May 20, 2025 • 39 mins
For the first time this season Red Bull Racing has beaten McLaren by having a faster car, with Max Verstappen dominating Imola. Is the title fight poised to turn on its head, or is it just a flash in the pan for the Dutchman?
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, and welcome to Pit Talk, brought to you by Shannon's.
On today's episode, Max Forstaffan wins the Emilia Romagna Grand
Prix to inject some hope into Red Bull Racing's campaign,
But did McLaren throw away a chance at victory by
neglecting team orders. My name is Michael Lomonato. It's great
to have your company and the company of my co host.
It's the Formula one Aws Grand Premier dal made in
(00:22):
Italy del Matt Clayson twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
I've been called worse Michael, but I was a little
bit concerned that you may not actually make it to
the end of the sentence. And this will been the
world's longest solo podcast for the next half an hour.
But yes, almost as many words in the event title
as there were laps at Imola on Sunday. But considering
Immola can be a very picturesque snorefest, but a snorefest nonetheless,
(00:47):
because of the nature of the circuit, we actually got
a pretty interesting one. And if it's the last one,
at least it was a nice way to go out.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yeah. That has been the phrase of the weekend, hasn't it.
If this is the last one, and there's certainly been
no clarity at least at the time of recording with
on what it is. The race is out of contract,
That's why there's been so much talk about it. But
I thought it was interesting just before we get into
the race to see how much support there was for
this circuit among the drivers, even among some team principals
(01:14):
who are asked over the course of the weekend. I mean,
this is a track that, to be fair to I
guess F one if they are about to drop it completely,
was absent for nearly fifteen years since its previous race
two thousand and six, was brought back as a COVID
race and then got a contract out of that, unlike
most of the other ones, now seems destined to fall
back off the calendar. But it's really interesting how much
(01:34):
of an impression it's made on what is a generation
of drivers, with one exception for no Orlans. I think
I'm saying, who hadn't driven on it before?
Speaker 2 (01:42):
In Formuda one, Yes, you are correct, Fernando Well one
of his biggest career early career moments was the fight
with Schumacher back in the previous Immola era. But I
think That's actually an interesting place to start this conversation
because back in the day you look at the Alonso
Reno versus Schumacher Ferrari Battleback in that era, the cars
were so small relative to the footprint they have these days,
(02:05):
and I think it probably generated better racing. Immil has
actually become one of those circuits now where it's a
proper driver's track in the same way that Suzuka is
a driver's track. The common denominator with those two tracks
is the drivers love them. They don't create great spectacles
because the cars are so wide and they're so fast,
and the corder nature of the old school layout doesn't
(02:26):
necessarily lead itself to great racing, but they're fantastic race tracks,
and I think that's the you know. I know some
of the drivers talked about this over the course of
the weekend, and that there is a homogeneity to a
lot of these new circuits. Now we've Joe goff Air
before that. When you get to the back end of
the season and then there's a night race in the
Middle East, you can only really remember where you are
based on what advertising side edge the cars are going past,
(02:48):
because all the cords are sort of cookie Cutter, and
they look a little bit similar. I love the fact
that places like Iimmila have existed in this sort of
second act if you like in its Formula one tenure,
because it is a point of difference. You wouldn't want
twenty four of them, But then you don't want twenty
four tilkodromes either, So it's nice to have a bit
of a mix. Look, if we're going to race in Italy,
(03:09):
if it's not going to be in Italy, you know
where I'm going to go. Let's go back to Midgella.
Come on, we did it once, the best racetrack in
Italy with the greatest iteration of Formula one cars. Again,
probably a terrible spectacle, but my god, they look nice.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Yeah, and it's just nice, you know, to go. You
called a picturesque earlier. I think you're absolutely right. After
racing in a car park and then two night races, Okay,
Saudi Arabia is a city race, but then bar rain
in an empty expanse of desert. It's just nice to
see some trees and some elevation changes and all these
natural features have been lacking.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
Honestly, on Sunday night, I was looking at it going.
Is this the first patch of grass I've seen since
Albert Puck because it kind of felt a little bit
like it, because you know, Japan early in the year.
Now the vegetation is not what it was back in October,
so it's pretty dry and dusty. And then everything else
is in the dark or in the middle of a
football stadium car park in the case of Miami. So yes,
lovely to see the the houses and the character. And
(04:02):
the thing I really was struck with is the helicopter
shot when they were following some of the cars around
early in qualifying, where you see houses on the inside
of the track and people on their balconies just you know,
having a cup of tea or whatever watching the cars
go past. It really is in the middle of a village,
just a beautiful, beautiful spot. But that may not marry
with the demands of modern day formula one.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Let's be honest, No, unfortunately not, But we'll wait and
see what conclusion Formula one comes to. One man who
probably had time to absorb some of the scenery in
the beauty of this circuit was max for staff and
because the victory in the end for him was relatively
comfortable there was a point at which he was twenty
seconds up the road from the McLaren drivers. Of course
the safety car bun to them up towards the end
of the race, but nonetheless a control drive of the
(04:43):
sort we haven't really seen for him for quite a while.
Of course, he won in Japan with that was much
more under pressure performance. This one was very found, very
much twenty twenty three vintage in summers, which or early
twenty twenty four, we could call it that a bounce
back from a lackluster Friday as well to end up
being the most competitive car was Red Bull Racing. What
do we take out of this? Was it all down
(05:05):
to that stunning move which I suspect we'll talk about
a little bit later on over the week at that
first chicane on Oscar Piastre. Because while I think victory
for Max is never out of the question, this kind
of victory felt like it wasn't going to happen this year.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Yeah, this kind of victory is exactly right. I think
he'll be more disappointed than anyone. We're not going back
to IMMLA because every time we turn up there he wins.
There's four in a row there now, but there's a
there're two very different victories for me, Japan and Immala,
much as we were talking about, Suzuka and Imila are
in the same breath before. In that Suzuka owed itself
to an absolutely otherworldly qualifying lap and then literally I
(05:44):
wouldn't say that he was actually blocking, because you can't
do that for fifty three laps of Suzuka, but he
was not the fastest car, and that race at Suzuka
relied on him executing a flawless race making no mistakes,
which he did because he's a four time world champion,
that's what he does. But that was a race win
that I felt he was defending the entire race. This
was a race win from that first lap overtake that
(06:07):
we'll talk about a little bit later until the end.
He bossed this race. He was in control. This is
a race he went in one rather than a race
that he defended grimly to try and retain. And that was,
like you said, I didn't think we were going to
see that sort of performance from him this year, maybe
at all, or only a few very very certain circuits
(06:27):
where we know how good he is, where track position
is king. This was a bit sort of you know there,
I say, old school early twenty twenty four and all
of twenty twenty three max for Stappen on Sunday. I
think the thing that was interesting and I'd be curious
to see your view on this. Is this a bit
of an outlier and that felt that he was in
control and everyone was sort of dancing to his tune,
(06:48):
which we've seen so many times with him in the past.
Or is this the perfect confluence of track position, circuit
whear driver is very very good car in a sweeter
spot than it has been. All those circumstances conspired to
maybe new to the McLaren advantage. Do you see this
as maybe being the first point of a trend or
do we need more evidence across a wider range of tracks.
(07:11):
I'm thinking Barcelona here is a real tell for these cars.
Is this happened genuinely in this championship fight or is
this just one man on one day operating at the
absolute perk of his powers.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I think the obvious and boring answer to that is yes,
we do need more evidence, because one race is only
ever one race. But there was enough in this to
make it genuinely intriguing, to make it more than just
oh wow, well, that's a little bit interesting because it
was the scale of the victory is there are enough
There are enough elements in this to explain that Max
could have won, and it's probably worth're emphasizing as well
(07:44):
that there were elements of this Grand Prix weekend that
made the margin look bigger than it was because Oscar
Piastri went onto the wrong strategy very early, having lost
the lead of the start. Then the timing of the
two safety cars were just perfect for Max to ensure
that no one was going to challenge him, including the
fact that Oscar on old time as was the head
of Norris at that safety car race. So there are
reasons for this victory a little bigger than it was,
(08:05):
but it was comfortable in the end because McLaren just
didn't have the pace to match. And that, for me
is the interesting part because while this track certainly suited
the Red Bull Racing car, we learned that from even
the first sector in Miami, we learned that from the
general layout in Saudi Arabia and even in suzukra Or
that was a version of the car that was just
less competitive full stop. That it likes these high speed
corners which are pretty much all of this track, so
(08:28):
it should have been equal with McLaren. But the fact
that it was just ahead of McLaren means, yes, we
need more evidence to understand it. But that's really interesting
because that is something no one saw coming, including I
think Red Bull Racing. Listening to Christian Hornet speak after
the race, he was surprised by what he called McLaren's underperformance.
McLaren's team Bridge Andrea Stelle said he was surprised that
his team couldn't match with the Red Bull Racing car.
(08:49):
So I think that in itself makes this such an
interesting result because it is so against not just the
run of form, but what we understood being the parameters
of form this year. And I think Imailer Wallad, I
don't think it's an outlier enough, right. I don't think
I'm crazy in saying this. We have outlying circuits. We're
(09:10):
about to go to the biggest outlier, which is Monaco. Yes,
similar is a particular track. It is a narrow it's
old school in many ways, but I don't think it's
enough of a whacky track, even with these very soft
tires which played a role. But I don't think as
massive a role as they could have in the end.
I don't think it's a whacky enough track to go, well,
you know, this is just a one off.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
I also think this probably you know, it's stating the
obvious to a degree, but this might be the best
version of Max forstaff. And we've seen in that he
doesn't need to have a car advantage. He doesn't even
need to be on a par with whatever it is
the best car at the time, which is the McLaren.
At the moment, he's operating at such a high level
that on the days where he can worm, he's way
(09:51):
into the front or race from a position of advantage.
