Business of Speed Podcast - From Star Wars Sets to the F1 Paddock: How Esmé Buxton Built The Paddock Journal in Under a Year

Episode Date: March 16, 2026

In this episode, Vincenzo and Lali sit down with the founder of The Paddock Journal, the Substack-turned-physical-magazine bringing fashion, culture, and editorial storytelling to the world of F1. Esmé breaks down how she went from pitching a Laura Winter feature to major publications (and getting rejected) to launching her own brand that had Alpine Stars knocking on her door within months.We get into all of it: why physical media is making a comeback in a short-form video world, how the F1 industry itself is paying attention to what she's building, the moment at the Dutch Grand Prix where she realized she had a real business, and why she thinks "imposter syndrome" needs to be deleted from our vocabulary entirely.Plus, Esmé reveals her biggest move yet: The Paddock Journal Atelier, a fashion showroom and shopping experience launching at the Monaco and Silverstone Grand Prix this year.Whether you're building a media brand, trying to break into motorsport, or just want proof that asking for what you want actually works, this one's for you.Connect with Esmé and The Paddock Journal: Website: thepaddockjournal.com Instagram: @thepaddockjournal

Hola, Vincenzo. Hey, Lali. How are you? It's a good day when I get to talk to you, Vincenzo. Ah, make me blush. I don't think people realize, perhaps, that you and I aren't in the same city, so we don't see each other all the time. No, no, I know. It's okay, though, because this is how we meet people, right? And it's like, you just have to be open to other, I guess, globalization, I'll say,

which has really opened us up to meeting quite a few really cool people. like the guest of the podcast that we have, that you're going to listen to very shortly, shortly. I met this person, same way I meet a lot of folks in the motorsport world, which is online. And I actually subscribed to her newsletter because I really liked what she was doing. Visuals were incredible, felt really magazine like, and was putting a lot of effort into how things, just like design language of posts on Instagram. And then every time she posted her newsletter, I was like, wow, this is really well done. And a lot of cool collaborations with other creators and giving voices to a lot of other folks in different, you know, in different areas around

the world, showing up at like all the Grand Prixs. I'm like, how are you going to all these Grand Prixs? And I realized like, she wasn't going to all these Grand Prixs. She's leveraging almost like correspondence essentially right like another creator maybe a small creator in uh like Abu Dhabi to be at the race or someone in Miami to be at the race and then cover it I'm like wow this is really really cool so I ended up subscribing to her newsletter uh paid subscription then she came out with a physical hard copy of it beautiful beautiful book which I showed off in this episode um she had some really really great people featured in it, but also on the cover. Cassidy Taurus, Dan Taurus's wife was on the cover. If

you don't know who that is, she is the brand advisor to the Cadillac F1 team, but it is Dan Taurus, the owner of the team, his wife as well. So she had that like, wow, this person is crushing it. And so I invited her onto the podcast and she was like, absolutely. I've never done a podcast before uh yeah and that was it i mean like had her on the show esme buxton of the paddock journal so she wants it to be known that she's not related to will buxton this matters to her crazy it's like the second buxton we've ever had on the show um so here's something really interesting usually except in two occasions when we have guests on the podcast i know a lot about our guests it's very common because it's people that whose careers I followed that I admire who

I've grown up watching racing which I still is quite shocking to me that we get the guests we get only two times have I had um the privilege of speaking to a guest that I didn't know that much about and both were people you introduced me to and I'm so grateful one was Shami Kalra yes the episode came out a week or two ago from homologato watches yep um and then also esme i didn't know that much about esme when i interviewed her alongside um vincenzo and it was it's fascinating when you interview someone you don't know that much about because you're sort of take peeling the layers of the onion in real time you're really learning about this person and i kind of developed a bit of a crush to be quite frank as we were talking to her because i was

so fascinated with this woman with her drive um how she how she carries herself the way she speaks she's so creative but also so kind and humble just it she's one of those people that you really want to do well like you're like oh man i really want you to crush it and do well absolutely unique voice so i really am grateful you introduced me to her i'm so happy to follow along with the Paddock Journal and everything she's doing. I'm very glad that she's now sort of a friend of Business to Speed, and we hope to do things with her and run into her at a racetrack, hopefully as soon as possible. And I hope people enjoy this episode because she is a wonderful woman and her voice deserves to be heard. And if you haven't subscribed to the Paddock Journal,

