342 - Japanese GP Prerace 2026

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1:16Minu Gakhan. Welcome to Shift F1, a podcast about speed race cars. That, of the way, is Japanese for not looking is flowers. That means your imagination is always better than reality. Oh, wow. Will there be flowers in Jonathan Wheatley's future? Time will only tell. I'm Drew Scalen joining me, Danny O'Dwyer. How are you, Danny? I suspect there will be flowers because there's no way that guys doing anything but gardening leave for a little fish. Oh, nice. That's how you do that much. Nice. Very good. Also joining us, Rob Zachney. How are you, Rob? Doing pretty well, anticipating this unexpected hiatus from F1. That's sure how I feel about it. Yeah. If you are new to this podcast, a very warm welcome to you. And if you are new to Formula One itself, we recommend listening to our pre-season primer episode, which assumes no prior F1 knowledge and explains how the sport works and who everybody is. So if you'd like to go back and listen to that, it's episode 338.

2:16Also, this show would not be possible without our audience over at patreon.com slash shift F1, where every month we release ad free versions of the podcast early, along with bonus podcasts and videos exclusively for our patrons that cover racing documentaries and films, F1 video games, experiments with the other racing series and a lot of weird things. So if you would like to support the show and get access to all that fun stuff, hit over to patreon.com slash shift F1 or click the link in the show notes. What do we have going on this month in Patreon and Danny? Our beautiful two bars review of Drive Justify. Season 8 is now fully up if you can watch or listen to both of those episodes over on the Patreon. And we split them up into the first four episodes of DTS Season 8 and the latter four episodes. And let me tell you two different sides of a coin as it came to our enjoyment of this season of Drive Justify. And a massive thanks, of course, to all of our incredible title sponsors, whose names we are very proud to slap on the side of our car.

3:16The military industrial complex, War Isle, or IP Egberto and Ego Forman, TVGP.tv, that video game podcast. Let's Margot Racing, Eaching Wells, Dr. V, Deanj, Itzemi Farario, AI Generated Content, Mojo Nixon, Get Rich, Joe DiRion, Agave ATX, Slyphus Training, Turf SES, Michael Maves, Sugarits, Telemetry Dec Racing Team, FTC, I got it. Bata's not last, Drew Stewart, Super Clippy, Bailey Foot, Abraham Getchel, The H-Button, Happy 30th birthday, Patrick, Hashtag Funny Jerk. Snigs, nicotine pouches, Alex Kushe, Max Foltar keyboards, Jeff Foster, Troy Stammer, William Romph, Lackling the Maddened Men, Samurai Love Story, and Jason Kelly. Thank you all so much, everyone, and apologies for my raspy voice and inability to say words. I didn't speak for most of yesterday. I have one of those, you know, your kid is sick last week's situations.

4:16You're like, oh, I think we got past it, and then bam! Sunday, myself and my wife are completely out of commission. So, this is the first time I've spoken in a while. Okay, well, thank you, Danny, for devoting a lot of your throat energy to Patreon. You know, I'm always, when it comes to you guys, I'm always there with my throat energy. Sponsoring host. All right, well, since this is a pre-race show, let's just jump right on into the news, and really, we only have a couple items here, the first one, the big F1 news. F1 team principal from Audi, Jonathan Wheatley, has left the team with immediate effect. But there is more going on here, Rob. What can you put some color on? What might be happening?

5:17Well, there's a few things, there's parts of this that I'm curious what you guys make of it, because there are parts of it that are odd, just contractually. This story kicked off last week when we got word, and this is how it was covered, that Adrian Newey is stepping down, and that's the Martin. And initially, I was like, I had the same reaction, because that's the initial headlines. I sound like, holy shit, like what is going on over there? And then it was like a day later, maybe even hours later, that we found out that they were actively looking for a team principal, and I think Wheatley leaked early. Prior to that, and I think prior to the Newey announcement, I feel like I saw some stories that they tried to maybe poach GP from Red Bull and Max to, for staff and team principal engineers. So, what we have to remember is, we have to remember the history of like,

6:23odd vibes around this Aston Martin team. We talked about when Newey said he was assuming the team principal position. Yes, exactly. We talked about like, one, that was weird. Two, like, there's a lot of work for a guy, his age, just in terms of amount. Running a team operation like this, especially with regulations changing, it's like running for president, right? It is a fully intensive, like you are, you're always on the go, you're always meeting with stakeholders, etc. So, it's always kind of weird, and when Newey took that position over, it was always very clear that he viewed it as a temporary assignment, that he was going to be, he was stepping into it because some things at Aston Martin seemed like they needed a little more hands-on attention from the Haas. Yeah, and even seemed like, like, I remember him saying like, oh, well, I'm going to be going to the first couple of races this year anyway to look at the car.

7:27So, like, you know, I'll be a team person. 100%, and he wasn't a China, right? I think my crack did the team principal duties on the day in China. So, yeah, exactly. I think at the time it looked like when the reports came out, it was this, you know, fracture already within the Aston leadership, but yeah, it seemed like them attempting to, you know, open up that position. And perhaps more publicly it was just something that was always going to be coming, you know? Well, and I think the, you know, with him enough, the step down, I think it was sort of easy to interpret it through. Aston's had a horrible start to the year. Worst car on the grid can barely actually be in the races. Is how bad that situation is. And so, the immediate reaction was like, is this a sign of things,

8:28the wheels coming completely off over at Aston Martin, and Newe is already sort of retreating from a position that looks like maybe it is, is turning into a debacle. And then we had kind of odd thing where Wheatley's name leaked early as the person they were bringing in for the new team principal position. It wasn't confirmed, it was slightly walked back, and then yeah, it is true. Wheatley is leaving Audi to go team B team principal at Aston Martin. But do we know that yet? Because we know he's leaving Audi, but I don't know if we know that he's actually going to Aston. I think that's, is that confirmed? I don't, it's weird, I keep checking. Because that's the weird thing, because these guys are usually, we talk about gardening leave all the time, the notion that they would, that is the weirdest part of this, that these are not, you can't make these changes simply in F1.

9:30Usually they will teams will force someone to sit on the sidelines. Right, so yes, what is confirmed is that the Audi Audi of F1 has said Jonathan Wheatley's gone. The strange, where it gets weird is that Aston Martin now, and you know, can we really trust anything they say after they're like, oh yeah, no, no, he's totally in. Actually, we always, Newy has always been the temporary team principal. So there is some, some strange quotes here from Lawrence Stroll owner of the team. So this is from the hyphen race.com. What remains a matter Aston Martin will not comment on, Stroll has opted to take the unusual step of issuing a formal statement that reiterates his support of Newy, while leaving the door open for a team principal change. Quote, we do things differently here. No, no, no, hey, you have to read it more forcefully than this.

10:33You like, you have to imagine how it appeared on Instagram. Like block lettering. Okay. Like, we do things differently here. Okay. We do things differently here. And while we don't currently adopt the traditional team principal role that you see elsewhere, it is by design. As the most successful engineer in the history of the sport, Adrian's primary focus is on the strategic and technical leadership where he excels. He is supported by a highly skilled leadership team to deliver on all aspects of the business, both at the campus and track side. We are regularly approached by senior executives of other teams who wish to join Aston Martin or Amco. But in keeping with our policy, we do not comment on rumor and speculation. Gotta get a romco in there. Yeah. So I, this has got to be some legal stuff, right? This has got to be like, so we just can't mention this now because of X reason. Yeah.

