August 2, 2022 • 38 mins
Wow, we're now comfortably in the midfield of the F1 grid! On today's episode, Lily and Michael dive into the confusing, inconsistent, and sometimes scandal-ridden history of Alpine, otherwise known until rather recently as Renault. You'll get to hear all about a second -gate called Crashgate and meet two very intriguing (and different!) drivers in the legendary Fernando Alonso and the scrappy Esteban Ocon.
--Production Note -- This episode was recorded prior to the August 1, 2022 news that Fernando Alonso is moving to the Aston Martin team for the 2023 season. Everything in the episode is still pretty relevant and super fun, but we'll talk more about that announcement when we discuss Aston Martin in a few weeks! (WHEW.)
Special thanks to our guests: Josh Revell.
This episode was produced by Lily Herman and Senior Producer Yochai Maital. Sound Design by Yochai Maital. Mastering by Sela Waisblum. Recording at The Cutting Room Studios by Rob O'Leary II. At SI Studios, Max Miller is Executive Producer and Brannan Goetschius is Head of Audio. At iHeartRadio, Sean Titone is Executive Producer.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everyone, it's Lily and you are hearing me from
my far inferior home recording setup. The reason for that
is because Fernando Alonso conveniently decided to announce twenty four
hours before this episode was slated to drop that he
is moving to the Aston Martin Formula One team at
the start of the season. Luckily, for us and for you,
(00:24):
a lot of the information in this episode is still
super relevant. It is also very fun, if I do
say so myself. So we'll talk more about Fernando's move
when we discuss Aston Martin in a few weeks. So
stay tuned, roll the tape. We're good to go. Okay,
So Michael, yes, congratulations, we have reached the midfield. Yes
(00:49):
we have. We have gone from best of the rest
status to true like mid territory. And I mean that
in the way like gen z TikTok er say, like
mid we are deafin like right, their average in the middle.
And to celebrate that, we're talking about a French team.
I and I own no alpine merch to speak of.
(01:10):
I brought you a croissant. Yes, yes, I'll eat it.
It's close to the microphone and it's it's probably a
little hard at this point. There we go from this
wonderful bakery. Thank you, really, that's very kind of you
here god mm hmmm mm hmmmm. They do know how
(01:33):
to bake ship the French, you know, even though I
think this bakery is just an American owned bakery that
don't don't from my Heart Radio and Sports Illustrated studios.
This is choosing sides. Yes one. Wow. So we're in
(02:01):
the midfield. The team we're talking about today has been
around the block for a while. They're very chaotic. They've
been on the grid. They've been off the grid. They
sold the team that they rebought the team. They are
also involved with a massive f one scandal. Today's team
is it's not Alpine. Nope, no Alpine, No Alpine. Alpine.
(02:24):
Wait to say alpine, and it looks like it's spelled
like Alpine, but no, we are the French Alpine. We're
gonna make it complicated exactly, and then we're going to
be really obnoxious when anyone mispronounces it. So Alpine, I
will say, off the bat. Alpine is a pain in
the asked to me personally, because it took forever to
research all of the name changing and the team buying
(02:47):
and all of this stuff. So they get points out
of off of my personal book just for that in
the amount of research this took. But I will let
the record show I'm not saying it should affect your
ranking well, but it does. They make it easy to
say Ferrari or Mercedes. These are these brands that are
so iconic. So you are making a point that as
(03:09):
a new fan coming into the sport, maybe all the
new fans are going to find these teams that are
already baked with a lot of money because it's just
easier to be fans exactly. And also, I mean you
have to explain O l Pen formerly Reno as of
you know, until it's it's a little bit confusing exactly.
So in it requires we're reaching like intermediate level knowledge here.
(03:30):
You need to have a little bit of context. Okay.
So Reno entered Formula one all the way back in
seven as a constructor, right, so they were infected team
on the Grid. They also then began supplying their engines
to other teams in three. There's about a seven year
period there. But then Reynault leaves F one two years later.
(03:53):
In to make this confusing, they still supply engines to
other teams for another year. I'm already three years after this,
they start supplying engines yet again. Then they say, we're
going to buy a team again. Isn't that great? So
they buy this iconic team called Benetta two thousand two,
in case you're keeping track of all the dates, they
(04:14):
rebrand it as rent two thousand five and two thousand six.
Reno wins both the Driver's Championship and the Constructor's Championship.
Both times. It's with a driver named Fernando Alonso are
old foe from the McLaren episode Our Petti as bitch
from McLaren. We'll get to Fernando and kind of what
(04:36):
he his whole energy is. In a second, you think
that's the end of it, that they're in forever. They
are not. They sell their shares in the company, but
continue to supply engines to other teams, including Red Bull,
who uses Reno engines to win their four championships. In
the Rena team becomes a very unsuccessful team called Lotus
for a couple of years, Lotus Lotus. It was like
(04:58):
a whole disaster. So then finally in Reno buy shares
in the team again, they rebranded to Rento, again, again,
back to Rento, and then, as if this wasn't already
enough of a journey, they rebranded as Alpine, which is
borderline did and produces only one car. This is Josh
Rebel n F one YouTuber, and all of a sudden
(05:19):
their brand is plasted all over the Reno motoriciple program.
It's like, okay, that've either got plans that we don't
know about. Well, this is just inherently French or some
mixture of both. I've already lost. I mean, I'm my
heads in circles. We're not going to do this again.
I you don't have to. It's not gonna be a
pop quiz. But all you need to know if they
were Reno up until the beginning of one, they are
(05:40):
now Alpine. Those are the two main things you have
to know. I know it Rena to Alpine. Okay, okay,
So why obviously you're wondering, probably why rebrand? Is it money? No? Actually,
the company claims that they want to use this spot
on the grid right because F one at the end
of the day, seen by a billion people a year.
They want to market lesser known Alpine brand within Renault.
(06:02):
The company. I mean, I don't even know. If I've
ever seen a Renault car, I would have known that
Renault was a car brand. But it's not good when
you've got to spend two minutes describing what the ship
something is. Definitely think it's a more European oriented brand. Yeah,
as usual. I don't think the French care about Americans
or think too highly as us, and that's fair. They
(06:23):
can do what they want exactly and we can do
what we want us. I was gonna say, you know,
it seems to working out for them, but I don't
know if it is, considering how many times they're in
and out of this sport and doing whatever they're doing. So,
speaking of mess so, as I have teased for quite
some time, they are involved in another massive scandal, another gate.
(06:45):
We've got another gate, and this came later than the
first gate by Gates, so you know it's serious and
they have to then attack on the gate a year later.
So we are talking today about crash Gate. Rash Gate. Yes,
imagine if there was ever a controversy with a gate,
like a literal gate gate Gate, Okay, crash Gate. So
(07:10):
the year is two thousand eight. We are in the
midst of a giant global recession thanks to American junk
home bonds, exactly the year that the first Twilight movie
came out. Oh yeah, that's what I was going to say. Yes, exactly,
we're you Team Edward or Team Jacob. I don't know
how those people are. Okay, that's great, that's totally fine.
I was team Belieds a personality. But anyway, this is
(07:32):
thus eight. In September of two thousand eight, the Singapore
Grand Prix is taking place. And the big deal about
this particular Grand Prix in that particular year is it's
the first night race in the Formula One history. Yes,
there's a lot of build up to this race to
begin with. So at the time Reno Reno has two drivers,
Fernando Alonso and Nelson p k Jr. Unfortunately, Nelson p
(07:55):
k Jr. It's not a very good F one driver,
but he is in F one driving Reno with this
you know, two time world champion, Fernando Alonso, he's out
for blood, he really wants the w I'll start with
what happens, then we'll go backwards into detail. So basically,
Nelson p k Jr. Crashes during the race and because
he crashes, his teammate Fernando Alonso inadvertently ends up having
(08:19):
an advantage and ends up winning the race. That's like
the long and short of it. At the time, Nelson
p k Jr. Said, Oh, yeah, I just I crashed.
It was a simple mistake. It happens. Some people were
really skeptical and very much were raising eyebrows, but a
lot of people were also like, you know what, racing
incidents happened. Sometimes you just get a little bit of
luck in the sport that that's part of f one, right,
is the unpredictability, the fact that anything could happen, and
(08:41):
the idea that a driver would do something like crash
a car to advantage the team just sounded absurd, right,
That's millions of dollars, that's a driver's life on the line.
You just can't fat them something like that happening. So
we skip ahead ten months to July of two thousand nine.
Reno announces that they are dropping Nelson P. K Jr.