please do so. It's a wonderful, wonderful newsletter. Yeah. One last thing before we jump into it, I wouldn't even necessarily call Esme a creator, although she is, because she is a very very um uh what's the word i'm looking for she's an excellent photographer with a great portfolio she's done a lot in that world uh fashion editorial before that but some might ask like what does this have to do with the business of speed and to me creator economy is it's so important to how motorsport is being consumed now that it would we would be remiss to is it remiss I don't know, to, to, to, to not have a creator on the show or somebody, somebody that's involved in that. And again, this is somebody who's putting a lot of time and effort into the

content that's being created and, you know, creating real stories around what they're writing about, what she's writing about, uh, the photos that are being taken and whatnot. So anyway, enjoy this conversation with Esme Buxton and, uh, yeah, let us know what you think of it. Hola, Vincenzo. Lali, you have a very... This is ironic. This is not the first Buxton we've had on the show. It is true.

And also, we're on a really good Brit sprint because we've had quite a few now. We've had quite a few, yeah. And we'll have another one, right? Coming up, too. We have a couple coming up, yeah. Yeah. But yeah, not the first Buxton,

which I thought of going into it before we started recording. I said, oh, wait a minute. It's also another Buxton. So for those of you that don't know, this is Esme Buxton. And Esme and I have never met in person, but I have followed along with the Paddock Journal, which is her sub stack. But it's not just a sub stack anymore newsletter. It's also a physical copy. So I have the physical copy here. I was one of the one of the many

actually, there was a lot of people that got this physical media, which is what I think got me most excited and spurned this conversation. Because number one, you don't see a lot of physical media anymore number two you don't see as many people that go into the creator route now you have you have a career behind you too so i don't want to downplay you as just a creator that came about recently but people don't think writing and then physical media right it's videos it's tiktok it's short 20 second clip it's things like that and here it is you're going completely the opposite route which is what really really drew me to to your content and i love what you produce anyway so welcome to the show thanks guys it's so nice to properly meet you both i've been fans for a

while so yeah this this is really fun well like i said i have been following along and i think something that is very telling is the quality of the work that you put out you can't put out a physical magazine to the level that first of all you have cassidy towers on the cover yeah which i believe you did you shoot you shot that in miami right yeah yeah we went out to her her home and photographed her there yeah that was incredible so i mean you don't have the level of of you know guest you have laura winter in here as well you have i think alex jakes is in there jenny goblin you have like there's a lot of big names in the formula one world that are in the physical copy here. But tell me, what was it that made you want to create a physical, beautiful, a coffee table

style book from your newsletter? What made you go from newsletter to that? Big jump. Yeah, big jump. Very, very good question. I think, well, first of all, my background is in fashion photography. That's sort of where I've started. And that's how I'm approaching the world of F1 is from the lens of editorial fashion storytelling culture right um and so for me a magazine was always kind of the end goal i just to be honest with you i didn't expect to do it so soon um we started the paddock journal as an instagram and substack in march 2025 and by i think what was it september october we were like cool let's make us make a magazine and we honestly Vincenzo was crazy we did it in two months I don't know how anybody does monthly magazines

well I guess they have teams we were three people and funding of course you know like right people don't realize how much print costs it's crazy it is yeah it's it's a it's a crazy amount of money and I just think what I was seeing in the f1 space was like you say a lot of digital content um a lot of that kind of creator economy is growing and growing and growing which is incredible but I personally was missing that editorial lens that kind of storytelling lens that you do get in other sports you know basketball soccer football like there is a bit more of a cultural lens that people view it through and I was surprised that there wasn't that in F1 as much that I could see do you think now because your content first of all Vincenzo introduced me to