11:33And so you're right. It isn't officially confirmed that we lose going over there, but everyone pretty much is assuming it's a done deal. And by the time this podcast goes up, who knows? You know, the curse of the podcast. Yeah. But the thing for weekly is it's like, it's like you're running into a burning building. That is the part of this that I find kind of odd. How much money could I give you for you to run into a burning building? Also, you don't have to live in Switzerland anymore. So that's the low key. That's, that appears to be the reason he was so eager to do it. Is that he and his wife hated Switzerland. And for real, and this is a matter of the first time I've heard people shit talk Switzerland. Right. And like say that like for a country that we view is like, Oh, it's just idyllic Alpine wonderland. People fucking hate that country. There's more. There's more watch repair places there per square yard than anywhere else in the world.

12:36And let's be honest. Weathe is a guy who really cares about his wife's wealth. His teeth. Yeah. His teeth. Is that just that? Yeah. Remember when they show him on drive to survive in the first shot of his of him flossing? Oh, yeah, that's true. That's true. Also, he's like, he does seem like quite a good, you know, partner. He seems like somebody unlike some other team. Perhaps he really cares about their wives well being. Or husband. Well, I'm going to throw Claire Williams on the bus. And so yeah, I thought that was interesting that like the Audi have been trying to get people out to Switzerland. Because that's kind of predominantly where they're based. They have an operation in the UK. But like apparently a big part of their sort of culture, I guess, is trying to get people out there. And he did just move out there. And yeah, it's seemingly not enjoying the sound of music. Is that Austria or Switzerland?

13:37That's Austria. Because obviously if it was Switzerland, I'll tell you this is making no sense. Why do you have to flee Switzerland in the middle, like before World War II? You wouldn't have to. You were fine. So come on Danny. Get us together. We were having our own fight. You know what I mean? We were trying to get you know, get some independence while everyone was kind of. Hey, Switzerland is also served by laundering, laundering access money into global financial markets. We're not talking about that, but it's on this podcast. But yeah, sorry, to that end, is the question because like Matthieu Bonanno is running the show over there now. That guy probably likes Switzerland, right? We saw him and him and Gunter hanging out in the foothills of the Alps with their. I don't think it is a geography issue though. I think it like everything I've heard is that like Switzerland is a little different. Everything.

14:37So I've heard this about Austria too. Austria is weird. Yeah. It's like Germany, but also like really small town, parochial and like sort of very up its own ass about like being Austria and not Germany. But like it can drive you a little bit crazy if you're used to like the more cosmopolitan life of say like Munich or or other parts of Germany. And Austria might be happening compared to compared to Switzerland. Like Switzerland sometimes sounds like what if an HOA got a country? Like that is that is kind of how it feels. It is like what if an HOA sees control of an entire nation? And we don't know the culture at the Audi as well. Like that's all it's so funny isn't it? Like whenever you see people leaving companies it's often a lot of like okay well maybe they won't pay this much or like even sports stars leaving teams. You know what I mean?

15:37It's a lot of like but the things we forget are like their kids have to go to school in those local schools. You know they have to live in this like part of the world. Maybe they're from a different type of part of the world. So who knows. Wheatley to me seems like the type of person who might be a bit more sensitive to that sort of stuff perhaps. I don't know but like I do think I do wonder if this has something to do with the leadership at Audi and perhaps him hitting a ceiling or I'm not sure. But the binado thing was always a little bit weird too. Yeah. Because it's like it's kind of like we have two team principles. Yeah. We have binado who clearly had the juice in Audi. He was brought in and sort of fixed the program and then where's that leaf Wheatley. But I am inclined to suspect that there might just be a part of I don't like living here. And logistically it's proving hard to do the job because like you are so off the beaten path of where a lot of F1 cottage industry stuff moves around.

16:37But going back to Newy for a second. I don't know how to. I'm two minds about this. This is exactly when someone gets fired. Like a car rolls out like this. Literally the drivers can't drive it because it vibrates so badly. It's like ripping their nerves apart. I'm also skipping Fp1 I heard in Japan. They're putting a rookie in the car. Okay. But how good are these rookies? Does this rookie have shaky bones or are they, you know, well now. But like this. This is a sort of situation where people do get fired. But Newy stepping up to be team principal also had the smell of like desperation to it. That something was wrong at Aston Martin. And he started taking on more responsibility trying to address it. Given how things have turned out, we can now I think we now surmise.

17:39Like there is a mounting panic as Newy steps into his role at Aston Martin. And he realizes like this isn't, this isn't bad shape. Is it possible that the firing had already happened? Their previous team principal, no longer team principal. And that's why Newy needed to come in. And then, you know, perhaps they thought that they were going to get some other someone to come in. And they couldn't because of, you know, whenever anyone came, they were like, oh yeah, so the, the honey engine, it's not doing so hot. And then they would walk, right? It's like who would want to take that over? Or maybe it just took this long until they convinced Wheatley. Yeah, or perhaps Newy. I can see a situation in which you end in this sort of like a duo polar power situation or whatever, right? Where you have an aerodynamicist who essentially is sort of the, you know,

18:41Lauren Stroll, businessman, not a, not a, you know, F1 guy. I mean, he is an F1 guy and so far he's been the sport for the best part of a decade, but like he's not an engineer, right? So he doesn't like run the team. The idea of him being timid principal would be ridiculous. But you know, that's just not his ilk. So you have like essentially Adrian Newy is the, you know, not only the highest ranking sort of, engineer at the team, but also presumably maybe a bit of a cult of personality, but you don't know what I mean. So if things are going wrong as well, adding in a team principle into that mix does create a sort of a power, you know, dance there, you know, sort of two magnetic poles of influence. So I can see how perhaps that was the type of thing that was intimidating to somebody coming in. I wonder and I wonder if this is them, you know, putting the car before the horse. We don't know because we don't know if Wheatley has already signed on paper or signed, you know, effective.

19:44Even if he has though, Rob's point, I think it's a good one. Like because these gardening leave regulations, he won't be able to just pop in. So sort of a non-compete thing, right? Yeah, I did see some journalists that said he might be able to join from the Dutch Grand Prix, which isn't so far in. But I don't know the reasonings why that is. I mean, you know, with some people with, with the, you know, how long was it this? Was it a year before Newy was able to join Aston Martin? Like he was on a significant gardening leave from, from Redwell. I think it was until the start of this calendar year maybe. So they, they have worked before Newy and Wheatley. Yes. So I think, I think it'll be a, I think it's a good move for them. Wheatley also from, you know, what little we've seen of him and driver's derives seems like a pretty cool head.