(09:02):
From the team for for low not good performance basically,
and he's upset and understandably he does not really have
any loyalty to this team at this point because they
have dropped him. Yeah, and they've been pretty not great
about him in the media, like he wasn't good. You know,
he's a little humiliated as and again comes from a
big racing family. It's just it's just kind of a sad,
(09:25):
depressing state. So he decides it is time to let
her rip and open his mouth. Now, Senior PK was
recently sacked by Renno, and he's now claimed that he
was asked to deliberately crash at a Singapore Grand Prix
last year, which of course helped Fernando to eventually win
the race. Here we go, So here's a more technical
look at what happens during the two thousand eight Singapore
Grand Prix. Fernando Alonso, you know Reno teammate, who's who's
(09:48):
kind of the golden boy, the star of that team.
He actually had been doing well in practice sessions earlier.
There's a lot of excitement. Qualifying happens, and for a
variety of reasons, Fernando ends up qualifying in p. Fifteen,
so he is nowhere near the top. Things didn't go
according to planning. The car broke down and he's somewhat
down the grid and a seen him so devastated. It's
almost impossible to win from there. You're you're just fighting
(10:09):
to get like a point or two right. Typically when
you're in something like P fifteen and Nelson p k Jr.
Is next to him at P sixteen, Yeah, Renault, it's
really not not doing well. So according to Nelson p
k Jr. This is where everything gets very sketchy. So
if you're starting in the back, you've got less to lose, right,
(10:31):
you're not in the points. You might take a riskier
or a more a weirder, a more unconventional strategy to
try and elevate yourself in the standings, for instance, having
a lighter fuel load and pitting earlier, you know, changing
tires up sooner, you know, any number of strategies. What
they come up with is that Fernando pits incredibly early
at lap twelve. So he's the first driver to go
(10:52):
in and pit in. The hope is hey, you know,
everyone's thinking, oh, he's going to get you know, newer,
fresher tires and maybe the ideas he's going to go
on and be able to kind of how to pulled himself,
you know, ahead of teams and drivers and cars that
are maybe slower and on top of that are on
older tires. Right, it makes sense it gets back on
and very quickly within three laps. So lap fourteen of
this race, Nelson p K Jr. Crashes at turn seventeen.
(11:20):
You can see the cogs turning with this one. And
on top of that that is likely I would have
thought to bring out a safety car is it's off
the line. The safety car comes out to slow the
drivers down. It's a physical car that is driving. They
have to hold back, they're not allowed to pass. And uh,
on top of that, it's a difficult place to recover cover.
There is not a crane nearby. This turn too quickly
(11:42):
pull the car out, so they have to get a
crane over there. They obviously have to collect debris all
these little pieces of carbon fiber and these parts are
all over the track. So these cars are obviously slowly
going around and around. And as we talked about, what
starts to happen with safety cars is because obviously everyone's
driving at the same speed, the cars begin to bunch up.
So if you were leading by, you know ten seconds,
(12:02):
you now have to slow down. You can't pass anyone,
but no one can pass you and then on top
of that, the regulations at the time stated that the
pit lane was closed if a safety car was out
until all of the cars were bunched up. So everyone
finally gets bunched up before anyone can pit, and obviously
Fernando Alonso now has already pitted. He's on the freshest tires,
(12:23):
and so based on that, basically Fernando ends up towards
the front. And because of the pit strategy and other
people having to pit at different times and the chaos
around any safety car, you know, it throws everyone's strategies
for a loop. Anybody who is chew a pit stuff,
he's gonna be really sweating. They're gonna have to come
in and take a penalty. Fernando ends up winning from p.
(12:43):
Fifteen in this race. And obviously, now that we know that,
there's always a little weird coincidences that seem to go on. Yeah,
you're kind of on your head. I'm shaking my head
back and forth because I'm not I'm not so sure
this was such a giant advantage, but okay, I'm still listening. Yes,
So basically though, what happened, So Nelson P. K Junior
(13:04):
is Brazilian so Brazilian media starts reporting shortly after Nelson
p K Jr. Is kind of saying, hey, something actually
happened here. You know, he's going to the f i
A and and kind of talking to them and making
some noise. Yeah, it breaks publicly within the month that
he is alleging that the two heads of Reno told
(13:24):
him to crash to give Fernando Alonso this advantage to
help his race on lap fourteen lap on lap fourteen,
after Fernando had already pitted, which you know they could
easily tell me is Nelson p K Junior, Hey your
teammate pitted, you know that that sort of thing. Uh.
So shortly thereafter we're still in the same like two
month period after Nelson p K Junior comes forward with
(13:46):
the allegations, So we're not just like eight months after
the incident exactly. We're almost a year after the incident.
So now we're actually a year later, September two nine.
At this point, the f i A, the governing Bartie body,
charges Reno with interfering in a two thousand eight Singapore
gram pri and conspiring with p K to deliberately crash
his car and put Alonso at an advantage under the
(14:08):
safety car rules. The two guys who are heading up
reddo at the time. This is the most like villain
in a Godfather movie name Flavio Briatore. He's the executive
director of the team. And then you have executive director
of engineering Pat Simmons. Less climactic. So you've got Flavio
and Pat are said to have told Nelson to do
this according to Nelson Pique. And of course, meanwhile Fernando
(14:32):
claimsy had no idea that any of this was going on.
He cannot fathom the team ever doing something like that
to him, gasp. So this is all going on, there's
like the Renault team starts threatening legal action against Nelson
p K Jr. And myself. We put a criminal plans
to in the High Court of Paris for black mail. Again,
(14:52):
everything is still building, building building, and they finally have
this hearing. At this hearing, an anonymous and mysterious Rehno
employee who's no and his witness X we still know
who they are comes forward and says they were at
the alleged pre race meeting where this plan was concocted.
Shortly after like this hearing and this witness and whatever.
Reynauld says they're not going to contest the charges from
(15:12):
the f i A and Bria, Tory and Simmons they
leave the team very quickly. So Renaud claims, look, we're
already cleaning house, We're already trying to do the right thing.
And basically what they get handed down is not a
one hundred million dollar fine or anything close to it.
F one's governing buddy f i A gave rey No
only a two year suspended ban, which means between now
and if Reynauld misbehaves again, it will be taken out
(15:36):
of the race. Entiality they can raise for those two years. Yeah,
but they're like, don't do anything sketchy again during that time.
It's like, yeah, a minor slap on the wrist. Uh.
And then on top of that, they banned Flavio indefinitely
and Pat our Darling. Pat was banned for five years
from f i A sanction events Why the difference? And yes,
(15:59):
so Pat, at a certain point when all of this
ship was going on, he eventually confesses to knowing the
plan and they did it, and you know whatever, he
saves his own ass. So they say, well, Patt at
Lease came forward again with this whole like honesty thing
or like he was honest with us eventually kind of
uh And to this day, Labio Briatore does not you know,
he's still he's still proclaiming his innocence at the time,
(16:22):
and to this day, that initial de facto lifetime ban
for uh briotry is considered the harshest in all of
motorsports history. And eventually they reduced the bands and and
all of this stuff, so eventually they're just it's kind
of said, hey, you guys can't work for a you know,
an f I a sponsored event or at an event
to like eleven, it's like really significantly reduced. So basically,
(16:44):
to to summarize this whole thing, the leaders of the
team asked, they're not as good driver to crash and
sacrifice his race to help the other one win. Yeah,
which puts that driver risk right on top of that
he could have died, right, I mean, you can't just
like correct, you gotta make it look like a real crash. Yeah,
he can't just kind of go two miles an hour
and kind of barely touched the wall. He if you
(17:04):
look at photos, he's straight up crash side barrier. It
looks bad. Yeah, I mean that's just really dangerous. Yeah yeah, yeah,
I don't think it means anything. I think we now
go on. We have problems from time to time. As
long as we solve them and deal with them properly,
that's fine. And I will say there was very different opinions.
So you had a former F one world champion and
team owner named Jackie Stewart said that that there's something
(17:26):
fundamentally rotten and wrong at the heart of Formula one.