you so I'm very grateful because I've followed along and and I love what you do and I do think it's so unique. Do you think now that what the kind of content you're producing, what you're doing, it's sort of in its own silo, that there's people who follow you who are into the lifestyle in the world around F1, but maybe not necessarily are following the races or free practice or qualifying? How much of your audience is just into the lifestyle around it? Yeah, that's super interesting, because I thought it would be higher than it actually is. I definitely expected it to be a more of a drive to survive cohort that found us and are interested in what we're doing but i've been really pleasantly surprised that we've had a large sort of old school kind of group as well

and people that are just understanding that you know formula one yes it's motorsport but it's an entire ecosystem as well um you know and i've been told by several people that if we created the Palette Journal five years ago, it would have died instantly. And if we created it five years in the future, it would be so saturated that we would probably have, you know, been moved into oblivion. So I think we've really just captured something at exactly the right time. And I wish I could tell you what that is. Isn't that the thing about life, right? It's timing with everything in life. It's timing. And I'm so glad for you that you found the exact timing. And I'm very surprised to hear that a lot of your audience are actually not surprised but I just was curious

about that how many yeah because I have friends who only follow sort of the lifestyle around F1 they could be in an elevator with Max Verstappen and Lando Norris and they wouldn't know but they know about Lewis Hamilton they know who he's dating they know that he showed up at the Met Gala so I do find that there are some people at least in my circle who follow the lifestyle but not the racing yeah i mean there is definitely definitely those people but like you know if we put a post out i think we put something out recently about um old test deliveries and the more interesting test deliveries and i thought people wouldn't necessarily or our audience necessarily care about that but there was people that were telling us information that we didn't

even know you know like oh back in 1985 there was blah blah blah and these are young women a lot of the time you know so i think uh it is you know and maybe you guys find it as well but when you start to love the sport you want to know everything about the sport you know yeah and i'm really finding that with our audience which is cool i think by nature formula one and you know lolly and i have been watching the sport probably right around the same time early early early 90s late 80s where we where we came in and we started watching it we were young and to me something like this gives credence to how far it's come and especially to the fan base it's not just the drive to survive fanbase, which I don't have a problem with the

Drive to Survive fanbase. The other Buxton who was on the show, Will Buxton, we talked extensively about the gatekeeping aspect and how there's so much of that that goes on and he was very adamant about why wouldn't you want people to love the sport that you love and it doesn't matter how they love it. What does it really matter, right? And that's

what I think looking at or seeing the Paddock Journal, but not just the Paddock Journal. I think it's what signifies, the Paddock Journal signifies like a larger movement around there's fashion. I love seeing the the fashion aspect what people i say people what a lot of folks that want to hate on the newer fan forget is that formula one drivers are always stylish i mean have you seen some of the old

fits like have we seen do we remember and i'm not you know whatever like the grid girls all that kind of stuff you know do we remember senna walking into the paddock even james hunt i mean His style, I mean, the styles were different, but that's fine because styles evolve. And now we have different styles and different fits and different things that people care about. But there was always, it was always there. This culture was always there. It's just showing up in different ways.

And that's what I say. To me, that's what the Paddock Journal signifies. It's like, hey, we're showing up, but in a different way or in a way that's more modern. It's a modern touch. Also, we used to have physical magazines back in the day. Autosport, F1 Racing, those magazines existed. And so not having a magazine anymore, like there's a gap, there's a hole there. That's why I think you reach, you can touch the older crowd too, because now with a physical

magazine, even your digital work is so high quality, it feels like a magazine. And to me, that's what, you know, changes or differentiates. But before we go too deep into what you're doing now, I want to talk about your, like what you've done in the past. So I want you to brag a little bit on yourself because you've worked with some pretty big names but tell the audience what you've done before you jumped into this world oh my gosh okay don't be humble i won't be humble i won't be humble but i do want to say we brought up world bucks in a couple times now we are not related i've been asked this well not to my knowledge

anyway i would you know well if you're listening i will happily take a dna test with you breaking news um but yeah well you know he's a he's a he's a great guy and and i'd love to interview him one day so yeah okay so my past then I've done a lot of things oh my gosh sorry my dog is going through my trash can you give me two seconds I'm just gonna get her something go for it go for it she's all sorted sorry about that no you're good like she couldn't care less if I'm doing work on my computer but as soon as I'm talking to someone she's like give me attention always that's how they are and my dog is the same way you could couldn't care less if you're standing there trying to give them attention and then the minute you're on the phone they're always they're always