20:46And he knows he's going in clear-eyed, again, if the rumors are to be believed. He's going in clear-eyed with knowing the problems of the team. So theoretically, this will be a stabilizing effect. I feel about. The thing about Audi is that I think they've shown that they are, but I've been really impressed with them. And they're, they're, they seem to be punching above their weight, especially this is the first season that they've had their new engine. And they, they, I think they got it off to a great start. So I, I also don't think that they'll have too much trouble attracting a team principal. It's just a matter of like we, we just, we need to see when and how these chips finally fall. So here's the thing. Wheatley, I, in drive to survive, we talked about this in our, in our reviews available now on Patreon.com slash ships and so forth. And the, the thing that comes across to him is he's very sort of like, I don't know, he's, he seems like a, like a good hand with the drivers.

21:49He's sort of empathetic, he sort of, maybe like low pressure or whatever. I can't think of two worst drivers for his style of management. Then Lance, my dad owns the company stroll and Fernando Alonzo, shaky hands, Alonzo. So in, in some ways, I'm like, oh my God, the next season of drive to survive, which version like this, is this the Wheatley arc? Was Wheatley at Renault when Alonzo was there because he did work for Flavio Breatoria. Right. Oh, he did. You're right. That all comes up in as well. So he's worked with some, some prickly characters. Yeah, but has he managed them? So I don't know. I mean, he may have, I mean, he may have been there with Alonzo. Yeah, he may have a previous connection there. I think he was making these good. I think it's a good move for them. I feel bad for Audi because again, they, they, they started so strong and this, this can be, you know, this is going to be disruptive.

22:56So hopefully we've been able to hold things together. I do feel it. I do wonder, well, it was two things. One, I feel like Aston Martin has gone a very long road to effectively hiring English outmarks after hour. Similar, like similar soft spoken, like really driver oriented, like, like, want to break some of the little confidence and positive reinforcement. Like stylistically, they seem very similar. And I was sort of felt like some of what stroll wanted out of this was like someone who's a little more alpha that he trusted. Like run team principle. And now new ease in there being like, no, what we need is a kindly uncle. Like that's, that's who we need for the team principle. The other thing is, I mean, one, the statement from stroll does make me worry a little bit that like, is there a bit of disenchantment with new ease specifically? Over there that like, is this just the plan to step down? I have too much on my plate or is there a bit of like disenchantment with how he's handled the fact that like this entire relationship with Honda, the car, it's all gone as bad as it can.

24:04Is his position at like for what they paid him a position better be secure. You can't be having buyers or more at this point. But it does feel a little bit like there might be a bit of like judgment about how things have been going, how his performance has been. I mean, it could also be the opposite. It could be like a consolation to newy to get him to stick around after I think to newy say it. He also may have been sold a false bill of goods. I guess sounds like when he arrived, he didn't fully grasp that. No conversations with Honda hadn't been what he thought they were. What is it the use for like project management, the Gantt chart, right, where it's like different timelines for everything to think up? All engine stuff, that bar of like how things change is like 18 months wide, right? And so if something's gone wrong in there, you can't just like fix that.

25:06Like car design is a thing product like nine months a year engine 18 month time horizon, specific arrow components that you can do within a season. But like all these things need to sort of sync up to really put together winning formula. And if newy got there with like, you know, six months, seven months till we're going to be taking the covers off this thing and discover the engine situation is bad. You know you're in for it. You cannot. There's nothing you can do. Seven months sounds like a long time, not with power human development. Like if that's gone bad, you're really limited in what you can, what you can do there. But yeah, like it is, it is a train wreck over there in a lot of ways. But I also wonder, are we seeing F1 moving toward what we see increasingly in a lot of other sports where the coach. It is the coach and the general manager positions are now effectively divorced and the general manager increasingly is the one with the power.

26:10You see this. I don't know if if like soccer is fully. It depends. There are some like you have a situation where it's like, well, some first, you know, some people get hired as head coach rather than manager, but also you have a director football role, which is increasingly. I am very important for sort of long term. It depends. I'm an Arsenal fan. We're in a position where we now have a manager that is sort of adopting the more traditional role of sort of helmsman of the entire ship as a were. But yeah, you do get that bifurcation of of a responsibility in a lot of clubs, especially ones with high managerial turnover. Well, in Hoss works this way. I think when Ayo Kamatsu took over, he basically said, like, look, Goother Steiner was, you know, the CEO doing the money stuff, bringing money into the team. And he was running the team itself, like the technical side. I can't do the money side. I know cars. So we have another guy doing that. Yeah. Yeah. And like the binado thing feels like that was a struggle in the team principal role, but appears to be very comfortable in that sort of head of the operation, but I'm not going to be there on game day, making the calls.

27:22Total wolf has always sort of felt like there's an executive role almost more than more than like a coach on the front line of how this is how this is running. And then I do master delegator. And I do wonder if we're seeing that with with Aston where it's like new ease in here. And now it's like this is going to bifurcate. This is new ease ship to steer, but I need someone traveling with the team and running like day to day operations with the team. But ultimately the person in charge of the team and like what what what the car is going to be, et cetera, that resides with with new. And that seems to be just a model that f1 is moving towards where we every every year we get further further from the Ron Dennis Christian Horner, like everything stove pipes through me. Now it is like team principal is someone playing motorsport manager, you know, you're you're making the tactical decisions, but like the development stuff is handled elsewhere.

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29:29Timberland, built on craft, visit Timberland.com to shop. All right, fellas, you have linked me. Did any of you sent me a reaction video? Yeah, well, it was hard to find footage of this on YouTube that you could link to. I think me and Rob Boatsaw are on like Instagram. Yep, this is the one I saw. You found it. Okay, great, okay. This is, yeah, this is a Max just happened at the Norge life of Max obviously raised GT cars this past weekend. I don't know if that's obvious. He's wanted to do this for a long time. That's true. And he's cute. Part of his Red Bull contract has been like, listen, he's been, you know, he's been very vocal about like not only the recent changes with F1 and the regulations, but also like, you know, Red Bull. And it sounds like they are allowing him to do these sorts of races just to keep him happy.

30:31Yeah, I mean, he wants to he's done. He's done them over the years. Yeah, yeah, this is like, it's not like a one. This is the first time he's done like any type of GT3 stuff. I think he's he's queuing up for the 24 hour that he wants to do at the Norge. That's what he's done spa, lunch and all this sort of stuff. So this was a four hour race that happened this past weekend. Yeah, there was two races. The first one he spoilers for anyone who wants to see this. But the first race is team one, but they were de-cute because they use an extra set of tires. So that was a bit of a bummer for him. And I think this is I think this overtakes from that race. There was a second one as well on Sunday, I believe. But yeah, this this is the overtake that was going around social media, which yeah, click it. Watch it. Give us give us your. Here's my reaction to this reaction. Okay, yes. It's what it might be a reaction that starts with the. We'll put a link in the show notes, but we've got I'm seeing an in-car multiple picture in picture here. The main shot is. First person from the inside of Max for staff. It's car. He is okay.

31:35He's between. Two cars are ahead of him one on either side and it looks like he is going to shoot up the middle. So I'm going to press play here. Okay. Yeah, he's still in the post end. Okay, but we're restarting hours. I'm seeing him set it up. Okay, passes one car on the left. And then oh my god, between the two. Makes it look so easy. Three wide on the Norge life. I love to see it. It is not a wide circuit. No, I do that move on the F1 game all the time, but it's when I put it in like easy mode and stick myself in a Ferrari at the back, you know. Yeah, it is. It is I'm pretty sure. So I think like some of the overtakes that have gotten flagged. There is effectively a lower class car, I think, on the field.