You know, the sport has never been in such a
mood of self destruction. Millions of fans are amazed, if
not disgusted, at a sport that goes from crisis to
crisis with everyone blaming everyone else. And keep in mind
this was also only you know, one to two years
after this whole spygate thing, right. And then on the
(17:46):
other hand, you had another former driver named Eddie Irvine
who basically said the whole situation was overblown. He's like,
it's probably slightly on the wrong side of the cheating thing,
but in past days, every team has done whatever they
could to win. Cheat been the les, break the rules,
sabotage opponents. This is just the f a going on
a crusade, and the truth is somewhere in between both
(18:07):
of those. So just to quickly summarize where Alpines at. Now, Yeah,
they've been generally midfield for a while, some years better
than others. They finished P five, so smack dab in
(18:29):
the middle of the championship, and generally there are some
weeks where they're car seem like they're going to be great,
and then they kind of fail. They're a little bit
all over the map. However, the drivers give us a
lot more insight as to what's going on in the
team than me just explaining this very convoluted team. So
we'll get into them right after an ad break. All right,
(18:54):
So we are back and we're talking about Alpines. Two drivers. Yeah,
who I want to know would two drivers are? Because
you've called a mid a lot of times and as
a driver, you don't want to be described as mid
and much like Lando didn't like me describing him as
slow and steady. But who are these Alpine drivers? Well,
(19:15):
we've got to talk about the man of the hour.
For the first driver we got, Fernando, he is back
to read the guy who snitched on his own team.
Stitch on his own team, different team, I will say,
and then claim to have no knowledge of the other
major scandal he was involved in. Uh yeah, at Reno.
(19:38):
To keep in mind too, he did win his two
world titles with Reno back in the mid two thousand's.
He is his start and F one was all the
way back in two thousand one. See sorry, we talked
about Fernando Worlds. So Fernando has been around for a while.
He has taken breaks from the sports. So he left.
(20:00):
For instance, he went back to McLaren in the late
tens before Lando came in, and he was having such
a miserable time that he left and tried to do
some other endurance racing and IndyCar. At one point he's
he's tried other stuff in between his many stints in
Formula one. You see the oldest driver on the grid.
He is currently the oldest driver by yeah, at least
(20:21):
at least three or four years. So picture him listening
to like AM radio while he drives, you know, because
he's old, and he puts his hands up on the
thing and it goes real slow, puts his golf clubs
in the trunk. Okay, stop, if anyone is the most
contentious driver on the grid. He's definitely in the running
for it because he's been around for forever. He's got
(20:42):
people who love him who are die hard Fernando Alonso fans,
he has got people who despise him the exactly like,
why are you still here? All of that stuff. It's
impressive the longevity his career. D Yeah, So okay, I
have some photos of Fernando alright, Fernando Alonzo. So this
(21:04):
guy looks a little shady. He also looks very intense
because that bottom right foot of him, like yelling, is
from when he won one of his world championships. So
he it's like you can just see the emotion. Yeah,
in that in that pose, it's just like arms up
like a lion roar. Basically, yeah, is this a win
at all costs? Guy? He has a win at all
(21:26):
cost guy? So okay, So I feel like we're saying
we're kind of like Fernando. It's the vibe. It's possible.
Why is he still around? I mean, is he is
there something I'm missing here? First of all, you know
that the one reason or one of the big reasons
a lot of teams keep older drivers around is They
come with a lot of experience. They know how to
talk about cars, they know how to really explain how
(21:46):
they're feeling in a car, what's not working, and also
obviously has built up the you know, the intuition. You know,
he knows, he's seen every scenario at this point, he
knows what to do. I get out of this place
is good. We're looking at the plan A plus aid
Plan A plus. Fernando is a great all around driver.
(22:07):
He's obviously very very aggressive, but what he is known for,
he's probably the best defender on the grid. Drivers live
in fear of having to be told by their teams
to pass Fernando Alonso iconically. In one there is a race,
the Hungarian Grand Prix, and there was a massive rain
storm and literally the start so we don't even get
through the first turn of the race. The cars end
(22:28):
up taking each other out like bowling pins after a
Ferrari and the Santa macarn it's literally whoever ends up
bypassing this situation kind of ends up in the front.
So you've got a wacky, wacky, wacky series of drivers.
So you have actually Fernando Alonzo's teammate, who will talk
about in a second, Espano con ends up in the
first place position, spans in the lead. Fernando's a little
(22:52):
bit back behind him. He's in like P. Three. But
coming up behind Fernando is Lewis Hamilton's and the Mercedes
is just booking it. So they basically they're like, Fernando,
we need you to hold off Louis Hamilton's, who's in
a far superior car for as long as you possibly can,
so that st Bond can win the damn race. Somehow
(23:13):
is keeping Hamilton? This is incredible. You can just see
and hear and feel the frustration for Louis Hamilton's, you know,
former teammate. These two people do not like each other. Yes,
Louis Hamilton's on the radio is just exasperated you saved
over me. Man, Come on, come on man, Like that
had to be illegal. They're like, no, Fernando is just
(23:34):
out defending like your offense. What a brilliant defensive drive
he's doing today, isn't it amazing? So you can block? Yeah,
the rules around making sure you aren't like for doing
all on Michael Schumacher, like just smashing into someone. But yeah,
like like Fernando's doing everything by the book, He's just
that good and every turn you just see Louis goes.
But then Fernando will like block him just enough legally
(23:57):
to keep him from passing. Almost ended up in contacts,
and essentially Fernando Alonso in a not as fast whatsoever
Alpine holds off Lewis's Mercedes for ten laps, which enables
Estebond to win this race. So something to keep in
(24:19):
mind too is that defending actually can harm your own race.
So for instance, if you just let someone like Louis through,
you save your tires, they're not going to get worn
down as quickly saving fuel, you know, You're just you're
just being in more of a conservation effort, which is
why you do see often if you know a car
sees a much faster car coming up on them, they'll
just let them pass. I mean, they won't completely lie
(24:41):
down and play dead, but they're like, what's the point
of me fighting this faster car. So it really was
I don't want to say selfless, but it was very
helpful of Alonso to say, you know what, I'm gonna
fight this guy. I'm gonna really go after this defense.
I want to funk with Louis. You know, I want
to help my teammate. Whatever was going through his mind,
it shouldn't be understated that it was in fact, you know,
to the detriment somewhat to to Fernando's race. He was
(25:03):
sacrificing his race, either for the betterment of his team
or to funk with his old teammate or both. Yeah,
he's a man of multip my therapist tells me all
the time. Both things could be true. Yeah, definitely a
guy who you want on your team for sure when
you need a defender or someone to kind of be
on your side, Like he's the guy you want to
(25:24):
to to just go after it. Not bad for an
old guy, Fernande, Yes, still, but yeah, I will say
there are people who are like ready for him to
get out of there. Like I said, he's turning forty
one this summer. I mean that is a remarkable feat.
You know, we talked about Lando at McLaren, who's twenty two.
(25:45):
This guy's forty one. I mean that is just so
much experience. Yeah, so it's obviously very good at f one.
He just might not be great at some of the
uh you know, finer points of off track etiquette. Yeah,
there is something to be said, for someone that is
still at world class level at that age, that's pretty remarkable.
Yeah uh yeah. I mean the other big argument against him,
(26:07):
I would say, is that, you know, every time you
have a driver like that who's there for a long
time and maybe maybe overstaying their welcome, they keep other
younger drivers in talent out. They've got some junior drivers.
We're hearing from Josh Revel again, do you have one
everything in the junior Fumula ranks who are looking at
the no vacancies and thinking, okay, great, when are we
(26:27):
getting into Formula one? Oh? And not? Why not? Because
we signed a mercurial French driver and an aging Spaniards
and we think, yep, that's what we need for our
Drava lineup in Formula two. So as you know, the
junior category right below Formula one. The driver who won
that Oscar Piastre. He he is just like a baby
faced cherub. He is like adorable, you know, he's like
(26:49):
nineteen twenty. There's a lot of hype around Oscar Oscars
in Alpines Young Driver's development program, and they basically have
no where to promote him because they're keeping someone like Fernando,
who's much older and definitely at the end of his career.
We don't need no junior formula. My stray will be
fine with what we've got right now, which is why
we're exactly bang average and Formula one. So besides Fernando,
(27:11):
who's in the other car that is, in fact Esteban,
oh Cod the other the other guy. I feel like
I've talked about Fernando in several episodes and now it's like,
oh yeah, and Esteban's there. So Estebon is more of
an enigma on the grid than the average driver. He's
interesting and that it's very well known that he does
not come from money, and the big story that's told
(27:33):
about him is that his dad's actually mechanic and when
he was growing up, they saw that he had affinity
for carding, so they actually sold their family home lived
out of an RV so they could drive around to
carting competitions with him, and his dad did all the
work on Esteban's cart, Yeah, to save money and because
he obviously knew what to do. So it really was
this family affair. They're very close and very tighten it.
(27:56):
So I guess if you have like slight eat the
rich vibe in a sport that everyone's rich. Uh, he
could potentially be one of your guys, um, but yeah, so,
Esteban definitely is known for being a little bit scrappier,
being a little bit elbows out than than the average
driver because he wants it so badly and obviously a
lot of sacrifices were made to get him to this point.