like that okay so shall i just keep talking yeah just so what i just asked you i asked you uh to brag about yourself so yeah you can just jump into that yeah cool okay so yeah i've had a quite an interesting past i suppose i've um studied film production at university back in the early 2010 and worked in film for a long time I kind of got my way into the art department working on things like Star Wars The Force Awakens which was ridiculous I've also done things with Peter Rabbit as well I don't know if you you mean you've got kids right like if you've watched the James Gordon version I worked on that and then worked in advertising as well I did a job with with Rihanna once I've been pat standing with Rihanna and if you search me up in the daily mail

you'll find me so I've kind of I've done a lot of crazy things in that department and then I'm you know my passion has always been uh fashion photography and portrait photography I um I kind of I entered that world um several years ago and have worked like you say like with Laura Winter and you know traveled the world I've lived in Australia for a time I've lived in Berlin for a time I think I've always just been interested in the arts and travel and culture so when I discovered Formula One which to be honest I've known about Formula One for years my dad used to watch it even though he denies ever watching it for some reason um he was like I've never been involved in it but he definitely did and I remember like learning

about it and kind of getting interested in the strategy of it all I'm thinking oh I could get I could maybe you know get into this to be honest with you it wasn't until Drive to Survive that I really understood what the what it was all about what the circus was the drama and the storytelling and on all of that and I think because I have you know a past or a background in um in production and in the arts and I love to travel F1 just kind of you know it's a culmination of all those things so so you I've my career my entire career has been as a creative director at different ad agencies so a lot of what you're saying resonates with me and so I'm thinking back to that day when you decide you're going to do this and you're going to create the the paddock journal had you creative directed

that in your head did you have this very crisp idea of what it was going to look like what you wanted to do with it and I think and then if you could also go into a little bit like at what point shortly after was there a tipping point where you're like oh man this is taking off like what or what single thing made that happen yeah so so you know maybe you found this too lally but like working in the creative industry I feel like you're always having to sell yourself you're constantly having to you know oh I need to touch on that yes you are a creative you are a salesperson and people don't understand how much a creative is constantly pitching yourself your creative your idea because that's what you're trying to get buy in on your idea so I adore that you just said that

yeah yeah exactly you know you're constantly having to push yourself and and and and market yourself and so I had the really wonderful opportunity like I said to work with Laura Winter um and we were talking about getting something an interview and a photo shoot done with her that we could publish in a major magazine like the Guardian or Sunday Times or something because I think her story is really interesting you know and especially around International women's day like there could be something there so we pitched the magazine pitched the idea around a magazine and just no one was that interested which I was really yeah I was really shocked about I was thinking okay look so there needs to be something out there that is fashion and

formula one related like how they do in football and basketball and you know NFL all these kinds of sports there there is a magazine or a space where they talk about the culture of the sport so i was trying to find something f1 related and um and there are some things out there like don't get me wrong but there was nothing that resonated with me as a woman as a fashion lover you know so i just thought like that's crazy that's crazy that this doesn't exist the sport has been around for what 75 years 76 years and there's nothing like this that's around maybe i can give it a go you know i've got this background i understand fashion i understand photography i understand marketing because I've had to market myself all my life so maybe I could give this a go so I took

inspiration from the fashion world to create the paddock journal did not expect it to do well I thought it might be just a little something I do one a day a week as I to complement my photography but within a few weeks I think I didn't tell Laura Wentz to do this but she found what I was doing and was like this is amazing and shared about it on her own platform and it kind of exploded from there and then a few other posts just did really well i i just kind of caught some sort of zeitgeist and it just kept growing and growing and growing and i think the biggest thing that i'm shocked about is how many people within the formula one industry are interested in what we're doing it's not just the fans so that shows that i've clearly captured something you know and i'm and

it's and i'm running with it i'm just gonna see what happens next yeah you keep riding you keep riding the wave for sure how so tell me how how often are you getting reached out to by teams brands like you don't have to name anybody specifically do whatever you want but how often is that happening for you now because a lot of folks that's that you set that out what i think is really interesting about what you just said is that you didn't set out to make it wasn't really the goal you just were like yeah this is something i want to do i want to do for fun and for me right for yourself but because you put all of yourself into it it resonated so now I know you have brands working with you but and people can go see that on your you know your

