343 - Japanese GP 2026

0:00Saru mo kikara ochiru and welcome to shift F1 a podcast about speed race cars, that by the way is Japanese for even monkeys fall from trees, which means that even if you're good at something you can still make mistakes. Has the F1 monkey fallen from the tree? Will they catch a vine during the April break? We shall see thanks to Aaron for the tip by the way of that phrase. I'm Dr. Scanlon joining me, Danny O'Dwire. How are you Danny? I'm doing good. Yeah, these monkeys, they keep running out of battery midway through the jump. It's kind of embarrassing to be honest. But look, we'll figure it out. In some of the monkeys, trying to jump past the other monkey at these weird monkey jumping speeds, they're just too different.

1:04And I think the FIA really needs to look into that. My FIA, I mean the trying to quickly come up with acronym about monkeys. I think the FIM is actually the motorcycle one. So FOM is the media rights holder. That's true. Yeah, there we go. Thank you. Formerly one month. Yes. Formerly a lot of monkeys. Formerly the monkeys. That's where we're at folks. I'll be joining us. Rob Zachley. How are you Rob? Just enjoy the auto support comments section. Top comment on an article about Max or stop and maybe leaving F1. Go elsewhere where there's proper racing. The way it was intended. Real racing fans will follow. F1 is now for the virtue signaling generation. Oh, wow. Liberty Media. You studied for knowing how to destroy a proper sport in four to five months. Wow. We are so woke. I'm expecting Pete Hague says to start invading us any moment.

2:07Invade your house and start drinking pushups and then drinking all your shit. Yeah. If you are new to this podcast, very warm welcome to you. And if you are new to Formula One itself, we've got an episode just for you. Our preseason primer episode assumes no prior F1 knowledge and explains how the score works and who everybody is. So if you'd like to go back and listen to that. It's episode 338. Also, 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 this podcast early along with bonus podcasts and videos exclusively for our patrons, the cover racing documentaries and films, F1 video games and experiments with other racing series. And a whole lot of other stuff. So if you'd like to support the show and get access to all of that, head 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 land, Danny? It's a little weird. It is. And also I kind of want to talk about what we're going to have this month writ large because obviously we have this weird gap that's happening now because of the the bizarre war that's happening in the Middle East at the moment and we've had two races.

3:15Cancels kind of think we're going to have some more cancelled before the end of this year unless you know I'm not super optimistic about anything being changed by the time we have what's left Abu Dhabi and Katar no Katar is one of these ones. They went to war with cancel culture. Yeah, you're right. And they're events their culture cancels in itself. It's it's it's a shot. It's just we're missing out on Jetta this year folks jet. Can you imagine how jettas clothing closing speeds in jetta. Oh boy. Yeah. Right. Like even on the old formula. We were like Jetta feels like a place to sign this gets someone killed. Yeah, Jetta has been for every year. We've had some great races there. Let's you know, I don't want to. Oh, you're always a little scared of like the death start trench run effect. And what was it like the first year, the final turn where you come in blazingly fast. You got to like have full commitment on the main straight didn't

4:15Verstappen. He was only a god to your run and then just like into the wall. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And also that we've and we've seen this a couple of times with the overtake mode thing. Remember, the Hamilton Verstappen breaking to get the DRS zone thing that was happening as well. So yeah, I don't know. In a way, I feel like, you know, I really, bullet dodged, which Jetta, but, um, you know, well, I guess we'll have to we'll have to wait and see. But yeah, the rest of the season, I mean, will they be able to end this, this year in Abu Dhabi? Like, I don't know, man, they're going to have to there's going to be have to be a lot of low miss the latest news is we might be done with this. And, uh, the message from the president is like literally told NATO go get the oil yourself. It should be easy. Oh my god. So I'm taking my toys home. Okay. Cool. Yeah. Here's the yeah, exactly news news happens fast. So who knows by the time this podcast goes up, but, uh, yeah, you know, it's just one of the dominoes falling. But, you know, here we are. We have this big old gap now. We have a pre season break an early season break in April. And no one expected. So, uh, Drew, what are what are what are we doing? Um, yeah. So the next three.

5:27This would leave us with three weeks without an episode. So what we're going to do is next week's episode will be an emails centric episode. So get them in. We've got a bunch of great ones already. And we'll, we'll, you know, any news that happens. We'll alert you to that as well. The following week, we're going to put up part one of our drive to survive episode series one of two. So if you are not a patron, you'll get to hear us discuss the first half of the most recent season of drive to survive. And if you want to hear the second half, you can sign up for the Patreon. And then the week after that, we will have a patron exclusive pod, which is the form of the two primary people have been asking about as well. So it will be a good time to sign up to the patron if you want to get. Um, that episode, I'll also obviously drive to that episode too and everything else. So, um, yeah. And then the one after that will, of course, be the pre Miami show, pre Miami. And then is a bit of a gap after Miami again. There's it. Yes.

6:30We'll have the first race Miami show and then we'll have a gap and then we'll have the pre Canada show. So, yeah, all right. So we might have another email show in there or something. We'll, we'll have to wait and see. Um, but yeah, what a, isn't it? Yeah, it's just a very weird, you know, way, it's probably the good thing that it's happening at this stage because we have a lot of questions coming out of this, uh, you know, race that we'll talk about today. Yeah, we will talk about it. Yeah. Um, but yeah, massive thanks. Of course, to all of our incredible title sponsors over Patreon.com slash shift F1, the military industrial complex. Wow. Good, good, uh, good business for them at the moment. I'm not unsurprised that they're a title sponsor. Also, War Isle, RIP Egberto and Egor Furman, TV GP dot TV. Let's Margot Racing, Eaching Wells, Dr. V, Dean, it's a me. I generated content, Mojo Nixon, get rich, oh, die Ryan, I got a ATX, Cypher's training, turf, SES, Michael Maves, cigarettes, telemetry deck, dot com, FTC, botas, not last, Drew Stewart, super clippy,

7:42foot, Abraham Getchel, the H button, hashtag bunny jerk, snigs, nicotine vouchers, Alex Kushe, Max Foltar, quick keywords, Jeff Foster, Troy Stammer, William Rump, Lacklin, the maddened man, Samurai love story, and Jason Kelly. Thank you all so much for sponsoring our beautiful podcast. And Drew, I think you have a shout out of your own. Well, yes, while we're discussing people who are generous with their funds, I did want to give a huge shout out to Sky Raven, who bought my Monaco tickets. Well, well, well, well, well, is that the wrong national nightmare? My all personal nightmare is over. Is that that person's real name? Sky Raven? It's what they prefer to be shouted out at. That is an amazing, they really swooped down and came to these tickets. That's the shiny little tickets they saw. That's right in their nest. I'm sure it'll be an awesome time, but you know, it is, that is a lot of money, and I am extraordinarily grateful that Sky was willing to help me out when I'm just some dude on the internet.

8:49So thank you, Sky, and thanks also to everyone else who reached out and inquired Ryan, Adam Demetri, Daniel Zach David, Clint, Doug meatballs and Amanda, Nick, Josh Soleto, Brian Derrick, Fulance, and Adrian. Wow, fair play. And hopefully they can all go to Monaco anyway and hang out together. That sounds like a fun party. Those, you know, there are, you may be surprised, cheaper tickets. I believe it's still available for Monaco. My tickets are very cheap. Imagine if everyone went and met, did a meetup without me. That would be, that would be very cool. That would be great. If you do that, please take a picture. Exactly. You're at that wedding, getting pictures, waves of pictures of like me, Danny. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Having a great time. It's like Jensen. Oh, she's there. Are you a Jensen Button's boat? We're doing shots with like the Crown Prince, you know what I mean? Like he's there in his suit with his, with his, his, his, his, his, his Mark of life and his American accent.