32:37But still, like that is usually you don't just send through a sweeping corner. Two cars. So it is a bonkers, very, very stapian move. And like the more so here's the thing. We talked about, I think we talked about last week where he was like people like this. People like what's happening at one. They don't like it. They don't understand race. And I do think in some ways, Max, you'll be so much happier if you race sports cars. In part because also you can bang quarter panels, bodywork, like I think. But you would love giving, like giving people a little shove in sports cars. And you can do that. So here's the thing, like they have things like balance of performance. Oh, yeah. That is yes.

33:39It's so hypocritical. There is. I do think maybe balance performance might be a little bit easier to swallow from the perspective of the drive. Like if you think like, I am God's gift to racing. You put me behind the wheel. Nobody can touch me. Put the training weights on the car. Just let me drive flat out. I will like, I will wash all these fools. I can see that kind of working for Max. But this is, this is very much to the point. Like it's his disenchantment is palpable. I think he earns for the sports cars. And I think it would be quite the coup if like WEC, I think it would end up being almost a win win. I think WEC would love to be like, we poached the best driver in the world because he wants to come to real racing and in WAC. And F1, no longer has to deal with the fact that when there are marquee stars,

34:39keeps taking pot shots at the sport, seems to not understand the fucking money. Yeah, I think it's one of these situations where he always has this to fall back on. It's weird that F1 has pushed him to this stage where he's probably genuinely considering the next few years and what he's going to be doing. But he's got more money than the other need, probably at this stage. Obviously the first app in name is stronger brand than ever. I think if he does, I can see a situation in which he goes into the world of endurance racing. Like he's done in other areas over the past few years since COVID starts a new team. You know what I mean? Starts his own operation, get some money in there and enters some alternative type of sport that way spends more time with his family. You know what I mean? Like I can, the pathways right there, you can see it. It's just whether or not he's going to step through or stick it at an F1 for a couple of years.

35:40This is something we've seen with so many drivers who have, like I'm not going to sit here and say I know more about, you know, what's good racing, then max bloody verstappen. But like outside of the regulation change and how he feels about these cars and how he has to drive these cars. He is also in a situation that lots of world champions have been in where they are dominant in the sport for a number of years and then kicked right down. Like not even a second. You know what I mean? How to go through this. So like, yeah, their fortunes change. Yeah, and they're not at the top anymore. And it's very easy to be happy with the formula when you're on top. And obviously it's very easy to point down when you go down. I'm not necessarily saying that's what's going on here. But I do think outside of how he feels or his justifications for how he feels about the current regulations. He is just going to be enjoying this a lot less because he stuck in a car that means that he's fighting in the top 10. And also a car that he can seem to start, which is probably also kind of a problem with the start of races. So yeah, it's interesting.

36:41It's already in the season for all this stuff, but yeah, it'll be interesting to see the direction travel for Maxion's career as the season goes on. Well, we travel now, Danny, to Japan. Japan. Tell us about Suzuka. I will. Suzuka, it's just a great place. It's a classic F1 track. That's the old guy way of saying this one has largely remained unchanged in the wake of a lot of classic tracks being modified for largely safety concerns. And I say that would a big asterix, maybe two asterix, actually, in that one of the turns 130 or was completely reprofiled. I think predominantly because of Moto GP related incidents. But and also this is the, the sadly, the site of the 2014 crash of Gilbert Yankee, which was the, you know, a lot of people will listen to this podcast.

37:42We'll remember watching live. I certainly do. And it was a, you know, a tragic day for F1, which led to us getting the halo and put on the cars, which has saved. And I suspect quite a number of drivers from terrible incidents, including Lewis Hamilton in, in Italy, at Monser, who? Jog on you. Jog on you. Absolutely. We've seen in GT2 and, sorry, F2 and F3 stuff as well. Yeah. So it's a, it's, it's a, it's a, a place that has, I think the drivers really like driving this one is the sense that you tend to get. It's been around since 1987. So almost as long as you and me drew, Rob, are you reaborning? Docs you right now. Oh, 83, 83 love. Okay. So you were, you were, he was already right. Rob was watching F1. He was why he was taking notes. He was already like, you know, complaining about the, the downforce on these.

38:4887 regulations. Just. Yeah. Yeah. They're ridiculous. Not ruining the sport. He's like, um, 50, it was originally built as a Honda test track. Um, it's 53 laps, 5.8 kilometers, 3.6 miles. It is the only track in Formula One that has a figure of a configuration. In fact, the earlier designs for the original Honda test track had a crossing itself three times. So they, this is the reserved version of Suzuki that we're racing in. And it does, if there is, it's an overpass. It is not, it's not an intersection. Yeah, it's not an intersection. Oh my god. But imagine. Oh, imagine. I did, I did see a post on, I think it was, I'm going to assume it was Formula dank on reddit. That was, um, how are they going to handle the, uh, the figure of eight at Suzuki? And it was like a shot of the track, um, map, and then sort of zoomed in square on the overpass and like one of those drivers,

39:48who has the right of way thing. So if you're coming at it from the right or at the bottom, which I thought was quite good. Um, yeah, it's an overpass. If you're watching on television, it's actually kind of one that's like a little bit maybe hard to, hard to see. You know what I mean? It does. Yeah, it looks like they just go through a brief tunnel. Exactly. That's quite, it's quite quick. Um, probably because the, the actual part at the top is, is such a high speed section of the track. Um, but yeah, this is a track with loads of iconic turns. You know, it's, it's, uh, it's fast. It's high speed. There's lots of gravel around sort of like alluding to what I was saying earlier about the classic nature of this track. Uh, you start the, the lap with the, with the S's here, which are, uh, probably the most technically complex aspect of the track. And it's going to be very interesting to see how these, and these cars would reduce downforce and we had last year tackles them. The S's are taking a quite a speed. They're also like kind of uphill. So there's a lot of like sort of, uh, front end required to, to tackle these things.

40:49I think the new cars are going to look pretty great actually, uh, tackling these S's. Um, then you go into the, the Dagnars, these kinds of series of, uh, of sharper turns at the top of the hill. Spoon, which is my favorite named curve, perhaps in all of F one, which is the Spoon curve. Come together with your car. Overtake me. Love it. Um, is that yeah, like a multi apex uphill, never ending right hand to left hand turn, um, lots of fun. And then of course, one thirty R, which is the, uh, the turn at the end of a straight used to be a bit more of a dangerous entry into this one. And now it doesn't necessarily have the sharpness that it had before, but, um, still a, you know, an exciting part of the track. And, and I guess the other thing to mention is that we have two straight mode zones here on, on Suzuka. Um, the first being the start finish in the second being one thirty R. So there's, there's no, there's no, there's, there's sort of not that many places for you to, to crack open the, the arrow on this one as opposed to what we saw in China, for instance, where there's a lot of these like sort of mini straights dotted around the track.

