July 26, 2022 • 38 mins
After three weeks of two-parters, it's time for our first single-team episode. This week, Lily and Michael discuss the storied history of McLaren, which spent decades at the top of the standings before struggling in recent years. In addition to covering the very contentious Spygate scandal, the pair also address McLaren's two drivers: The rising star Lando Norris and the perennial favorite — and struggling — Daniel Ricciardo.
Special thanks to our guests: Josh Marsh and Nicole Sievers.
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):
Okay, ready to go. Uh gimmick is up here? Have
we have many gimmicks today? So to kick us off,
I have another one of my beloved coasters. This is
uh Danil Ricardo is on this in his McLaren gear.
Lily handed me a paster of Daniel Riccardo in the
quote beneath his characature drawing is sometimes you gotta lick
(00:22):
the stamp and send it. Sometimes you just got to
lick the stamp and send it. A lot of the
time you get one chance to try. So I made
the most of every opportunity. Man. From what I can
tell about him, likable guy, very across is likable guy.
And we will get to the ballad of Danil Ricardo
very soon. From I Heart Radio and Sports Illustrated Studios,
(00:45):
this is choosing sides. Yes one Wow. So first and foremost,
we're talking about a team that is historic, It is revered,
(01:06):
it is storied. It is the second winning ist team
on the grid end of all time in F one.
That is a ton of races, second only two Ferrari
and they have had a rough go of it as
of late. The team we are talking about today, which
is America's kind of informal team is McLaren McLaren. So
(01:28):
who is McLaren. I've heard this name all the time,
and even as an American, I feel familiar somewhat with
the brand, but I really don't know a whole lot. Yeah,
so McLaren is definitely one of the more historic teams
on the grid. It's one of only three that's been
around for decades that has kept the same name over time.
The other two are and the other Williams. Yes. So,
(01:55):
McLaren was founded by a New Zealand racing driver named
Bruce McLaren in nineteen sixty three. He won four Grands
Prix and got twenty seven podiums during his time and racing.
Uh it's great, except that he died in a test
driving accident in nineteen seventy at the age of thirty two. Yeah,
(02:19):
so that sucks. Ended obviously a very storied career tragically
and abruptly, But they kept the McLaren name alive. McLaren
really had its initial heyday starting in the late seventies
into the early two thousand's. It was known for really
having a lot of innovative engineering, playing around a lot
(02:39):
with like weights of cars and aerodynamics and kind of
trying things out and obviously after a certain point that
attracts some of the best drivers. They're also home to
some of the greatest rivalries on the grid. In the
late eighties early nineties, for instance, they were two drivers,
a Land Prost and Ayrton Senna. They both won several
World championships. Yeah, same team. I think everyone knows pressed
(03:01):
by now. He's always complaining that he's never his fault.
If I find him again in the same way they
push him out, that's for sure. The way he's doing,
he's behaving like a coward. They're kind of the quintessential
example of rivalry within a team and how that can
almost tear the team apart. Right. Yrton Senna died back
in a very tragic accident that was very public during
a race weekend, and it's it's very much an accident
(03:24):
that you can see online which is very grim and morbid.
But yeah, it was very public. A driver had already
died that weekend. It's all just very sad. He was
actually carrying the driver's like country flag in his car
to wave it after the race. Like it's just all
really depressing. That doesn't happen in golf. Yeah, so so
basically McLaren historic team, not a nail unfit in the
(03:45):
McLaren garage r and success today meant that they finished
the Constructors Championship. I really can't find any words absolutely right.
They were the number one team for a while. They
were number one team and Lewis Hamilton's won his first
World Championship two thousand eight in a McLaren, so he
was really a McLaren guy. That's why it was so
shocking when he left. Lewis Hamilton's is set to leave McLaren.
(04:10):
The two thousand and eight F one World champion will
race the Mercedes. The team took a real nose dive
starting in the early tens. They didn't really nail the
new regulations in two thousand nine, They had really ineffective leadership,
a lot of drama between team co owners behind the
scenes kerfuffles if you will. They had mechanical problems, they
(04:30):
had if the drivers at times, and had some other
kind of inner team drama that all kind of led
to a real slump knoween around this time where it
just was really not looking good for them. That the
long time McLaren fans were really not feeling great, really tough. Yeah,
quite embarrassing really to be floating round at the back.
(04:51):
Before we get to the present day and kind of
their their upswing, We're going to talk about one of
the great F one scandals, and of course you know
it's serious. It's called Spygate. It must have a gate.
At the end of I was gonna say the gate
comes in Spygate. We're gonna go back to Ferrari for
(05:13):
a second. So Ferrari at this point is in a
championship battle with McLaren. McLaren has two different drivers, the
rivals Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, in the hunt for
that same title. So they have a at Ferrari a
higher up employee named Nigel Stepney. He starts publicly and
(05:35):
privately complaining about being unhappy with the team. He doesn't
like them. He's kind of over it with Ferrari. All
of a sudden, one day, Uh, Ferrari alleges that this guy,
Nigel Stepney, gave almost eight hundred pages of confidential Ferrari
information to a McLaren senior engineer named Mike Coglin. Oh,
(06:00):
Nigel and Mike, what are you doing. So that's already
like Nigel and Mike doing a lot. But here's where
it gets very funny of how they discovered this at Ferrari.
So here's what we know, is that or the belief
is that Nigel gives these pages to Mike Coglin, Mike
Coglan's wife, just like a random other lady takes the
(06:23):
seven hundred and eighty pages to like a printer store,
remember those back in two seven, to a printer store
to have them photo copied. And the person, the employee
who works at the printer store who's helping with this
is a Ferrari fan who realizes that they are helping
print confidential Ferrari information called Yes, the Folcy came through
(06:49):
so hard in this story, and so then the to
Folcy person goes to Ferrari's like, hey, whistle blowing the
ship out of this. Someone came into my store and like,
it's printing out documents. So obviously that's crazy, it's fucking nuts.
It's part of my French the f bomb was necessary,
just like the wildest, weirdest coincidence to have a Ferrari
fan running the printer shop that day. What does it
(07:10):
say about me that I blame the wife. You know,
it's like, of all the places, you're gonna pick that place.
But maybe I mean, where do you go? Where do
you copy eight? You can't copy it at home? I
bet you this happened all the time that we don't
know about. I wouldn't be surprised. There's a lot of
as we know, teams will be very hush hush, but
every team is not hush hush about every other team. Correct.
(07:32):
That's how we know driver salary estimations is not from
the teams. But everyone loves to gossip in the F
one paddock. So Coglin from McLaren and Stepane from Ferrari
are very quickly dismissed as soon as this all comes
to light, you know, the f i A is the
governing body, is immediately like, well, we gotta do something
about this. We gotta have hearings, because we know briercrats
(07:52):
left nothing more than a hearing. It gets them going
in the morning. And they're big question mark is did
McLaren have access to these documents, you know and mass
and did they use the information they got from them
to get an advantage in the sport. So initially they
say we have not at any stage used any intellectual
(08:12):
property of any other team. Oh no, this guy Coglin
acted alone, as did stepped me. It's very contained. No
one at McLaren saw these documents. I don't believe that
we'll get into all of that right after the break.
Let me do a quick recap just so I understand. Recap.
Lewis Hamilton and Fernando both race for McLaren. Yes, at
(08:33):
this point McLaren is in a tight race with Ferrari
for the titles. For the titles, Nigel Ferrari secretly gave
Mike McLaren eight hundred pages. Mike McLaren's wife photo copied
it at the local kink Kinkos that the Ferrari fan
works at the Kinkos, and turned him in. Okay, so
(08:55):
I got that right, Thank you did. You did a
great job explain that to me. And I would also
think this is not the first time this has happened.
And I would also think they did use this information,
and I would also think more people were involved. But
that's just me. Here we go, Okay, here's what's also
going on. So the backdrop of this whole thing is
Lewis Hamilton's and Fernando Alonso they're really duking it out
for this title, absolutely hate each other, and basically Louis
(09:19):
does something that could have been seen as like borderline
not kosher, and Fernando gets angry at it and sort
of tries to sabotage the race because he's so piste
not getting on with it. On a minute forty to go?
Is he flocking Hamilton? That was a little bit of
nualtyall think. And then the fa basically says, McLaren, you
gotta get your ship together. Your drivers are like putting
(09:40):
putting the sport at risk and making us look bad.