9:53Yeah, it's, we're just having a great time. Somehow, Danny's hired to be the new team principal over at Audi. Yeah, they want to me in there. It's gonna be a good time. And we need a new silver fox. Yes, exactly. That's, yeah. I, I'll be like the Eddie Jordan of the current, you know, epoch of, of F1. Your shirts are not nearly that. That's a good point. I wear black shirts every day. I might be the opposite of Eddie Jordan. That's, that's a very, that's a very good point. All right. Well, yes. Thank you again to everyone who offered and thanks again to Sky for coming through for me. Yeah. Look, I've, I've, I've, I've a, you know, 2020 Jeep Wrangler. I'm thinking about getting, you know, getting rid of. So if anyone wants to email me with some offers, you know, if you want to, I got eggs. We got, we got chickens. We got chickens and make that lady's eggs. I sell eggs. We got a bunch. You want to get some of that, you know, sure, we could spin out a couple of businesses here on the side.

10:55That's right. That's right. That's why we, that's why we do it. We're in it for the, for the big. Exactly. That's box. I'm not selling my Jeep. I'm never selling that Jeep. All right. Let's take it to the race. The Japanese Grand Prix. Everyone. Much to discuss. Let's start with the grid. Good place to go. The whole position once again, Kimmy Antonelli and his Mercedes, just ahead of his teammate, George Russell. In third, we got to Oscar Piastry and then Carla Claire in fourth. An incredible slide on his final qualifying lap just feels like he was barely holding it together throughout. In that final turn, causing problems for a lot of people. A lot of, a lot of good, a lot of good drifting. Some initial D you've heard. Yeah. The gifts were flying in the discord live chat. Let me say that. Nice. Fifth place, Landon Horace. He had some technical issues in free practice two and three, which had to be nerve-wracking considering McLaren's double DNS last round.

12:00They and their power unit supplier Mercedes were apparently unable to fix his battery after China. And so he's got a new one in for this round. The second of three that he has allowed for the year. Oh boy. So it's a new regulation here. Things are parts are going fast. Lewis Hamilton will line up sixth ahead of Pierre Gasley in his Alpine followed by Isaac Hachar. Gabrielle Bordeaux in the Audi and Arvid Lindblad in the racing bulls car out qualifying in 11th, Max Verstappen. Complaining during qualifying that the car is undrivable. Not happy with his nose. Yeah. You know how he likes to attack those corners. And yeah, a lot of understeer seem like happening with that or B. Yeah. With a red bull. Yes. Sorry for the red bull. He's running some upgraded parts. A lot of them apparently on the side pod engine cover floor and rear brake ducts. Apparently they're not jelling quite as well as he would like.

13:0411th Esteban O'Conn followed by Niko Hulkenberg, Liam Lawson, Franco-Colopinto, carless science in 16th. Then Alex Albon in 17th and collided with Sergio Perez in practice. Yeah. Which is rare. Seemed like a just a people didn't see each other. Yeah. Yeah. Perez didn't see him and turned in at the chicane at the end of the lap. But Albon maybe, maybe optimistic there. Little dive bomb match. Eighteenth Oliver Bareman rough showing for him considering he's going into the sitting fifth in the drivers championship. Sergio Perez and Valtteri Botas line up 19th and 20th. Valtteri, the only one starting the race on the hard tire to everyone else's medium. Botas is also as it turns out. Not quite. Fernando. Oh, yeah, sorry. Oh, line up 21st. He missed free practice one. Do the to do the birth of his first child. There you go. FP1 FC one. First child. First child one. Fernando Alonzo.

14:04Do we know anything about this child? Is it a, you know, is it a, is it a PK for stopping situation? You know, do we have, do we, is there a, is it the quid's, quid's out as a right? Is it like, have they blended houses enough? Fernando Alonzo is Fernando Alonzo. He's really a bit off-big in calding or so apparently it's a Spanish motorsport journalist. Okay. I looked at his family through having rumors about them for a while before relation was confirmed because like they appeared to be heavily flirting during interviews. I guess. Oh, nice. Oh, wow. That's great. Yes, his partner Melissa Jimenez. Very cool, very cool. Congratulations to them. Congrats, you're well done. Yeah. All right, the race, Danny, do you wanna take us through the start of the Japanese Grand Prix? Absolutely, all eyes on our good friends, the Mercedes crowd who, you know,

15:05just like in Mario Kart, you can get that boost if you time it right. Wait, hold on, real quick, okay? She's 38, Fernando Alonzo, way to go. Danny, age appropriate, age appropriately. We did wonder what pre-recording, the phrase geriatric pregnancy was thrown in the ring by me. Which is a real term with a shockingly low age to have it applied as a 35, I think, as a... It was low, it's like the medical establishment used to be like, I don't even just be a spinster. Yeah, yeah, yeah, shouldn't you be a, like the latter ages of a brood mayor, like just this is, I don't like this term at all. I don't think they use it anymore. They don't use it anymore, okay, okay, see? Well, it has to, I think, I will bring it back, you know what I mean? That's all I'm saying. That's all I'm saying. The start, the start, please.

16:07So yes, looking forward to my Mario Kart start and folks here, but you know, if you time that boost wrong, you get that little, you know, you get that little, you're saying Anthony Ali held the button for too long. Did Latikus laugh at him? Yeah, yeah. So he had a not great start, either the Russell, but Anthony, honestly, the start itself, not so bad, but he got a rough amount of wheelspin as he went up through the gears, which has sort of been that, I'm not sure I call it that second phase, but not, you know, we used to call it the second phase when somebody would have a bad little start there after they were getting up through the gears. This is kind of more like the first phase, and now we have this early phase, which is the actual, can you get the car to bite at the light set? So it was kind of just a rough bit of wheelspin coming out of that, which allowed Oscar Piastry to just go yank around the outside from his position and third. Piastry, of course, starting this race, breaking recent McLaren tradition,

17:10Chuck LeClock as well, who is in fourth, obviously sees both Mercedes in front of him, the Ferraris, as we've been saying for weeks, are particularly good at these starts, and so was able to snake his way through the two Mercedes, but by the time he does it, you know, Piastry is already gobbled up first place and he's ahead of him. Landon Ars throws himself in the ring as well. Why not? He makes his way up into fourth from his position and Lewis Hamilton also manages to get past Kimi Antonelli, who by the time they get down into that first turn is, is object in sixth position, which is a. That's a rough one. Obviously not ideal, he's got a lot to do from there. But Jack, great little battle there. Lando ends up getting up into third position, ahead of George Russell as well, but a wonderfully brave overtake into the, into the S's ride, the start of the S's. So yeah, leading up into the S's,

18:12we have Piastry, Charlotte Claire, Landon Ars, Russell, Hamilton, and then Kimi Antonelli. Yeah, he doesn't take long to start reclaiming positions. He gets by Hamilton on the start finish, straight on lap two, and there's some more jockeying for position in these opening few laps for Stappen, making it up to ninth and fighting with Hadjar, who appears, I guess to use a little too much energy, defending and also falls victim to Ocon. Russell also retakes a position, getting third back from Norris, and less than a lap later gets by LeClair on that start finish, straight into second place. And on lap eight, makes his way past Russell, with a great move into the chicane, but immediately Piastry retakes the lead on that following straight. That was cool to see, because we have some more back and forth. Yeah, some more back and forth. Look, I'm open to the idea that people feel like this is somewhat artificial,

19:13or like I'm not going to dissuade that immediately. I thought that was cool, but it was also very cool to see McClaren doing it, because obviously we had a bit of this happen in the last race with Ferrari, the McClarence, where Ab sent from us, and so there was this sort of like grain of hope that perhaps the McClaren might have racepaced actually sort of take it to Mercedes this year. So when that happened, you could hear the cheers around the circuit, which I think as much as anything else, sort of the internal cheer that was happening in me and the cheer on the Discord as well, when it happened, it was very much a hope that this was maybe a sign that there's some competition here. And also, I think as this season goes on, we're going to find out that like a lot of people prefer pastery to Russell, you know what I mean? I don't know, Russell's stock, I feel like. Just personally. Yeah, yeah. Not in China, where he's the racing emperor. Well, that's, yeah, he looks like an idol, so. Also big sister George.