42:08Obviously, active arrow is going to do its own thing, but, you know, I, I feel like there's, uh, it's a different, you know, we talked about how like these new cars going to tackle these, these, uh, these tracks in China was the one, especially with regard to super clipping that we were like, all right. It's going to be, they get pretty fast on this one. Obviously, uh, the, the, the back straight, especially leading into one thirty R is going to be one more, we're probably going to experience a little bit of that super clipping happening. Um, but, uh, I do think these, I'm excited to see how these cars tackle like two thirds of this track. I think it's going to be very cool to see them whipping around the way they, they, they, they really like attack corners. Um, I'm excited to see if we get some interesting spots for overtakes that we, uh, we, we tend to not get here at Suzuka. That is my big question as well, because I, this may be in my personal track ratings, hmm, the worst rated track. That's not, yeah, it's, I, I feel because you're, how many years, sorry, how many years does your, your, I know your form book, um, which is something we need to apply some statistical rigor and correction to, but your racing quality record, uh, goes back further, right?

43:35Uh, only three years for Suzuka. So when, when you've been saying like a one four scale of, of how good it was, okay, well, yeah, that's a, it's narrow. It's a bad lately. It has been. Yeah, I, I think part of that has to do with the fact that we have had like the overtaking spots in this track have very much been like, oh, trying to get down to the chicane before somebody out breaking the chicane, you know, the, the, the, you know, this is also a track that has like so much history on it. You know, Santa and, and, and prost and, um, you know, overtaking happening in that spot, but I do feel like the, that was a problem for a long time is lack of overtaking spots. And then obviously the last thing to say about Suzuka is that you roll the dice, what weather, this is a track where we have had some crazy stuff happened because of rain. And so I may just sit to see what the, what Drew's crystal ball says about that. Yeah, I mean, um, you're right. Kind of all that can go out the window. Um, I think we've got the, the new regulations that could completely upend, you know, what, what has been a fairly boring track in the most recent three years.

44:50And, and like you said, there is weather. So we're looking at qualifying at 3 p.m. local time on Saturday. Um, oh, guys, guys 63 degrees Fahrenheit. Um, 24% chance of rain 24. Okay. 24% chance. That's for quality. That's for qualifying. Yeah. On race day, it's currently zero percent chance of rain zero degrees Fahrenheit or Celsius. It's 65 Fahrenheit. Yes. Zero percent. Okay. We might not need it this year. That's the thing. Who knows who knows who knows. That's the F one 2026 slogan. Who knows what Max for stop and stick around. Who knows? Max for step and won the last four Japanese grandfries. Um, and going to say one for that in 2019 was Valtruvotas. Right. So Red Bull has in the past, um, see, five years, the best finishing statistics, one of their top five tracks. It's also a top five track for Alex Albon.

46:03Um, bottom five tracks for, uh, Carlos signs, um, Pierre Gasley and Liam Lawson, um, Ferrari and McLaren, uh, both go decently well here. Mercedes, though, uh, in the past, their past 10 finishes have averaged a 5.5. It's also one of the top tracks for, let's get, let's get weird with our livery because, you know, Japan, like Japan, it's like it's, it's, it's, it's anime. It's manga. It's, it's, you know, the Western eye loves to look at Japan. It's, look at all this. Look at all this. It's, it's, it's gojura. It is. It is. I'm asked of decided to, to, uh, him, him, you know, sort of take on the power of, what's the word again for big, for the, of the, of the guy. Geiju. Geiju, I, Geiju. I was about to say Geijin, but, but both apply. You don't apply the power of the, the power of the Geijin. I mean, isn't it, if, if, if one, if one is if nothing,

47:07a, a, a Geijin, you know, endeavor, especially now that we are in a post sonota world. And that's true. So, you know, it's, uh, the Geijin Kaiju is coming. And that's, that's what they should call the Haascar. I'm going to say it from now. That's called the Geijin Kaiju for the rest of the rest of the weekend. Well, as we head into the Japanese round, George Russell stands atop the driver's, uh, championship standings with 51 points, four points ahead of his teammate. Kimi Antonelli. He's T-Pose got there. Charlotte Claire in third. Louis Hamilton fifth. I'm sorry. Fourth. And in fifth all over bareman, 16 points of field of Louis Hamilton. Two points ahead of last year's champion, Landon Morris. And we've got Pierre Gasley in seventh. Max for Stappen in eighth. One point behind his former teammate, uh, tied on points with Liam Lawson in ninth. Arvid Lindblad is 10th. Well, uh, tied on points with Isaac Hunter. Then we've got Oscar Pastery, 12th. Wow. Uh, Carlos signs in 13th Gabrielle, born a little 14th.

48:08Franca Colapinto. 15th Esteban Ocon. 16th. He's got zero points along with Holkemberg, Alban, Botas, Perez, Alonso, and Stroll. In the constructors championship, uh, Mercedes is on top. 31 points ahead of Ferrari, who themselves are 49 points ahead of McLaren, who are just one point ahead of Haas. Imagine Haas being top three in the constructors. That's why Red Bull is in fifth followed by racing bulls, Alpine, Audi, Williams. And then the zero points, scorers of Cadillac and Aston Martin. Uh, all right. Well, if you'd like to join the standings yourself, you can do so in the, uh, official shift of one fantasy league. Um, you can also send us an email, shiftofonepodcast.gmo.com. Refund.cool slash emails. And before we get to emails, I've, I've got, I've got a message email here from me.

49:13Oh, yeah. Oh, I forgot about this. Oh, would you do this now? Yeah, let's do. Yeah. All right. As Rob mentioned in the previous episode. I was planning on going to the Monaco Grand Prix this year because I am turning 40. Um, my wife Sarah and I were going to go. However, my sister-in-law is now getting married in that weekend. And we definitely don't want to miss that. That's it. Sounds like you're, sounds like you're that second good reason not to go, you know, to go to Monaco. I'm saying, she got a registry, right? This is partially my fault. I, I, so all right. There's a lot of, you know, considerations that go into this. I figured that since, you know, I wanted to go big. And I figured that since we were going to spend a lot of money getting over there, it made sense to get the best tickets we could.

50:14It's the 40th birthday thing. I'm, I've, I turned 40 years here too, but I didn't, I, I kind of think of the big thing that I want to do yet. So I haven't done it. But I've got the money sitting there to do it. Well, Danny. No, no, you're in luck. No. So I want to get the best tickets I could. I did a ton of research. I read a lot of people's accounts of being Monaco, including people who had sent us emails. I watched a lot of YouTube videos from various grandstands. I determined that grandstand K is the place to be. It's the one that looks out directly at the marina. And then you've got to back to your left. Okay. And then to the right is the entrance to the swimming pool section. So I wanted to be in a place where you can actually see the skill of the drivers instead of just, you know, watching cargo by. It's also the wrong circuit, my friend. I'm kidding. It's also a spot where there's a big TV, which not every grandstand has. So I wanted to make sure that I got that spot,

51:20which meant buying the tickets at the first possible moment, which meant booking through F1 experiences, which is directly from F1, but also includes typically a kind of hospitality event package, which takes the price up. But I was like, let's go big. So Monaco does this have like, okay, yeah, because this is really like you meet drivers or like to hang out with for Christian order. I mean, I would have prints that it's different per track. But in Monaco, it means a party on a trackside yacht. Oh, man, can you ride through that? I sure hope so. Well, an F1 insider in quotes shows up. And you get to talk. It's either a driver, a team member, or an F1 media person. That's cool. That's cool. So I very early bought these tickets, because I wanted to make sure that, you know, again, I'm going all the way over there.