Instagram account and and everywhere you could just see everyone in it you know you're you're working with but how often are you getting reached out to and how many times are you saying no that's what I'm really curious about I mean so we're just under a year old so we're still figuring out the whole sort of brand and partnership side of it all you know it's as you guys know it's quite an interesting landscape and there's no rules to it so we're trying to like figure out you know what rules work for us but yeah we're getting reached out to quite often more than i ever expected and like i said i'm used to fighting i'm used to saying hey i'm here i'm worth working with please give me a chance you know i know i can do this and i'm now waking up to emails in

my inbox saying hey we really want to work with you you don't have to prove anything that's awesome it's amazing nice i'm not used to it i need to get better yeah feel trusting myself as me so early on in the in so let's talk about the business a little bit of what you're doing that's what you guys do so laura winters does that post you start taking off in those first few weeks at what point actually are you like i have a business here like i maybe don't have to doing my freelance photography and that hustle like that life may be coming to an end when did that start happening for you I think that started happening it's a good question let me think about that I think it was around the Dutch Grand Prix last year I wanted to go and I wanted to get

paddock access and actually you know go to the Dutch Grand Prix as a business rather than as a fan and I was thinking about ways how to do that you know how do people get paddock access and kind of through some research and just being audacious I suppose I reached out to some some brands to see if they would want to you know look after me and I reached out to Alpine Stars Reserve happy to give them a shout out because they're incredible and they already knew who we were it wasn't a hard sell and I kind of thought hey so if Alpine Stars Reserve know who we are maybe this is worth really pursuing you know and then getting access to that world and seeing how it works you kind of realize I don't mean this in a negative way at all but you realize that everybody's just trying to figure

it out like you know you see these teams and you see you know the people within the in the paddock and you think oh my gosh they're they all know exactly what they're doing you know they've all got their business sorted but we're all the same yeah you know me a year in or a huge conglomerate like 25 years in we're all just trying to figure it out and that was when I realized I deserve to be here and I can make this into a proper business I love that you just said that I love that. Because women, sometimes we have this enormous amount of imposter syndrome, especially associated with motorsports. I mean, Chinzon, I've struggled with that as well. And I have been a little bit ostracized. I had a whole rant about it when we had a Marshall Pruitt on the podcast. But I love that you felt that, like, I belong here because guess what? We do belong. You belong. I belong. All the other women involved, we belong. and we have a voice and we have opinions and they they deserve to be heard and i'm so pleased that you're getting your moment in the sun because you deserve it yeah thank you and so do you and

i spoke with a neuroscience and psychologist expert um for international women's day called dr marcia goddard and we spoke a lot about imposter syndrome and she was saying that that word needs to like leave our language because not a real thing like imposter syndrome is not a real syndrome it's just us telling ourselves we don't deserve to be here and the more that we tell our brain something the more we believe it right so if we go oh i don't deserve to be here oh i have imposter syndrome then we start to think like there is something wrong with us or you know there's a legitimacy to why we feel worried you know so just yeah screw it do it anyway the other thing i say vincenzo right fake it till you make it yeah it's true i mean you know here's

the thing i i have a love hate with that phrase because some people are faking it when they don't have anything to rest like actual they're just faking everything that i don't agree with no no but to your point that's man where you're like hey i i i know what i'm doing i know that i bring value so yeah maybe i do have to just go along with it and i'm gonna act like i belong here oh wait a minute i do belong here right you already told yourself i'm gonna act like i do and so now i do because you've already told yourself in your head i have to this is what i'm gonna you know how I'm going to present myself what I'm curious go ahead if you want to say something well I just want to say one last thing on that is that um I think something that I get a lot of people