This is a couple of weeks after the initial photo
copy whistle blowing incident in the f AI hearing. But
what comes out of this whole issue is so basically
Fernando Alonso being piste off in a petty person, goes
to the f i A and he he's like, hey,
(10:01):
me and the reserve driver at McLaren, This dude, Pedro
de LaRosa have emails that prove that McLaren know about
these documents, have read them and have like used them
to our advantage, snitching on his own team. Stitching on
his own team because he's pissed about how he feels
like they're treating him versus Lewis Hamilton's and so, yeah,
(10:22):
this is your employer, sign your million dollar check. Yeah.
So so then of course the head han show at
McLaren at the time, Ron Dennis is saying that, you know,
Alonzo is just trying to blackmail them because he's pissy
and but hurt, etcetera, etcetera. But of course the f
A look into this, they claim that they get substantial
evidence that this is in fact the case, and they
(10:44):
hand down a one hundred million dollar fine McLaren unprecedented
in the history of Formula one, if not just sports history,
hundred million dollars. And don't left points from two thousand
and sevens championship withdrawing them from next year's championship as well,
which makes it even more draconian. You had different team
members and personnel coming out with all sorts of statements.
(11:06):
I'm absolutely appalled. I'm disgusted. There is a great possibility
of it wiping McLaren off my Formula one map altogether,
true madness. So here's the funny thing where I love
like the ethics of F one are very inconsistent. Is
you would think they would say, oh, if we're just
qualifying and giving this huge fine, we'll just qualify the
drivers too. But no. Good news for Lewis Hamilton for
(11:29):
his teammate Fernando Alonso in the McLaren team are that
they won't be punished, their points won't be taken away
the f A as official reasoning as they say, well,
you know, the drivers are really honest with us and
we appreciate their honesty in actuality. They were locked in
a very compelling championship battle with this third guy at
the other team implicated in this whole situation, and they
didn't want to suddenly have two to three drivers go
(11:50):
poof in the night. So so the team is in trouble,
but not the individual. That's interesting and it's very It
adds to the complexity of Formula one and that there
is also this engineering component that's so that that's there's
there's also a race for the engineering exactly. Yeah. So,
as I said, this is two thousand seven, McLaren a
couple of years later starts to have a little bit
(12:11):
of a slide down the rankings. Yeah, this is gonna
be a lot of drama. Is gonna hurt you? Yeah,
this seems like a lot of drama. Like I said,
they had leadership problems, they had some driver issues, they
had mechanical problems. Just everything was not adding up for them.
It was poorly managed. There was money problems. The list
goes on and on. However, they made a couple of
big changes towards the end of this downturn one a
(12:32):
lot of the original you know owners who are causing issues,
like Ron Dennis. They end up leaving, but not without again,
lots of drama. A guy named Zach Brown ends up
coming in and he's an American, he's the California dude bro. Yeah,
And and they make some other big changes to their leadership,
and basically by they end up in third place in
(12:54):
the championship. And then this past year they were in
third but ended up in fourth. So they went from
kind of being in in you know, bottom of the
grid to being kind of in that best of the
rest category where them in Ferrari were sort of you know,
duking it out for that that unofficial informal title, which
(13:15):
is exciting in terms of leadership. Yeah, they have this
guy Zach Brown. I'll show you photos of Zach Brown,
so uh not to be mistaken with Zach Brown band
No spelled slightly differently, but Zach Brown is from California,
was born and I think Los Angeles, so here is
Zach Brown. Zach Brown doesn't doesn't really fit the same
(13:40):
kind of mold as the rest of these guys. Zach
Brown looks American silver foxy probably, you know, how do
I say this kindly? He's not as fit as the
other team principles Uh interesting. He actually used to also
be a racing driver, not enough one or anything like that,
but he's he's very knowledgeable at cars. He as his
own giant car collection. Not as alpha male ish looking.
(14:04):
Yeah you know you look at it red Bull and
they're pretty tough on their drivers publicly, That's not my approach.
It's more of a we're in this together. What can
I give you or do for you? Good time? Guy?
Arry gets very enthusiastic and we'll shout in woo a
lot when when they win or do well. Zach is
(14:27):
so ingrained into that McLaren racing team you're hearing from
Popular f one TikTok or Josh Marsh that like people
like all the time are like what is that? Like,
what is his role? Like? Is he team boss? It?
Like what is He's like, Oh No, he's just the CEO.
He's just always there. I love that a CEO is
around all the time, Like he's there on the pit wall,
he's there with the engineers, he's like with the drivers.
(14:49):
Um So that like kind of camaraderie and like that
dedication the team. I I love to see because just
as a team, the things that they do as a
team is so like so different. Yeah. So, Zach Brown
actually had a really fun bet going with Daniel Ricardo
at the start of Daniel's first season where he said, hey, Daniel,
you're new to McLaren. If you get a podium, I
(15:11):
will let you drive one of Dale Earnhart's cars. Because
he knows that Daniel Ricardo is the biggest Dale Earnhart fan.
He decided to race under the number three because of
Dale Earnhart. He loves NASCAR, and sure enough, when Daniel
Ricardo won Manza, he got to drive that car at
(15:33):
the U S Grand Prix no less. And then similarly,
when when when Daniel want to race last year one,
Zach Brown and him had another bet going, and Zach
got a tattoo of the Manza circuit on his arm
with the date of the win. And of course they
(15:54):
brought every with cameras there. It was all over social media.
But he's the kind of guy who will do kind
of funny stuff like that that's kind of absurd, and
he holds up his end of the bargain. So and
as a player, if your coach leader is doing that stuff,
you love that exactly. The other thing too that McLaren
did really well kind of as they were building up
is around the time they were really having trouble is
(16:16):
when that company, Liberty Media bought f one from our
our our old friend Bernie from way back. When McLaren
around the same time decided, hey, we're going to kind
of do almost like a brand refresh. I think I
enjoyed watching that shift of watching McLaren go from like
a yes, we are all business and no fun to
like a lighthearted team very like more fun, more enjoyable. Um.
(16:39):
And then I saw McLaren was one of the first
teams to do a lot more on the social media
side of things, you know, with like TikTok with YouTube videos,
funny little things like hey, we're gonna you know, we're
gonna play songs for you and you're gonna guess what
the song is. Just basic stuff that kind of gave
fans more of this inside look at the team to
make them feel like they were part of it online
(16:59):
on our Hi, I'm Daniel mcconder, which I'm sure the
athletes hated, but fans love exactly. And now it's it's
more part of the course. You know, coming in f one,
you're gonna have to do that. That was not the
case even you know, five, six, seven years ago. This
was all brand new. But McLaren also, for instance, has
a very popular race weekend recap series called Unboxed where
(17:21):
their their media team just goes around filming things. There's
no narration over, it's just filming what goes on over
a race weekend. The Senna Monuments where he had his
fatal accident May one, and I remember it like it
was yesterday. There's an unbelievably sad and fans immediately, you know,
(17:42):
loved it. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I'd like to check
that out. It feels like you're not just a fan
of McLaren, like you're part of the McLaren family and
like that's pretty sick, like that they can make you
feel like that. So this all coincided to with the
launch of that show Drive to Survive on Netflix, which
started airing in McLaren had already started building up this
really strong social media presence, this digital presence and Drive
(18:06):
to Survive was aimed at a lot of North American fans,
particularly Americans. So despite the fact that Bruce McLaren is
from Note New Zealand, them claren team is based in
the UK, it's become the the unofficial American team on
the grid. I think some people have like adopted almost
Zach Brown as the unofficial American mascot. And now obviously
(18:29):
we want to talk about the drivers, but before we
do that, we are going to take a quick ad break.
We're back from the ad break. I want to hear
about the McLaren drivers. So they have two of who
I would argue are the most marketable drivers on the
entire grid. That is, they have Lando Norris and they
have Daniel Ricardo. Lando and Daniel are fun and that
(18:52):
they are so different from each other, both in terms
of personality and in terms of where they are in
their careers, and then also where they are in terms
of McLaren the team. So we'll start with Lando. Lando
is twenty two and as Ferrari is a big Charles
Laclard team, and as Red Bull is a giant Max
(19:12):
verstaff and team McLaren is a giant Lando Norris team.