Twenty twenty three was so hard to gauge how good
Max was because the car was absolutely magnific. Say for
the one race that he didn't win, and as I've
jokingly said before, the car was so good that even
Sergio perez One races in it. But it was a
fantastic race car, and so we it was, well, the
(10:12):
car's brilliant. How well is Max operating here? Even at
the start of twenty twenty four, we saw that before
McClaren caught up and rapidly overtook them. The way he's
operating this year, it's hard to think of too many
opportunities that he has let slip. And when he's racing
like this, he is like a dog with a bone
in that he needs a very very small opening to
(10:33):
take advantage of someone else dropping the ball, and then
he's not letting that thing go, And that, to me
shows you why he's probably the best version that he
has ever been. Now the separate question, of course, is
how long can this best version keep himself in a
realistic championship fight depending on how many eggs Red Bull
are still going to put in this twenty twenty five
basket with the loom inspector of twenty six and they've
(10:54):
got more changes than most to deal with next year,
let's be honest. So there's this interesting to push pool
here with Red Bull at the moment because they're desperate
to keep Max happy, because that's why they exist. You
only have to read every Christian Horder press briefing to
see how they're operating at the moment in their one
car team. But how many eggs do they put in
this basket? Where there's a bigger picture here twenty twenty
(11:18):
six and beyond is more important in a lot of
respects than the remaining seventeen rounds of this season. But
will they be tempted to push more chips in for
twenty five If for staff and keeps out performing this
car to the level that he is, it's an interesting push, Paul.
The next two races are so you know, you mentioned
Monaco the outlier of outlies, and then followed by Barcelona,
and you remember that, you know, the old truism with
(11:41):
Catalonia or the two things that the grip would always
be teammates on each row, like the animals light up
in pairs. Because it's a car specific circuit. You could
only do what your car allows you to. It's such
a specific racetrack in modern day Formula one, if a
car works well in Barcelona, it generally works well just
about everywhere. And so I'm super keen to see what
Red Bull do there because that might give us an
(12:03):
indication as to what they're going to do for the
rest of this season. If they're really good at Barcelona,
then I think maybe we've got more of a championship
fight than we thought.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
Yeah. I think the other element of this as well
is that we've known for most of this season at least,
that there is a quick car in that Red Bull
Racing car, just as it was the case last year.
But it's just that the set up windows become so narrow,
it's become so difficult to drive, and that slowed it
down trying to find answers. If it's pride open that
set up window and this is what it thinks it's
done with these upgrades, just enough for Max to drive
(12:34):
it regardless of the other car, which foot all intents
and purposes, does not exist in the Red Bull plan,
then that's enough. Like the car doesn't have to be
good in the conventional sense of the word to propel
the staff into a championship. It just has to be
good enough. And like you say, in the form that
he's in at the moment, he'll be able to get
the job done. So it's almost must be very tempting,
like you say, to put a little bit more into
(12:55):
this car, because it might not actually be that much
to get it over the line. It might need only
just a little bit more finessing. And that'll be something
interesting to see in the next few months, really, because
I don't think it'll be long before I mean, realistically
most teams are already very focused next year, but it
won't be long before it's completely shut off. There's the
McLaren angle of this as well, though there's the McLaren aspect,
which is the team underperformed a little bit, only in
(13:17):
the sense that it was slower than Red Bull Racing.
The car didn't look like it was particularly difficult to drive.
It was fairly happy here, considering the layout wasn't its favorite.
Oscar Piastri got pole position with a great qualifying performance
from him, so Orlando Norris stumbling Q three, but that
seems very much farf of the course this year, and
performed better in the Grand Prix. But really the flashpoint
for them, well they were in a sense. Two One
(13:37):
was its decision to jump very early with strategy with
Oscar Piastre that condemned him to know better than third
as it turned out. But then there was this idea
of team orders. After the safety car, Orlando Norris had
fresh tires like Max was stapp and did, but was
in third place. The team opted not to tell Oscar
to let him pass at the safety car restart, which
meant there was definitely no chance they're going to win
(13:58):
the race. I think that was the right call. I
note that Andrea Stella said afterward didn't think they were
fast enough to win anyway. But is it the kind
of drive a team pursuing two World championships should be
taking that? Well, if you didn't think it was going
to happen, then there was no point trying.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
Yeah, I think you know, there's both things can be
true here in that. Was it the correct call? Probably not,
because if either of the McLaren drivers had a chance
of catching Verstappen, unfortunately for Australian fans, it was an
Oscar Piastri because of the tires that he's on and
the age of them. If either of those McLaren drivers
was going to make Max sweat, it was going to
be Norris because they were on the same age of tires.
(14:36):
They didn't intervene to give that a chance to happen.
Now again, could it have happened, Probably not, so Stelle
is probably correct in that regard. But it was interesting
in that your cars are second and third, so you're
going to score the same amount of constructors points no
matter what. Fourth was not in the equation, so you
had a nailed on double podium. They didn't give Red
(14:56):
Bull anything really to think about by just as soon
as the he race restarted after that second, after the
Antonelli safety car. They didn't make Red Bull blink in
that regard because it took Norris a couple of laps
to get past Piastre, which he did because he had
fresher tires and the team didn't intervene. So there was
an outside chance they could have made for Stappen sweat.
(15:18):
But outside is the keyword. I don't think he was
being beaten by Eia McLaren on that day, let alone
the one with the correct ties at the time, let
alone the one that wasn't. So maybe both things can
be true in that regard.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah, and I do you know, Look, Andreastella is going
to have to play some level of politics if it
does become a Red Bull racing fight, because Christen Horner
won't let him not. Maybe he won't rise to the bait,
but there'll be a lot of it out there. But
I do tend to trust his interpretations of the races.
There's not too much mayonnaise on a lot of his
commentary because he's an engineer, yes, not like a team vincible.
First he came from an engineering background. A lot of
(15:50):
what he says fields pretty ground. But maybe he's just
playing a better game than anyone else to have everyone
believing everything he says. But I'm inclined to believe his
assessment of it. Let's move, Matt now to move the
week brought to you by Shannons, and I feel like
this is a big and obvious one. More overtaking, I've
got to be said, when I was thinking about this
before this weekend, I thought this is going to be
quite a grim segment, but actually it ended up being
(16:12):
pretty good. There's quite a bit of overtaken, quite a
bit of racing over the course of the weekend. But
I'm going to start this one off first of all
because I think the winner here is obvious, and that
is Max for staffen on Oscar Piastri at the start.
A lot of Look, we've all seen a lot of
first lap overtakes, including for the lead, but I genuinely
gasped when he made this move watching on the television
(16:33):
because it was gutsy a little bit surprise. Oscar left
the door open so wide, but nonetheless Max had to
pin him to that first apex to ensure there could
be no fight back to ensure there could be no
running off the road as it happened in Saudi Arabia.
It was gutsy. He trusted the car, he trusted the
level of grip and pulled off what was a decisive
move in terms of the victory. And that's probably, you know,
(16:56):
if we're talking about Max being in such good form,
and particularly in this race where he just looked like
old fashioned Max, if we want to call him that,
this was the move. I think that summed it up.
It was a championship style move and we shouldn't be
surprised he's capable of pulling them off. But it's been
a while, I think, for a long time, maybe never
in this context that we've seen Oscar subjected to such
a movement. It took Max to do it well.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
And you said the word gasp. I did the same
thing because my first thought was you can't pass there.
It just cannot pass them at Immler and I think
the lead up to it, he'd actually got off the
line pretty poorly and I thought, wow, he might be third,
he might be passed by George Russell on the rundown
to this first big pinch point and from basically nowhere
(17:36):
and no wheel banging and all the other silliness that
goes on with some of these other stapp and passes
that we've seen. So my first thought was breathtaking. I
did would audibly gasp. It was a spectacular move. And
then part of me was like, so why does he
resort to all this other nonsense by opening the steering
and running people into the runoff when you can do
something like that it is I am really struggling to
(17:59):
think of a better first lap move that he has
done to take the lead, and at a track where
you know there's not going to be many opportunities to
do this, Like you, I was a little bit surprised
at Oscar Piastre has become someone who is very very
decisive with his own overtaking and is a really stubborn
person in those will to will battles, and whether he also,
(18:22):
like me, he didn't think that it was possible for
Max to come from the angle that he came and
take that first quarter. I thought that he was a
little bit passive, and which is not something you often
say with Oscar, And look, I don't think if there's
a similar situation in the future. This is one you
file away as this is a learning experience. I won't
do that again. So the door was partially left open,
but my goodness, he had to threat the needle to
(18:44):
make that work. And I love the fact that it
was clean and decisive and we were running off the
track and getting all this he pushed me off, all
that sort of stuff. It was just absolutely clinical. Move
of the week. Yes, probably move of the season since
we've been doing this. Yeah. I do also like the
fact that not only do you introduce this segment, you
take the obvious answer to this one. So you leave
(19:06):
me scrambling because I know what sort of a bloke
you are in these sorts of situations. I can't prepared.
So I will give you the fruit that's hanging so
low that it's on the ground. I'll reach a little
higher up the tree. My move of the week is
Alex Albon recorded his third top five finished of the
year in the first seven rounds for Williams on Sunday.
(19:28):
It's now the most successful season in his tenure at Williams.