52:24I only turn 40 once. So that's why we went big here. So for two of these tickets, it came out to $6,800. That's not each. That's for two. For two. Okay. We don't normally throw this kind of money around. Yes. Which is why I'm now desperate. I can tell this is killing you doing this, because it implies that you like to just like champagne your life around. And, you know, this crowdfunded podcast, you know, I know. Yeah. It is. There's a sort of brutalness to the fact that the one time you have decided to indulge yourself is also the one time you have to publicly. Right. Backpedal. Here's like, does feel weird to be doing this on the podcast. Ask me how much I had, like when Drew was getting married, I was like, I'm in the West Coast in a while. I'm going to be hanging out in style, going to hang with all my buddies. Fuck it. I'll stop off in like I'll go see friends and Seattle after that.

53:28I had the whole thing booked. Right. And then like, oh, like a week and a half before we flew out dog medical crisis. Yeah. Yeah. Very funny. She turned out to be fine. But like all that shit was all that shit was locked. So it is. Hey, at least you have something somebody wants, right? Which is actually, I guess, yeah, Rob couldn't sell his ticket to your wedding. He tried. Right. And then I had to hear from everyone. Like it was so well, I guess this will be worse. I heard from like three or four people that like, man, Drew's wedding was so good. It was just fine. Like Drew's family was lovely. It was such a good time. Meeting Drew's family who, you know, especially your aunt who listened to the podcast. That was just like amazing. Well, there's your number of people who were like the scan lens are exactly who you think they are. Yeah. Like it was delightful. But I guess it could be like if it is an awesome Monaco GP this year.

54:28And you sold the tickets. You'll have that experience, but like kind of global scale where it's like instead of like three people being like managers wedding was really nice. It's going to be like a crafty every year at Monaco. And of course, we all remember the 2026 Monaco GP where the finest moment of pure racing. If ever there was going to be a race, a Monaco GP that was going to be like, this isn't me trying to like sell up Drew's tickets. But like genuinely, you know, this is the one time any of us has a sliver of hope about the race from a TV perspective. Monaco has always been a race that people should go to if they can go in person because, you know, it just seems like the vibes. That's also why I wanted to go big here because, you know, we went to Austin together, Danny. Sometimes being on the track is not the best place to watch a race, but Monaco is the most the biggest disparity between like I want to just be in the place amongst.

55:35Yeah, what's happening there? So yeah, Austin, you know, sort of track outside of a field. Yeah, it's in a field like a couple of miles outside of a cool town. But Jay, I think for two reasons, one, obviously, there is just the it's in Monaco. So you're just like, you know, you're living in a in a James Bond movie for a couple of days. Obviously, you know, I think that's that's super cool. But also as a track perspective, the track is like super compressed. So like, even if you're like, you're sitting at the back, you can hear them, you know, flying up turn breaking into turn one, you can hear them coming out of the tunnel. You know what I mean? Yeah. And the way this works is that you can so with F1 experiences, you get a like a contact that so I've been emailing with Grace, who's been wonderful. Thanks, Grace. And I've requested certain zones of the grandstand, you only get the tickets three weeks prior to the event. But I've there is a spot of grandstand K where you can turn around and look behind you and see the start finish.

56:41Oh, nice work. Yeah, that's how compressed the track. I don't know if we're getting that. But anyway. So the other thing that I learned is that the thing to do is to not get a hotel in Monaco because they are way overpriced. But to stay in Nice and take the train every day. Cool, which is like 30 minutes or something. Also train trip across picturesque south of France. So we also booked a hotel for two in Nice, which is also transferable. So if you're interested, like I said, I am fairly desperate here. So I will definitely entertain best offers. Okay. If you are interested, shift up on podcasts at gmail.com or f1.cool slash emails. Now, here's the cool thing. Don't be, don't be dissuaded by this. You're going to be sending in like offers to the email. And then I'm going to see what the best offer is. I'm going to beat it by about $500. Price is right style. I wouldn't do that to you. But what if I did? That would really make some people angry.

57:45But I probably won't because I already had to pass on these tickets. Because like, honestly, it turns out flying to Miami from Miami GP. More expensive than I thought it was going to be. Yeah, airline, you know, all that beautiful fuel isn't calling cheap these days. Do you see the United CEO said they're just assuming oil at 125 a barrel until I think like end of 2027? Why the fuck, you know, I don't work in supply chains. Okay. I don't know. Why the fuck do we have to pay for the increase in oil? Let the fucking oil companies pay for that. You know what I mean? Oh, I'm sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. It's going to cut you can just really nearly always have your, always have your profit margin. No matter what, what's, what is that about? Oil companies just not even once regulate them all. I know they're richer than anything. They've more political influence than anything else. But I'm like, oh, you just get to like preemptively put the cost at the thing at the, at the faucet.

58:50So does zero risk to you at all in terms of the business whatsoever instantly the concern that you have to go back to these are national resources. And they never should have been privately extracted 100% like that was just a utter like modern society just like, hey, this isn't going to cause problems down the road. But crucially, even though oil companies are evil and have all the money, crucially, Drew does not. And so you've got to send in your offers to shift F1 podcast at gmail.com. Yeah. And get drew out of the stupid jamming Scott that's often too prioritizing a family obligation for a once in a lifetime. Well, hopefully that one's like hopefully, you know, you can, I mean, look, I hope the marriage goes really well. And it's not like every year, like you're having to attend this fucking wedding because like, well, I thought I really thought that one was going to be the one that would be really good to do in Monica weekend.

59:53But hopefully you get a chance to do this again and do it in style. But in the meantime, shift F1 podcast gmail.com make, make Drew an offer, make Drew hole on these on these Monica tickets. Thank you. Thank you, Rob. What else we got in the old email hopper? Oh, we got we got so much stuff. I left myself some meteor things to read. So Drew obviously kick it right back to you to lead us off with VPN questions for reasons. All right. Yeah, for security. Kelly writes, hey team, I hope you can provide your personal experiences and advice for streaming F1 in the coming season. Any thoughts on the best VPNs and or server location to be using to purchase and stream from a non Apple F1 TV subscription based on my internet slew thing. It sounds like Canada is the best bet. All right. So sounds like the emailer doesn't want to sign up for Apple TV and is in the US.

1:00:55And therefore wants to subscribe to F1 TV itself. And you could do last year. Which you could do last year. And therefore it would be I think I don't remember the exact breakdown, but I guess a little cheaper. So two things about a few things about this. I think you would have to sign up for an F1 TV account using that because it it won't let you I guess if you're in America sign up for an F1 TV accounts. You have to first sign up as if you're in another country. Then you must stream from a VPN in another country. The signing up might actually be the hardest part because I don't know what kind of address you've got to provide for your for your credit card. Right. Oh, should that really get you that might be how you get you. However, there are services such as privacy.com where you can link your bank account to privacy.com. Then it will generate a credit card number for you.