So Lando, yeah, is from the UK. He's British. His
family does have wealth. His dad is worth two hundred
and thirty million pounds at last calculation, and for some
reason this is available on the internet that at one
point his dad was the five dred and first richest
(19:34):
person in England. We've talked about some drivers who you
other families had a really struggle to make ends meet
and have them race and even krding. This is not
necessarily the case for Lando. I would say the Norris
family seems very fun though, like his parents seemed relatively normal,
like they they aren't like like whereas Max's dad. We
all the stuff to say, they're kind of in the background.
They randomly show up to races. In a very cute
(19:56):
moment after Lando one podium, he got a podium at Monico.
There's a clip of him in a McLaren unboxed video
of him talking to his mom while he's holding his
trophy and he's like, yeah, you were right. Yea. His
teammates are kind of making fun of him. They're going like, mummy,
(20:19):
so he's at he's he's a kid, he's a mom's boy.
Uh So Lando, Yeah, grew up racing against a lot
of these other people we talked about, like George Russell,
another person who's in the mix of guy Alex Alban.
All these drivers on the grid who are kind of
from the UK had to race in karting together at
some point. They obviously also race people like Max Verstappen.
There's like hilarious photos online of Lando who is the
(20:40):
tiniest person. He's only five seven now, like this tiny
like shrimp of a kid, and then Max Verstappen looks
like a giant next to him, and they're like thirteen
years old. You know, it's it's it's very funny. So yeah,
Lando was sort of um. He started driving under a
McLaren McLaren's Young Driver's program long ago. He became an
(21:01):
F one driver when he was only nineteen years old.
And you think he's tiny now, he looked tiny then
as a barely nineteen year old, you know, barely legal
adult who was on the grid. I think there were
some people who were really skeptical despite him having a
very good race record of him coming on, especially that
young and in the midst of the McLaren team really
not doing well. You know, Lando showed up and McLaren
(21:22):
was not great, so it was probably hard for him
to be like, well, I've already put so many eggs
in this basket. I'm gonna go you know, I'm gonna
I'm gonna go with my gut and go with this team.
So yeah, so Lando came in very much as the
golden boy or sort of. The idea was, we're going
to build this program around Lando. Not to say that
they're going to ignore the second driver like Red Bull
almost does in a lot of cases, but the idea was,
(21:42):
you know, we invested all this time in Lando's career.
He's coming in. This was happening right after you know,
Zach Brown had only been with the team for a
little bit. He really loved Lando. They have a great relationship,
and the idea was, we're all going to build together.
So Lando comes in, he's doing great. He also at
the time when he came in, he drove for his
first two years with Carlos who's now at Ferrari. They
have a very close friendship. They're called Carlando by the
(22:05):
fan base. It's better than Lando's exactly, Yeah, Carlando. I've
seen I've seen merch that has like gravestones that say
like r I P. Carlando on them, like people were
very passionate about them as a driver pairing. But on
that in that dynamic, Carlos was faster than Lando both years. Yea.
So on top of that one makes Lando a little
different than other drivers. He kind of is very public
(22:28):
about having a life and a career outside of F one.
So whereas you know, we all we know about Max
ver Staff and is he is like all about driving
seven In particular, Lando is known for doing a ton
of Twitch streaming, and he has an e sports slash
lifestyle brand and team called Quadrant. His number on the
(22:48):
greatest number four. It's it's it's quintessential, Like some teenager
came up with this and they think it's brilliant, and
you're like, okay, we're lucky. People were getting to play
F one twenty one and we're doing it at no
other right, and as a vision where I'm racing this weekend.
Obviously it's not for money, but it's it's smart from
a marketing standpoint that he has something else going on.
(23:09):
But of course when he first entered at nineteen, there
was a lot of criticism of him being interested in
other stuff like twitch streaming. Right. People were like, this
kid is not, you know, taking this sport seriously, This
little punk is not focusing on his racing very hard apparently,
and it was also hard because McLaren wasn't doing well,
so he wasn't necessarily killing it on the grid because
he was a rookie at a team that was really
(23:30):
trying to build back up, and having all this criticism
at that age is hard. He's actually talked a lot
about it, and he's one of the only drivers who's
very open about his mental health and the toll that
being enough one driver can take on a person which
is definitely very different. You know, it's good that their
necks are so strong because there's so much going on
(23:51):
in the head. I don't know, you can edit that
at or or replay it many times. I mean, Lando
does have like a very thick neck for his like
big heads their next are unbelievable. I'm I'm I'm baffled
at their next strength. Okay, so that's Lando. Who's the
other driver, Dania Ricardo. Technically his name should be pronounced
(24:11):
Richiardo if we're going by the Italian pronunciation, but Daniel
the Australian does not care Daniel. There's a reason why
if you watch the show Drive to Survive, Daniel is
the first driver you meet in the very first episode
of the first season. And it makes complete sense because
this happened to me when I watched Drive to Survive.
(24:32):
All of my friends, regardless of gender, this happened then,
where they said, Oh my god, I am so invested
in this one guy. He is personable, he is very positive,
he's very funny, and he's great with press. He's great
with the media, is great with fans. It seems effortless.
I haven't seen Drive to Survive. I was specifically told
by Sports Illustrated not to watch it. But you meet
(24:54):
Daniel Ricardo over the Internet and you immediately like him
because he's not putting it on. Isn't you like it
at least? Yeah, that's just how he is. Now. There
are other drivers who do have personalities on the grid,
whether you like them or not, they they're giving us more.
But especially when Daniel even started, you know, over a
decade ago, that wasn't necessarily the case. And he was
always very open and fun even with the media back then,
(25:15):
in a way that other drivers weren't or really tried
hard not to be. So he always stood out, not
just in terms of the personality he has, but in
comparison to literally know of the Grid. Was your relationship
with the Nicol Hackenberg compared to your relationship with Max
are you always doing? Um? I mean they're both non sexual,
which is certainly beneficial for the working environment. Is Daniel
(25:38):
one of the better drivers? Yes? So Daniel is an
interesting case. So Daniels a very fun driver to watch.
He can be aggressive when he needs to be. There's
just something about the way that Daniel races Josh marsh
He is like aggressive and he's very bold and ballsy
with the like with the moves that he will make
UM and I really like that. I like the risk
that he's taken races UM. He's had a lot of
(26:01):
race wins. He was really considered at one point to
be a driver who was going to win a championship. Uh,
here's how it went for him. So Daniel started out
in Red Bulls young driver program. He distinguished himself very quickly.
He was really talented, very very early on. He got
his start on a very short lived and disastrous team
called HRT not important, but within a year he went
(26:24):
over to that junior sister team at red Bull Toro
Rosso now Alpha TWI. He was there for a few
seasons before he was promoted to the Red Bull team, right,
and he was like a perfect person for Red Bull.
He's positive, he's fun. They would make him do these
weird challenges and drive the car in weird environments and
he loved it and you know, the crowd would eat
(26:44):
it up wherever he was. He's just like the perfect
encapsulation of that brand and in a slightly less kind
of Alpha match away, he's just very fun. Right. He
does something that he has coined a shoey. If he
ends up on the podium where he takes off his
racing boot, you know he's had on for a whole
race that is smelly and disgusting and like is like
hot and gross. I know where is he dumps his
(27:07):
champagne on it or in it and then drinks out
of it. I want some tennis players to do that.
It had some pizzazz. Shoey shoey. Yeah, of course he
says it with his like Australian accents, so it sounds
cooler and hipper than when I say it. I feel
like I dug a hole for myself for this one.
I'm just like walking along minding my business and they're
like doing shoe I don't actually just take my shoe
(27:29):
of while I'm looking in the street and drink out
of it. However, by his teammate is Max for Steppin
and as we know Dr Evil, as we know Red
Bull has made a very clear that Max is their dude. Yeah, yeah,
they are like all in. We'd love to know how
(27:49):
exactly that happened. All happen, but we'll talk about that
in season two. Yeah, it'll take a while. But so Daniel,
obviously he's older than Max. He's thirty two now, he
was in his late twenties. Then he's aware of what's
going on. He feels like, hey, Red Bull might not
be prioritizing me the same way, and in a somewhat
surprising announcement even to Red Bull, he says he's leaving
(28:09):
the team at the end of and even weirder, he
is moving to a team called Reyno, which everyone was like,
rend out there, kind of lateral move maybe exactly. Yeah,
it was kind of a weird move, and he was
there for two years. It was kind of a weird fit.