(28:16):
You know, it doesn't get I think, much grittier than like,
we literally sold our home to fund your career. Dad's
the mechanic. Yeah, that's a mechanic. He definitely has had
a much more chaotic career in terms of it very talented,
has won things in the junior categories and whatnot, but
definitely bounced around in the sense that he's never really
been a team's number one driver, even at Alpine. It's
(28:40):
kind of a weird dynamic with the Fernando right because
Estebon is seen as like the future of the team
and also Alpinea French company loves having a French driver
and Esteban that's a that's a huge boon for any team.
But Fernando Alonso is Fernando Alonso. So even if you
are kind of considered the future and the the big
talent going forward. It's hard to you know, not feel
(29:01):
overshadowed by such an icon and legend of the sport.
He is Fernando Alonso for a reason. Another interesting thing
to note is Estebon is managed by Total Wolf at Mercedes. Yeah,
as we know, it's it's a very fun ethical minefield
over in F one. So I have to be like, Okay,
maybe there is more to Estebon than what we're seeing.
(29:21):
We gotta do a quick break and then we'll be back.
So I guess when it comes to Alpine in terms
of pitching the team, I mean, it's kind of a
weird one. What is the grand plans? I'm not entirely
sure because they say, you know, we're looking to win
in Formula one, Josh Revel again, Okay, when in Formula
(29:42):
one with your current package, good luck. You've got about
nine other teams that have the exact same freaking goal.
What stands them out amongst the others kind of hopes
and dreams and arguably living into that and in six
they are a bit of an enigma for sure. As
(30:03):
of the middle of the two season, things have been
a little rocky at times for Alpine, but they are
still in the hunt for best of the rest status.
They're very comfortably at the top of the midfield, and
both their drivers, Fernando and Esteban, have had relatively good seasons. Um.
Fernando unfortunately has had some bad luck with you know,
(30:25):
an engine not starting here or there. Esteban has quietly
done pretty darn well all things considered. So again I
feel I feel bad saying it, but Alpine is doing
very mid But I actually kind of mean that in
a good way. They're under the radar. They're a little
bit quiet, but we could see some really interesting stuff
in the back half of two if they keep at
(30:46):
it and other teams kind of fall off. I wish
I had a more like exciting pitch for you for Alpine,
but there are some people who really love Alpine. I
like their colors. I like their name. It sounds like eeek,
you know, top of the mountain h And I liked
(31:07):
that this guy is forty one years old, you know,
fun the young guys, they'll get their shot, but he's
holding on. He's a grizzly old veteran grinding it out.
And uh, I certainly liked that he played such a
good defense against Louis Hamilton. That's that's that's a fun story.
But no, they're not jumping off the page. For me,
French hurts. It hurts being French, but that's not even
(31:29):
their fault. It's hard to really devote your energy to
it thinking in two years they're gonna be making engines.
In three years quit and then to five years come back,
and yeah, I would love another, not another I would
say crash Gate. I would love another scandal involving LPN.
They need something to put them back on the map
because it's been a while since crash Gate. It's been
a decade and a half. We need something new. And
(31:49):
then when we come to the driver's here, Yeah Fernando,
I mean and YOHI actually said this, but I think
it's true. Is that Fernando, despite being in the sport
for two decades, basically he still drives like a rookies
who's got something to prove, right, Like he drives lights out,
like every race could be his last. I mean at
this point he is getting older, so the end could
(32:10):
come is going to come sooner rather than later for him.
That's a tremendous quality in a competitor because he's got money,
so he doesn't necessarily need to do this, but he
obviously every race he's going to try to win. That's unbelievable. Yeah,
and I mean great defender, just a fun guy to watch.
So if you're someone who likes you know, I want
to a I want to follow great racers, right like Fernando, Well,
(32:31):
you know, he doesn't have the chance always, but if
he gets it, he will put on the show. Like
you will not be disappointed watching him fly around and
hold people back and and generally go lights out the
entire time. I will say Esteban is great in the
sense that there's I think I think there's just a
lot there that we haven't quite seen yet. He is
in his mid twenties and I think that these next
(32:52):
couple of years could be really defining for him. So
if you are someone who likes a little bit of
an enigma who definitely also has a lot of fighting them, right, Like,
he comes from a back ground where his family and
him had to really work for it. He knew the
pressure he was undertook perform so that it wasn't all
for not for his parents and his family. You know,
he is a guy who can, like I said, put
some elbows out, which isn't always everyone's favorite, but there
(33:13):
is a fire there and it's just a matter of
when it comes out and when it really dominates. And
his dad working on the car when he was a kid.
That's cool and it's a good story. And I know
he he mentioned it in that one video I watched,
but he was he was like, I used to sleep
by the track in the van. Now I'm in this
like really nice trailer. And he was like really appreciative
(33:33):
of that, and that was cool to hear him say that. Yeah,
he's got perspective. He was raising against kids who would
would roll up with these multimillion dollar cars and what
you know, he's just out there with his mom and
dad for sure. Yeah, I will say he's someone who
often is seen as either an underrated driver or at
the very least overlooked. He's kind of forgotten about. He's
in this midfield team. He's had a couple of moments
of real brilliance and f one, but there's not to
(33:56):
be said for being a little bit more low key
and on top of that, total wolf is man him.
So if if Toto and the Mercedes Jugger not see
something in you that can't be forgotten or sort of
written off. And some people are late bloomers in every sport.
We see this. Even as teams, we see this, as coaches,
we see this. Some people take some time to get
the confidence. And maybe that's what's happening. Oh definitely. So
(34:17):
I definitely have never counted Estebon out. Who knows what's
going to happen with him. So, Michael, we are officially
halfway through the F one grid. Who are you feeling
the most right now? I've embarrassed that I put so
much emphasis on colors and brand names, but I really
(34:42):
love learning about the component of what's made each driver,
you know, as a controversy, the dad working on the car,
the dad that pushed him to be the bet a
lot of dad, Like I said, dad issues. It's hard
for me to connect with Alp Mercedes. I feel the
same way Red Bull. That guy Christian pisces me off.
(35:06):
Uh McLaren, I can see what people are talking about
with McLaren um, but I'm still coming back to this
Ferrari on the poster of my bedroom, and I like
the vibe A little bit of them, and I could
be off, but that's still where I'm at. And who
else did I miss? So I'm not going to make
you rank all the drivers, but which which? Which? Like
(35:29):
two to three drivers thus far are you excited about?
I'm liking what just listening to you talk about, I'm
liking how always in contention Alpha Great White Shark, Lewis
Hamilton's seems to just always be. I mean it seems
like every race we talked about your like, and then
Lewis was about to win, You know what I mean?
(35:50):
I like that. That's just like pure dominance is unbelievable.
How do you achieve that? But you know from from
asking me this question, I always like these underdog guys.
I always like the people that are assumed to be
number two. I hate the number two things. These are
all world class drivers, but it's like kids. You you
really do as a parent, need to love one of
(36:11):
them more so I didn't, did I answer your question? Yeah?
Kind of. I still like George Russell. I know that's
what you're really getting at. No, we like George, Yeah,
and I like Charles Sure, I like him. I like him,
um Lando Daniel as Demano, Fernando I could I can
(36:32):
leave him on the in the paddock, so to speak.
It pains me slightly because I, as we know, I
like Lando, I have I have an interesting soft spot
for for an estebond character. But I I see where
your your your minded head are going. I think what
maybe you're finding with me is I am I'm in
on the sport. I love the competition of it. I'm
(36:53):
loving this whole new world I didn't know about. But
it's gonna take me some time to really figure out
whom I'm in love with. Does that make sense? Well,
as you know, we're only halfway through, so we've got
a lot of teams to discuss, a lot of drivers,
a lot more chaos. We've got some real dark horses
and wild cards in the mix, especially as we get
(37:13):
further down the grid. You've gotta be a little bit
scrappy to be on some teams that are perpetually towards
the bottom of the midfield or even at the bottom
of the standings there. So there's lots more to to
see and to hear about. I'm gonna like the people
that are the grittiest down there. Yeah, So next week
we finally get to talk about the Red Bull sister
Team Alpha Towery, which I'm sure you're wondering, what the
(37:36):
heck does a sister team, junior team whatever even do?
So settled be next week? Are we all good? Okay? Um? Yeah?
I think it is a rapid This has been Choosing
Sides F one, a production of Sports Illustrated Studios and
I Heart Radio. The show is hosted by Michael Costa
(37:59):
and Lily Harp. This episode was produced by Lily Herman
and our senior producer Yhai Mi Tao, who also did
the sound design At the Cutting Room Studios. We are
recorded by engineer Robo Leary, the second mastering by Cello Weisblu.