20:14Big sister. Big sister, yeah. The two big themes of his fandom. But yeah, no, I'm with you. I do think there's probably a little bit of, I don't know, there's like a low key distaste for George. There is. It's out there. Yeah. A little too, too. I think just how people find him. I don't totally agree, but like I can actually see where it is coming from. But then again, who people decide to like in NF1 often, like seems kind of weird to me as well? Cause like there's, there's a lot like, there's a lot of folks who's like, Oh, everybody just loves this. Everybody just loves this guy. And I'm like, yeah, but do we though? This is me and Danny Riccardo, right? Everyone just loves Danny Ray. Oh, yeah. It's very nice. Yeah. He's very nice. I don't know if it's like just the ray of sunshine you've made out to be. Well, you're saying fandom might be a little weird. Yeah.

21:16Yeah. All right. Antonelli meanwhile, sitting in a train at this point behind Norris and LaClaire, he tries the same move as Russell on lap 11, getting by Norris. And this time he makes it stick like his teammate. And four laps later does the same thing to LaClaire, getting himself into third place, nearly loses it though in the final corner, which allows LaClaire to repass him on the street. Like I said, that final corner proving pretty tricky across the weekend. Yeah, I'm not overtaking spot, the sort of traditional entry of the chicane after 130 or was becoming sort of the spot again. I take a brief mention of the super clipping on that straight as worth a mention. Obviously F1, this weekend, changing some of the battery deployment rules around qualifying in particular to attempt to stop the level of super clipping by expanding the amount of available battery usage in at certain RPM.

22:17But yeah, I think this was another one that sort of left F1 fans a bad taste in their meth, you know what I mean? Or sort of? I think the hardcore ones, the ones who couldn't watch on onboard through 130R and go like, wait a minute, they're derading. Well, an onboard if it doesn't cut away from it, what did you make of this whole thing? Cause like yeah, they're sort of a lot. Yeah, well it's hard to tell, right? Cause there's like, there's elements obviously of this discussion that we're having around these, you know, the theory they're cutting away from onboards to disguise what's happening with the clipping. Yes, that they're cutting away from onboard so that you cannot hear the engines running at that high RPM, high gears right at the end of the straight and they're going to these, you know, outside cameras, external cameras, regular TV cameras. Yeah, I think a lot of this is coming from the fact that when they posted Kimmy's qualifying lap,

23:18it cuts away from his onboard right at that time. Right. There's a post in the YouTube comments from F1 saying that there was a technical issue with his onboard and that's why they didn't show it. They don't want to hear the soy engine, the spool is spilling up. They did post a one of the ghost car videos, which compares his and Russell's lap and it's from Russell's onboard and they show his onboard there. The other, so I'm inclined to believe them on this one, especially because when they cut away, they don't come back. So my expectation is that the recording ended or got corrupted at some point and that anything from then on was lost. I wonder, not to, you know, take a, pick aside on this one, but worth mentioning Suzuki is one of these tracks that has kind of like China, has a bit of a radio issue sometimes. They do run into some transmission problems here.

24:19Well, the onboard would be recording, right? Yeah. There's a lot of times we'll see live like some glitches. What do you mean both, right? From the feed and then in the YouTube posting, or in a replay, or it wouldn't be replay. In the YouTube posting, there isn't any of that. So I think they have an onboard recorder. Okay. But yeah, let's see, lap 19 is when Piaestry pits from the lead, going from medium to hard tires, 2.4 seconds. Russell pits three laps later and comes out still behind Piaestry. Leclerc had already pitted by this point. So Anson Elliott, who seemed to have a stronger pace, then Russell is left leading the race. The top three of himself, Hamilton and Gasley has been not pitted, along with about half of the field, who also had not pitted. And it is right at this time that we get yellow flags for bearmen in the wall, followed shortly thereafter by a safety car.

25:19And on the replay, we see that bearmen was attempting to enter into the spoon curve, but Colapinto is there. And the closing speed, that is the difference in speed between bearmen and Colapinto, is really high, apparently, 50 kilometers an hour or 31 miles an hour. And so bearmen has to bail into the grass to avoid hitting Colapinto, and then sort of skids across the track as it turns to the left. Thankfully, avoiding Colapinto, but he baremen slams into the barrier sideways at more than 50 G's, which automatically scrambles the medical car. He appeared to be limping as he got out of the car, but thankfully we learned during the race that he didn't break anything, just had a bruise to his knee. So I'll just throw out here that race fans, and I'll put this in the show notes, has a good analysis of the incident, specifically around Colapinto's driving,

26:20whether he took a different line, went slower than previous laps. It doesn't look to me like Colapinto did anything untoward, but what some drivers like signs have pointed out, and we alluded to this a little earlier, is that the main culprit here is the difference in speed, as a result of energy harvesting. And if not in this specific case, this is something that they've warned about, and that they surmise the drivers at least will continue to happen. Signs is a director of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, and in this quote from race fans, it says, I'm hopeful that Formula One management and the FIA will come up with something a bit better for Miami. We've been warning them about this kind of thing happening, these kinds of closing speeds, these kinds of accidents were always going to happen. I'm not very happy with what we've had up until now,

27:20and hopefully we come up with a better solution that doesn't create these massive closing speeds and a safer way of going racing. So again, just to kind of reset here, because we are harvesting so much energy that slows the car down, and so you have cars that aren't harvesting going much faster. And that is unusual. Yeah, especially because the where you harvest and where you deploy stuff has been less predictable than it could have been perhaps. Like, I don't know if before this season, so we had a lot of questions about how is this gonna work? Is it gonna allow people to take dramatically different laps? Different lines will like tire wear or track conditions be, have an impact on this. It was just a lot of questions kind of thrown up about it. And what we've noticed is that there is a lot of variance in how drivers are attacking this stuff,

28:21and it's not just on a driver by driver. It's on a lap by lap. It's on a position by position. And yeah, like you said, the drivers had been warning about this, and this is kind of an acknowledgement of those fears. It is a very, when you look at it, it's a really unfortunate crash, because you're like, there's not, Collapinto didn't really do anything wrong. He actually ends up sort of sympathetically going off himself a little bit as well after the, he watches another car fly across him. He misses someone distracting. Yeah, exactly. He misses the entrance to Spooner, the left hand runner. And yeah, and Bairman is you know, what do you do? It's one of these like, you turn a corner and there's somebody stopped in the middle of the road, you know what I mean, like what do you do? You slam the brakes and go into the back of them, they try and get around them.

29:21There's kind of like no great option available for him, and it's kind of a nasty place for it to happen, because like, it's on a, it's on a, you're basically between two Apexes of a court. There's no straight really there. And then unfortunately when he loses it onto the grass, there's only one place for him to go. And I'm glad he's all right, because the car looked like it went sideways into the barrier. Yeah, maybe, you know, and then we obviously saw him hobbling and they took a little while to get back to him. And obviously, you know, Suzuki is a track that we have a lot of unfortunate memories of incidents over the years. He's your Bianchi, of course, but also that terrible, you know, truck on the road incident we had a number of years ago as well. So there's always a bit of me at Suzuki. It's like, all right, let's just chill out here, folks. So yeah, thankfully he's all right. But what do they do about this? Because like the only reasonable, you know, or the only real sort of non-milk toast response

30:21to this is to dampen the effect of the batteries, right? Like to get that 50-50 back to 75-25 or something. And I don't think they're going to go there. Like I think we're going to see sort of like, you know, piecemeal change to try and like take the heat off of this, but I don't know if, what are your thoughts on this Rob? Because I'm kind of, I don't know what they're going to do. Yeah, there's a few things. First, I think one of the, like my immediate reaction was call Pinto got way into the middle of the racetrack. Like my first reaction just watching it live was, he drifted way the fuck over and closed off, like both paths he would take, like around him through there. And it looked like there was a mirror check there too. So there's a degree of, there are styles of driving that have gotten more acceptable