After seven rounds, he has scored forty points this season
and it's gone. It's gone beyond the Oh wow, look,
Alex Albon's doing well today. This is all very nice
and interesting to the point now where you are absolutely
expecting him to be in Q three, and you are
absolutely expecting him to be there, to be ahead of
(19:50):
the second Red borord about her who it is this
driving it and possibly mixing it with some Ferraris and
if Mercedes are a little bit off, he's almost the
guy now that he's inherited the Fernando a lot so
ronger or two years ago, and that if one of
those top teams was going to drop the ball, there
was going to be a green Aston Martin in there
and start twenty twenty three, Albon just gets better and
better and better. And of course the other thing I
keep thinking is he'd look pretty good in that second
(20:12):
red Bull, right, But that's a that's a story from
a by good era. But that's going to be my
My move of the week is Alex Albon elevating himself
above anything else he's done in his Williams tenure and
making that team more credible by the weekend. So a
slightly left field move of the week, but that's where
I'm going now.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
I like it a lot. It is a great Move
of the Week contender, considering it's not just his second
fifth place in a row, but it's the second week
in a row he's been racing the Ferraris and beating
at least one of them after of course the Miami
Grand Prix as well. It is a remarkable situation for
him to find himself there. I feel like he's the
right guy to find himself there as well, because he
just's he's obviously undaunted by racing at the front, because
(20:53):
he's done it before, it's been successful elsewhere, and then
of course did race at the front briefly with Red
Bull Racing as well before he was dropped from the tea.
But just feels like the right guy to just, oh,
there's another opportunity. I'm going to take that. Another opportunity
from it, I'm going to take that one as well.
Nothing seems to trip him up when the race unfolds,
either for or against him. He's exactly the right guy
to suddenly be dicing with Charle Clair and then, had
(21:16):
he not been run off the road, an interesting bit
of contentious driving slash stewarding slash interpretation of the rules
as to whether or not he was entitled to that corner.
Everyone talking themselves in nots a little bit about that one.
But nonetheless, had he not been off the road, felt
like he could have raced not just Lewis Hamilton, but
even Oscar Piastre for third. And he doesn't say that
(21:37):
stuff just for fun, like he's not because williams the
position that's in. It's not making things up when it
says that genuinely felt like he had that pace remarkable,
And I think particularly because and he segues us very
well to our subsequent talking topic, which was going to
be how Ferrari's doing and William's doing it at the
same time. But for him to be doing this at
a track they didn't expect to be competitive at. You know,
(21:58):
they knew Miami was probably are going to suit them.
They think that the Monico will suit them as well.
So it's a good chance for them to go back
to back to back with some big performance. It's but
at a track where the car shouldn't have been that
good to roll out and actually be pretty good. And
both cars were good. Carlos Science was made a little
bit unlucky by the secety car timings and such. That's
a massive vote of confidence for Williams, not just this season,
(22:20):
but it's the same guys of course developing next year's
car that they started developing pretty much from the first
of January and ignored this car. There's got to be
a bit of optimism now for Williams in even the
short term.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
It's been so long since we've actually had a sensible
conversation about Williams being a legitimate Formula One team. You know,
we've obviously thought so much about their heritage and where
they've come from and the success, but they've not been
that team for a very very long time now. And
I guess you know your point made about twenty six
and they're all in for twenty six. They should be
all in for twenty six. But if we didn't have
(22:52):
a big rule change for next year, it'd be so
interesting to see given this start that they've had, It's
fifty one points in the constructors now after seven rounds,
which is just not something Williams has done for a
really long time. It'd be so interesting if we had
another year of this rule set next year and they
really kept on developing that car. I trust what they
do at a week to week basis right now more
(23:14):
than any team other than McLaren to be quite honest,
because Rebel, we know, can be in that sweet spot
where the Stappa can win races, or it can be
frustratingly nowhere Mercedes if the sun comes out, no good. Ferrari?
Who Ferrari? Look, they don't know, so why are we
supposed to know? Like to me, they're almost the second
and most believable team in Formula One, not right now,
(23:34):
because there's a sense of comfort when you watch them.
It goes, Yeah, I think I know what I'm going
to get from these guys, and they're just delivering race
after race.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah, there is a consistency about it now, and I
thought it was. It was telling an important Carlos signed
set afterwards because he felt like mistakes were made over
the course of the race. He said, well, this is
the year for those mistakes to be made. Yeah. Next
year it's the real deal, because they think they'll have
a car, whether the obviously no one knows where the
cars are going to be, but they think they're going
to have a competitive generally car, a step forward on
this year's car, or this car has been better than
(24:02):
I think they thought it was going to be. In
the preseason. This is the time to bed those things down.
It does feel like where McLaren was maybe two years ago.
And I speak again not necessarily for the relative competiti risks,
because no one knows next year, but two years ago
where suddenly McLaren was more competitive than it thought it
was going to be and was suddenly making these decisions
that had much more weight because this wasn't about whether
or not you finished twelve or thirteenth, but it could
(24:23):
be a matter of whether or not you score, or
potentially whether or not it's the top five or maybe
even depending on the track, a podium. I mean that
can't be totally out of the question. If the front
runners are as chaotically placed as they are at the moment,
they carry a lot more weight. The risk feels much
better that bigger. The stakes are obviously much larger, you
bet in those decision making protocols. Now, you know they
(24:44):
talked about it in Miami, where there was a bit
of a frakka about the team orders. They realized they
made a mistake in the way they ran it. They're
not going to do it again. Next year could be
really promising, and obviously they have a driver line up
to do it. You know, I feel like Alex Alboin
has improved this year with Carlos Science next to him.
Carlos Science know how good he is, and it feels
like he's finally found his feet. It's an exciting time
to be with him as a long time as we
(25:04):
said that a couple of decades, but it's coming back around.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
It is, and I just think there's a there's leadership,
there's a pathway there. They've got a terrific driver lineup.
They don't go down the path of over promising and
under delivering. Everything's very sensible. They feel like a legitimate
Formula One team again, and it's been painful to watch
them not be that for so so long, floundering around.
(25:30):
They now seem like a legit F one team, Like
are they ever going to get back to their championship
winning pomp of days? Look, I don't think so. I
don't think a team like that can succeed like that
in Formula One anymore. Now I'm happy to be proven
incorrect on that one. But I can't necessarily see that.
But as you know, you're not looking down to the
last row of the grid to find them sadly just
making up the numbers anymore. They feel like a legit
(25:52):
Formula One team in my unofficial scale in my head
of which team principle would you want running, you know,
pit talk GP when we start our own Formula one team,
James vows would be fairly close to the top of
my list. Listeners could probably work out through the rest
of our episodes wh'd be down towards the bottom, but
that's up to you. But he is. He feels like
(26:13):
the right guy at the right time to lead this
team in its current state, making the best of what
they have, and I'm super interested to see what they
do in twenty twenty six because all the pieces seem
to be in place for them to take a step up.
Where that leaves in the pecking order, we don't know,
but it feels like something we should be watching.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
So let's slip this one around to the other perspective now.
Because Williams has been benefiting off Ferrari's missteps. That's been
pretty clear of the last two rounds at least. But
the fact for the last two weekends we've been talking
about Ferrari finishing behind Williams at least one car or
both Ferraris in the case of the performance in Miami
a couple of weeks ago. I mean that is remarkable
(26:52):
in itself. I think you made the comment two weeks ago,
what is this nineteen ninety seven. Yes, that's what it
feels like. We're talking about a really rollercoaster a weekend
for Ferrari, its first home race of the year, Lewis
Hamilton's first home Ferrari race as well. It's worse qualifying
by far of the year. On Saturday, both drivers relatively
closely matts or just in qualifying, but over the course
(27:13):
of the weekend, so it sort of tells you that
usually when that's the case, you're getting the most out
of the car, and this car just was not a
top ten car, I believe. I read the statistic that's
the lowest Ferraris ever qualified in Himmel ever, which is
pretty sad. But then on Sunday better In fact, race
pace looked pretty good. It's got to be said, Lewis
Hamilton finished on your second half behind Oscar Piastre. Yes,
(27:35):
he was on quite a different strategy in Piastre had
been hobbled by his own strategy in the timings of
the safety cars. But nonetheless he was there. He was
in contention for a little bit. Charlot Clair could have
finished right behind him, but for that Alex Albon scuffle
that they decided was better to give the position back
than risk a penalty that could have dropped him out
of the points. This is the first time, Matt, that
I've kind of been tempted to believe the arguments from
(28:00):
Ferrari that actually there's a quick car in there, but
it can't qualify well, and that's the problem. What did
you make of this weekend? Because I think it's a
complicated one really to sum up in the sense of
what it tells us about where Ferrari actually is, You're.
Speaker 2 (28:14):
A kind of man than me, which not just in
this instance, just in life generally. Let's pull the curtain back.
Let's be real about this, but is there a quick
car in there? Look? Probably, do I have any faith
in Ferrari knowing how to extract that, and then once
they know how to extract that, to be able to
repeat it. Because this is the way you build a
(28:35):
championship campaign over ten months and twenty four rounds. You
only have to look at the way the mood and
the performance has swing so violently within twenty four hours,
as in the case of the m of the weekend,
dreadful Saturday, absolutely nowhere on Saturday, and then on Sunday
like Lewis Hamilton's finished fourth. That's lovely, which is great.
(28:55):
It's great that they've got a result. Theyn't get me wrong,
you know it's fos. He went home relatively happy because
from such an underperforming Saturday. If you'd said to this
FOCI before the weekend, your cars will finish fourth and six,
they would have said, well, that's a bit rubbish. But
given the way that Saturday went, Sunday probably seemed like
a bit of a victory in some degree.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
But I.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Don't trust what they're going to deliver on a race
to race basis, and I'm not surprised anymore when it's
really really good or really really bad, because there seems
to be no middle ground and they just vacillate wildly
from one extreme to the next. So look, do I
think this, I mean, we know your point in about qualifying,
where you've got two drivers very very close to one another,
(29:36):
absolutely positioned nowhere, shows you that they've got the they've
got the guys behind the wheel to do the job.
We know how good these two guys are, even with
Lewis Hamilton, you know, taking some time to settle into
Ferrari by the same token, I just can't. I can't
trust that they're going to get on top of what
they need to get on top of on a week's
a week basis to be able to fight for these
(29:57):
sorts of positions, because to my mind, you've got these.