Max Miller is the executive producer and Brannan get Us
(38:20):
his head of Audio at s I Studios. At I
Heart Radio, Sean t Toon is our executive producer. For
more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app Apple Podcasts where wherever you get your podcasts,
don't forget to subscribe to us and leave a review.
And if you want more F one goodness, follow us
(38:42):
on Instagram at Choosing Sides of What
Hey everyone, it's Lily and you are hearing me from
my far inferior home recording setup. The reason for that
is because Fernando Alonso conveniently decided to announce twenty four
hours before this episode was slated to drop that he
is moving to the Aston Martin Formula One team at
the start of the season. Luckily, for us and for you,
(00:24):
a lot of the information in this episode is still
super relevant. It is also very fun, if I do
say so myself. So we'll talk more about Fernando's move
when we discuss Aston Martin in a few weeks. So
stay tuned, roll the tape. We're good to go. Okay,
So Michael, yes, congratulations, we have reached the midfield. Yes
(00:49):
we have. We have gone from best of the rest
status to true like mid territory. And I mean that
in the way like gen z TikTok er say, like
mid we are deafin like right, their average in the middle.
And to celebrate that, we're talking about a French team.
I and I own no alpine merch to speak of.
(01:10):
I brought you a croissant. Yes, yes, I'll eat it.
It's close to the microphone and it's it's probably a
little hard at this point. There we go from this
wonderful bakery. Thank you, really, that's very kind of you
here god mm hmmm mm hmmmm. They do know how
(01:33):
to bake ship the French, you know, even though I
think this bakery is just an American owned bakery that
don't don't from my Heart Radio and Sports Illustrated studios.
This is choosing sides. Yes one. Wow. So we're in
(02:01):
the midfield. The team we're talking about today has been
around the block for a while. They're very chaotic. They've
been on the grid. They've been off the grid. They
sold the team that they rebought the team. They are
also involved with a massive f one scandal. Today's team
is it's not Alpine. Nope, no Alpine, No Alpine. Alpine.
(02:24):
Wait to say alpine, and it looks like it's spelled
like Alpine, but no, we are the French Alpine. We're
gonna make it complicated exactly, and then we're going to
be really obnoxious when anyone mispronounces it. So Alpine, I
will say, off the bat. Alpine is a pain in
the asked to me personally, because it took forever to
research all of the name changing and the team buying
(02:47):
and all of this stuff. So they get points out
of off of my personal book just for that in
the amount of research this took. But I will let
the record show I'm not saying it should affect your
ranking well, but it does. They make it easy to
say Ferrari or Mercedes. These are these brands that are
so iconic. So you are making a point that as
(03:09):
a new fan coming into the sport, maybe all the
new fans are going to find these teams that are
already baked with a lot of money because it's just
easier to be fans exactly. And also, I mean you
have to explain O l Pen formerly Reno as of
you know, until it's it's a little bit confusing exactly.
So in it requires we're reaching like intermediate level knowledge here.
(03:30):
You need to have a little bit of context. Okay.
So Reno entered Formula one all the way back in
seven as a constructor, right, so they were infected team
on the Grid. They also then began supplying their engines
to other teams in three. There's about a seven year
period there. But then Reynault leaves F one two years later.
(03:53):
In to make this confusing, they still supply engines to
other teams for another year. I'm already three years after this,
they start supplying engines yet again. Then they say, we're
going to buy a team again. Isn't that great? So
they buy this iconic team called Benetta two thousand two,
in case you're keeping track of all the dates, they
(04:14):
rebrand it as rent two thousand five and two thousand six.
Reno wins both the Driver's Championship and the Constructor's Championship.
Both times. It's with a driver named Fernando Alonso are
old foe from the McLaren episode Our Petti as bitch
from McLaren. We'll get to Fernando and kind of what
(04:36):
he his whole energy is. In a second, you think
that's the end of it, that they're in forever. They
are not. They sell their shares in the company, but
continue to supply engines to other teams, including Red Bull,
who uses Reno engines to win their four championships. In
the Rena team becomes a very unsuccessful team called Lotus
for a couple of years, Lotus Lotus. It was like
(04:58):
a whole disaster. So then finally in Reno buy shares
in the team again, they rebranded to Rento, again, again,
back to Rento, and then, as if this wasn't already
enough of a journey, they rebranded as Alpine, which is
borderline did and produces only one car. This is Josh
Rebel n F one YouTuber, and all of a sudden
(05:19):
their brand is plasted all over the Reno motoriciple program.
It's like, okay, that've either got plans that we don't
know about. Well, this is just inherently French or some
mixture of both. I've already lost. I mean, I'm my
heads in circles. We're not going to do this again.
I you don't have to. It's not gonna be a
pop quiz. But all you need to know if they
were Reno up until the beginning of one, they are
(05:40):
now Alpine. Those are the two main things you have
to know. I know it Rena to Alpine. Okay, okay,
So why obviously you're wondering, probably why rebrand? Is it money? No? Actually,
the company claims that they want to use this spot
on the grid right because F one at the end
of the day, seen by a billion people a year.
They want to market lesser known Alpine brand within Renault.
(06:02):
The company. I mean, I don't even know. If I've
ever seen a Renault car, I would have known that
Renault was a car brand. But it's not good when
you've got to spend two minutes describing what the ship
something is. Definitely think it's a more European oriented brand. Yeah,
as usual. I don't think the French care about Americans
or think too highly as us, and that's fair. They
(06:23):
can do what they want exactly and we can do
what we want us. I was gonna say, you know,
it seems to working out for them, but I don't
know if it is, considering how many times they're in
and out of this sport and doing whatever they're doing. So,
speaking of mess so, as I have teased for quite
some time, they are involved in another massive scandal, another gate.
(06:45):
We've got another gate, and this came later than the
first gate by Gates, so you know it's serious and
they have to then attack on the gate a year later.
So we are talking today about crash Gate. Rash Gate. Yes,
imagine if there was ever a controversy with a gate,
like a literal gate gate Gate, Okay, crash Gate. So
(07:10):
the year is two thousand eight. We are in the
midst of a giant global recession thanks to American junk
home bonds, exactly the year that the first Twilight movie
came out. Oh yeah, that's what I was going to say. Yes, exactly,
we're you Team Edward or Team Jacob. I don't know
how those people are. Okay, that's great, that's totally fine.
I was team Belieds a personality. But anyway, this is
(07:32):
thus eight. In September of two thousand eight, the Singapore
Grand Prix is taking place. And the big deal about
this particular Grand Prix in that particular year is it's
the first night race in the Formula One history. Yes,
there's a lot of build up to this race to
begin with. So at the time Reno Reno has two drivers,
Fernando Alonso and Nelson p k Jr. Unfortunately, Nelson p
(07:55):
k Jr. It's not a very good F one driver,
but he is in F one driving Reno with this
you know, two time world champion, Fernando Alonso, he's out
for blood, he really wants the w I'll start with
what happens, then we'll go backwards into detail. So basically,
Nelson p k Jr. Crashes during the race and because
he crashes, his teammate Fernando Alonso inadvertently ends up having
(08:19):
an advantage and ends up winning the race. That's like
the long and short of it. At the time, Nelson
p k Jr. Said, Oh, yeah, I just I crashed.
It was a simple mistake. It happens. Some people were
really skeptical and very much were raising eyebrows, but a
lot of people were also like, you know what, racing
incidents happened. Sometimes you just get a little bit of
luck in the sport that that's part of f one, right,
is the unpredictability, the fact that anything could happen, and
(08:41):
the idea that a driver would do something like crash
a car to advantage the team just sounded absurd, right,
That's millions of dollars, that's a driver's life on the line.
You just can't fat them something like that happening. So
we skip ahead ten months to July of two thousand nine.
Reno announces that they are dropping Nelson P. K Jr.
(09:02):
From the team for for low not good performance basically,
and he's upset and understandably he does not really have
any loyalty to this team at this point because they
have dropped him. Yeah, and they've been pretty not great
about him in the media, like he wasn't good. You know,
he's a little humiliated as and again comes from a
big racing family. It's just it's just kind of a sad,
(09:25):
depressing state. So he decides it is time to let
her rip and open his mouth. Now, Senior PK was
recently sacked by Renno, and he's now claimed that he
was asked to deliberately crash at a Singapore Grand Prix
last year, which of course helped Fernando to eventually win
the race. Here we go, So here's a more technical
look at what happens during the two thousand eight Singapore
Grand Prix. Fernando Alonso, you know Reno teammate, who's who's
(09:48):
kind of the golden boy, the star of that team.