31:23because the racing is so safe that back in like the 70s might have gotten you your ASCICT. And I think that was one such moment. But the other issue, like, so it gets complicated because call Pinto is going to be like, yeah, it absolutely shows, you know, how tough it is with these, with these regs. I'm just sitting duck out there. Don't look at me for my role in it. It's these goddamn battery regs. Like there's an inside of there. There's a lot of drivers who, okay, we weren't getting traction with the argument for whether or not this is aesthetically good racing, but nobody can argue with safety. And so you're going to have a lot of people, like sort of moving that route to try and shift the shift, like to work the refs back to like a set of regulations that disadvantage them less and signs a sort of in that boat

32:24as well, you know, wearing the hat of both drivers association wrap and then also someone who is just in a much less competitive car. But you heard all the way back in Australia, if not sooner, that there were concerns about these overtaking speeds that the effect was, you had cars that were damn near in different classes, right? Like the overtakes that happen on Mulsan in the 24 hours where it's like, you just have a vastly faster prototype car overtaking a GT. It's a sort of a similar dynamic here. But here like nobody is trained to treat it as if you're looking for it. And also you can't tell, right? Like you can always tell a different class car in endurance racing. The thing about the clipping and the energy recovery is that a car with the same broad performance envelope as you will just suddenly slow way the fuck down. Yeah, I mean, you get flashing lights, but it's not immediately recognizable

33:25by the shape of the car or anything. And apparently, Colipinto's lights were not flashing. Oh, interesting. According to Oscar P. Astring. Huh. So, yeah, and the flashing lights still isn't going to tell you, it's like seeing someone's brake lights on, right? It's like, that's telling you the person is slowing, it's telling you the person is recovering. It's not going to tell you that like, oh, man, they just parked it and now you're just rocking towards them. So it does, like I'm not sure what the fix is, short of like retreating from some of the battery dependency, they pushed the rigs toward. I guess the other question is, are they at the limit of what these energy systems can do where can you loosen it up a bit and allow more harvesting and deployment per lap so that you are not clipping the, they were not like at the edge of this battery budget all the time of the problem there is people spend what's in their pocket.

34:26Yeah. I feel like we're gonna let you recover more per lap. But you negate overtake modes as well. In that situation, what you're doing is you're sort of gobbling overtake modes cake, you know what I mean? Like you're right, taking it out of that. But it is striking the degree to which this is old stuff, right? Like this is, people are harvesting energy and coming off at, you know, inner and corners before in the old regulations. But this like tweak to the percentage has had a pretty drastic effect for what that looks like on the track. And it is like lift and coast on steroids almost when you see it happening. And I'm with you Dan, like I don't, this is how they've chosen for the sport to work. It's had some good effects. But at the same time, if you do have a critical mass of drivers being like, it is just way too dicey for coming up on someone

35:27and suddenly there's going, you know, 50 KPH slower, we can't safely race that way. And for what it's worth, I think a lot of what we've liked has primarily been the arrow regulations, like do you know what I mean? Like I'm not, it's interesting seeing that have to husband the battery resources a bit better. But I think you could still do that and force them to like use the resources a little more carefully while making the car more engine, you know internal combustion dependent. So I, you know, I think they may have to retreat on this because like Suzuki doesn't have the most runoff, but it's not nothing. And to the thing you flagged at the start of the race, at the start of the, start of the episode, they're not racing in Jetta this year. This happens in Jetta we're having a different conversation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, big time. Monaco could happen less opportunity there, but could. We have mentioned that the FIA will be having meetings in April to see what adjustments could or should be made.

36:30Oh, sorry, quick thing. Did you see the, did you mention this too? That the signs also mentioned, he's like we've been complaining about this and the FIA is focused on fixing qualifying. And they prioritize that. And there's an article I think over it, like auto-sport where it's like FIA trying to fix the qualifying crisis, which I think again, it's starting to like, just the weird vibe around this regulations, where it's like parts of this are treated as a crisis that don't seem that serious. And then they're kind of ignoring this other aspect. Yeah, one of the things I was gonna flag. It sounds like according to Andrea Stella and who reported this is in a quote from a race fans article, Andrea Stella, the team principal of McLaren, the closing speed thing is on the agenda for this April meeting. So, yeah, thanks, Danny. Just gonna close off this story and then we'll be back after this short break

37:34with the safety car restart. All right, the safety car means a much cheaper pit stop for those who hadn't yet pitted, given that the rest of the field will be going slowly. Russell, of course, having pitted right before this is not pleased, radioing simply unbelievable. Yeah. So, on the restart on lap 27, it is Anson Alley in first who pitted under safety car then Piestri Russell and Hamilton, who also pitted under safety car. McLaren, Norris, and then Gasley, and he and the ones behind him also got that safety car pit stop. It's for Stappen, Lawson, and Borderletto running out the top 10. Yeah, so a massive shame the Piestri ends up losing a hard fought and novel for the season we've had first position. I'm not sure Russell's whining won him many fans, at least not in the Shift F1 Discord.

38:35It was a little bit like, yeah, all right. You're not, you know, you're in the fastest car here, mate. I mean, like, get it. Sorry, what was I doing? He was like saying we're so unlucky. We're so unlucky, kept going on about, you know. How come he was? What are we talking about here? Well, it's like a safety car like pit stop. Like, I feel like complaining about it to that degree when you're in like the fastest cars. Like, yeah, okay, cool. The safety car happened because of a crash. Someone's harsh and you fell on the wrong side of the look. Like, I guess if you're in the car, it's, yeah. Well, I mean, it's just one of those things where, like the minute that safety car came out, the race was handed down to not like, that was just, that was a given. Like, the race was over. The race was over. Yeah. Basically, action wise, the race was over. Yeah. Like, the, the latter portion of this race was, was, was pretty dull. But like, Russell said, like,

39:37I do think there's a bit of, he's also not a signing blame when he says we've been unlucky. Like, that is the other part of this. He's not taking it out as an engineer. He's not taking it on the team. It's just this is portions of war and that's kind of what he's saying over the radio. So I think there's an element of, people read in what they want to read in to people. And yeah, like, it was a frustrated reaction, a pretty mild one by the standards of like, stuff we hear routinely said to engineers. About something we all can see was true, which is that Russell was in a really good position. And then the safety car happened and he was out of it for the win. And Antelli was going to coast to a win. That was like, not, that was even debatable. Yeah, maybe it was because, who knows what Piaestry said on team radio? Maybe it just didn't broadcast it. But like, he was the unluckiest. Like, he's the one who's in like the less parafacare where track position is gonna be even more critical who had fought again to first position.

40:39And ultimately, you know, with, with it, with, I think McLaren had a very sort of like, you know, first foot forward strategy in this race. You know what I mean? It was the type of thing that you like to see. You know, it was the classic decision that Ferrari would not have made. You know what I mean? To sort of like force everyone else into a strategy. And, you know, they were unlucky. And I'm, yeah, I felt bad for Piaestry, although what was then fun was to watch if he could, you know, retain the podium. Yeah, so Antonelli gets a good jump on everyone at the restart and just streaks away into the distance. Hamilton also has a good one and goes around the outside of Russell at turn one to take third place. Further back, Verstappen is challenging his former teammate, PR Gasley, as they go, side by side for the first three turns or so, Gasley impressively managing to keep Verstappen at bay. Can I, can, we have not had an opportunity to talk about PR Gasley much this season.