You know, McLaren is the best car right now. Vestappan's
doing amazing things in a Red Bull. George Russell's quietly
having an excellent season in a Mercedes, and I'm not
one hundred percent I think he's outperforming maybe the capability
of that car. By the way I described that, to me,
there's a space there for Ferrari to quite neatly slot
(30:17):
into if they can get things right and be consistent
with their performance. But they can't get things right and
be consistent with their performance. Just the wild fluctuations week
to week is the thing that's confusing me the most.
And I don't one hundred percent trust that they even
know the answer to this themselves, But I guess look
at the end of the day, Lewis Hamilton finished fourth,
Charla Clair finished sixth. We move on Monaco, massive outliary,
(30:39):
as you said, but at what point do they start
turning a tap off and thinking about twenty twenty six?
But can you approach twenty twenty six with any confidence
that you'll understand how things are going where it doesn't
appear that they've got their head around twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Yeah, we really Remarkably, the Italian media has been reporting
that Ferrari intends to continue some level of development until
the mid season break, which seems quite late for these regulations.
A lot of that's going to be mechanical, which they
feel like could cross over into some lessons for next
year because mechanically, I guess the cars are, you know,
four wheels and some suspension on them. Fine, I'll kind
(31:12):
of buy that. But it nonetheless feels like a lot
of focus on this year's car. But I think that
does speak to, as you we are alluding to, their
the need for the team to understand why this year's
car has gone wrong when it felt like they had
a lot of momentum behind them last season, and you know,
looking at this this weekend overall, it was really interesting
as well. I think considering the drivers seem so closely
matched that the different responses from those drivers, both in
(31:34):
qualifying and in the race, you know, no one was presenting.
Qualifying was good, but Lewis Hamilton was almost bizarrely upbeat.
It's like it finally come to terms with what Ferrari
was all about. But this was going to be it,
and this is the dream that he wanted to be living.
But then the same after the race, now as he
finished fourth, which is his best Grand Prix result of
the year, certainly, so I guess he had some reason
to feel good. But he had a fun race, I guess.
(31:57):
But even though Charlotte Their could have finished right behind
him and lost that position was disappointed by but Nonethelairs
remained very pessimistic about where Ferrari was and I feel
like you could probably certainly my interpretation of it is
that Hamilton's the new guy there. He's still growing into
the role. So every weekend probably does feel a little
bit better and better for him, genuinely, but he can't
exactly go out and the meaning go go. This team's
(32:19):
just no good apologizing on behalf of to the fans.
Whereas Charlotte Clair as the credit at the bank. With Ferrari,
he is the Ferrari lifer. Yes, he can go out
and say, we can only apologize. I'm not a miracle worker.
This is what the car's capable of. This is it.
I think that that was quite interesting. So I think
if you were to draw an interpretation from the drivers,
I'd be more inclined to take the cues from.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
Leclair here completely.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
That's much less rosy a picture, no.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Lewis, Hamilton's watching the movie for the first time, Charlotte
Claire's watching the movie for the sixth time, and he
knows how it ends. And I think that's the difference
between the two of them at the moment, is that
Hamilton sees a glass that you could probably put war into,
and Nale close going, oh man, this feels a bit
like a previous year, at a previous year, at a
previous year before that. But I do wonder you mentioned
the Italian media before, who are not known for being
(33:07):
hugely rational. What times of Ferrari underperformance. I wonder how
much of a free pass. I wonder how much grace
they're being given this year, because Ferrari can always say, well, look,
we're focusing so much on next year. We're focusing on
next year. Next year is the big chance. I wonder
if they're getting a little bit of a free a
free pass from what can be a very very critical
(33:28):
media corps and fan base because there is always next year.
And sometimes you can say that in the same set
of regulations and you're to use one of your favorite
saying it's kicking the can down the road. But next
year we've got a whole new can. So perhaps that's
what they're thinking about.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
Yeah, I think you're right. From my reading of what's
been published in the Italian media, surprisingly muted, I think
I think they know it's much more about the car.
Lewis Hamilton's not coming in too much for too much
stick when I think that you possibly could have after
the last few races or the last couple have been
much better. So that's good for him. But I think
twenty twenty six does get them a little bit out
of jail. I'll have to wait and see what happens
(34:03):
in twenty twenty six. Perhaps you'd like to predict it
in the crystal Ball brought to you by Complete Home Filtration.
Before we wrap up. Of course, it's important to look
forward to the future. We're in the thick of some
really quite a lot of racing between Formula One and
Motor GP and then before a couple of weeks Supercars
as well, because well for the European sports, we are
in the European leg of the season when the races
(34:23):
come pretty thick and fast. I'll give you the first
one now, Matt, since you didn't like me going first.
For change in the r move of the week, it's
up to you. You can kick us off.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
That's fine, I'll allow it just this once. But I
congratulations on the excellent professional segue you just manished to
stitch together there. But we have one of those crazy
motorsport weekends where we have Formula one and Motor GP
in Europe at about the same time. So we have
a Moto GP sprint at Silveston at one am on
Sunday morning. One for the enthusiasts at me, I would say,
(34:55):
but I'm going to go two wheels with my prediction
this weekend. And this doesn't sound like an outlandish prediction
until you look at recent history and history over a decade.
I'm picking Mark Marquees to win the British Motorcycle Grand
Prix on Sunday at Silveston the ten pm start. You
go out on a limboy day here us. He hasn't
won either of the last two Grand Prix this season,
(35:16):
and he hasn't won the British Motorcycle Grand Prix since
two thousand and fourteen. Wow, that's how long it has been.
His second motor GP season, where he won the first
ten races of that season, Silverston being one of them.
He's nearly won the British Grand Prix several times since.
I remember the one where he was beaten by about
half a wheel by Alex Rinz on a Suzuki back
(35:36):
in nineteen astonishing to think he hasn't won at this
circuit for eleven years, so given the form that he's
in and the bike that he's on, surely that's one
of those.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Look.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
He hadn't won at Catafa t years either, and he
managed to do that back in round four. So I'm
predicting of Mark Marquez win, but not just Oh Mark
Marqueess is going to turn up and annihilate everybody. This
is a track where he hasn't gone particularly well relative
to some of the ones that he does but this
Sunday for me is the end of that streak. And
what's more interesting for me is that I did a
little digging for a piece of Fox Sports earlier in
(36:08):
the week and when he finished second to Joan Zaco
at Lemon in all of his career podiums, that's the
most It's the furthest behind first place he's ever been.
When he finished second to Grand Prix Yes, over nineteen seconds,
I go won that race by So it's the most
that Marquez has been beaten by in a race when
he's finished second in his entire career. He scored more
(36:28):
points in Lemont than the next five guys on the
championship table combined. So two things for me, I think
this is the last time we've seen the matter GP
Championship league change for the entire year. And when we
look back at the end of twenty twenty five as
to what was the decisive moment, it might be a
race that he was beaten to second place by more
than he'd been beaten in his entire career that ended
(36:51):
up being the decisive race of the World Championship. So
all that being said, I'm predicting a Mark Marquez win
for Sunday at Silverston. But while where christ Balling and
Chris my crystal Ball last week, I'm going to burn
any evidence of that because it was very, very very bad.
Where are you going for this weekend, given that we've
got a fearbit going on, including Monaco and eighty five
hundred as well.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Yes, and no Infinelly on the podium fil Crystaball. Yes,
the Indy five hundred with Robert Schwartzman on pole position. Yes,
which is I mean, look, I'm no IndyCar for Shionado,
so I don't pretend to know too much about the
ins and outs of it. But that is pretty remarkabul
for the premier team, which I think has no I
was reading, has no major backer. They're just having a
crack and they've had a good crack and over the
(37:33):
course of the race, remarkable stuff. But no, my crystal Ball.
I'll stick with Formula one, the Monaco Grand Prix, the
big one, well one of the big ones, I suppose.
I'm going to go with a little sort of statistical
cadence here because since twenty twenty one had been not
that long ago, Max Ustaffan has won every other year
in Monaco, it's either been win or well not win. Obviously,
it's a nice little pattern, so I think he's going
(37:54):
to be due for one this year because that's what
the pattern says. This would be though, his first back
to back victories since Canada in Spain pretty much this
time last year. That of course preceded the ten Grand
Prix drought that completely swung the constructors championships certainly, but
also understanding of form in Formula One because it was
the resurgence of McLaren So I think he can win
in Monaco as well. This is a track that should
(38:15):
not suit this car, but it will be a massive
signifier of the idea that actually Red Bull Racing's probably
figured out its car. I've just looked at the weather
forecast as well. Saturday could be raining, so you know what,
I think it could just about stack up, and we
know the race is one really in qualifying in Monaco,
so I don't got to put it past him.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
I don't mind that at all. The thing I love
about Monico best Q three of the year, the Q
three there in twenty twenty three, the lap that vestappen
we pinbare off the barriers a couple of times in
the last sector to beat Fernando altso we thought he
had pole. It's the best Q three of the year
and probably the worst race of the year. Whispered it quietly,
but qualifying at Monaco, washing those cars on the limit,
(38:53):
no fuel in them, guys absolutely ragging it. Knowing what's
at stake on the Sunday is absolute must ce TV
and I'm very much looking forward to that.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Yes, it generally, I've had to admit this dre it
generally not a great race, but when it is a
good race, it could be the best race of the
year because it takes a lot to generate a good
race in Monaco, so it's worth keeping an eye on
it at least for that reason. But that's all the
time we have for pit Talk today. You can subscribe
to pit Talk wherever you get your favorite podcasts, and
you can leave us a rating at a review as well.
This weekend it is the British Motorcycle Grand Prix with
(39:23):
lights out at ten pm on Sunday, followed by the
Monaco Formula One Grand Prix with lights out at eleven pm.
Quite a nice back to back for you to end
your weekend. You can keep up to date with all
the latest F one, supercars and MotoGP news at Fox
sports dot com dot Au from Matt Clayton and me
Michael Lomonado. Thanks very much for your company. We'll catch
you next week.
