, and then there is
the little you know, caveat all the Collanius and of Mercedes.
We are raising people and we don't like bops. We
don't like balance of performance. We don't like somebody assessing
your power, your energy consumption, you wait, your driver's skill.
Speaker 2 (40:16):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (40:16):
And then you know I'm being harsh.
Speaker 3 (40:19):
Now it's you that won't survive. I think you're right.
I don't think that's going to survive after this. It's
just not fair.
Speaker 4 (40:26):
Yeah, you know, you spend so much time and money
and effort in developing the quickest car and then you're
being put in kilograms of balanced into this car. And
I don't want to be I just want to, you know,
build the quickest car, and Formula one has shown how
it goes. Give us a cost cap. You know, dou
lamt give everybody a cost cap. You cannot spend more
(40:46):
than achs whatever you said thirty forty million, and we
didn't this thirty forty million, that is what. Then you
can do what you want. I mean, still there's regulations,
but nobody needs to bleff in pre season racing or
in qualifying. But it's war, it's you know, gloves of
PA racing. If that was to happen Lemar, absolutely would
(41:08):
you know, it would be something that we would be
looking at. But at the moment, BPE having some officials
judge whether whether you're quick or too quick putting ten
kilograms in your car taking it out from someone else
the next day, not for us at the moment.
Speaker 3 (41:23):
Hey man, it's been really great spending some time with you.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (41:26):
Thank you, and I really enjoyed it. And you know,
it's good to have a chat with the two of
you so enthusiastic about cars. Having been in Lemont. There
won't there wouldn't be many Americans. I guess that you
would have found in Lemont this weekend. So great that
you have been.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
There more with Cadillac more right, So.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
Yeah, true, true, I mean, we love it.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
And I know you won't remember, but we last spoke
in Las Vegas at the F one Race in Vegas,
and I always very much appreciate you taking the time
for Bloomberg, So thank you, very pleasure for me all.
Speaker 3 (41:59):
That's how we have for this. We'll be back the
same time, same place next week. Thanks so much for
joining us. I'm Matt Miller, I'm
Speaker 1 (42:04):
Anna Elliott, and this is Bloomberg.
Hosts And Creators
Hannah Elliott
Matt Miller
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