41:41He is like Loki, one of the best drivers this year. Like he has been race after race, you know, the Alpenes in a better position for sure. But PR Gasley, I was actually surprised he didn't get, well, it was a surprise. I think he would have been a good chef for drivers the day, I think, as well. And, you know, he's, we don't get to see him much because of where he's at, but it was at least cool to see a bit of a bit of TV time given to him in that position. Because we're certainly seeing him more. Yeah, he's, he's, you know, sort of come of age, I think this year, and obviously the Alpenes as well. And that is a big help, but yeah, just PR Gasley, he's doing really well. Well, real quick, we're shouting out to you and seeing off of, there was a point where it was like, we need to stop looking at Russell, like failing to overtake Piaestry. And we need to cut to whatever's going on with, I think it was Hadjar and Lindblad. Like, you just, like in the tiny window, next to like, oh, maybe next lap, George. Meanwhile, you have this insane, like top gun Maverick shit

42:43happening, just like routinely through every corner. And it's like, producer, I swear to God, like, we know what's happening with the battle for the lead. We need to watch this because like, there's civil war happening in the Red Bull camp. Yeah, they are fun, man. Like, Lindblad is a, you know, he ended up not, and you know, he ended up not in the best position. I'm not sure if the same thing comes up. T2, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's noticed for it where it's like, you're a little over the line there, but it was good shit. Yeah, I was, yeah, yeah. He's a fun driver. He's a, yeah, I like him. I like this new crop of young Red Bulls, you know, Hadjar as well, of course. It's amazing, like a lot of, we talked a lot last year about how are these rookies gonna do? And, you know, do they have the mentality these super young drivers? Look at these, look at them all. They're all great. Like, there's no one we're pointing at out of this big, you know, sweet of rookies or not technically rookies anymore

43:43because it's their second season, but like babies, you know. And none of them are, they're all great. Like, it's really impressive, I think. Like, I think it's amazing that we're not talking about it. Like, they have, you know, because it could easily have become a narrative thing as well, especially with the complexity of these new cars. And I think they're all doing really well. Yeah. lap 37, kind of a weird moment for Russell where it looks like he loses power briefly. Oh, yeah. Which causes him to lose fourth to Leclerc. Although it could be, this is something that Leclerc talked about after the Chinese sprint qualifying. He got a bullet bill, I think. Was that a loss? So he, and this is, let's see, and I saw this in the race. So he, we've talked about how the, a lot of the energy deployment over the course of a lap

44:44is automatic. It's not driver controlled. So the car will detect when you've let off and then will start recovery, or it will like try to detect where you are on the track and then deploy energy in a certain place. Leclerc said during China sprint qualifying, he had to correct for a slide and lifted off by like two percent of the throttle, which is like two millimeters, right? And it learned that. Well, not that it learned it, it thought, the car thought he was in some other place. And so it messed up. That was my thought, the way the power died, yep. Yeah, and so he attributed that to losing half a second on that lap. Wow. So he's also saying, like goes on to say like, if I, if I need to figure this out,

45:45I don't know if at this point, or if that kind of a thing is an FIA thing, or a Ferrari, you get a mess with your algorithm a little more kind of a thing. That's wild. You got to, I think what his point is, you have to be able to, the regulations must allow for a driver to be able to control their car and to correct for slides and things like that and not have to worry about energy management. You know, energy management. So I think that's an interesting subtle point to this kind of overall discussion of the new regulations. But maybe that happened here, I'm not quite sure. Lap 42 Hamilton, despite his newer tires is getting hounded by LaClaire. They are very close through the final chicane, but LaClaire gets a run on him down. You start finish straight and sweeps around at the outside of turn one. There wheels getting uncomfortably close,

46:45but in the end LaClaire takes that final podium position. And that's not it for Hamilton because one lap later, Russell gets by him in the same place for fourth. He, Hamilton was apparently on the radio asking about what's going on with the car's energy deployment and seems to be having more trouble because at one point he cuts the final chicane ahead of Norris and eventually seeds that place to him on lap 48. I'll be it briefly because he then retakes fifth from Norris on the following straight. But then our Sky commentators. Yes. He overtakes him, I think. On the penultimate lap. Yes, yeah, great overtake. That same spot, entry chicane after 130 or 130 or 130. Yes, Sky commentators pointed out that the final lap is a great time to use all of your energy because then you don't have to worry about getting retaken. Three laps remaining. Russell goes for it on the Claire taking third place

47:47into the chicane, but the Claire then has a chance to come back at him and does hanging it out around the outside of turn one to retake the place. I also kind of thought like maybe three laps to go is a good time because if you, if you go for it and then you get retaken, you still have one more chance to do it, but it didn't look like Russell was able to do it there. So the Claire takes the final step on the podium. Yeah, split and look there, fortunes for the Mercedes because you know, Russell struggling to get past some of these drivers to get a podium. Antidelli, 15 seconds up the road. Yeah, and he gets a from Bano, his race engineer who used to engineer Louis Hamilton, he gets a get in there, Kimmy. Get in there, Kimmy. That's what he said. Sure. Yeah, if you, if you listened to a notable, if you, well, if you watched any of Louis Hamilton's victor all your rights, get in there.

48:48You'll notice get in there. Louis as a common, common radio phrase. Kimmy becomes, yeah, sorry. You took the words out of my mouth. The youngest ever leader of the F1 drivers championship at 19 years old and even more importantly, they said his name, Reich, at the podium ceremony this time. Much to the laughter of some of the people watching. Right. Second place, Oscar Piazdri finally got to start a race. Yeah. This time. Fair play. Great drive, great to see you, Matt there. Third place, Charlotte Claire, followed by George Russell fourth, Lando Norris fifth, Louis Hamilton sixth, Pierre Gasly in seventh, holding on to that place. He started in, Max or Stappin making up some spots into eighth and Liam Lawson in eighth, making up five positions. Yeah, look at that. Racing bulls car, by the way, looks incredible. This weekend with that kind of red, red paint job. Yuki shouldn't have left. I guess he had to. He had to go, he had to, he had to make the step up.

49:49But we all knew it was the, the kiss of death. And that's one of a kind of running out the top 10. By the name we've got, Niko Hulkenberg, Isaac Hanchard, Gabrielle Bordeletto, Arvid Lindblad, Carlos Sines, Franca Colipento in 16th, then Sergio Perez, Fernando Alonzo, who finished, I think this is the first time in Aston Martin has done a full race distance. Wow. They retired Stroll and their messaging was, we just both want to get one cart finnet, like, somehow they're like, we can only do one per race. That's your boat test, 19th, Alex Abon, 20th, and then yes, Lance Stroll DNFed, along with Oliver Bareman. You can see the reliability though, already improved, all 24 or 22, sorry, cars started. And yeah, two retirements and one of them was a crash. So, you know, definitely improvements in some aspects. All right, well, that is it for the race recap.

50:51Let's run down the driver's championship standings here. Andrea Kimi Antonelli in first place. From first place. First place. First place. Hey, at least you can call him Andrea Kimi Rykelin. That's right. George Russell, second, Charlotte Clarotherd, Lewis Hamilton, fourth, Lando Norris, moving up a spot into fifth place, and Oscar Piastry jumping six spots into sixth place. Nice. Oliver Bareman, losing two spots with his DNF. He's now in seventh. Pierre Gasley is now in eighth, and Max Verstappen, ninth place in the driver's championship. We'll get to his saltiness in a second. Yes. Liam Lawson in 10th, and then Arvid Lindblad in 11th, Isaac Hadjar in 12th, tied on points with Lindblad. Gabrielle Bordeaux, 13th, tied on points with Carlos Sines in 14th. Estimon Ocon in 15th, tied on points with Franca Colapinto in 16th, and then the zeros of Niko Holgenberg, Alex Albon, Valtteri Botas, Sergio Perez,

51:52Fernando Alonzo, and Lance Stroll. We've got some movement in the Constructors Championship as well. Mercedes is still on top for our second McLaren third. Jean Hassan team still hanging in fourth place. Alpine has moved up two spots to fifth place, tied on points with Red Bull. They are in sixth, followed by racing bulls, two points back in seventh place, then Audi in eighth, tied on points with Williams in ninth, and then Cadillac and Aston Martin both have zero. Alright, well, speaking of Verstappen and his woes, let's see, how do we want to split this up? Do we want to take Rob, you want to take the journalist angle of this, and Danny, you want to take his overall frustration? Sure, sure, yeah, absolutely. Go ahead, Rob, you want to go first? Yeah, so apparently this news came out early in the ground pre weekend. The start of a media session held in Red Bull hospitality.