Hello, and welcome to Pit Talk, brought to you by Shannon's.
On today's episode, Max Forstaffan wins the Emilia Romagna Grand
Prix to inject some hope into Red Bull Racing's campaign,
But did McLaren throw away a chance at victory by
neglecting team orders. My name is Michael Lomonato. It's great
to have your company and the company of my co host.
It's the Formula one Aws Grand Premier dal made in
(00:22):
Italy del Matt Clayson twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
I've been called worse Michael, but I was a little
bit concerned that you may not actually make it to
the end of the sentence. And this will been the
world's longest solo podcast for the next half an hour.
But yes, almost as many words in the event title
as there were laps at Imola on Sunday. But considering
Immola can be a very picturesque snorefest, but a snorefest nonetheless,
(00:47):
because of the nature of the circuit, we actually got
a pretty interesting one. And if it's the last one,
at least it was a nice way to go out.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yeah. That has been the phrase of the weekend, hasn't it.
If this is the last one, and there's certainly been
no clarity at least at the time of recording with
on what it is. The race is out of contract,
That's why there's been so much talk about it. But
I thought it was interesting just before we get into
the race to see how much support there was for
this circuit among the drivers, even among some team principals
(01:14):
who are asked over the course of the weekend. I mean,
this is a track that, to be fair to I
guess F one if they are about to drop it completely,
was absent for nearly fifteen years since its previous race
two thousand and six, was brought back as a COVID
race and then got a contract out of that, unlike
most of the other ones, now seems destined to fall
back off the calendar. But it's really interesting how much
(01:34):
of an impression it's made on what is a generation
of drivers, with one exception for no Orlans. I think
I'm saying, who hadn't driven on it before?
Speaker 2 (01:42):
In Formuda one, Yes, you are correct, Fernando Well one
of his biggest career early career moments was the fight
with Schumacher back in the previous Immola era. But I
think That's actually an interesting place to start this conversation
because back in the day you look at the Alonso
Reno versus Schumacher Ferrari Battleback in that era, the cars
were so small relative to the footprint they have these days,
(02:05):
and I think it probably generated better racing. Immil has
actually become one of those circuits now where it's a
proper driver's track in the same way that Suzuka is
a driver's track. The common denominator with those two tracks
is the drivers love them. They don't create great spectacles
because the cars are so wide and they're so fast,
and the corder nature of the old school layout doesn't
(02:26):
necessarily lead itself to great racing, but they're fantastic race tracks,
and I think that's the you know. I know some
of the drivers talked about this over the course of
the weekend, and that there is a homogeneity to a
lot of these new circuits. Now we've Joe goff Air
before that. When you get to the back end of
the season and then there's a night race in the
Middle East, you can only really remember where you are
based on what advertising side edge the cars are going past,
(02:48):
because all the cords are sort of cookie Cutter, and
they look a little bit similar. I love the fact
that places like Iimmila have existed in this sort of
second act if you like in its Formula one tenure,
because it is a point of difference. You wouldn't want
twenty four of them, But then you don't want twenty
four tilkodromes either, So it's nice to have a bit
of a mix. Look, if we're going to race in Italy,
(03:09):
if it's not going to be in Italy, you know
where I'm going to go. Let's go back to Midgella.
Come on, we did it once, the best racetrack in
Italy with the greatest iteration of Formula one cars. Again,
probably a terrible spectacle, but my god, they look nice.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Yeah, and it's just nice, you know, to go. You
called a picturesque earlier. I think you're absolutely right. After
racing in a car park and then two night races, Okay,
Saudi Arabia is a city race, but then bar rain
in an empty expanse of desert. It's just nice to
see some trees and some elevation changes and all these
natural features have been lacking.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
Honestly, on Sunday night, I was looking at it going.
Is this the first patch of grass I've seen since
Albert Puck because it kind of felt a little bit
like it, because you know, Japan early in the year.
Now the vegetation is not what it was back in October,
so it's pretty dry and dusty. And then everything else
is in the dark or in the middle of a
football stadium car park in the case of Miami. So yes,
lovely to see the the houses and the character. And
(04:02):
the thing I really was struck with is the helicopter
shot when they were following some of the cars around
early in qualifying, where you see houses on the inside
of the track and people on their balconies just you know,
having a cup of tea or whatever watching the cars
go past. It really is in the middle of a village,
just a beautiful, beautiful spot. But that may not marry
with the demands of modern day formula one.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Let's be honest, No, unfortunately not, But we'll wait and
see what conclusion Formula one comes to. One man who
probably had time to absorb some of the scenery in
the beauty of this circuit was max for staff and
because the victory in the end for him was relatively
comfortable there was a point at which he was twenty
seconds up the road from the McLaren drivers. Of course
the safety car bun to them up towards the end
of the race, but nonetheless a control drive of the
(04:43):
sort we haven't really seen for him for quite a while.
Of course, he won in Japan with that was much
more under pressure performance. This one was very found, very
much twenty twenty three vintage in summers, which or early
twenty twenty four, we could call it that a bounce
back from a lackluster Friday as well to end up
being the most competitive car was Red Bull Racing. What
do we take out of this? Was it all down
(05:05):
to that stunning move which I suspect we'll talk about
a little bit later on over the week at that
first chicane on Oscar Piastre. Because while I think victory
for Max is never out of the question, this kind
of victory felt like it wasn't going to happen this year.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Yeah, this kind of victory is exactly right. I think
he'll be more disappointed than anyone. We're not going back
to IMMLA because every time we turn up there he wins.
There's four in a row there now, but there's a
there're two very different victories for me, Japan and Immala,
much as we were talking about, Suzuka and Imila are
in the same breath before. In that Suzuka owed itself
to an absolutely otherworldly qualifying lap and then literally I
(05:44):
wouldn't say that he was actually blocking, because you can't
do that for fifty three laps of Suzuka, but he
was not the fastest car, and that race at Suzuka
relied on him executing a flawless race making no mistakes,
which he did because he's a four time world champion,
that's what he does. But that was a race win
that I felt he was defending the entire race. This
was a race win from that first lap overtake that
(06:07):
we'll talk about a little bit later until the end.
He bossed this race. He was in control. This is
a race he went in one rather than a race
that he defended grimly to try and retain. And that was,
like you said, I didn't think we were going to
see that sort of performance from him this year, maybe
at all, or only a few very very certain circuits
(06:27):
where we know how good he is, where track position
is king. This was a bit sort of you know there,
I say, old school early twenty twenty four and all
of twenty twenty three max for Stappen on Sunday. I
think the thing that was interesting and I'd be curious
to see your view on this. Is this a bit
of an outlier and that felt that he was in
control and everyone was sort of dancing to his tune,
(06:48):
which we've seen so many times with him in the past.
Or is this the perfect confluence of track position, circuit
whear driver is very very good car in a sweeter
spot than it has been. All those circumstances conspired to
maybe new to the McLaren advantage. Do you see this
as maybe being the first point of a trend or
do we need more evidence across a wider range of tracks.
(07:11):
I'm thinking Barcelona here is a real tell for these cars.
Is this happened genuinely in this championship fight or is
this just one man on one day operating at the
absolute perk of his powers.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I think the obvious and boring answer to that is yes,
we do need more evidence, because one race is only
ever one race. But there was enough in this to
make it genuinely intriguing, to make it more than just
oh wow, well, that's a little bit interesting because it
was the scale of the victory is there are enough
There are enough elements in this to explain that Max
could have won, and it's probably worth're emphasizing as well
(07:44):
that there were elements of this Grand Prix weekend that
made the margin look bigger than it was because Oscar
Piastri went onto the wrong strategy very early, having lost
the lead of the start. Then the timing of the
two safety cars were just perfect for Max to ensure
that no one was going to challenge him, including the
fact that Oscar on old time as was the head
of Norris at that safety car race. So there are
reasons for this victory a little bigger than it was,
(08:05):
but it was comfortable in the end because McLaren just
didn't have the pace to match. And that, for me
is the interesting part because while this track certainly suited
the Red Bull Racing car, we learned that from even
the first sector in Miami, we learned that from the
general layout in Saudi Arabia and even in suzukra Or
that was a version of the car that was just
less competitive full stop. That it likes these high speed
corners which are pretty much all of this track, so
(08:28):
it should have been equal with McLaren. But the fact
that it was just ahead of McLaren means, yes, we
need more evidence to understand it. But that's really interesting
because that is something no one saw coming, including I
think Red Bull Racing. Listening to Christian Hornet speak after
the race, he was surprised by what he called McLaren's underperformance.
McLaren's team Bridge Andrea Stelle said he was surprised that
his team couldn't match with the Red Bull Racing car.
(08:49):
So I think that in itself makes this such an
interesting result because it is so against not just the
run of form, but what we understood being the parameters
of form this year. And I think Imailer Wallad, I
don't think it's an outlier enough, right. I don't think
I'm crazy in saying this. We have outlying circuits. We're
(09:10):
about to go to the biggest outlier, which is Monaco. Yes,
similar is a particular track. It is a narrow it's
old school in many ways, but I don't think it's
enough of a whacky track, even with these very soft
tires which played a role. But I don't think as
massive a role as they could have in the end.
I don't think it's a whacky enough track to go, well,
you know, this is just a one off.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
I also think this probably you know, it's stating the
obvious to a degree, but this might be the best
version of Max forstaff. And we've seen in that he
doesn't need to have a car advantage. He doesn't even
need to be on a par with whatever it is
the best car at the time, which is the McLaren.
At the moment, he's operating at such a high level
that on the days where he can worm, he's way
(09:51):
into the front or race from a position of advantage.