He actually had been doing well in practice sessions earlier.
There's a lot of excitement. Qualifying happens, and for a
variety of reasons, Fernando ends up qualifying in p. Fifteen,
so he is nowhere near the top. Things didn't go
according to planning. The car broke down and he's somewhat
down the grid and a seen him so devastated. It's
almost impossible to win from there. You're you're just fighting
(10:09):
to get like a point or two right. Typically when
you're in something like P fifteen and Nelson p k Jr.
Is next to him at P sixteen, Yeah, Renault, it's
really not not doing well. So according to Nelson p
k Jr. This is where everything gets very sketchy. So
if you're starting in the back, you've got less to lose, right,
(10:31):
you're not in the points. You might take a riskier
or a more a weirder, a more unconventional strategy to
try and elevate yourself in the standings, for instance, having
a lighter fuel load and pitting earlier, you know, changing
tires up sooner, you know, any number of strategies. What
they come up with is that Fernando pits incredibly early
at lap twelve. So he's the first driver to go
(10:52):
in and pit in. The hope is hey, you know,
everyone's thinking, oh, he's going to get you know, newer,
fresher tires and maybe the ideas he's going to go
on and be able to kind of how to pulled himself,
you know, ahead of teams and drivers and cars that
are maybe slower and on top of that are on
older tires. Right, it makes sense it gets back on
and very quickly within three laps. So lap fourteen of
this race, Nelson p K Jr. Crashes at turn seventeen.
(11:20):
You can see the cogs turning with this one. And
on top of that that is likely I would have
thought to bring out a safety car is it's off
the line. The safety car comes out to slow the
drivers down. It's a physical car that is driving. They
have to hold back, they're not allowed to pass. And uh,
on top of that, it's a difficult place to recover cover.
There is not a crane nearby. This turn too quickly
(11:42):
pull the car out, so they have to get a
crane over there. They obviously have to collect debris all
these little pieces of carbon fiber and these parts are
all over the track. So these cars are obviously slowly
going around and around. And as we talked about, what
starts to happen with safety cars is because obviously everyone's
driving at the same speed, the cars begin to bunch up.
So if you were leading by, you know ten seconds,
(12:02):
you now have to slow down. You can't pass anyone,
but no one can pass you and then on top
of that, the regulations at the time stated that the
pit lane was closed if a safety car was out
until all of the cars were bunched up. So everyone
finally gets bunched up before anyone can pit, and obviously
Fernando Alonso now has already pitted. He's on the freshest tires,
(12:23):
and so based on that, basically Fernando ends up towards
the front. And because of the pit strategy and other
people having to pit at different times and the chaos
around any safety car, you know, it throws everyone's strategies
for a loop. Anybody who is chew a pit stuff,
he's gonna be really sweating. They're gonna have to come
in and take a penalty. Fernando ends up winning from p.
(12:43):
Fifteen in this race. And obviously, now that we know that,
there's always a little weird coincidences that seem to go on. Yeah,
you're kind of on your head. I'm shaking my head
back and forth because I'm not I'm not so sure
this was such a giant advantage, but okay, I'm still listening. Yes,
So basically though, what happened, So Nelson P. K Junior
(13:04):
is Brazilian so Brazilian media starts reporting shortly after Nelson
p K Jr. Is kind of saying, hey, something actually
happened here. You know, he's going to the f i
A and and kind of talking to them and making
some noise. Yeah, it breaks publicly within the month that
he is alleging that the two heads of Reno told
(13:24):
him to crash to give Fernando Alonso this advantage to
help his race on lap fourteen lap on lap fourteen,
after Fernando had already pitted, which you know they could
easily tell me is Nelson p K Junior, Hey your
teammate pitted, you know that that sort of thing. Uh.
So shortly thereafter we're still in the same like two
month period after Nelson p K Junior comes forward with
(13:46):
the allegations, So we're not just like eight months after
the incident exactly. We're almost a year after the incident.
So now we're actually a year later, September two nine.
At this point, the f i A, the governing Bartie body,
charges Reno with interfering in a two thousand eight Singapore
gram pri and conspiring with p K to deliberately crash
his car and put Alonso at an advantage under the
(14:08):
safety car rules. The two guys who are heading up
reddo at the time. This is the most like villain
in a Godfather movie name Flavio Briatore. He's the executive
director of the team. And then you have executive director
of engineering Pat Simmons. Less climactic. So you've got Flavio
and Pat are said to have told Nelson to do
this according to Nelson Pique. And of course, meanwhile Fernando
(14:32):
claimsy had no idea that any of this was going on.
He cannot fathom the team ever doing something like that
to him, gasp. So this is all going on, there's
like the Renault team starts threatening legal action against Nelson
p K Jr. And myself. We put a criminal plans
to in the High Court of Paris for black mail. Again,
(14:52):
everything is still building, building building, and they finally have
this hearing. At this hearing, an anonymous and mysterious Rehno
employee who's no and his witness X we still know
who they are comes forward and says they were at
the alleged pre race meeting where this plan was concocted.
Shortly after like this hearing and this witness and whatever.
Reynauld says they're not going to contest the charges from
(15:12):
the f i A and Bria, Tory and Simmons they
leave the team very quickly. So Renaud claims, look, we're
already cleaning house, We're already trying to do the right thing.
And basically what they get handed down is not a
one hundred million dollar fine or anything close to it.
F one's governing buddy f i A gave rey No
only a two year suspended ban, which means between now
and if Reynauld misbehaves again, it will be taken out
(15:36):
of the race. Entiality they can raise for those two years. Yeah,
but they're like, don't do anything sketchy again during that time.
It's like, yeah, a minor slap on the wrist. Uh.
And then on top of that, they banned Flavio indefinitely
and Pat our Darling. Pat was banned for five years
from f i A sanction events Why the difference? And yes,
(15:59):
so Pat, at a certain point when all of this
ship was going on, he eventually confesses to knowing the
plan and they did it, and you know whatever, he
saves his own ass. So they say, well, Patt at
Lease came forward again with this whole like honesty thing
or like he was honest with us eventually kind of
uh And to this day, Labio Briatore does not you know,
he's still he's still proclaiming his innocence at the time,
(16:22):
and to this day, that initial de facto lifetime ban
for uh briotry is considered the harshest in all of
motorsports history. And eventually they reduced the bands and and
all of this stuff, so eventually they're just it's kind
of said, hey, you guys can't work for a you know,
an f I a sponsored event or at an event
to like eleven, it's like really significantly reduced. So basically,
(16:44):
to to summarize this whole thing, the leaders of the
team asked, they're not as good driver to crash and
sacrifice his race to help the other one win. Yeah,
which puts that driver risk right on top of that
he could have died, right, I mean, you can't just
like correct, you gotta make it look like a real crash. Yeah,
he can't just kind of go two miles an hour
and kind of barely touched the wall. He if you
(17:04):
look at photos, he's straight up crash side barrier. It
looks bad. Yeah, I mean that's just really dangerous. Yeah yeah, yeah,
I don't think it means anything. I think we now
go on. We have problems from time to time. As
long as we solve them and deal with them properly,
that's fine. And I will say there was very different opinions.
So you had a former F one world champion and
team owner named Jackie Stewart said that that there's something
(17:26):
fundamentally rotten and wrong at the heart of Formula one.
You know, the sport has never been in such a
mood of self destruction. Millions of fans are amazed, if
not disgusted, at a sport that goes from crisis to
crisis with everyone blaming everyone else. And keep in mind
this was also only you know, one to two years
after this whole spygate thing, right. And then on the
(17:46):
other hand, you had another former driver named Eddie Irvine
who basically said the whole situation was overblown. He's like,
it's probably slightly on the wrong side of the cheating thing,
but in past days, every team has done whatever they
could to win. Cheat been the les, break the rules,
sabotage opponents. This is just the f a going on
a crusade, and the truth is somewhere in between both
(18:07):
of those. So just to quickly summarize where Alpines at. Now, Yeah,
they've been generally midfield for a while, some years better
than others. They finished P five, so smack dab in
(18:29):
the middle of the championship, and generally there are some
weeks where they're car seem like they're going to be great,
and then they kind of fail. They're a little bit
all over the map. However, the drivers give us a
lot more insight as to what's going on in the
team than me just explaining this very convoluted team. So
we'll get into them right after an ad break. All right,
(18:54):
So we are back and we're talking about Alpines. Two drivers. Yeah,
who I want to know would two drivers are? Because
you've called a mid a lot of times and as
a driver, you don't want to be described as mid
and much like Lando didn't like me describing him as
slow and steady. But who are these Alpine drivers? Well,
(19:15):
we've got to talk about the man of the hour.