52:58Verstappen refused to begin the session until I think it was the Guardians Giles Richards was removed from the session. This was punishment for a question Richards asks before Abu Dhabi last year about the collision with George Russell that got Max Verstappen hit with a multi-placed penalty that would have been a title decider. If he'd held on to those points. And Verstappen felt the question was massively disrespectful and so that is why he chose this moment five months later to throw this guy out of a Red Bull media session and let the session begin until he was gone. Discuss.

53:58Yeah, I like. Yeah, I don't know. I think like people try so hard. We try real hard, folks. We do. Every time, you know, Max, I feel like if you listen to this podcast going back a couple of years, I think my tenor and Max was very different. I think I like his more mature version but there are times where the Joss Verstappen comes out of him. And like, this is so, it's just so petty. I think there's like a degree of emotional maturity that I assume that people as they're getting older should have. And like the inability to recognize power in one's self is something that and to not recognize, you know, to recognize power in others and not recognize power in yourself and to play victim in a situation where there is this like clear asymmetry. Like people get to ask you questions. You get to answer them. Like this is like the, obviously,

54:59there are freedom of press issues here. Like the question was a legitimate question. Max didn't like it because it framed him in a, you know, in a human way. And the fact that he still cares about it and then the fact that he did this, I mean, if I was a journalist in that room, I would have walked out with him. You know what I mean? Like that's, and I know it's hard. You're beat reporter for everyone. You gotta like play the part and make sure everyone on the paddock likes you. But like, this is, yeah, it's just a pattern. You don't want him caring for you now too. So, yeah. But like that's, you know, it's bullying. It's stupid, it's petty. Max is a wealthy, famous, talented driver. Successful. Yeah, and this guy's, this guy's, you know, reporting on Formula One and asking legitimate questions. He wasn't a tabloidie question. It was a fair question. Get out of here, like stop it. And then stop trying to legitimize it. Like, it's, it's, it's smirking at me. Yeah.

55:59He says he was smirking at me. They asked the question back and now we go. I bet it, I bet he thought he was smirking at him. It's just, this is ego. Yeah, just like, yeah, it's silly, petty, and it reminds me of the old Max and then he should grow the fuck up. It's so stupid. So stupid. Well, speaking of reminding you of the old Max. Yeah. Threatening to quit F1, I've heard that one before. And look, I think, I think Verstappen is probably not in a great place at the moment. You know, he's, with the leader, he is, he's ninth. That's fair, yeah. Yeah, obviously the car's not doing well, but he also, you know, has been pretty consistent in worrying about these regulations and, you know, not being particularly happy with the driving. So I don't, I don't necessarily take the argument that like because of where he is in the championship. I think if he was ahead in the championship or if he was like close to the top, I do think Max is the type of guy who a lot of times

56:59when it comes to racing does sort of speak is truth on things. So I, I kind of, I do, you know, I do think that there's an element there. I think, yeah, okay, Rob, Rob, my disagree. Well, no, I was saying what one's truth is, sometimes varies, depends on how things are going for oneself. I think he's being honest. Let me, let me give you my galaxy brain sort of reason why and then I'll get to the quote in a second. I think the reason why Verstappen is angry has, if not as much to do with the state of the car, and obviously the state of the racing, I think there is a sort of third element to this that we don't see, which is the state of red bull racing. I think we have seen an exodus of people from there, one of the mechanics who's been there for donkey's ears, just the Nancy's left the team as well. I think it was yesterday.

58:00I think there is a, you know, as much as they didn't like the hornar era, there seems like the current era, there might be a lot of, you know, a lack of belief perhaps in the project. Obviously the car has not come out particularly well as well. And I think there is sort of a, this confluence of factors are contributing to Verstappen. For the first time, saying what a lot of people have been sort of saying around the paddock that he is closer than ever from stepping away from Formula One, I think it was just Verstappen on Thursday, did an interview with some Dutch journalists where he mentioned us and then, you know, Verstappen's tenor over the course of the weekend was sort of not particularly positive and then it was a post-race interview with the BBC where we got the quote. He said, I'm thinking about everything inside this paddock when pressed further on talks of the possible exit. Privately, I'm very happy. You also wait for 24 races.

59:01This time it's 22, but normally 24 and then you just think about it. Is it worth it? Or do I enjoy being more at home with my family, seeing my friends more when you're not enjoying the sport? He's clearly not enjoying the sport. He is clearly, you know, having fun, doing his other racing. There has always been this question of when will Verstappen retire? Like, he was in the sport from an incredibly young age. He's clearly somebody who enjoys lots of different forms of racing. His exit from F1, you know, prematurely, let's say, has been somewhat inevitable, whether or not it's something he doesn't come back, who knows, but like, everyone sort of assumed the max would be, wouldn't do an Alonzo, wouldn't like, you know, get into his latter years, having never experienced other types of racing. Obviously now he's a young dad as well. And, you know, he was a step, young stepped out for a while now, he's a young father. That's obviously going to be playing on his mind as well. So, yeah, I think there is a legitimate chance

1:00:04that he, you know, he obviously will play at this season. There is a break clause in his contract that says, if by the summer break, he's not in second, he can leave his contract because his contract doesn't run out until the end of the 2027 season. So, yeah, which is going to happen. They're not going to be second. So, that exit clause is going to be triggered in the summertime. Don't think he's going to leave mid season. I suspect it for Stappen ever, if he does leave F1, he will, you know, probably make a pretty good wage as a red bull ambassador in some way. So, I don't think he's going to spoil the brought there. I don't necessarily think he's going to change teams. I think maybe, though, total wolf cold up. Maybe you made the wrong call. Don't know. Maybe. Yeah, I mean, I'm taking this with a grain of salt to some degree, I think years ago, I forget when it was, but there were also like, is for Stappen going to leave? Like, this is not the first time this story has come up.

1:01:06I think it's a different situation now. He's got more championships under his belt. And I think it's just, it's going to be down to what he values. Like, does he value being the greatest of all time? I don't know. I think he might value having fun now that he's got, you know, four championships under his belt. I think he might actually value having fun more than, you know, eclipsing Hamilton and Schumacher. And whether you are the best numerically and whether or not you believe you are the best, I think, or two different things. And I think he chose believes he's the best. I think a lot of people do too in fairness. It's, yeah, and I think he's, he's maybe not like a Vettel level student of the sport, but I do think just anyone who's watched F1 or been familiar with it last like 20 years, counting championships is not really going to decide who is the best ever to do it. You become more and more aware of like, the nature of the sport now creates dynasties, but that doesn't necessarily like indicate

1:02:07who is the best to ever do it. But yeah, I think it's of a piece with the guys on tilt a little bit, right? Like you got the lash out of the journalist is kind of a, the guy is tilting, he's looking for places to assert himself, he's not having a good time, he's pissed off and sort of the more like aspects of his personality that are maxed a little prick, those are coming out a little bit to the four. I do think there is a bit of, God, there's two, like, you know what, they'll fuck it. I'm just gonna lean to the fact that sometimes I don't like this guy. There's a party really sympathizes with, and I think he's been, there's always been this through line with him where like of anyone's ever in grade at F1, he seemed the one who enjoys being at F1 the least. It's always been the case is like he always seemed like someone who was very quick to think about, I don't wanna be here forever, I don't wanna do this.