He didn't do poorly. He actually finished fifth in the
championship his second year there, but it's just yeah, it
(28:30):
was kind of an odd time for him. And again,
he's the same personality, still very happy, go lucky, very
work hard, play hard. But he then announces that he
is going to move at the end of to McLaren.
So when from being a guy who seemed almost like
a one team guy with the whole Red Bull organization
to kind of bouncing around a little bit. So here's
(28:50):
where things get interesting. So McLaren announces this driver lineup, right,
Lando and Daniel. The fan base is like, oh my god,
these two fun person guys that we love on the
internet are going to be together. This is gonna be dope,
Like everything's gonna be great, like people were so hype.
But unsurprisingly, Lando is kind of used to being, you know,
the keeper of his own domain. And I would say Daniel,
(29:13):
despite being a cancer on the zodiac sign, very much
has like Leo energy, Like he loves to be like tall.
It makes sense like three percent of the people listening,
but he has like a lot of he likes to
be the center of attention. I'll put it that way.
He likes to ham it up. Lando hams it up
in a different way. But these are two people who
are kind of used to having the spotlight on them.
I'll be it very in very different ways. Lando can
(29:34):
be a little more quiet and a little more reserved
than you have Daniel coming in just like WHOA, let's go. Um.
So a lot of these initial videos you were seeing
coming out from McLaren, it would really be Daniel carrying
these videos and like trying as hard as in. Lando
was like he didn't really care to hang out with
Daniel as much. Um honestly, like, oh, maybe this relationship
is not working. Um, And in reality it was just
(29:58):
it's a very they're very different people in the way
that they approached racing, in the way they approached life.
It's almost like there's a weird passive aggression to some
of their interactions of like I can't tell if he's
kidding or if he is serious, and that is a problem,
Like all their jokes to each other have that quality
to them where you're like, oh, this body language is weird,
and so what makes us worse is Lando, despite being
(30:18):
behind Carlos for his first two seasons and being a
rookie and making you know, some mistakes, even in his
sophomore season, he has this gun's blazing breakout season, particularly
in the first half of one, so he's killing it.
And on the flip side, Daniel isn't just kind of
liking a little bit behind. He is struggling at McLaren.
There's lots of theories and reasons as to why. A
(30:38):
big one that he brought up is and everyone has
said the McLaren car, regardless of season, is just kind
of built differently. Daniel has said that he almost had
to relearn how to drive in F one to drive
the McLaren car, like it doesn't you know, he kind
of doesn't doesn't break the same way he's used to.
He can't really use his natural strength to drive this car.
So you have races where Lando is qualifying, you know,
(30:59):
like P. Five, and Daniel's qualifying like P. Sixteen, Like
it's it's just huge discrepancies. So it's very obvious that
Lando is just killing it. And of course he's had
this car now this is that was his third season.
He's now been in that car for over three years. Uh,
but you know, Daniel's just having the hardest time getting it.
And obviously to a lot of Daniel's whole vibe and
persona and quote unquote brand is that he's winning. He's
(31:21):
this fun guy. It's a little bit harder to be
like the positive fun guy when you're not yeah, when
you suck, and the guy who's beating you on your
team is a decade younger. And it's also really well liked,
really popular. It's not even like a less press requests
you get. You get to show off your personality a
lot less and no one even wants you to thanks
for your unwavering Yeah, it's one that everyone The McLaren's
(31:50):
story in two is turning into one where you're seeing
two drivers on completely opposite traject trees. So on one
side you've got Lando Norris, this young, dynamic driver who
had this breakout one season. The world is his oyster.
Even if the McLaren Carr isn't quite there in two.
(32:13):
There's still a lot of hope for him. He's still
in conversations about one day being this championship caliber driver.
And then the opposite side of the garage, you've got
Danil Ricardo, who has a massive fan base, is very beloved,
but he has just been having a slog of a
time for a year and a half at this point,
and even some of the most die hard Daniel Ricardo
(32:34):
fans out there are worried that this is in fact
the beginning of the end, you know, the real high
points of his career are behind him. I think he
has what it takes to be a champion. I just
don't think he's in the right on the right team
to be a champion. And I think that that is just,
unfortunately the way the cookie crumbles right now. This is
Nicole Seevers, a co creator of Two Girls, One Formula
(32:54):
and Danny rick Stand. He's just all around a happy person,
you know, just spite his dumb comments, he makes every
now and again real Golden Retriever energy. You know, um,
just happy, go lucky. Hard not to root for him
when he's buddies with everyone in the paddock. Always like
cheering people on. He's got drive, and I just want
(33:15):
I just want what's best for him, and I want
him to succeed and I hold him close to my heart.
Sounds like she's talking about an X. McLaren has been
hard for him this past season. So at this point,
I think Danny Rick is a little bit of an
underdog and I want to see him return to his
former glory of being Red Bull. Danny finishing for a
(33:36):
second podium after podium. I just don't think that a
championship is in his future unless he gets like pulled
up to Mercedes or you know, back to Red Bull,
which I don't want for him. Um. I just I
don't feel good about it, unfortunately, And I really hate
to say that on the record in case you know
(33:57):
that sever comes up in the court of law. Um,
but like, I'm not feeling good. He did have some
some real high points and he did win a race
at Manza, but generally speaking, in one not gonna lie
or mince words here, it's been a pretty bleak for
most races. If you're Dana Ricardo, hey, maybe he completely
(34:18):
turns it around and has this gangbuster second half of
the season, But right now, there are a ton of
rumors swirling around what Daniel Ricardo is going to be
doing next year. He is supposed to have a contract
with McLaren through three, but they're just being incredibly opaque
about what is going on with him. Yeah, so, how
(34:41):
how does McLaren stack for you compared to the other
three teams that you've heard about this far? I personally
and more attracted to grit than shine. McLaren feels shiny
like with their marketing, and Daniel is so fucking likable,
Like it's this guy TV hosters. He a professional competitor.
(35:03):
But I get, I get what everyone's saying. I'm I'm
buying what they're selling. I think that's cool, But I'm
I'm a I might like a little more street fighter
one Daniel like crash into someone. You'll be like, yeah,
like we've got so I don't want that. I want
Daniel to lose his ship on a reporter, you know.
(35:25):
And I want to see I want to see like
the fire in his belly that for a moment doesn't
care if he's accepted or liked by others. He's just
ready to function up. He went like slightly unhinged behavior.
I want a little bit unhinged behavior. And Lando seems
like a really excellent driver who's slowly climbing and he
(35:46):
has the foundation to stay there when he gets all
the way up. I like that too. Tennis has these
guys who are so good, so young, but you can
tell they're kind of like foundationally aren't aren't set up,
and then they get there and they blow it or whatever.
But it seems like Lando is slow and steady, young
going to the top. That's that's cool. It's one of
the youngest two out there and still still really holding
(36:07):
his own. They say in show biz, the longer it
takes you to go up, the longer takes you to
come down. And maybe that's what I was thinking about
with Lando. I like that. Yeah, so yeah, so are
are like the Chuckos and the Georgia is still at
the top for you. I do like those guys. I
(36:31):
don't know how to answer that, but I do like
the the Lando Daniel team. I do like that. Um.
I like the teams where the two drivers are can
both win. I know right now with McLaren it feels
like Daniel maybe kind of isn't there, but maybe he'll
get there. So if that's an answer. That's my answer. Okay,
(36:55):
So next episode, we are switching gears. We're moving to
a team that is almost like the true midfield. We
are moving to a team called Alpine formerly called Reno,
and they are also one of the teams that is
responsible for another one of the biggest scandals in F
one history. It's got everything, it's got crashes, it's got
(37:16):
people turning on one another within the same team. We
love to see it. And it's got two very different drivers,
one of whom is a scrappy young kid just trying
to make his mark. And then you've got one of
the titans in the sport of Formula one. Who's who's
still out there twenty years later, So that will be Alpine.
(37:44):
This has been Choosing Size f one, a production of
Sports Illustrated Studios and I Heart Radio. The show was
hosted by Michael Costa and Lily harp. This episode was
produced by Lily Harman and our senior producer Hi mi Ta,
who also did the sound design at the cutting room studios.