For the first driver we got, Fernando, he is back
to read the guy who snitched on his own team.
Stitch on his own team, different team, I will say,
and then claim to have no knowledge of the other
major scandal he was involved in. Uh yeah, at Reno.
(19:38):
To keep in mind too, he did win his two
world titles with Reno back in the mid two thousand's.
He is his start and F one was all the
way back in two thousand one. See sorry, we talked
about Fernando Worlds. So Fernando has been around for a while.
He has taken breaks from the sports. So he left.
(20:00):
For instance, he went back to McLaren in the late
tens before Lando came in, and he was having such
a miserable time that he left and tried to do
some other endurance racing and IndyCar. At one point he's
he's tried other stuff in between his many stints in
Formula one. You see the oldest driver on the grid.
He is currently the oldest driver by yeah, at least
(20:21):
at least three or four years. So picture him listening
to like AM radio while he drives, you know, because
he's old, and he puts his hands up on the
thing and it goes real slow, puts his golf clubs
in the trunk. Okay, stop, if anyone is the most
contentious driver on the grid. He's definitely in the running
for it because he's been around for forever. He's got
(20:42):
people who love him who are die hard Fernando Alonso fans,
he has got people who despise him the exactly like,
why are you still here? All of that stuff. It's
impressive the longevity his career. D Yeah, So okay, I
have some photos of Fernando alright, Fernando Alonzo. So this
(21:04):
guy looks a little shady. He also looks very intense
because that bottom right foot of him, like yelling, is
from when he won one of his world championships. So
he it's like you can just see the emotion. Yeah,
in that in that pose, it's just like arms up
like a lion roar. Basically, yeah, is this a win
at all costs? Guy? He has a win at all
(21:26):
cost guy? So okay, So I feel like we're saying
we're kind of like Fernando. It's the vibe. It's possible.
Why is he still around? I mean, is he is
there something I'm missing here? First of all, you know
that the one reason or one of the big reasons
a lot of teams keep older drivers around is They
come with a lot of experience. They know how to
talk about cars, they know how to really explain how
(21:46):
they're feeling in a car, what's not working, and also
obviously has built up the you know, the intuition. You know,
he knows, he's seen every scenario at this point, he
knows what to do. I get out of this place
is good. We're looking at the plan A plus aid
Plan A plus. Fernando is a great all around driver.
(22:07):
He's obviously very very aggressive, but what he is known for,
he's probably the best defender on the grid. Drivers live
in fear of having to be told by their teams
to pass Fernando Alonso iconically. In one there is a race,
the Hungarian Grand Prix, and there was a massive rain
storm and literally the start so we don't even get
through the first turn of the race. The cars end
(22:28):
up taking each other out like bowling pins after a
Ferrari and the Santa macarn it's literally whoever ends up
bypassing this situation kind of ends up in the front.
So you've got a wacky, wacky, wacky series of drivers.
So you have actually Fernando Alonzo's teammate, who will talk
about in a second, Espano con ends up in the
first place position, spans in the lead. Fernando's a little
(22:52):
bit back behind him. He's in like P. Three. But
coming up behind Fernando is Lewis Hamilton's and the Mercedes
is just booking it. So they basically they're like, Fernando,
we need you to hold off Louis Hamilton's, who's in
a far superior car for as long as you possibly can,
so that st Bond can win the damn race. Somehow
(23:13):
is keeping Hamilton? This is incredible. You can just see
and hear and feel the frustration for Louis Hamilton's, you know,
former teammate. These two people do not like each other. Yes,
Louis Hamilton's on the radio is just exasperated you saved
over me. Man, Come on, come on man, Like that
had to be illegal. They're like, no, Fernando is just
(23:34):
out defending like your offense. What a brilliant defensive drive
he's doing today, isn't it amazing? So you can block? Yeah,
the rules around making sure you aren't like for doing
all on Michael Schumacher, like just smashing into someone. But yeah,
like like Fernando's doing everything by the book, He's just
that good and every turn you just see Louis goes.
But then Fernando will like block him just enough legally
(23:57):
to keep him from passing. Almost ended up in contacts,
and essentially Fernando Alonso in a not as fast whatsoever
Alpine holds off Lewis's Mercedes for ten laps, which enables
Estebond to win this race. So something to keep in
(24:19):
mind too is that defending actually can harm your own race.
So for instance, if you just let someone like Louis through,
you save your tires, they're not going to get worn
down as quickly saving fuel, you know, You're just you're
just being in more of a conservation effort, which is
why you do see often if you know a car
sees a much faster car coming up on them, they'll
just let them pass. I mean, they won't completely lie
(24:41):
down and play dead, but they're like, what's the point
of me fighting this faster car. So it really was
I don't want to say selfless, but it was very
helpful of Alonso to say, you know what, I'm gonna
fight this guy. I'm gonna really go after this defense.
I want to funk with Louis. You know, I want
to help my teammate. Whatever was going through his mind,
it shouldn't be understated that it was in fact, you know,
to the detriment somewhat to to Fernando's race. He was
(25:03):
sacrificing his race, either for the betterment of his team
or to funk with his old teammate or both. Yeah,
he's a man of multip my therapist tells me all
the time. Both things could be true. Yeah, definitely a
guy who you want on your team for sure when
you need a defender or someone to kind of be
on your side, Like he's the guy you want to
(25:24):
to to just go after it. Not bad for an
old guy, Fernande, Yes, still, but yeah, I will say
there are people who are like ready for him to
get out of there. Like I said, he's turning forty
one this summer. I mean that is a remarkable feat.
You know, we talked about Lando at McLaren, who's twenty two.
(25:45):
This guy's forty one. I mean that is just so
much experience. Yeah, so it's obviously very good at f one.
He just might not be great at some of the
uh you know, finer points of off track etiquette. Yeah,
there is something to be said, for someone that is
still at world class level at that age, that's pretty remarkable.
Yeah uh yeah. I mean the other big argument against him,
(26:07):
I would say, is that, you know, every time you
have a driver like that who's there for a long
time and maybe maybe overstaying their welcome, they keep other
younger drivers in talent out. They've got some junior drivers.
We're hearing from Josh Revel again, do you have one
everything in the junior Fumula ranks who are looking at
the no vacancies and thinking, okay, great, when are we
(26:27):
getting into Formula one? Oh? And not? Why not? Because
we signed a mercurial French driver and an aging Spaniards
and we think, yep, that's what we need for our
Drava lineup in Formula two. So as you know, the
junior category right below Formula one. The driver who won
that Oscar Piastre. He he is just like a baby
faced cherub. He is like adorable, you know, he's like
(26:49):
nineteen twenty. There's a lot of hype around Oscar Oscars
in Alpines Young Driver's development program, and they basically have
no where to promote him because they're keeping someone like Fernando,
who's much older and definitely at the end of his career.
We don't need no junior formula. My stray will be
fine with what we've got right now, which is why
we're exactly bang average and Formula one. So besides Fernando,
(27:11):
who's in the other car that is, in fact Esteban,
oh Cod the other the other guy. I feel like
I've talked about Fernando in several episodes and now it's like,
oh yeah, and Esteban's there. So Estebon is more of
an enigma on the grid than the average driver. He's
interesting and that it's very well known that he does
not come from money, and the big story that's told
(27:33):
about him is that his dad's actually mechanic and when
he was growing up, they saw that he had affinity
for carding, so they actually sold their family home lived
out of an RV so they could drive around to
carting competitions with him, and his dad did all the
work on Esteban's cart, Yeah, to save money and because
he obviously knew what to do. So it really was
this family affair. They're very close and very tighten it.
(27:56):
So I guess if you have like slight eat the
rich vibe in a sport that everyone's rich. Uh, he
could potentially be one of your guys, um, but yeah, so,
Esteban definitely is known for being a little bit scrappier,
being a little bit elbows out than than the average
driver because he wants it so badly and obviously a
lot of sacrifices were made to get him to this point.
(28:16):
You know, it doesn't get I think, much grittier than like,
we literally sold our home to fund your career. Dad's
the mechanic. Yeah, that's a mechanic. He definitely has had
a much more chaotic career in terms of it very talented,
has won things in the junior categories and whatnot, but
definitely bounced around in the sense that he's never really
been a team's number one driver, even at Alpine. It's
(28:40):
kind of a weird dynamic with the Fernando right because
Estebon is seen as like the future of the team
and also Alpinea French company loves having a French driver
and Esteban that's a that's a huge boon for any team.