1:01:59And you can put in whatever address you want. Wow. It's all it's legal because they know privacy.com knows who you are. Okay. You have to verify your identity with them. One, two, three, fake street. Exactly. Canada. Sixteen Yemen Road Yemen. The other thing about VPNs is that a lot of them are bad and a lot of them may not necessarily support streaming. So the F1 TV might detect that you're on a VPN and just say, nope. So you might end up paying for it and then be unable to watch it through your VPN. You could try different VPNs for streaming. I personally have used private internet access. In the past, they have specific streaming only or stream dedicated for streaming servers. It sounds like Canada's the best bet. I would just go with whatever streaming server has the lowest latency.

1:03:03You can change it around. Or whichever one like private internet access gives you access to a lot of servers. So you can if one doesn't work, you could switch to another one. But again, F1 TV might be doing some like, oh, you registered your account in Canada. You're trying to stream from Mexico. What's the deal here fraud detected? You're off. Another one that people like is proton VPN. That is another company that I would trust. I don't know anything else about VPN companies. A lot of them can be shooting. We might be the only sports. No, podcast. We might be doing podcasts in the world that is giving away free VPN recommendations. I'm gonna say that. Right. As opposed to like, you know, sponsoring. I don't know what it is actually good, but they aggressively caught like moved into the podcast space. I use Mozilla VPN, which I think they use someone else's, I think it's white label.

1:04:05I think they use someone else's VPN infrastructure. But it is like these things are tough. And I expect that F1 and Apple have been pretty clever about this, which is that like people have known that VPNs are used for this purpose pretty extensively. And what happens over time with a lot of VPNs I've used is that they do start to figure out which IP addresses are VPNs. And then you will just watch streaming services just magically stop working through your usual like VPN service. And there's a big different location. And hopefully you get an IP address that they haven't figured out is is affiliate with the VPN. It's tough. It is a bit of a game of of whack-a-mall. You know, I sympathize. It does kind of suck that now you kind of need, you know, two subscriptions. If you're going to get the app, the F1 TV experience that you got last year. Yeah, I would do some math and see if it is actually worth it. You don't pay for everyone. You just pay for Apple TV now. You don't need to pay for F1 anymore.

1:05:06Yeah, because I got an email two weeks ago. It was like, oh, you're, you're canceled. You canceled that. And I was like, what the fuck? I was like, hang on. And then it was, oh, okay. I thought you still had to pay for the full suite of F1 TV features though. No. To get all my, you get it. You get F1 TV premium with your Apple TV subscription. Oh, sorry. Hang on then. What are we doing here? Hey, all good then. You're fine. I guess, no, it's if you don't have the Apple TV box. You can still install the Apple TV. You can still install the F1 TV app. You just need to link your Apple TV account to your F1 TV account. Hey, you know what's weird? You know where I sometimes watch Apple TV on my PlayStation 5. What? Yeah. You media. It's it. It feels so weak wrong to do it. But, but it feels so good. It feels so good. You saw that. Honestly, that, that's a good point.

1:06:06I did not realize that like they, you sign up and you just get F1 TV premium. That's not such a thing. Yeah. And you can watch F1 the movie every day. Yeah. The thing about Apple TV is that they will try to make you believe that it is a monthly subscription. But you sign up for one month and then you go in and you modify your subscription to be yearly. Oh. And then it's cheaper. Okay. Drew, I, I have fucked that up since I sat like, thank you. Yeah. I've been, I've been flushing money down the, down the toilet because I think I've let them do monthly building. Yeah, I need to do that too, actually. Yeah. God dang it. I, I, I, I launch Sony's marathon on steam and play with my Xbox control. Yeah, that's weird. Wait, you play marathon on a PC with a controller. You psychopath. Yes. Yes. Most credible. Wow. Yeah. Is it a, is it a risk thing? Are you? I mean, I just, I don't know. I think it's comfortable. I don't have a lot of space right here for a mouse.

1:07:07And also, I will say, it likes plugged in. Yeah. Yeah. It feels good. He's going to go over the fact that he's just held up a track ball and that's like this is 1998. Oh, yeah. Look at that. I started using it with this with a cloth map because I was getting RSI. Or do you have the vertical with it? Do you have the vertical mouse? It's not, it's not quite vertical. This is the Logitech MX. Yeah. Something nice. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Now we're just doing aging nerd recommendations. But Kelly, I hope that was helpful with the money we saved you. Maybe you could afford it once in a lifetime trip to Monaco this year. I already got your hotel. It's so easy. Danny, you want to read this next one from Nick? Sure. Nick writes in, Could a team's off-site strategy department simply be replaced by AI? It seems that all the factors that go into completing successful undercut pit stops could be calculated within seconds by a laptop sitting on pit row and a good Wi-Fi connection. No, I'm not saying could. Not sure.

1:08:07I personally believe that human's ability to make mistakes is what makes formula one interesting. But in the era of cost caps, I wondered for placing an entire department with a chat GPT subscription would free up money for other developments. Okay. So maybe I'm not the best person to answer this question because I have levels of AI bullshit detectiveness detection that are perhaps higher, maybe not even detection, just AI. What is it when you think something is a total suspicion? Suspicion, smokes. There are things that machine learning and what we have called AI, which is large for people. It's largely the generous of stuff, let's say, but like there is areas of this that are very good at doing quick jobs for humans to do. Like the world of like writing code, for instance, has changed inexorably over the past 18 months.

1:09:07It has changed workflows, it's changed hiring practices, all of this stuff. There are significant aspects of the things that people are telling you AI can do is total horse shit. I'm not saying like not even that like, oh, we can do an okay job. I'm saying there are like fundamental things that this technology is absolutely terrible at. This, to me, is a great example of people assuming that this tech, the way that it works, especially when it comes to like coming up with outcomes, it is particularly bad at coming up with outcomes. Like this is why when people ask chat, you know, chat GPT, if you want like quick research done that you can then later go in and fix and fact check and stuff like that. Sure, you can use these things to do this. If you are looking for a data point, if you're looking for it to do want to get to take all of this information and give you the right answer, you are barking up the wrong tree.

1:10:12The analysis that they already have computers that find the gap in the lap, like that's been around for 10 years folks. AI gets like sort of prescribed with this like almost godlike power to do things that we've been doing very well with regular code for a long time. So like yes, they can do that. The issue has never been when is the best time to piss in terms of the mathematics. I mean, it was years and years ago when they had to figure this stuff out. But like no, they have people and computers to do this stuff now to find the gap. It has always been the strategic element of that. It has been okay, well, we have to look at that and the tires. We have to look at that and the, you know, the is there going to be a safety car? Is there going to be a safety car later? All of this sort of stuff. And you can't just plug all that into an AI and have it come out with. It doesn't know what your point is you do. I agree with you. You would want to because we're talking about a binary outcome here.

1:11:13Yeah. And the inputs are going to be like integers that are coming from the track and averages from previous sessions, previous races. Like those are things that AI is not we're not writing an email here. We're not like generating an it. No, and it is it is it is. It is on like one of my favorite things to do is watch videos of people asking it to do the most basic stuff that it just does not have any comprehension for any like it is. It is a it is it, especially all of the like sort of consumer touching stuff like Chachi PT or like gen like any of these ones that are talking to you. The the success rate of most of this technology is its ability to trick people into thinking it's doing the right job. I'm not saying that like is some sort of duplicitous thing. It's literally what it's designed to do. Chachi PT is designed to try and make to try and create things that sound like a human made it. So the problem is is that you are essentially hiring a snake oil salesman to get you snake oil.