Twenty twenty three was so hard to gauge how good
Max was because the car was absolutely magnific. Say for
the one race that he didn't win, and as I've
jokingly said before, the car was so good that even
Sergio perez One races in it. But it was a
fantastic race car, and so we it was, well, the
(10:12):
car's brilliant. How well is Max operating here? Even at
the start of twenty twenty four, we saw that before
McClaren caught up and rapidly overtook them. The way he's
operating this year, it's hard to think of too many
opportunities that he has let slip. And when he's racing
like this, he is like a dog with a bone
in that he needs a very very small opening to
(10:33):
take advantage of someone else dropping the ball, and then
he's not letting that thing go, And that, to me
shows you why he's probably the best version that he
has ever been. Now the separate question, of course, is
how long can this best version keep himself in a
realistic championship fight depending on how many eggs Red Bull
are still going to put in this twenty twenty five
basket with the loom inspector of twenty six and they've
(10:54):
got more changes than most to deal with next year,
let's be honest. So there's this interesting to push pool
here with Red Bull at the moment because they're desperate
to keep Max happy, because that's why they exist. You
only have to read every Christian Horder press briefing to
see how they're operating at the moment in their one
car team. But how many eggs do they put in
this basket? Where there's a bigger picture here twenty twenty
(11:18):
six and beyond is more important in a lot of
respects than the remaining seventeen rounds of this season. But
will they be tempted to push more chips in for
twenty five If for staff and keeps out performing this
car to the level that he is, it's an interesting push, Paul.
The next two races are so you know, you mentioned
Monaco the outlier of outlies, and then followed by Barcelona,
and you remember that, you know, the old truism with
(11:41):
Catalonia or the two things that the grip would always
be teammates on each row, like the animals light up
in pairs. Because it's a car specific circuit. You could
only do what your car allows you to. It's such
a specific racetrack in modern day Formula one, if a
car works well in Barcelona, it generally works well just
about everywhere. And so I'm super keen to see what
Red Bull do there because that might give us an
(12:03):
indication as to what they're going to do for the
rest of this season. If they're really good at Barcelona,
then I think maybe we've got more of a championship
fight than we thought.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
Yeah. I think the other element of this as well
is that we've known for most of this season at least,
that there is a quick car in that Red Bull
Racing car, just as it was the case last year.
But it's just that the set up windows become so narrow,
it's become so difficult to drive, and that slowed it
down trying to find answers. If it's pride open that
set up window and this is what it thinks it's
done with these upgrades, just enough for Max to drive
(12:34):
it regardless of the other car, which foot all intents
and purposes, does not exist in the Red Bull plan,
then that's enough. Like the car doesn't have to be
good in the conventional sense of the word to propel
the staff into a championship. It just has to be
good enough. And like you say, in the form that
he's in at the moment, he'll be able to get
the job done. So it's almost must be very tempting,
like you say, to put a little bit more into
(12:55):
this car, because it might not actually be that much
to get it over the line. It might need only
just a little bit more finessing. And that'll be something
interesting to see in the next few months, really, because
I don't think it'll be long before I mean, realistically
most teams are already very focused next year, but it
won't be long before it's completely shut off. There's the
McLaren angle of this as well, though there's the McLaren aspect,
which is the team underperformed a little bit, only in
(13:17):
the sense that it was slower than Red Bull Racing.
The car didn't look like it was particularly difficult to drive.
It was fairly happy here, considering the layout wasn't its favorite.
Oscar Piastri got pole position with a great qualifying performance
from him, so Orlando Norris stumbling Q three, but that
seems very much farf of the course this year, and
performed better in the Grand Prix. But really the flashpoint
for them, well they were in a sense. Two One
(13:37):
was its decision to jump very early with strategy with
Oscar Piastre that condemned him to know better than third
as it turned out. But then there was this idea
of team orders. After the safety car, Orlando Norris had
fresh tires like Max was stapp and did, but was
in third place. The team opted not to tell Oscar
to let him pass at the safety car restart, which
meant there was definitely no chance they're going to win
(13:58):
the race. I think that was the right call. I
note that Andrea Stella said afterward didn't think they were
fast enough to win anyway. But is it the kind
of drive a team pursuing two World championships should be
taking that? Well, if you didn't think it was going
to happen, then there was no point trying.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
Yeah, I think you know, there's both things can be
true here in that. Was it the correct call? Probably not,
because if either of the McLaren drivers had a chance
of catching Verstappen, unfortunately for Australian fans, it was an
Oscar Piastri because of the tires that he's on and
the age of them. If either of those McLaren drivers
was going to make Max sweat, it was going to
be Norris because they were on the same age of tires.
(14:36):
They didn't intervene to give that a chance to happen.
Now again, could it have happened, Probably not, so Stelle
is probably correct in that regard. But it was interesting
in that your cars are second and third, so you're
going to score the same amount of constructors points no
matter what. Fourth was not in the equation, so you
had a nailed on double podium. They didn't give Red
(14:56):
Bull anything really to think about by just as soon
as the he race restarted after that second, after the
Antonelli safety car. They didn't make Red Bull blink in
that regard because it took Norris a couple of laps
to get past Piastre, which he did because he had
fresher tires and the team didn't intervene. So there was
an outside chance they could have made for Stappen sweat.
(15:18):
But outside is the keyword. I don't think he was
being beaten by Eia McLaren on that day, let alone
the one with the correct ties at the time, let
alone the one that wasn't. So maybe both things can
be true in that regard.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah, and I do you know, Look, Andreastella is going
to have to play some level of politics if it
does become a Red Bull racing fight, because Christen Horner
won't let him not. Maybe he won't rise to the bait,
but there'll be a lot of it out there. But
I do tend to trust his interpretations of the races.
There's not too much mayonnaise on a lot of his
commentary because he's an engineer, yes, not like a team vincible.
First he came from an engineering background. A lot of
(15:50):
what he says fields pretty ground. But maybe he's just
playing a better game than anyone else to have everyone
believing everything he says. But I'm inclined to believe his
assessment of it. Let's move, Matt now to move the
week brought to you by Shannons, and I feel like
this is a big and obvious one. More overtaking, I've
got to be said, when I was thinking about this
before this weekend, I thought this is going to be
quite a grim segment, but actually it ended up being
(16:12):
pretty good. There's quite a bit of overtaken, quite a
bit of racing over the course of the weekend. But
I'm going to start this one off first of all
because I think the winner here is obvious, and that
is Max for staffen on Oscar Piastri at the start.
A lot of Look, we've all seen a lot of
first lap overtakes, including for the lead, but I genuinely
gasped when he made this move watching on the television
(16:33):
because it was gutsy a little bit surprise. Oscar left
the door open so wide, but nonetheless Max had to
pin him to that first apex to ensure there could
be no fight back to ensure there could be no
running off the road as it happened in Saudi Arabia.
It was gutsy. He trusted the car, he trusted the
level of grip and pulled off what was a decisive
move in terms of the victory. And that's probably, you know,
(16:56):
if we're talking about Max being in such good form,
and particularly in this race where he just looked like
old fashioned Max, if we want to call him that,
this was the move. I think that summed it up.
It was a championship style move and we shouldn't be
surprised he's capable of pulling them off. But it's been
a while, I think, for a long time, maybe never
in this context that we've seen Oscar subjected to such
a movement. It took Max to do it well.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
And you said the word gasp. I did the same
thing because my first thought was you can't pass there.
It just cannot pass them at Immler and I think
the lead up to it, he'd actually got off the
line pretty poorly and I thought, wow, he might be third,
he might be passed by George Russell on the rundown
to this first big pinch point and from basically nowhere
(17:36):
and no wheel banging and all the other silliness that
goes on with some of these other stapp and passes
that we've seen. So my first thought was breathtaking. I
did would audibly gasp. It was a spectacular move. And
then part of me was like, so why does he
resort to all this other nonsense by opening the steering
and running people into the runoff when you can do
something like that it is I am really struggling to
(17:59):
think of a better first lap move that he has
done to take the lead, and at a track where
you know there's not going to be many opportunities to
do this, Like you, I was a little bit surprised
at Oscar Piastre has become someone who is very very
decisive with his own overtaking and is a really stubborn
person in those will to will battles, and whether he also,
(18:22):
like me, he didn't think that it was possible for
Max to come from the angle that he came and
take that first quarter. I thought that he was a
little bit passive, and which is not something you often
say with Oscar, And look, I don't think if there's
a similar situation in the future. This is one you
file away as this is a learning experience. I won't
do that again. So the door was partially left open,
but my goodness, he had to threat the needle to
(18:44):
make that work. And I love the fact that it
was clean and decisive and we were running off the
track and getting all this he pushed me off, all
that sort of stuff. It was just absolutely clinical. Move
of the week. Yes, probably move of the season since
we've been doing this. Yeah. I do also like the
fact that not only do you introduce this segment, you
take the obvious answer to this one. So you leave
(19:06):
me scrambling because I know what sort of a bloke
you are in these sorts of situations. I can't prepared.
So I will give you the fruit that's hanging so
low that it's on the ground. I'll reach a little
higher up the tree. My move of the week is
Alex Albon recorded his third top five finished of the
year in the first seven rounds for Williams on Sunday.
(19:28):
It's now the most successful season in his tenure at Williams.