(38:04):
We are recorded by engineer Robot Larry, the second mastering
by Cello Wisblue. Max Miller is the executive producer and
Brennan get us his head of audio at s I Studios.
At I Heart Radio, Sean Titon is our executive producer.
For more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I
(38:25):
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
on Instagram at Choosing Sides
Okay, ready to go. Uh gimmick is up here? Have
we have many gimmicks today? So to kick us off,
I have another one of my beloved coasters. This is
uh Danil Ricardo is on this in his McLaren gear.
Lily handed me a paster of Daniel Riccardo in the
quote beneath his characature drawing is sometimes you gotta lick
(00:22):
the stamp and send it. Sometimes you just got to
lick the stamp and send it. A lot of the
time you get one chance to try. So I made
the most of every opportunity. Man. From what I can
tell about him, likable guy, very across is likable guy.
And we will get to the ballad of Danil Ricardo
very soon. From I Heart Radio and Sports Illustrated Studios,
(00:45):
this is choosing sides. Yes one Wow. So first and foremost,
we're talking about a team that is historic, It is revered,
(01:06):
it is storied. It is the second winning ist team
on the grid end of all time in F one.
That is a ton of races, second only two Ferrari
and they have had a rough go of it as
of late. The team we are talking about today, which
is America's kind of informal team is McLaren McLaren. So
(01:28):
who is McLaren. I've heard this name all the time,
and even as an American, I feel familiar somewhat with
the brand, but I really don't know a whole lot. Yeah,
so McLaren is definitely one of the more historic teams
on the grid. It's one of only three that's been
around for decades that has kept the same name over time.
The other two are and the other Williams. Yes. So,
(01:55):
McLaren was founded by a New Zealand racing driver named
Bruce McLaren in nineteen sixty three. He won four Grands
Prix and got twenty seven podiums during his time and racing.
Uh it's great, except that he died in a test
driving accident in nineteen seventy at the age of thirty two. Yeah,
(02:19):
so that sucks. Ended obviously a very storied career tragically
and abruptly, But they kept the McLaren name alive. McLaren
really had its initial heyday starting in the late seventies
into the early two thousand's. It was known for really
having a lot of innovative engineering, playing around a lot
(02:39):
with like weights of cars and aerodynamics and kind of
trying things out and obviously after a certain point that
attracts some of the best drivers. They're also home to
some of the greatest rivalries on the grid. In the
late eighties early nineties, for instance, they were two drivers,
a Land Prost and Ayrton Senna. They both won several
World championships. Yeah, same team. I think everyone knows pressed
(03:01):
by now. He's always complaining that he's never his fault.
If I find him again in the same way they
push him out, that's for sure. The way he's doing,
he's behaving like a coward. They're kind of the quintessential
example of rivalry within a team and how that can
almost tear the team apart. Right. Yrton Senna died back
in a very tragic accident that was very public during
a race weekend, and it's it's very much an accident
(03:24):
that you can see online which is very grim and morbid.
But yeah, it was very public. A driver had already
died that weekend. It's all just very sad. He was
actually carrying the driver's like country flag in his car
to wave it after the race. Like it's just all
really depressing. That doesn't happen in golf. Yeah, so so
basically McLaren historic team, not a nail unfit in the
(03:45):
McLaren garage r and success today meant that they finished
the Constructors Championship. I really can't find any words absolutely right.
They were the number one team for a while. They
were number one team and Lewis Hamilton's won his first
World Championship two thousand eight in a McLaren, so he
was really a McLaren guy. That's why it was so
shocking when he left. Lewis Hamilton's is set to leave McLaren.
(04:10):
The two thousand and eight F one World champion will
race the Mercedes. The team took a real nose dive
starting in the early tens. They didn't really nail the
new regulations in two thousand nine, They had really ineffective leadership,
a lot of drama between team co owners behind the
scenes kerfuffles if you will. They had mechanical problems, they
(04:30):
had if the drivers at times, and had some other
kind of inner team drama that all kind of led
to a real slump knoween around this time where it
just was really not looking good for them. That the
long time McLaren fans were really not feeling great, really tough. Yeah,
quite embarrassing really to be floating round at the back.
(04:51):
Before we get to the present day and kind of
their their upswing, We're going to talk about one of
the great F one scandals, and of course you know
it's serious. It's called Spygate. It must have a gate.
At the end of I was gonna say the gate
comes in Spygate. We're gonna go back to Ferrari for
(05:13):
a second. So Ferrari at this point is in a
championship battle with McLaren. McLaren has two different drivers, the
rivals Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, in the hunt for
that same title. So they have a at Ferrari a
higher up employee named Nigel Stepney. He starts publicly and
(05:35):
privately complaining about being unhappy with the team. He doesn't
like them. He's kind of over it with Ferrari. All
of a sudden, one day, Uh, Ferrari alleges that this guy,
Nigel Stepney, gave almost eight hundred pages of confidential Ferrari
information to a McLaren senior engineer named Mike Coglin. Oh,
(06:00):
Nigel and Mike, what are you doing. So that's already
like Nigel and Mike doing a lot. But here's where
it gets very funny of how they discovered this at Ferrari.
So here's what we know, is that or the belief
is that Nigel gives these pages to Mike Coglin, Mike
Coglan's wife, just like a random other lady takes the
(06:23):
seven hundred and eighty pages to like a printer store,
remember those back in two seven, to a printer store
to have them photo copied. And the person, the employee
who works at the printer store who's helping with this
is a Ferrari fan who realizes that they are helping
print confidential Ferrari information called Yes, the Folcy came through
(06:49):
so hard in this story, and so then the to
Folcy person goes to Ferrari's like, hey, whistle blowing the
ship out of this. Someone came into my store and like,
it's printing out documents. So obviously that's crazy, it's fucking nuts.
It's part of my French the f bomb was necessary,
just like the wildest, weirdest coincidence to have a Ferrari
fan running the printer shop that day. What does it
(07:10):
say about me that I blame the wife. You know,
it's like, of all the places, you're gonna pick that place.
But maybe I mean, where do you go? Where do
you copy eight? You can't copy it at home? I
bet you this happened all the time that we don't
know about. I wouldn't be surprised. There's a lot of
as we know, teams will be very hush hush, but
every team is not hush hush about every other team. Correct.
(07:32):
That's how we know driver salary estimations is not from
the teams. But everyone loves to gossip in the F
one paddock. So Coglin from McLaren and Stepane from Ferrari
are very quickly dismissed as soon as this all comes
to light, you know, the f i A is the
governing body, is immediately like, well, we gotta do something
about this. We gotta have hearings, because we know briercrats
(07:52):
left nothing more than a hearing. It gets them going
in the morning. And they're big question mark is did
McLaren have access to these documents, you know and mass
and did they use the information they got from them
to get an advantage in the sport. So initially they
say we have not at any stage used any intellectual
(08:12):
property of any other team. Oh no, this guy Coglin
acted alone, as did stepped me. It's very contained. No
one at McLaren saw these documents. I don't believe that
we'll get into all of that right after the break.
Let me do a quick recap just so I understand. Recap.
Lewis Hamilton and Fernando both race for McLaren. Yes, at
(08:33):
this point McLaren is in a tight race with Ferrari
for the titles. For the titles, Nigel Ferrari secretly gave
Mike McLaren eight hundred pages. Mike McLaren's wife photo copied
it at the local kink Kinkos that the Ferrari fan
works at the Kinkos, and turned him in. Okay, so
(08:55):
I got that right, Thank you did. You did a
great job explain that to me. And I would also
think this is not the first time this has happened.
And I would also think they did use this information,
and I would also think more people were involved. But
that's just me. Here we go, Okay, here's what's also
going on. So the backdrop of this whole thing is
Lewis Hamilton's and Fernando Alonso they're really duking it out
for this title, absolutely hate each other, and basically Louis
(09:19):
does something that could have been seen as like borderline
not kosher, and Fernando gets angry at it and sort
of tries to sabotage the race because he's so piste
not getting on with it. On a minute forty to go?
Is he flocking Hamilton? That was a little bit of
nualtyall think. And then the fa basically says, McLaren, you
gotta get your ship together. Your drivers are like putting
(09:40):
putting the sport at risk and making us look bad.