1:03:09You think about Anson Ali and Drive to Survive being like, they've got me doing 40, Lewis, they've got me doing 40 appearance days. Like I don't think Max enjoys that shit. I think Max wants to go play video games and now he's got a family and I think this, I think the stuff is real for him. So I think there is a bit of that and I think he enjoys racing other series and other sorts of tracks. On the other hand, it's hard to get away from the way this seems like some of the softest shit I've ever seen from an F1 champion where, oh I'm sorry, is the car not competitive this year? And it turns out F1 is bad now and it's time to leave. It is the most like I'm taking my ball and going home thing I've maybe ever seen. Like Nico Rosberg left on a high note. He was like, well I've seen the top. I don't want to do what it takes to climb this mountain ever again in my fucking life. I'm gone. Yeah. But this is,

1:04:10oh I like, I already dealt with my years in a mediocre car. And then I had years in a dominant car now I'm back in a mediocre car and this sucks. I hate the sport now, I'm gone. I'm just not gonna stick it out. And most other drivers have. Now is possibly learning from them. He's looking at like, do I want to be? Do I want to be? Do I want to be? Yeah. Do I want to be Louis Hamilton? Like riding out the lean years at Mercedes and going into a situation at Ferrari, who knows what's gonna happen? Do I want to be Michael Schumacher? Toughing out sort of the waning years at Ferrari and then coming back for sort of a mediocre comeback, you know getting owned by Nico Rosberg. Like I do think there's examples of most of the people who've stuck out bad cars are doing it because things will come back around. Right, and I'll get my chance. And for most of them it doesn't. It did for Louis sort of. He left, he left McLaren, stayed in the sport

1:05:14and hitched his wagon to a dominant program. But for most part, people who like, win their championships and then are like, all right, where's my next one coming from? The answer's nowhere. Didn't show up for Vettel, didn't show up for Alonzo. In the meantime, you're sacrificing a lot of your life. And I, like, even just pragmatically, I think he should leave F1 in a couple of years. Like I think, like if I was in his position and it's obviously incredibly difficult to do so, he's done it. He's done it now multiple times. He does have a genuine interest and desire and thirst for other forms of motorsport. And if I was in that position, that would be, that seems cool, doesn't it, doesn't it seem cool to like go off and try other weird types of racing if you're into us? Like hell, yeah, especially if you've got the, for staff and name and, you know, all this money and influence within all these sports, like anyone would take him. Like, yeah, like, and he's good. That's the other thing is that he can turn up when these other formulas and do well.

1:06:15It's not like a Michael Jordan baseball situation or, you know what I mean? Or like, you know, oh, I'll, I'll limp over with my tail between my legs to Indycar because I lost my F1 seat. You know what I mean? This is, this is a different type of scenario. And, and yeah, if the racing feels, and like, as much as we all are here lists, you know, on this podcast, you're listening to this podcast, we're watching these races every week. F1 can be one of the least competitive racing crafts through it. We don't love it because every week who know who's gonna win and we don't know who's gonna win. We love it because of lots of other reasons. So like, I, you know, I think once you've been in that machine a while and if your desire isn't just to like, you know, because he can easy mode pick the best team. Like if he wanted a good way to see who has the best car and then ask them for a job and they'd say yes. But like, is that, does that sound fun? To somebody who's like a competitor? Is that saying competitive or is competitive?

1:07:16I'm gonna go in a completely different series and I'm gonna show everyone how good I am at this too. I think the thing that kinda roasts me the worst about this is like, the quitting as a moral good. Yes, 100% like this car's not racing. I'm leaving because F1 is not what it was. And then it just like, it fuels the chuds around F1 everywhere. He's always sort of been their chud standard bearer. But in terms of like, what's at stake? Oh, I'd be a vapor trail. I'd be gone. Like, yeah, F1, the season is so long. They make you like, you're the dancing monkey for so many people and if you're like, you got your money, you can go like, race literally anything. Yeah. Again, like in your own terms. We all watch the fastbender thing. Yeah. Hey, hanging out with your boys, go and race around Europe. Seems pretty good. All right, seems all right. Yeah, yeah, no, I'm with you.

1:08:17And I think, I think the other thing I don't necessarily like about this. And we've seen this in the past with like, with him and the army of fans. But I think this is less of me pointing it back in particular with this and just, broadly speaking, we're entering, this is a really like, it feels like the start of quite a toxic era in the F1 fan base. Like if you go look at the comments on the Japanese Grand Prix, and again, look, this is self filtering. These might just, you know, the YouTube comments, you know, on a blah, blah, blah. But like people, the narrative that F1 has turned bad because of the battery stuff and because they've broken real racing. A lot of this stuff stands again. We've said before, like people who, not that there aren't criticisms of what's going on. Sure. I mean, you know, and we're not here to like, to, you know, whitewash, the current regulations or anything. We just talked a lot about them. Yeah.

1:09:18Yeah, but the idea that like the pure, like people's memories are so, so, so, so, so much. They don't know what to talk about. Like literally anyone is like, this is not real racing. The minute I hear real racing applied to F1, I'm just like, okay, I do not need to think about anything you have to say from here. Like this is the most A historical, like there's no platonic form of race that's ever been observed. That's certainly not an F1. What I keep thinking is like sports are not science experiments. They are games and games need balance. Games and games are entertainment. So get over your sports entertainment. They had the three-point line of basketball. Until basketball better run for like decades. And there's still people who are like, well, that fucked up the sport forever. Do you see that? Yeah, in the end of that Yukon fight or a game? No. No. There was a buzzer beater in the, in the March Madness semifinals that is epic.

1:10:18He should go check it out. Oh, Drew, that bit about like the shot clock because pre-shot clock. Oh yeah. The pass and delay strategies teams would try to do where it's like basketball as a submission hold ground game. Exactly. Like they're all on control. Yes. Every boy you're trying to figure out like, ooh, this is having unexpected consequences. Games are artificial because rules are artificial. This is, we're not talking about physics. We're talking about a structure. And there's this, and there's also like this, and not to get too broad about this. But like one of the problems we've had in the modern era is that so much of the implementation of new rules has relied on or has rather lent on or been enabled by the fact that technologically we have sort of entered a new epoch. Yes. So then technology ends up getting the finger pointed at it. But like technology is not the root. The technology is a means to an end.

1:11:18And I think we're sort of, there's this sort of ludd-ice reactionary thing that happens sometimes, which again, I'm not washing editing, but like there's a lot of that going on right now. The racing was pure and competitive when they were all internal combustion and you didn't watch, you didn't watch shit. Yeah, you didn't watch shit. Like literally, I became F1, F1 fan, 30 seconds later. What is F1 going to do about these processional races that keep happening? It's like, let me talk to you about tire degradation. You know what I mean? Hey, do you want tires? Guess what? There are tires that will last the whole race. They exist. Did you know that? Let's go back to real racing with DRS. We don't need pit stops. Wire pit stops even a thing. That's not competition, you know? Yeah, I remember, Perrelli said, like when people started to play about the tires, their head was like tired of them and was like, we can just make a compound that never wears out. That's how they told us to do. Exactly. Yeah, remarkably, you're able to do that.

1:12:20Yeah, it's incredible that your roadcar can last more than three hours, without getting its tires replaced that these other ones can't. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. So, you know, when it's hard to get into the weeds on these are, in a way, we're speaking to the choir and I assume that our listeners are very smart, adult, intelligent people who can come to their own decisions about this stuff, but yeah, there's something about it. And they're not on the YouTube comments and I don't know if they're in a lot of the motorsport press because a lot of the headlines look exactly the same and I feel like I'm going crazy. It's the self-selection thing. So it's like, first of all, the surface is moved to leave a comment. It's like a restaurant view. It takes a lot from me to comment on something. Yeah, yeah. It does. I just don't, I don't have time to be on forums. I don't have time to be commenting on stuff. Someone else who does, already routinely was a different sort of person. Similarly, people are like, I'm going to devote my life to covering motorsports. I do think the self-selection again is like the odds of that person being like,

1:13:23politically or even spiritually similar to where I'm at, pretty low, honestly. And so I do think there's a bit of, you spend your career around petrolheads and you start sounding like a petrolhead. Well, maybe that's why we don't sound like everyone else. If you'd like to get a championship of your own, you can join the Shift F1 podcast, Official Formula 1 Fantasy League. Fantasy. Boy, look at this podium from Japan. It is a six-way tie for second between Destroya, the Makarina, Hossing a Good Time, I cast Haste, later Hosen, and Hamilton's Revenge Tour. But in first, the Leo LeClaire Motor Club. Very good, very good. Fantastic. Leo LeClaire, it's good. I prefer Chuck LeClaire, but we'll get there. Well, Leo, the tiny doxen,

1:14:24this, you might. Oh, sorry, of course, yeah, yeah. Much cuter. The overall podium, though, looks like this. In the Niko time, in second, cigarettes. Oh, right. And in first, the Makarina. The Makarina. It's back. I had heard that during this podcast, the Makarina, the whole, why is it called that? You do, at the end of the, when you go high at the Makarina, you do flip 180. You do turn 180, right? You do a 180-degree turn, just like the wing. Just like the wing. Oh, okay. Yeah. All right. Who came up with it? There's definitely one person that did that. There's no way in it. Priviser? Yeah, probably. Emails, shift to from podcast. gym.com, reference.com, cool. Slash emails. Again, we'll be reading emails next week. So get them in. Also, you can follow us on the socials, using the link in the show notes. That is us around the internet. Should we take it around the world then?