1:12:18You're asking it for snake oil. So how can you then tell you don't even if it's real snake oil. So the one of the issues you run into is like you know this this technology cannot see or interpret or even a lot of times ignores super obvious aspects of a problem. And then ultimately even if it does have all the data a lot of it gives it's kind of designed to find the mean. You know what I mean? Like it is not it is not some it's an auto computer basically based on past experience. So I think it would be ill suited to this situation. But I think the question of like can this just be automated. They try to do that. Like that's why that team of people looking at computers is they are looking at simulations. They're looking at like we believe the computer is telling us to pit now. Do we believe it? And I think that is this is such a thing that I think tech have really in the pursuit of trying to chase like hype and investment.

1:13:23Yes. I think tech has done itself a disservice coming from a finance side and not an engineering side nearly as much. Like should it be called AI is a debate that happens among comp side people all the time given how these things work. But there's this notion that like computer analysis has gone really far with this. Like you already have the machine you know as Danny pointed out it's already crunching so much of this data in real time. The problem is that last step of like taking that data in and making a snap decision about what is the correct call this moment on the race. Well forward looking into what you expect to happen this race at some point you need someone who's going to be pretty sharp to make that decision and have good instincts. And you can you could give that decision to a computer. But it is probably going to at best be average at it.

1:14:24Right. And to get to that point you're going to have to change everything about how you run strategy. And probably have to work out an iron out a ton of bugs to basically arrive back at a mediocre race strategist. Yeah. There are elements of like you know computational and again look I have some computer science background but I'm not an expert at any of this sort of stuff. But there are clearly types of work that this stuff would be really good at like we're lucky you know I think about like the protein folding stuff that was going on with you know the PlayStation 3 for instance. Right we're just going to throw comps how it all started right we're folding at home right was the first I looked at was that that was our Trojan horse. We never should have been folding at home. We were using all our power you know the whole thing was like you's your what if it was falling at home. Falling at home was basically the same things like how we ended up mining crypto right I think that is well you know morally know but but like yeah in terms of like using your home internet.

1:15:31Electricity and compute power to solve a problem that you know the difference with crypto being that like the the worth of the crypto was based on the electricity used to produce it right. But whereas what you were doing is hoping was folding protein to try and help cancer research so like you know morally there are two different things but like yes they're very similar in some respects in terms of their architecture. And yeah like I think like you know one of the things for instance like scanning you know um you know CT scans and stuff like that being able to like find things that maybe a doctor might miss you know what I mean like a single point of. Even then unfortunately. They've done studies with this on oncology oh really and it's like even having access to the tool makes oncologist worse. Of course that was the terrifying thing is you even then you can't use it as a tool because the second you're like here's an AI analytical tool oncologist who have an extremely good record of like diagnosing what they're looking at.

1:16:35Get worse because they have a sense figuring out what they're looking at yeah yeah so like unfortunately like AI uses is way if you're even for stuff like that. That reminds me of VAR and soccer when they brought in video referees you are now starting to see decision making to adapt because they know that there is this sort of like safety that that exists. So yeah yeah I think like there is a lot of propaganda and a lot of misinformation and a lot of hype which as Rob said even people who understand this technology are sort of happy to go with just because it you know essentially sort of you know everyone's making money so let's feel good about it. This technology is going to be good at doing certain things it's going to be good at developing certain tools it's going to be probably be good in software engineering to a certain extent. 90% of the reasons people are saying this technology is good are total horses. Like I don't even saying like they are they're stretching they're trying to know they are doing this because you have to do this to keep your shareholder happy.

1:17:35So look at all this stuff with a massive amount of skepticism and especially when it comes down to things that are you know as require a level of human ingenuity that a you know a median finding machine is not going to be able to do. But you know not snake oil two tickets to the Monica GP shift F1 podcast at gmail.com that's an investment that will return. Are you going to cost within experience you can get 10% over the top of the time of memories could be yours shift F1 podcast gmail.com. I know we're in our hard out we get some good emails we'll have an email episode coming up soon but Drew if you just need to if we need to bounce we bounce yeah let's. Oh man there's so many good ones but yes I do we got a layoff cup we have time we do a big yeah we'll do an email episode I do need to go to work that's fair. It's got to pay for these Monica tickets somehow.

1:18:38All right shift F1 podcast at gmail.com we're having a cool slash emails you can also hit us up on the socials that's us. We take it around the world and we're about to burn. I feel like you enter 2x podcast mode. Me too let's go. MotoGP is at the circuit of the Americas. Cover the Cota round the world's super back championship is in Portugal for at the auto drum. International Algarve. Oh beautiful Montenegro. The NASCAR Arrioli series is in Ridge Wave, Virginia at the Martinsville Speedway for the NFPA 250. Motocross Grand Prix is in where else but Switzerland for the Motocross Grand Prix of Switzerland. Indycar is at the Barbara Motorsports Park in leads Alabama for the Children's of Alabama Indycar. Leads Alabama I have to go there sometime but it's very much like leads in England.

1:19:40And we got NASCAR. Also at Martinsville for the cookout 400. That's classic classic Merck. And that's going to cause one usual. Cookout with. We're using renewable fuel. It's cheaper. The Japanese Grand Prix kicks off Thursday. Eastern time at 10.30 p.m. Practice one. Followed by practice at 2 a.m. Friday. Fruit practice three is at 10.30 p.m. Friday. March 27th followed by qualifying at 2 a.m. Saturday. And then the race. 1 a.m. Sunday. So 10 p.m. Saturday night. Pacific time. This is all very hard to crack. I love it. I love these early races. I love it. I love when we get to Thursday and there's stuff happening.

1:20:40But I will post a session time graphic to our. Thank you. Check out the social feeds. Yes. I love it 10 p.m. Race on Saturday. It's a good time. But that's what's going on this weekend. What happened this day in history, Danny? The threat to take F1 from free to air terrestrial to pay TV was averted on this day in 2000. A moment of the FIA and Incident assigned a 100 year deal for the commercial and broadcasting rights of the sport with Bernie Ecclston's SLEC organization. The deal was key in preventing the major car manufacturers from forming their own breakaway championship. Formerly one fans in the UK were cursing ITV's coverage of the San Marino GP on the stay in 2005. A threading race was heading for a dramatic climax with Fernando Alonzo and Michael Schumacher going head to head when with just three laps left, producers cut to an advertising break. Viewers were dumbfounded and ITV returned to the action just in time to see Alonzo win from Schumacher by just 0.21 seconds.

1:21:40Sterling Moss said, I can only assume the producer was a football fan. But you, friends, don't have to worry about ITV cutting to commercial if you buy Drew's tickets to the Monaco Ground Parade. If you would like to support the show and get access to all of her bonus episodes, the early ad re-version of the podcast and the official SHIFT-F1 discord you can do so over at patreon.com slash SHIFT-F1. Have a great race weekend everyone. We will see you all next week. .

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