reaching out to me asking how how to do what I'm doing they want to get involved they want to know how to do what I'm doing and I had a really interesting chat with Cassidy Taurus uh when we were working together and she said to me hey like I just want to thank you for reaching out to me about this she said no one reaches out to me they all reach out to Dan Taurus her husband you know and you're thinking you know yes she's got something to say and and i thought reaching out to her was a big deal and i possibly couldn't talk to her you know and so everyone's thinking we can't talk to each other when we should just try yeah you so okay i i'm gonna i'm gonna say this and i i do want to ask you about xanvort so don't let me forget okay sorry i had no no no i

have i want to piggyback off what you just said because even with us with this podcast this podcast is only a few months old we started it we decided to start it after we you know started working a little bit more closely together and we said let's do this podcast we don't know if we're going to get these guests lali says to me okay by the end of next year so one full year of the podcast i want to get at least one i think she said one indie car driver and one active formula one driver on the podcast yeah i'm like okay like that was just but it was like blue skying like it was yeah we're like low goal you know that's whatever and then next thing you know we just started asking people to be on the show i did nothing like special we didn't even ask for

introductions most of the time it was just here's a linkedin dm here's an instagram dm here's a twitter dm next thing you know we've got connor daly james hinchcliffe mario andretti i'm real yeah mark blundell we've had ceos of formula e on the show people have not said no it's it's actually knock on wood right now we had will buxton recently on the show we have someone you have a few lined up that are quite special as well that we can't say yet yeah there's a there's a it's but like you said you just made a really really good point you reached out to cassidy you're thinking oh my god this is a big deal just like us like i reached out to mario andretti and i'm thinking oh my god this is shoot like hero childhood like legend and the you should have

seen the email i got back it was like yeah here he's how about this time it wasn't even there was no negotiation it was just like yeah here's the are you available this time yep okay well i think that that doing this and and i hope you've had the same experience like people want to tell their story i always say that's people people want to tell their story and if and if you're nice and open and kind and they'll come on perhaps and they'll tell their story people often tell me how did you get mario andretti how did you get will buxton how did you get james hinchcliffe and you know what i say we asked exactly i always say that you just have to ask and i think what as well when i'm kind of learning about the f1 space you know coming from the fashion world a lot of

what i'm bringing to the f1 space is already happening in fashion so my mind is going oh this has been done before there's no point not being done in f1 you know so whatever whatever you want to do in f1 there's a huge space for it so you just got to try you just got to do it i'll tell you the inspiration for business of speed was business of fashion there you go exactly ironic i just to tie those worlds together it was it was one of but it was it's what really helped me click when i brought when i kind of went all into business speed all right i gotta get back to zandvoort because i wanted to ask you right away zandvoort you said that's when you realized it how long had you been doing the paddock journal at that point when you got to zandvoort where

you're like okay i want to make this a thing like what was the time between that those two things happen. Okay. Remind me when Zandvoort was again. September. September. Okay. So we started in March. Okay. So like about five, six months. Five, six months. Yeah. I can you say I started. Well, you started and then you, you started building out the team, which I want to talk about the team a little bit. Cause I know you have some other amazing women that are helping you out. Also you do something very interesting. I guess we could just talk about it now, but before we get to that so about six months where you went from I started it from nothing zero yeah yeah I think it was less than six months to be honest with you I think it was just that

sort of it's hard to quantify because it's been so far you know everything's just gone so quickly but I think it was that kind of realization well first of all that I know that building and building something on Instagram and building something online isn't nothing you know but like 10 10 years ago that's a frivolous thing that oh you know you're building something online it's not a big deal whereas now it's an entire economy right so oh yeah you know that growing online can become a business so I was very aware of that and also it was just an instinct there's just something instinctually you kind of go okay there's something here this isn't just a hobby this isn't like just one of a million other accounts like there is something in this so just keep keep

riding it and treat it like a business in my head and you know and then yeah what happens no it's good to hear that it's not there wasn't like i didn't know what i didn't know what your answer was going to be but i'm thinking like there doesn't have to be this elaborate story not everything is right i mean i think of the story of lolly and i coming together i had started business at speed it was just there i was doing things not as consistent as i wanted to and lolly comes along she saw a video of me posting sabering a champagne bottle on linkedin and she reached out to me Napoleon Bonaparte people like Napoleon he was in a tux like out in the cold someplace and like it's snowing he's in a tux no Vincenzo that's how you were I'm gonna tell the story it's literally