After seven rounds, he has scored forty points this season
and it's gone. It's gone beyond the Oh wow, look,
Alex Albon's doing well today. This is all very nice
and interesting to the point now where you are absolutely
expecting him to be in Q three, and you are
absolutely expecting him to be there, to be ahead of
(19:50):
the second Red borord about her who it is this
driving it and possibly mixing it with some Ferraris and
if Mercedes are a little bit off, he's almost the
guy now that he's inherited the Fernando a lot so
ronger or two years ago, and that if one of
those top teams was going to drop the ball, there
was going to be a green Aston Martin in there
and start twenty twenty three, Albon just gets better and
better and better. And of course the other thing I
keep thinking is he'd look pretty good in that second
(20:12):
red Bull, right, But that's a that's a story from
a by good era. But that's going to be my
My move of the week is Alex Albon elevating himself
above anything else he's done in his Williams tenure and
making that team more credible by the weekend. So a
slightly left field move of the week, but that's where
I'm going now.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
I like it a lot. It is a great Move
of the Week contender, considering it's not just his second
fifth place in a row, but it's the second week
in a row he's been racing the Ferraris and beating
at least one of them after of course the Miami
Grand Prix as well. It is a remarkable situation for
him to find himself there. I feel like he's the
right guy to find himself there as well, because he
just's he's obviously undaunted by racing at the front, because
(20:53):
he's done it before, it's been successful elsewhere, and then
of course did race at the front briefly with Red
Bull Racing as well before he was dropped from the tea.
But just feels like the right guy to just, oh,
there's another opportunity. I'm going to take that. Another opportunity
from it, I'm going to take that one as well.
Nothing seems to trip him up when the race unfolds,
either for or against him. He's exactly the right guy
to suddenly be dicing with Charle Clair and then, had
(21:16):
he not been run off the road, an interesting bit
of contentious driving slash stewarding slash interpretation of the rules
as to whether or not he was entitled to that corner.
Everyone talking themselves in nots a little bit about that one.
But nonetheless, had he not been off the road, felt
like he could have raced not just Lewis Hamilton, but
even Oscar Piastre for third. And he doesn't say that
(21:37):
stuff just for fun, like he's not because williams the
position that's in. It's not making things up when it
says that genuinely felt like he had that pace remarkable,
And I think particularly because and he segues us very
well to our subsequent talking topic, which was going to
be how Ferrari's doing and William's doing it at the
same time. But for him to be doing this at
a track they didn't expect to be competitive at. You know,
(21:58):
they knew Miami was probably are going to suit them.
They think that the Monico will suit them as well.
So it's a good chance for them to go back
to back to back with some big performance. It's but
at a track where the car shouldn't have been that
good to roll out and actually be pretty good. And
both cars were good. Carlos Science was made a little
bit unlucky by the secety car timings and such. That's
a massive vote of confidence for Williams, not just this season,
(22:20):
but it's the same guys of course developing next year's
car that they started developing pretty much from the first
of January and ignored this car. There's got to be
a bit of optimism now for Williams in even the
short term.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
It's been so long since we've actually had a sensible
conversation about Williams being a legitimate Formula One team. You know,
we've obviously thought so much about their heritage and where
they've come from and the success, but they've not been
that team for a very very long time now. And
I guess you know your point made about twenty six
and they're all in for twenty six. They should be
all in for twenty six. But if we didn't have
(22:52):
a big rule change for next year, it'd be so
interesting to see given this start that they've had, It's
fifty one points in the constructors now after seven rounds,
which is just not something Williams has done for a
really long time. It'd be so interesting if we had
another year of this rule set next year and they
really kept on developing that car. I trust what they
do at a week to week basis right now more
(23:14):
than any team other than McLaren to be quite honest,
because Rebel, we know, can be in that sweet spot
where the Stappa can win races, or it can be
frustratingly nowhere Mercedes if the sun comes out, no good. Ferrari?
Who Ferrari? Look, they don't know, so why are we
supposed to know? Like to me, they're almost the second
and most believable team in Formula One, not right now,
(23:34):
because there's a sense of comfort when you watch them.
It goes, Yeah, I think I know what I'm going
to get from these guys, and they're just delivering race
after race.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah, there is a consistency about it now, and I
thought it was. It was telling an important Carlos signed
set afterwards because he felt like mistakes were made over
the course of the race. He said, well, this is
the year for those mistakes to be made. Yeah. Next
year it's the real deal, because they think they'll have
a car, whether the obviously no one knows where the
cars are going to be, but they think they're going
to have a competitive generally car, a step forward on
this year's car, or this car has been better than
(24:02):
I think they thought it was going to be. In
the preseason. This is the time to bed those things down.
It does feel like where McLaren was maybe two years ago.
And I speak again not necessarily for the relative competiti risks,
because no one knows next year, but two years ago
where suddenly McLaren was more competitive than it thought it
was going to be and was suddenly making these decisions
that had much more weight because this wasn't about whether
or not you finished twelve or thirteenth, but it could
(24:23):
be a matter of whether or not you score, or
potentially whether or not it's the top five or maybe
even depending on the track, a podium. I mean that
can't be totally out of the question. If the front
runners are as chaotically placed as they are at the moment,
they carry a lot more weight. The risk feels much
better that bigger. The stakes are obviously much larger, you
bet in those decision making protocols. Now, you know they
(24:44):
talked about it in Miami, where there was a bit
of a frakka about the team orders. They realized they
made a mistake in the way they ran it. They're
not going to do it again. Next year could be
really promising, and obviously they have a driver line up
to do it. You know, I feel like Alex Alboin
has improved this year with Carlos Science next to him.
Carlos Science know how good he is, and it feels
like he's finally found his feet. It's an exciting time
to be with him as a long time as we
(25:04):
said that a couple of decades, but it's coming back around.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
It is, and I just think there's a there's leadership,
there's a pathway there. They've got a terrific driver lineup.
They don't go down the path of over promising and
under delivering. Everything's very sensible. They feel like a legitimate
Formula One team again, and it's been painful to watch
them not be that for so so long, floundering around.
(25:30):
They now seem like a legit F one team, Like
are they ever going to get back to their championship
winning pomp of days? Look, I don't think so. I
don't think a team like that can succeed like that
in Formula One anymore. Now I'm happy to be proven
incorrect on that one. But I can't necessarily see that.
But as you know, you're not looking down to the
last row of the grid to find them sadly just
making up the numbers anymore. They feel like a legit
(25:52):
Formula One team in my unofficial scale in my head
of which team principle would you want running, you know,
pit talk GP when we start our own Formula one team,
James vows would be fairly close to the top of
my list. Listeners could probably work out through the rest
of our episodes wh'd be down towards the bottom, but
that's up to you. But he is. He feels like
(26:13):
the right guy at the right time to lead this
team in its current state, making the best of what
they have, and I'm super interested to see what they
do in twenty twenty six because all the pieces seem
to be in place for them to take a step up.
Where that leaves in the pecking order, we don't know,
but it feels like something we should be watching.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
So let's slip this one around to the other perspective now.
Because Williams has been benefiting off Ferrari's missteps. That's been
pretty clear of the last two rounds at least. But
the fact for the last two weekends we've been talking
about Ferrari finishing behind Williams at least one car or
both Ferraris in the case of the performance in Miami
a couple of weeks ago. I mean that is remarkable
(26:52):
in itself. I think you made the comment two weeks ago,
what is this nineteen ninety seven. Yes, that's what it
feels like. We're talking about a really rollercoaster a weekend
for Ferrari, its first home race of the year, Lewis
Hamilton's first home Ferrari race as well. It's worse qualifying
by far of the year. On Saturday, both drivers relatively
closely matts or just in qualifying, but over the course
(27:13):
of the weekend, so it sort of tells you that
usually when that's the case, you're getting the most out
of the car, and this car just was not a
top ten car, I believe. I read the statistic that's
the lowest Ferraris ever qualified in Himmel ever, which is
pretty sad. But then on Sunday better In fact, race
pace looked pretty good. It's got to be said, Lewis
Hamilton finished on your second half behind Oscar Piastre. Yes,
(27:35):
he was on quite a different strategy in Piastre had
been hobbled by his own strategy in the timings of
the safety cars. But nonetheless he was there. He was
in contention for a little bit. Charlot Clair could have
finished right behind him, but for that Alex Albon scuffle
that they decided was better to give the position back
than risk a penalty that could have dropped him out
of the points. This is the first time, Matt, that
I've kind of been tempted to believe the arguments from
(28:00):
Ferrari that actually there's a quick car in there, but
it can't qualify well, and that's the problem. What did
you make of this weekend? Because I think it's a
complicated one really to sum up in the sense of
what it tells us about where Ferrari actually is, You're.
Speaker 2 (28:14):
A kind of man than me, which not just in
this instance, just in life generally. Let's pull the curtain back.
Let's be real about this, but is there a quick
car in there? Look? Probably, do I have any faith
in Ferrari knowing how to extract that, and then once
they know how to extract that, to be able to
repeat it. Because this is the way you build a
(28:35):
championship campaign over ten months and twenty four rounds. You
only have to look at the way the mood and
the performance has swing so violently within twenty four hours,
as in the case of the m of the weekend,
dreadful Saturday, absolutely nowhere on Saturday, and then on Sunday
like Lewis Hamilton's finished fourth. That's lovely, which is great.
(28:55):
It's great that they've got a result. Theyn't get me wrong,
you know it's fos. He went home relatively happy because
from such an underperforming Saturday. If you'd said to this
FOCI before the weekend, your cars will finish fourth and six,
they would have said, well, that's a bit rubbish. But
given the way that Saturday went, Sunday probably seemed like
a bit of a victory in some degree.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
But I.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Don't trust what they're going to deliver on a race
to race basis, and I'm not surprised anymore when it's
really really good or really really bad, because there seems
to be no middle ground and they just vacillate wildly
from one extreme to the next. So look, do I
think this, I mean, we know your point in about qualifying,
where you've got two drivers very very close to one another,
(29:36):
absolutely positioned nowhere, shows you that they've got the they've
got the guys behind the wheel to do the job.
We know how good these two guys are, even with
Lewis Hamilton, you know, taking some time to settle into
Ferrari by the same token, I just can't. I can't
trust that they're going to get on top of what
they need to get on top of on a week's
a week basis to be able to fight for these
(29:57):
sorts of positions, because to my mind, you've got these.