This is a couple of weeks after the initial photo
copy whistle blowing incident in the f AI hearing. But
what comes out of this whole issue is so basically
Fernando Alonso being piste off in a petty person, goes
to the f i A and he he's like, hey,
(10:01):
me and the reserve driver at McLaren, This dude, Pedro
de LaRosa have emails that prove that McLaren know about
these documents, have read them and have like used them
to our advantage, snitching on his own team. Stitching on
his own team because he's pissed about how he feels
like they're treating him versus Lewis Hamilton's and so, yeah,
(10:22):
this is your employer, sign your million dollar check. Yeah.
So so then of course the head han show at
McLaren at the time, Ron Dennis is saying that, you know,
Alonzo is just trying to blackmail them because he's pissy
and but hurt, etcetera, etcetera. But of course the f
A look into this, they claim that they get substantial
evidence that this is in fact the case, and they
(10:44):
hand down a one hundred million dollar fine McLaren unprecedented
in the history of Formula one, if not just sports history,
hundred million dollars. And don't left points from two thousand
and sevens championship withdrawing them from next year's championship as well,
which makes it even more draconian. You had different team
members and personnel coming out with all sorts of statements.
(11:06):
I'm absolutely appalled. I'm disgusted. There is a great possibility
of it wiping McLaren off my Formula one map altogether,
true madness. So here's the funny thing where I love
like the ethics of F one are very inconsistent. Is
you would think they would say, oh, if we're just
qualifying and giving this huge fine, we'll just qualify the
drivers too. But no. Good news for Lewis Hamilton for
(11:29):
his teammate Fernando Alonso in the McLaren team are that
they won't be punished, their points won't be taken away
the f A as official reasoning as they say, well,
you know, the drivers are really honest with us and
we appreciate their honesty in actuality. They were locked in
a very compelling championship battle with this third guy at
the other team implicated in this whole situation, and they
didn't want to suddenly have two to three drivers go
(11:50):
poof in the night. So so the team is in trouble,
but not the individual. That's interesting and it's very It
adds to the complexity of Formula one and that there
is also this engineering component that's so that that's there's
there's also a race for the engineering exactly. Yeah. So,
as I said, this is two thousand seven, McLaren a
couple of years later starts to have a little bit
(12:11):
of a slide down the rankings. Yeah, this is gonna
be a lot of drama. Is gonna hurt you? Yeah,
this seems like a lot of drama. Like I said,
they had leadership problems, they had some driver issues, they
had mechanical problems. Just everything was not adding up for them.
It was poorly managed. There was money problems. The list
goes on and on. However, they made a couple of
big changes towards the end of this downturn one a
(12:32):
lot of the original you know owners who are causing issues,
like Ron Dennis. They end up leaving, but not without again,
lots of drama. A guy named Zach Brown ends up
coming in and he's an American, he's the California dude bro. Yeah,
And and they make some other big changes to their leadership,
and basically by they end up in third place in
(12:54):
the championship. And then this past year they were in
third but ended up in fourth. So they went from
kind of being in in you know, bottom of the
grid to being kind of in that best of the
rest category where them in Ferrari were sort of you know,
duking it out for that that unofficial informal title, which
(13:15):
is exciting in terms of leadership. Yeah, they have this
guy Zach Brown. I'll show you photos of Zach Brown,
so uh not to be mistaken with Zach Brown band
No spelled slightly differently, but Zach Brown is from California,
was born and I think Los Angeles, so here is
Zach Brown. Zach Brown doesn't doesn't really fit the same
(13:40):
kind of mold as the rest of these guys. Zach
Brown looks American silver foxy probably, you know, how do
I say this kindly? He's not as fit as the
other team principles Uh interesting. He actually used to also
be a racing driver, not enough one or anything like that,
but he's he's very knowledgeable at cars. He as his
own giant car collection. Not as alpha male ish looking.
(14:04):
Yeah you know you look at it red Bull and
they're pretty tough on their drivers publicly, That's not my approach.
It's more of a we're in this together. What can
I give you or do for you? Good time? Guy?
Arry gets very enthusiastic and we'll shout in woo a
lot when when they win or do well. Zach is
(14:27):
so ingrained into that McLaren racing team you're hearing from
Popular f one TikTok or Josh Marsh that like people
like all the time are like what is that? Like,
what is his role? Like? Is he team boss? It?
Like what is He's like, Oh No, he's just the CEO.
He's just always there. I love that a CEO is
around all the time, Like he's there on the pit wall,
he's there with the engineers, he's like with the drivers.
(14:49):
Um So that like kind of camaraderie and like that
dedication the team. I I love to see because just
as a team, the things that they do as a
team is so like so different. Yeah. So, Zach Brown
actually had a really fun bet going with Daniel Ricardo
at the start of Daniel's first season where he said, hey, Daniel,
you're new to McLaren. If you get a podium, I
(15:11):
will let you drive one of Dale Earnhart's cars. Because
he knows that Daniel Ricardo is the biggest Dale Earnhart fan.
He decided to race under the number three because of
Dale Earnhart. He loves NASCAR, and sure enough, when Daniel
Ricardo won Manza, he got to drive that car at
(15:33):
the U S Grand Prix no less. And then similarly,
when when when Daniel want to race last year one,
Zach Brown and him had another bet going, and Zach
got a tattoo of the Manza circuit on his arm
with the date of the win. And of course they
(15:54):
brought every with cameras there. It was all over social media.
But he's the kind of guy who will do kind
of funny stuff like that that's kind of absurd, and
he holds up his end of the bargain. So and
as a player, if your coach leader is doing that stuff,
you love that exactly. The other thing too that McLaren
did really well kind of as they were building up
is around the time they were really having trouble is
(16:16):
when that company, Liberty Media bought f one from our
our our old friend Bernie from way back. When McLaren
around the same time decided, hey, we're going to kind
of do almost like a brand refresh. I think I
enjoyed watching that shift of watching McLaren go from like
a yes, we are all business and no fun to
like a lighthearted team very like more fun, more enjoyable. Um.
(16:39):
And then I saw McLaren was one of the first
teams to do a lot more on the social media
side of things, you know, with like TikTok with YouTube videos,
funny little things like hey, we're gonna you know, we're
gonna play songs for you and you're gonna guess what
the song is. Just basic stuff that kind of gave
fans more of this inside look at the team to
make them feel like they were part of it online
(16:59):
on our Hi, I'm Daniel mcconder, which I'm sure the
athletes hated, but fans love exactly. And now it's it's
more part of the course. You know, coming in f one,
you're gonna have to do that. That was not the
case even you know, five, six, seven years ago. This
was all brand new. But McLaren also, for instance, has
a very popular race weekend recap series called Unboxed where
(17:21):
their their media team just goes around filming things. There's
no narration over, it's just filming what goes on over
a race weekend. The Senna Monuments where he had his
fatal accident May one, and I remember it like it
was yesterday. There's an unbelievably sad and fans immediately, you know,
(17:42):
loved it. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I'd like to check
that out. It feels like you're not just a fan
of McLaren, like you're part of the McLaren family and
like that's pretty sick, like that they can make you
feel like that. So this all coincided to with the
launch of that show Drive to Survive on Netflix, which
started airing in McLaren had already started building up this
really strong social media presence, this digital presence and Drive
(18:06):
to Survive was aimed at a lot of North American fans,
particularly Americans. So despite the fact that Bruce McLaren is
from Note New Zealand, them claren team is based in
the UK, it's become the the unofficial American team on
the grid. I think some people have like adopted almost
Zach Brown as the unofficial American mascot. And now obviously
(18:29):
we want to talk about the drivers, but before we
do that, we are going to take a quick ad break.
We're back from the ad break. I want to hear
about the McLaren drivers. So they have two of who
I would argue are the most marketable drivers on the
entire grid. That is, they have Lando Norris and they
have Daniel Ricardo. Lando and Daniel are fun and that
(18:52):
they are so different from each other, both in terms
of personality and in terms of where they are in
their careers, and then also where they are in terms
of McLaren the team. So we'll start with Lando. Lando
is twenty two and as Ferrari is a big Charles
Laclard team, and as Red Bull is a giant Max
(19:12):
verstaff and team McLaren is a giant Lando Norris team.
So Lando, yeah, is from the UK. He's British. His
family does have wealth. His dad is worth two hundred
and thirty million pounds at last calculation, and for some
reason this is available on the internet that at one
point his dad was the five dred and first richest
(19:34):
person in England. We've talked about some drivers who you
other families had a really struggle to make ends meet
and have them race and even krding. This is not
necessarily the case for Lando. I would say the Norris
family seems very fun though, like his parents seemed relatively normal,
like they they aren't like like whereas Max's dad. We
all the stuff to say, they're kind of in the background.