But Fernando Alonso is Fernando Alonso. So even if you
are kind of considered the future and the the big
talent going forward. It's hard to you know, not feel
(29:01):
overshadowed by such an icon and legend of the sport.
He is Fernando Alonso for a reason. Another interesting thing
to note is Estebon is managed by Total Wolf at Mercedes. Yeah,
as we know, it's it's a very fun ethical minefield
over in F one. So I have to be like, Okay,
maybe there is more to Estebon than what we're seeing.
(29:21):
We gotta do a quick break and then we'll be back.
So I guess when it comes to Alpine in terms
of pitching the team, I mean, it's kind of a
weird one. What is the grand plans? I'm not entirely
sure because they say, you know, we're looking to win
in Formula one, Josh Revel again, Okay, when in Formula
(29:42):
one with your current package, good luck. You've got about
nine other teams that have the exact same freaking goal.
What stands them out amongst the others kind of hopes
and dreams and arguably living into that and in six
they are a bit of an enigma for sure. As
(30:03):
of the middle of the two season, things have been
a little rocky at times for Alpine, but they are
still in the hunt for best of the rest status.
They're very comfortably at the top of the midfield, and
both their drivers, Fernando and Esteban, have had relatively good seasons. Um.
Fernando unfortunately has had some bad luck with you know,
(30:25):
an engine not starting here or there. Esteban has quietly
done pretty darn well all things considered. So again I
feel I feel bad saying it, but Alpine is doing
very mid But I actually kind of mean that in
a good way. They're under the radar. They're a little
bit quiet, but we could see some really interesting stuff
in the back half of two if they keep at
(30:46):
it and other teams kind of fall off. I wish
I had a more like exciting pitch for you for Alpine,
but there are some people who really love Alpine. I
like their colors. I like their name. It sounds like eeek,
you know, top of the mountain h And I liked
(31:07):
that this guy is forty one years old, you know,
fun the young guys, they'll get their shot, but he's
holding on. He's a grizzly old veteran grinding it out.
And uh, I certainly liked that he played such a
good defense against Louis Hamilton. That's that's that's a fun story.
But no, they're not jumping off the page. For me,
French hurts. It hurts being French, but that's not even
(31:29):
their fault. It's hard to really devote your energy to
it thinking in two years they're gonna be making engines.
In three years quit and then to five years come back,
and yeah, I would love another, not another I would
say crash Gate. I would love another scandal involving LPN.
They need something to put them back on the map
because it's been a while since crash Gate. It's been
a decade and a half. We need something new. And
(31:49):
then when we come to the driver's here, Yeah Fernando,
I mean and YOHI actually said this, but I think
it's true. Is that Fernando, despite being in the sport
for two decades, basically he still drives like a rookies
who's got something to prove, right, Like he drives lights out,
like every race could be his last. I mean at
this point he is getting older, so the end could
(32:10):
come is going to come sooner rather than later for him.
That's a tremendous quality in a competitor because he's got money,
so he doesn't necessarily need to do this, but he
obviously every race he's going to try to win. That's unbelievable. Yeah,
and I mean great defender, just a fun guy to watch.
So if you're someone who likes you know, I want
to a I want to follow great racers, right like Fernando, Well,
(32:31):
you know, he doesn't have the chance always, but if
he gets it, he will put on the show. Like
you will not be disappointed watching him fly around and
hold people back and and generally go lights out the
entire time. I will say Esteban is great in the
sense that there's I think I think there's just a
lot there that we haven't quite seen yet. He is
in his mid twenties and I think that these next
(32:52):
couple of years could be really defining for him. So
if you are someone who likes a little bit of
an enigma who definitely also has a lot of fighting them, right, Like,
he comes from a back ground where his family and
him had to really work for it. He knew the
pressure he was undertook perform so that it wasn't all
for not for his parents and his family. You know,
he is a guy who can, like I said, put
some elbows out, which isn't always everyone's favorite, but there
(33:13):
is a fire there and it's just a matter of
when it comes out and when it really dominates. And
his dad working on the car when he was a kid.
That's cool and it's a good story. And I know
he he mentioned it in that one video I watched,
but he was he was like, I used to sleep
by the track in the van. Now I'm in this
like really nice trailer. And he was like really appreciative
(33:33):
of that, and that was cool to hear him say that. Yeah,
he's got perspective. He was raising against kids who would
would roll up with these multimillion dollar cars and what
you know, he's just out there with his mom and
dad for sure. Yeah, I will say he's someone who
often is seen as either an underrated driver or at
the very least overlooked. He's kind of forgotten about. He's
in this midfield team. He's had a couple of moments
of real brilliance and f one, but there's not to
(33:56):
be said for being a little bit more low key
and on top of that, total wolf is man him.
So if if Toto and the Mercedes Jugger not see
something in you that can't be forgotten or sort of
written off. And some people are late bloomers in every sport.
We see this. Even as teams, we see this, as coaches,
we see this. Some people take some time to get
the confidence. And maybe that's what's happening. Oh definitely. So
(34:17):
I definitely have never counted Estebon out. Who knows what's
going to happen with him. So, Michael, we are officially
halfway through the F one grid. Who are you feeling
the most right now? I've embarrassed that I put so
much emphasis on colors and brand names, but I really
(34:42):
love learning about the component of what's made each driver,
you know, as a controversy, the dad working on the car,
the dad that pushed him to be the bet a
lot of dad, Like I said, dad issues. It's hard
for me to connect with Alp Mercedes. I feel the
same way Red Bull. That guy Christian pisces me off.
(35:06):
Uh McLaren, I can see what people are talking about
with McLaren um, but I'm still coming back to this
Ferrari on the poster of my bedroom, and I like
the vibe A little bit of them, and I could
be off, but that's still where I'm at. And who
else did I miss? So I'm not going to make
you rank all the drivers, but which which? Which? Like
(35:29):
two to three drivers thus far are you excited about?
I'm liking what just listening to you talk about, I'm
liking how always in contention Alpha Great White Shark, Lewis
Hamilton's seems to just always be. I mean it seems
like every race we talked about your like, and then
Lewis was about to win, You know what I mean?
(35:50):
I like that. That's just like pure dominance is unbelievable.
How do you achieve that? But you know from from
asking me this question, I always like these underdog guys.
I always like the people that are assumed to be
number two. I hate the number two things. These are
all world class drivers, but it's like kids. You you
really do as a parent, need to love one of
(36:11):
them more so I didn't, did I answer your question? Yeah?
Kind of. I still like George Russell. I know that's
what you're really getting at. No, we like George, Yeah,
and I like Charles Sure, I like him. I like him,
um Lando Daniel as Demano, Fernando I could I can
(36:32):
leave him on the in the paddock, so to speak.
It pains me slightly because I, as we know, I
like Lando, I have I have an interesting soft spot
for for an estebond character. But I I see where
your your your minded head are going. I think what
maybe you're finding with me is I am I'm in
on the sport. I love the competition of it. I'm
(36:53):
loving this whole new world I didn't know about. But
it's gonna take me some time to really figure out
whom I'm in love with. Does that make sense? Well,
as you know, we're only halfway through, so we've got
a lot of teams to discuss, a lot of drivers,
a lot more chaos. We've got some real dark horses
and wild cards in the mix, especially as we get
(37:13):
further down the grid. You've gotta be a little bit
scrappy to be on some teams that are perpetually towards
the bottom of the midfield or even at the bottom
of the standings there. So there's lots more to to
see and to hear about. I'm gonna like the people
that are the grittiest down there. Yeah, So next week
we finally get to talk about the Red Bull sister
Team Alpha Towery, which I'm sure you're wondering, what the
(37:36):
heck does a sister team, junior team whatever even do?
So settled be next week? Are we all good? Okay? Um? Yeah?
I think it is a rapid This has been Choosing
Sides F one, a production of Sports Illustrated Studios and
I Heart Radio. The show is hosted by Michael Costa
(37:59):
and Lily Harp. This episode was produced by Lily Herman
and our senior producer Yhai Mi Tao, who also did
the sound design At the Cutting Room Studios. We are
recorded by engineer Robo Leary, the second mastering by Cello Weisblu.
Max Miller is the executive producer and Brannan get Us
(38:20):
his head of Audio at s I Studios. At I
Heart Radio, Sean t Toon is our executive producer. For
more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Radio app Apple Podcasts where wherever you get your podcasts,
don't forget to subscribe to us and leave a review.
And if you want more F one goodness, follow us
(38:42):
on Instagram at Choosing Sides of What
Host
Michael Kosta
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