You know, McLaren is the best car right now. Vestappan's
doing amazing things in a Red Bull. George Russell's quietly
having an excellent season in a Mercedes, and I'm not
one hundred percent I think he's outperforming maybe the capability
of that car. By the way I described that, to me,
there's a space there for Ferrari to quite neatly slot
(30:17):
into if they can get things right and be consistent
with their performance. But they can't get things right and
be consistent with their performance. Just the wild fluctuations week
to week is the thing that's confusing me the most.
And I don't one hundred percent trust that they even
know the answer to this themselves, But I guess look
at the end of the day, Lewis Hamilton finished fourth,
Charla Clair finished sixth. We move on Monaco, massive outliary,
(30:39):
as you said, but at what point do they start
turning a tap off and thinking about twenty twenty six?
But can you approach twenty twenty six with any confidence
that you'll understand how things are going where it doesn't
appear that they've got their head around twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Yeah, we really Remarkably, the Italian media has been reporting
that Ferrari intends to continue some level of development until
the mid season break, which seems quite late for these regulations.
A lot of that's going to be mechanical, which they
feel like could cross over into some lessons for next
year because mechanically, I guess the cars are, you know,
four wheels and some suspension on them. Fine, I'll kind
(31:12):
of buy that. But it nonetheless feels like a lot
of focus on this year's car. But I think that
does speak to, as you we are alluding to, their
the need for the team to understand why this year's
car has gone wrong when it felt like they had
a lot of momentum behind them last season, and you know,
looking at this this weekend overall, it was really interesting
as well. I think considering the drivers seem so closely
matched that the different responses from those drivers, both in
(31:34):
qualifying and in the race, you know, no one was presenting.
Qualifying was good, but Lewis Hamilton was almost bizarrely upbeat.
It's like it finally come to terms with what Ferrari
was all about. But this was going to be it,
and this is the dream that he wanted to be living.
But then the same after the race, now as he
finished fourth, which is his best Grand Prix result of
the year, certainly, so I guess he had some reason
to feel good. But he had a fun race, I guess.
(31:57):
But even though Charlotte Their could have finished right behind
him and lost that position was disappointed by but Nonethelairs
remained very pessimistic about where Ferrari was and I feel
like you could probably certainly my interpretation of it is
that Hamilton's the new guy there. He's still growing into
the role. So every weekend probably does feel a little
bit better and better for him, genuinely, but he can't
exactly go out and the meaning go go. This team's
(32:19):
just no good apologizing on behalf of to the fans.
Whereas Charlotte Clair as the credit at the bank. With Ferrari,
he is the Ferrari lifer. Yes, he can go out
and say, we can only apologize. I'm not a miracle worker.
This is what the car's capable of. This is it.
I think that that was quite interesting. So I think
if you were to draw an interpretation from the drivers,
I'd be more inclined to take the cues from.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
Leclair here completely.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
That's much less rosy a picture, no.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Lewis, Hamilton's watching the movie for the first time, Charlotte
Claire's watching the movie for the sixth time, and he
knows how it ends. And I think that's the difference
between the two of them at the moment, is that
Hamilton sees a glass that you could probably put war into,
and Nale close going, oh man, this feels a bit
like a previous year, at a previous year, at a
previous year before that. But I do wonder you mentioned
the Italian media before, who are not known for being
(33:07):
hugely rational. What times of Ferrari underperformance. I wonder how
much of a free pass. I wonder how much grace
they're being given this year, because Ferrari can always say, well, look,
we're focusing so much on next year. We're focusing on
next year. Next year is the big chance. I wonder
if they're getting a little bit of a free a
free pass from what can be a very very critical
(33:28):
media corps and fan base because there is always next year.
And sometimes you can say that in the same set
of regulations and you're to use one of your favorite
saying it's kicking the can down the road. But next
year we've got a whole new can. So perhaps that's
what they're thinking about.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
Yeah, I think you're right. From my reading of what's
been published in the Italian media, surprisingly muted, I think
I think they know it's much more about the car.
Lewis Hamilton's not coming in too much for too much
stick when I think that you possibly could have after
the last few races or the last couple have been
much better. So that's good for him. But I think
twenty twenty six does get them a little bit out
of jail. I'll have to wait and see what happens
(34:03):
in twenty twenty six. Perhaps you'd like to predict it
in the crystal Ball brought to you by Complete Home Filtration.
Before we wrap up. Of course, it's important to look
forward to the future. We're in the thick of some
really quite a lot of racing between Formula One and
Motor GP and then before a couple of weeks Supercars
as well, because well for the European sports, we are
in the European leg of the season when the races
(34:23):
come pretty thick and fast. I'll give you the first
one now, Matt, since you didn't like me going first.
For change in the r move of the week, it's
up to you. You can kick us off.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
That's fine, I'll allow it just this once. But I
congratulations on the excellent professional segue you just manished to
stitch together there. But we have one of those crazy
motorsport weekends where we have Formula one and Motor GP
in Europe at about the same time. So we have
a Moto GP sprint at Silveston at one am on
Sunday morning. One for the enthusiasts at me, I would say,
(34:55):
but I'm going to go two wheels with my prediction
this weekend. And this doesn't sound like an outlandish prediction
until you look at recent history and history over a decade.
I'm picking Mark Marquees to win the British Motorcycle Grand
Prix on Sunday at Silveston the ten pm start. You
go out on a limboy day here us. He hasn't
won either of the last two Grand Prix this season,
(35:16):
and he hasn't won the British Motorcycle Grand Prix since
two thousand and fourteen. Wow, that's how long it has been.
His second motor GP season, where he won the first
ten races of that season, Silverston being one of them.
He's nearly won the British Grand Prix several times since.
I remember the one where he was beaten by about
half a wheel by Alex Rinz on a Suzuki back
(35:36):
in nineteen astonishing to think he hasn't won at this
circuit for eleven years, so given the form that he's
in and the bike that he's on, surely that's one
of those.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Look.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
He hadn't won at Catafa t years either, and he
managed to do that back in round four. So I'm
predicting of Mark Marquez win, but not just Oh Mark
Marqueess is going to turn up and annihilate everybody. This
is a track where he hasn't gone particularly well relative
to some of the ones that he does but this
Sunday for me is the end of that streak. And
what's more interesting for me is that I did a
little digging for a piece of Fox Sports earlier in
(36:08):
the week and when he finished second to Joan Zaco
at Lemon in all of his career podiums, that's the
most It's the furthest behind first place he's ever been.
When he finished second to Grand Prix Yes, over nineteen seconds,
I go won that race by So it's the most
that Marquez has been beaten by in a race when
he's finished second in his entire career. He scored more
(36:28):
points in Lemont than the next five guys on the
championship table combined. So two things for me, I think
this is the last time we've seen the matter GP
Championship league change for the entire year. And when we
look back at the end of twenty twenty five as
to what was the decisive moment, it might be a
race that he was beaten to second place by more
than he'd been beaten in his entire career that ended
(36:51):
up being the decisive race of the World Championship. So
all that being said, I'm predicting a Mark Marquez win
for Sunday at Silverston. But while where christ Balling and
Chris my crystal Ball last week, I'm going to burn
any evidence of that because it was very, very very bad.
Where are you going for this weekend, given that we've
got a fearbit going on, including Monaco and eighty five
hundred as well.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Yes, and no Infinelly on the podium fil Crystaball. Yes,
the Indy five hundred with Robert Schwartzman on pole position. Yes,
which is I mean, look, I'm no IndyCar for Shionado,
so I don't pretend to know too much about the
ins and outs of it. But that is pretty remarkabul
for the premier team, which I think has no I
was reading, has no major backer. They're just having a
crack and they've had a good crack and over the
(37:33):
course of the race, remarkable stuff. But no, my crystal Ball.
I'll stick with Formula one, the Monaco Grand Prix, the
big one, well one of the big ones, I suppose.
I'm going to go with a little sort of statistical
cadence here because since twenty twenty one had been not
that long ago, Max Ustaffan has won every other year
in Monaco, it's either been win or well not win. Obviously,
it's a nice little pattern, so I think he's going
(37:54):
to be due for one this year because that's what
the pattern says. This would be though, his first back
to back victories since Canada in Spain pretty much this
time last year. That of course preceded the ten Grand
Prix drought that completely swung the constructors championships certainly, but
also understanding of form in Formula One because it was
the resurgence of McLaren So I think he can win
in Monaco as well. This is a track that should
(38:15):
not suit this car, but it will be a massive
signifier of the idea that actually Red Bull Racing's probably
figured out its car. I've just looked at the weather
forecast as well. Saturday could be raining, so you know what,
I think it could just about stack up, and we
know the race is one really in qualifying in Monaco,
so I don't got to put it past him.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
I don't mind that at all. The thing I love
about Monico best Q three of the year, the Q
three there in twenty twenty three, the lap that vestappen
we pinbare off the barriers a couple of times in
the last sector to beat Fernando altso we thought he
had pole. It's the best Q three of the year
and probably the worst race of the year. Whispered it quietly,
but qualifying at Monaco, washing those cars on the limit,
(38:53):
no fuel in them, guys absolutely ragging it. Knowing what's
at stake on the Sunday is absolute must ce TV
and I'm very much looking forward to that.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Yes, it generally, I've had to admit this dre it
generally not a great race, but when it is a
good race, it could be the best race of the
year because it takes a lot to generate a good
race in Monaco, so it's worth keeping an eye on
it at least for that reason. But that's all the
time we have for pit Talk today. You can subscribe
to pit Talk wherever you get your favorite podcasts, and
you can leave us a rating at a review as well.
This weekend it is the British Motorcycle Grand Prix with
(39:23):
lights out at ten pm on Sunday, followed by the
Monaco Formula One Grand Prix with lights out at eleven pm.
Quite a nice back to back for you to end
your weekend. You can keep up to date with all
the latest F one, supercars and MotoGP news at Fox
sports dot com dot Au from Matt Clayton and me
Michael Lomonado. Thanks very much for your company. We'll catch
you next week.
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