They randomly show up to races. In a very cute
(19:56):
moment after Lando one podium, he got a podium at Monico.
There's a clip of him in a McLaren unboxed video
of him talking to his mom while he's holding his
trophy and he's like, yeah, you were right. Yea. His
teammates are kind of making fun of him. They're going like, mummy,
(20:19):
so he's at he's he's a kid, he's a mom's boy.
Uh So Lando, Yeah, grew up racing against a lot
of these other people we talked about, like George Russell,
another person who's in the mix of guy Alex Alban.
All these drivers on the grid who are kind of
from the UK had to race in karting together at
some point. They obviously also race people like Max Verstappen.
There's like hilarious photos online of Lando who is the
(20:40):
tiniest person. He's only five seven now, like this tiny
like shrimp of a kid, and then Max Verstappen looks
like a giant next to him, and they're like thirteen
years old. You know, it's it's it's very funny. So yeah,
Lando was sort of um. He started driving under a
McLaren McLaren's Young Driver's program long ago. He became an
(21:01):
F one driver when he was only nineteen years old.
And you think he's tiny now, he looked tiny then
as a barely nineteen year old, you know, barely legal
adult who was on the grid. I think there were
some people who were really skeptical despite him having a
very good race record of him coming on, especially that
young and in the midst of the McLaren team really
not doing well. You know, Lando showed up and McLaren
(21:22):
was not great, so it was probably hard for him
to be like, well, I've already put so many eggs
in this basket. I'm gonna go you know, I'm gonna
I'm gonna go with my gut and go with this team.
So yeah, so Lando came in very much as the
golden boy or sort of. The idea was, we're going
to build this program around Lando. Not to say that
they're going to ignore the second driver like Red Bull
almost does in a lot of cases, but the idea was,
(21:42):
you know, we invested all this time in Lando's career.
He's coming in. This was happening right after you know,
Zach Brown had only been with the team for a
little bit. He really loved Lando. They have a great relationship,
and the idea was, we're all going to build together.
So Lando comes in, he's doing great. He also at
the time when he came in, he drove for his
first two years with Carlos who's now at Ferrari. They
have a very close friendship. They're called Carlando by the
(22:05):
fan base. It's better than Lando's exactly, Yeah, Carlando. I've
seen I've seen merch that has like gravestones that say
like r I P. Carlando on them, like people were
very passionate about them as a driver pairing. But on
that in that dynamic, Carlos was faster than Lando both years. Yea.
So on top of that one makes Lando a little
different than other drivers. He kind of is very public
(22:28):
about having a life and a career outside of F one.
So whereas you know, we all we know about Max
ver Staff and is he is like all about driving
seven In particular, Lando is known for doing a ton
of Twitch streaming, and he has an e sports slash
lifestyle brand and team called Quadrant. His number on the
(22:48):
greatest number four. It's it's it's quintessential, Like some teenager
came up with this and they think it's brilliant, and
you're like, okay, we're lucky. People were getting to play
F one twenty one and we're doing it at no
other right, and as a vision where I'm racing this weekend.
Obviously it's not for money, but it's it's smart from
a marketing standpoint that he has something else going on.
(23:09):
But of course when he first entered at nineteen, there
was a lot of criticism of him being interested in
other stuff like twitch streaming. Right. People were like, this
kid is not, you know, taking this sport seriously, This
little punk is not focusing on his racing very hard apparently,
and it was also hard because McLaren wasn't doing well,
so he wasn't necessarily killing it on the grid because
he was a rookie at a team that was really
(23:30):
trying to build back up, and having all this criticism
at that age is hard. He's actually talked a lot
about it, and he's one of the only drivers who's
very open about his mental health and the toll that
being enough one driver can take on a person which
is definitely very different. You know, it's good that their
necks are so strong because there's so much going on
(23:51):
in the head. I don't know, you can edit that
at or or replay it many times. I mean, Lando
does have like a very thick neck for his like
big heads their next are unbelievable. I'm I'm I'm baffled
at their next strength. Okay, so that's Lando. Who's the
other driver, Dania Ricardo. Technically his name should be pronounced
(24:11):
Richiardo if we're going by the Italian pronunciation, but Daniel
the Australian does not care Daniel. There's a reason why
if you watch the show Drive to Survive, Daniel is
the first driver you meet in the very first episode
of the first season. And it makes complete sense because
this happened to me when I watched Drive to Survive.
(24:32):
All of my friends, regardless of gender, this happened then,
where they said, Oh my god, I am so invested
in this one guy. He is personable, he is very positive,
he's very funny, and he's great with press. He's great
with the media, is great with fans. It seems effortless.
I haven't seen Drive to Survive. I was specifically told
by Sports Illustrated not to watch it. But you meet
(24:54):
Daniel Ricardo over the Internet and you immediately like him
because he's not putting it on. Isn't you like it
at least? Yeah, that's just how he is. Now. There
are other drivers who do have personalities on the grid,
whether you like them or not, they they're giving us more.
But especially when Daniel even started, you know, over a
decade ago, that wasn't necessarily the case. And he was
always very open and fun even with the media back then,
(25:15):
in a way that other drivers weren't or really tried
hard not to be. So he always stood out, not
just in terms of the personality he has, but in
comparison to literally know of the Grid. Was your relationship
with the Nicol Hackenberg compared to your relationship with Max
are you always doing? Um? I mean they're both non sexual,
which is certainly beneficial for the working environment. Is Daniel
(25:38):
one of the better drivers? Yes? So Daniel is an
interesting case. So Daniels a very fun driver to watch.
He can be aggressive when he needs to be. There's
just something about the way that Daniel races Josh marsh
He is like aggressive and he's very bold and ballsy
with the like with the moves that he will make
UM and I really like that. I like the risk
that he's taken races UM. He's had a lot of
(26:01):
race wins. He was really considered at one point to
be a driver who was going to win a championship. Uh,
here's how it went for him. So Daniel started out
in Red Bulls young driver program. He distinguished himself very quickly.
He was really talented, very very early on. He got
his start on a very short lived and disastrous team
called HRT not important, but within a year he went
(26:24):
over to that junior sister team at red Bull Toro
Rosso now Alpha TWI. He was there for a few
seasons before he was promoted to the Red Bull team, right,
and he was like a perfect person for Red Bull.
He's positive, he's fun. They would make him do these
weird challenges and drive the car in weird environments and
he loved it and you know, the crowd would eat
(26:44):
it up wherever he was. He's just like the perfect
encapsulation of that brand and in a slightly less kind
of Alpha match away, he's just very fun. Right. He
does something that he has coined a shoey. If he
ends up on the podium where he takes off his
racing boot, you know he's had on for a whole
race that is smelly and disgusting and like is like
hot and gross. I know where is he dumps his
(27:07):
champagne on it or in it and then drinks out
of it. I want some tennis players to do that.
It had some pizzazz. Shoey shoey. Yeah, of course he
says it with his like Australian accents, so it sounds
cooler and hipper than when I say it. I feel
like I dug a hole for myself for this one.
I'm just like walking along minding my business and they're
like doing shoe I don't actually just take my shoe
(27:29):
of while I'm looking in the street and drink out
of it. However, by his teammate is Max for Steppin
and as we know Dr Evil, as we know Red
Bull has made a very clear that Max is their dude. Yeah, yeah,
they are like all in. We'd love to know how
(27:49):
exactly that happened. All happen, but we'll talk about that
in season two. Yeah, it'll take a while. But so Daniel,
obviously he's older than Max. He's thirty two now, he
was in his late twenties. Then he's aware of what's
going on. He feels like, hey, Red Bull might not
be prioritizing me the same way, and in a somewhat
surprising announcement even to Red Bull, he says he's leaving
(28:09):
the team at the end of and even weirder, he
is moving to a team called Reyno, which everyone was like,
rend out there, kind of lateral move maybe exactly. Yeah,
it was kind of a weird move, and he was
there for two years. It was kind of a weird fit.
He didn't do poorly. He actually finished fifth in the
championship his second year there, but it's just yeah, it
(28:30):
was kind of an odd time for him. And again,
he's the same personality, still very happy, go lucky, very
work hard, play hard. But he then announces that he
is going to move at the end of to McLaren.