like cold out you can tell it's winter he has a champagne bottle and he sabers it like Napoleon Bonaparte and I'm thinking still have that witness and Lali you were like that's my business partner right there actually she thought I was an idiot I'm pretty sure she thought I was a complete like psychopath like what is wrong with you i just thought why is this on linkedin but i can't stop looking i think it was my answer i think she was like why did you post this on linkedin and i said i don't know why not and she's like okay we should talk can i ask a little bit about racing so i want to ask a little bit now that you're so heavily involved in formula one specifically is that your main motorsport outlet do you enjoy other forms of racing and how into formula one have you gotten

are you watching the series are you watching sessions tell us about that yeah yeah Formula One and Formula One Academy are the two sports that I watch religiously I'm slowly learning about MotoGP IndyCar NASCAR um I haven't watched any of them yet so I'd be happy if you guys teach me but I do know I think a couple of things are going on right so I know that the reason why the Paddock Journal works it's because we're so niche and I think this is something that people tell you a lot when you're starting a business especially an online business it's like niche down niche down niche down and a lot of people refuse to do that and I completely respect that um but I do think our sort of secret sauce is the fact that we do just focus on F1 and F1 Academy a because I love

it and b because the more I think anyway the more like specific you are the more audiences know what to expect every day you know which you know works for some people doesn't work with for others is you know completely fine but i think that's what's working for us at the minute but yeah obsessed with f1 like it's embarrassing like i do feel like i've got friends who don't love f1 and they ask me about it and i just and i i don't know why but i get all embarrassed to talk about it oh you should be so proud don't do that i was at a restaurant yesterday last night and i had my phone 8 30 p.m watching fp1 i said i'm sorry i have to do this and i took out my phone i would just watched the whole session and also i'm gonna tweet about it so like no no no you should be

loud and proud it's loud and proud it's a beautiful sport to be a fan of it is yeah it's it's quite a quite a unique thing yeah yeah it's come a long way and i think you know that this entire conversation just proves that if you want to do something you just do it there there really is no people have asked they asked me that i'm sure they asked uh you know all three of us here like oh how do you do it or what what do you what do you do to do that and it's like do i give you do i give you like some big grandiose answer or do i just tell you yeah i just started posting i think this is the biggest thing that people have to get kind of get over is the cringe part right that initial cringe where you post something and your family sees it

and they're like what are you what are you doing yeah what is that well it's something i like to talk about and then you post again and eventually it just gets to the point where i remember when i stopped posting for a little while because i was trying to figure things out and people were like hey when are you going to post about formula one again we really like that and i was like oh okay but they don't tell you sometimes they're not they're not actively letting you know I agree, yeah. It's like, when I do post, you don't say anything, but then... I'm like, you don't like it, you don't share it,

you don't respond to me at all, you don't text me about it. Like, I didn't even know you wanted it. Well, you miss it when it's gone. Esme, how much copycat accounts have you had? Are people sort of starting to imitate what you're doing? Are you flattered by that? Do you hate it? How do you feel about that? Yeah, yeah, I am flattered about it.

I think, to go back to your question, first of all, Vincenzo, about, you know, I can't remember what your question even was, but to go back to kind of talking about like, just do it, just do it, just do it, just do it, just do it. Yeah. We're just stealing that from Nike, but to, to, to just do it is true. You should just do whatever you want to do. But I do think there is a level, like I couldn't have just done this 10 years ago because of who I was as a person back then. What I knew, the knowledge I had, the, the skills and experience that I had um it's only because I have worked extensively in film production and fashion and photography and marketing that I understand how to make this work you know so I think if you want

to just do it do your research as well don't just kind of throw stuff at the wall and hope it sticks you know know it and then do it you have to be knowledgeable and whatever you I feel like when I met Vincenzo I felt like it was a culmination of a lifetime of education and motorsports and meeting him was a catalyst for me of like, finally, I have this outlet for this like lifelong knowledge. So I knew it. And then I did it. Yeah. What is what piece of advice do you would you give to someone aside from just doing like, what is the best piece of advice that you would give to someone who wanted to get involved in maybe not even necessarily Formula One or motorsport related? It's just like if to follow