1:15:25Let's rinse around the world. Hello, but not in the Middle East, yeah. Yeah, not a lot of reason happening this Easter weekend. We've got the craftsman trucks at Rockingham Speedway in Rockingham, North Carolina for the Blacks Tire 200. We've also got the, it's not the Nascar Xfinity Series, it's the O'Reilly Auto Parts series. Chalkingham. For the North Carolina Education Lottery 250 presented by Blacks Tire. Congratulations to all of the students that win an education this year in that lottery. And we got super formula at the unfortunately renamed Mobility Resort Motegi in Haga District, Tochigi Prefecture. Mobility Resort Sands Lottery. That sounds like I'm checking in for extensive physical therapy. Yeah, I was going to say, I'm sorry to say it all folks on.

1:16:27Yes, it does. Like, and listen, there's times I wake up and my hips are like time to go to the Mobility Resort Rob. But you know what? Twin ring. Oh, like tattooing the twin sons of Rixx. Yeah, yeah, that's a good time. It's a good time. So I wonder how many races were canceled this week because of the, the, I don't know, maybe some endurance stuff. Frank, do you guys think that was at the end of the race around the world? It is. Do you have, what are you guys? Let's, let's like just make an, you know, an expectation. What do you guys think the Qatar and Abu Dhabi will happen? Because we're talking the end of November, like sort of Thanksgiving is Qatar and Abu Dhabi is obviously the last race of the year, December 6. So it's the final two rounds. Will we be in Berlin by Christmas? Is that what you're asking? Effectively, yes. That is, that's the situation we're in, right? Like I asked Rixxion in 26th of September. I wonder if they have had some places in Azerbaijan.

1:17:29I think we are not. I think we, I think we, I think we might go racing, man. Because, because the United States will fund another way to surrender to Iran. Right. Like fundamentally, I think that's it. The already the fact that they're like, and you know what, we're going to, we don't even need to open the, the straight. We just like, the toll is not a problem for us. Like it's, it's fine. Like I think there's an element of, there's a lot of people want to, want to weigh out of this. And by then, there will be, there's decent chance of concessions granted. I feel like there's some equilibrium somehow where maybe there's still stuff going on, but yeah. Yeah. Well, it's not going to go back, yeah, probably, you know, probably not going to go back to pre-attack phase. But like how long, and even like, I wonder how much this is affecting forming a one just in terms of, like, because the gas price is stuff is crazy. So if you're running fresh all around the world, like, and it's, if it's going to get worth,

1:18:29like if we're only feeling, sales on our ships. If, if we're only feeling sales now, the market effects of a right now, we're not actually feeling the support cast, you know, the supply effects. Yeah, exactly. Good also. Danny mentioning that, like, the fuel, like, fluids for, like, advanced race engines in other series, I wonder, like, you know, does this start, like, there's a lot of, a lot of teams not running with fat margins that can easily absorb, like, yeah, you know, a doubling of, you know, prices for any input. And, and we've already seen in like other countries, like, for instance, Singapore, like, there are sort of, like, level, levels of, of public bailout stuff, the, is reminiscent of COVID, right, where you had certain pockets of society or certain industries that just were simply not going to be able to weather this financially. And you're starting to see that happen already in places that are, you know, more directly affected, perhaps,

1:19:30by the closing of the straight-of-war moose or whatever it is. And like, we're going to see this with, like, if it's not petro-cam stuff, it's going to be other types of, you know, what are they saying? They're saying, like, helium, for instance, like, there's all of these things that come at it at an area and it's going to have this knock on effect. So, yeah, I do worry about, you know, just writ large how this is going to affect. Obviously, first and foremost, the people on the ground, especially civilians who are getting caught in the crossfire. And obviously, what's happening in the incursion to Southern Lebanon? And I mean, there's new fronts on this thing every, every day it seems, but, but also just, yeah, like, the financial implications of this, ultimately, who pays for this is, is people at the pump and, and folks happen to, you know, having the cost of living driven up. And yeah, so it's, obviously, we're here talking about F1. I'm just interested in the counter stuff, but, yeah, I can see these as getting a lot worse before it gets any better. Well, that's looking forward, Danny. Let's look back this day in history. Let's look back, surely to a better time. What do we think?

1:20:31Yeah, okay, I haven't read this had a time. I have not. July 31st, Dutch, oh, Dutch driver, Jasper Stoppen was always one, sorry? Are we at July 31st? Did I go, I did, I went July. Why did I go July? I'm getting ahead of myself here. Jesus, July? No one would know what happened to Jasper Stoppen. It's March, silly. Oh my God. Maybe that's the day they burned him. I mean, not the ton, but like a little bit. They sent him. Maybe it was in a, maybe April Fool's threw me off. I don't know, I don't have to wait and see. If many former and one fans were dismayed by Michael Schumacher's dominance of the sport, there we go. The news that he had a younger brother who was also pretty nifty behind the wheel may not have been good. In 1999, Rob Schumacher joined Williams and by 2001, the Grove team was moving back towards winning ways. Michael and Ralph made history on this day in 2001 when they qualified first and second respectively for the Brazilian Grand Prix. They were the first siblings to achieve a front row lockout in F1 history.

1:21:34Nice. Something that has never been broken. For sure, probably won't be. Maybe not ever. A year later, back at InterLogos and Enrique. I don't know. Looks like his brother is waiting in the win. Oh, your good point, John. He's probably the closest one. Maybe sort of like a Daniel plane views half-brother situation. Maybe someone will turn up, you know what I mean? Who's the most likely to have a secret half-brother or half-sister in F1? I bet Alonzo. He's got that sort of telenevala sort of life. He quits, but then he retires from F1, but then a different Alonzo comes back with a mustache. It's like, no, I'm completely new. Yeah, I'm for Lando, the nonzo. A long nonzo. Anyway, let's end this podcast. A year later, back at InterLogos and Enrique Bernoldi caused chaos when he crashed his arrows in the Sunday morning practice

1:22:36session. The medical car arrived on scene and the driver, Alex Ribeiro, opened his door. At that moment, Nick Heidefeld came around the corner in his sauber. And when nowhere to go, took to the grass and smashed into the door of the Mercedes. A split-second later and Ribeiro might have been killed. This is a now famous. Have you ever seen this footage? I don't think so. It is a classic piece of F1 history. It's up there with the Takae Anui getting run over by the, I think that was a medical car. Doesn't get run over. Yeah, he gets bombed by the medical car. He gets hit, you know? He gets hit. He gets hit. But yes, this one is pretty bad. Yeah, the passenger side door opens on the, if I remember correctly, on the safety car and just Heidefeld takes it out. Oh, man. All right. Yeah. All right. Well, if you'd like to support the show and get access to all of our bonus episodes, the early ad free version of the podcast and the official shift F1 Discord you can do

1:23:38so over at patreon.com slash shift F1. Have a good race weekend, everyone. We will see you all next week. Buh, buh.