So when from being a guy who seemed almost like
a one team guy with the whole Red Bull organization
to kind of bouncing around a little bit. So here's
(28:50):
where things get interesting. So McLaren announces this driver lineup, right,
Lando and Daniel. The fan base is like, oh my god,
these two fun person guys that we love on the
internet are going to be together. This is gonna be dope,
Like everything's gonna be great, like people were so hype.
But unsurprisingly, Lando is kind of used to being, you know,
the keeper of his own domain. And I would say Daniel,
(29:13):
despite being a cancer on the zodiac sign, very much
has like Leo energy, Like he loves to be like tall.
It makes sense like three percent of the people listening,
but he has like a lot of he likes to
be the center of attention. I'll put it that way.
He likes to ham it up. Lando hams it up
in a different way. But these are two people who
are kind of used to having the spotlight on them.
I'll be it very in very different ways. Lando can
(29:34):
be a little more quiet and a little more reserved
than you have Daniel coming in just like WHOA, let's go. Um.
So a lot of these initial videos you were seeing
coming out from McLaren, it would really be Daniel carrying
these videos and like trying as hard as in. Lando
was like he didn't really care to hang out with
Daniel as much. Um honestly, like, oh, maybe this relationship
is not working. Um, And in reality it was just
(29:58):
it's a very they're very different people in the way
that they approached racing, in the way they approached life.
It's almost like there's a weird passive aggression to some
of their interactions of like I can't tell if he's
kidding or if he is serious, and that is a problem,
Like all their jokes to each other have that quality
to them where you're like, oh, this body language is weird,
and so what makes us worse is Lando, despite being
(30:18):
behind Carlos for his first two seasons and being a
rookie and making you know, some mistakes, even in his
sophomore season, he has this gun's blazing breakout season, particularly
in the first half of one, so he's killing it.
And on the flip side, Daniel isn't just kind of
liking a little bit behind. He is struggling at McLaren.
There's lots of theories and reasons as to why. A
(30:38):
big one that he brought up is and everyone has
said the McLaren car, regardless of season, is just kind
of built differently. Daniel has said that he almost had
to relearn how to drive in F one to drive
the McLaren car, like it doesn't you know, he kind
of doesn't doesn't break the same way he's used to.
He can't really use his natural strength to drive this car.
So you have races where Lando is qualifying, you know,
(30:59):
like P. Five, and Daniel's qualifying like P. Sixteen, Like
it's it's just huge discrepancies. So it's very obvious that
Lando is just killing it. And of course he's had
this car now this is that was his third season.
He's now been in that car for over three years. Uh,
but you know, Daniel's just having the hardest time getting it.
And obviously to a lot of Daniel's whole vibe and
persona and quote unquote brand is that he's winning. He's
(31:21):
this fun guy. It's a little bit harder to be
like the positive fun guy when you're not yeah, when
you suck, and the guy who's beating you on your
team is a decade younger. And it's also really well liked,
really popular. It's not even like a less press requests
you get. You get to show off your personality a
lot less and no one even wants you to thanks
for your unwavering Yeah, it's one that everyone The McLaren's
(31:50):
story in two is turning into one where you're seeing
two drivers on completely opposite traject trees. So on one
side you've got Lando Norris, this young, dynamic driver who
had this breakout one season. The world is his oyster.
Even if the McLaren Carr isn't quite there in two.
(32:13):
There's still a lot of hope for him. He's still
in conversations about one day being this championship caliber driver.
And then the opposite side of the garage, you've got
Danil Ricardo, who has a massive fan base, is very beloved,
but he has just been having a slog of a
time for a year and a half at this point,
and even some of the most die hard Daniel Ricardo
(32:34):
fans out there are worried that this is in fact
the beginning of the end, you know, the real high
points of his career are behind him. I think he
has what it takes to be a champion. I just
don't think he's in the right on the right team
to be a champion. And I think that that is just,
unfortunately the way the cookie crumbles right now. This is
Nicole Seevers, a co creator of Two Girls, One Formula
(32:54):
and Danny rick Stand. He's just all around a happy person,
you know, just spite his dumb comments, he makes every
now and again real Golden Retriever energy. You know, um,
just happy, go lucky. Hard not to root for him
when he's buddies with everyone in the paddock. Always like
cheering people on. He's got drive, and I just want
(33:15):
I just want what's best for him, and I want
him to succeed and I hold him close to my heart.
Sounds like she's talking about an X. McLaren has been
hard for him this past season. So at this point,
I think Danny Rick is a little bit of an
underdog and I want to see him return to his
former glory of being Red Bull. Danny finishing for a
(33:36):
second podium after podium. I just don't think that a
championship is in his future unless he gets like pulled
up to Mercedes or you know, back to Red Bull,
which I don't want for him. Um. I just I
don't feel good about it, unfortunately, And I really hate
to say that on the record in case you know
(33:57):
that sever comes up in the court of law. Um,
but like, I'm not feeling good. He did have some
some real high points and he did win a race
at Manza, but generally speaking, in one not gonna lie
or mince words here, it's been a pretty bleak for
most races. If you're Dana Ricardo, hey, maybe he completely
(34:18):
turns it around and has this gangbuster second half of
the season, But right now, there are a ton of
rumors swirling around what Daniel Ricardo is going to be
doing next year. He is supposed to have a contract
with McLaren through three, but they're just being incredibly opaque
about what is going on with him. Yeah, so, how
(34:41):
how does McLaren stack for you compared to the other
three teams that you've heard about this far? I personally
and more attracted to grit than shine. McLaren feels shiny
like with their marketing, and Daniel is so fucking likable,
Like it's this guy TV hosters. He a professional competitor.
(35:03):
But I get, I get what everyone's saying. I'm I'm
buying what they're selling. I think that's cool, But I'm
I'm a I might like a little more street fighter
one Daniel like crash into someone. You'll be like, yeah,
like we've got so I don't want that. I want
Daniel to lose his ship on a reporter, you know.
(35:25):
And I want to see I want to see like
the fire in his belly that for a moment doesn't
care if he's accepted or liked by others. He's just
ready to function up. He went like slightly unhinged behavior.
I want a little bit unhinged behavior. And Lando seems
like a really excellent driver who's slowly climbing and he
(35:46):
has the foundation to stay there when he gets all
the way up. I like that too. Tennis has these
guys who are so good, so young, but you can
tell they're kind of like foundationally aren't aren't set up,
and then they get there and they blow it or whatever.
But it seems like Lando is slow and steady, young
going to the top. That's that's cool. It's one of
the youngest two out there and still still really holding
(36:07):
his own. They say in show biz, the longer it
takes you to go up, the longer takes you to
come down. And maybe that's what I was thinking about
with Lando. I like that. Yeah, so yeah, so are
are like the Chuckos and the Georgia is still at
the top for you. I do like those guys. I
(36:31):
don't know how to answer that, but I do like
the the Lando Daniel team. I do like that. Um.
I like the teams where the two drivers are can
both win. I know right now with McLaren it feels
like Daniel maybe kind of isn't there, but maybe he'll
get there. So if that's an answer. That's my answer. Okay,
(36:55):
So next episode, we are switching gears. We're moving to
a team that is almost like the true midfield. We
are moving to a team called Alpine formerly called Reno,
and they are also one of the teams that is
responsible for another one of the biggest scandals in F
one history. It's got everything, it's got crashes, it's got
(37:16):
people turning on one another within the same team. We
love to see it. And it's got two very different drivers,
one of whom is a scrappy young kid just trying
to make his mark. And then you've got one of
the titans in the sport of Formula one. Who's who's
still out there twenty years later, So that will be Alpine.
(37:44):
This has been Choosing Size f one, a production of
Sports Illustrated Studios and I Heart Radio. The show was
hosted by Michael Costa and Lily harp. This episode was
produced by Lily Harman and our senior producer Hi mi Ta,
who also did the sound design at the cutting room studios.
(38:04):
We are recorded by engineer Robot Larry, the second mastering
by Cello Wisblue. Max Miller is the executive producer and
Brennan get us his head of audio at s I Studios.
At I Heart Radio, Sean Titon is our executive producer.
For more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I
(38:25):
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
on Instagram at Choosing Sides
Host
Michael Kosta
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