their passion, like what would you say to someone about that? Yeah, my gosh, you can say you can think about it all good I mean if you want to follow your passion I think get clear on what your passion is I think that's one thing you know you can be passionate about a lot of things but but be clear on the on the thing that you want to do forever right because that that's different for everybody just doing it is is easy but I think just find out who you are as well like discover who you are first do a bit of soul-supporting because as well like Lali to talk about you know the copycat accounts that are coming out now yes I'm noticing them and yes there are some and I think there are some that are doing it incredibly well and some that aren't and the ones that are

doing it well are the ones who know who they are know what they're about um and are coming up with their own take on things it's the copycat accounts who just want the kudos or just want the paddock pass or just want the you know the clout that comes with f1 that you can see straight through that's so funny you say the paddock because if you go on i don't know how often you're on threads on so every time i go there i'm reminded as to why i don't want to spend time there because all it is or all it feels like is people just saying can't wait for the f1 season would love to get paddock passes or something like something along those lines like rough rough post is like how do i get a brand to give me access or how do i get f1 i want to and i'm just thinking and then

you click on their profile and the follower count doesn't matter but it's like they're not even posting about yeah what they're asking for and i'm like how do you expect yeah you're not even posting anything at all they're usually like their newer account and i'm just like how do you just expect and they'll be the same accounts that go why are all these celebrities and influencers in the paddock why yeah it's like because the fans sadly don't make money yeah i think there's such a people miss you made a comment you you said earlier that of all the things that you've done to get to the point of paddock journal right you're not you didn't just suddenly start paddock journal with zero experience of anything else you're a phenomenal photographer you have an

incredible creative eye there's a lot to what you do that translates over to other skills you know lolly's was a creative director for many like it's not like oh i just showed up and i'm i like motorsport okay cool so do 827 million other people they like this they like formula one so get in line you have these transferable skills that you've taken and brought to the table and you figured out how to put them together to create a you know a single package that that makes sense for people i don't think people realize how because i i you know i've gotten comments i'm sure you get comments i know people get comments my wife's a youtuber she's been doing this since like 2009 comments from my family her family friends oh you're just posting a video like

you're just you're not doing anything you're just posting on social media it's like i wish it was that easy no no like this podcast goes goes out and then it's okay we cut the clips this is just for one piece of content right just for the podcast not anything else all those clips have to be posted individually with individual captions depending on what platform they're on maybe some different styling depending on the platform they're on you know there's the tagging there's all that stuff that goes into it takes 15 to 20 minutes per platform sometimes to post one video i'm like no it's not no it's not as simple as just posting a video and getting followers thanks though people don't understand the work that goes i feel like people that don't do any

specific thing in any they don't understand the work that goes behind it so for instance you're a photographer right people think you just show up you grab your camera you hit the thing and there's your beautiful photo they don't understand that you've already sketched this out you've creative directed this in your mind you know exactly what it needs to look like you need the lighting you need the wardrobe you need the angle you need the natural light to cooperate you need the location like there's so much it's not just showing up and clicking your camera people don't realize yeah how much work is involved in a lot of things in the creative field yeah even now in the creator content field they people just don't understand they think it's a silly pastime yeah

exactly you know and you'll know this as well Ali like you can't just think about the the end product either you have to think about how it's going to be received and you have to think about you know the marketing that goes behind it and you know that like you say the different the different platform what audience is going to be you know using those platforms who how are we wording this differently you know it's it's it's a huge operation and i think people that and i've and i've seen this a lot this year actually a lot of new people coming into f1 wanting to be content creators or wanting to have an account online credible there's room for everybody i always say that there's room for everybody there's you know no gatekeeping no competition but the people that

succeed are the ones that understand that it's a business understand that f1 is a business and what they're producing is also a business and the ones that are want to be a fan that to get a paddock pass or to get access to the sport are the ones that's going to struggle to really succeed i think because people see through that eventually too yeah that's the other thing people people become more and more savvy so they know who's there for the right reasons because it is a business because they love the sport because they're knowledgeable because they have an opinion that is worth sharing and who's there as vincenzo often complains the people on threads who just want a paddock pass and they just want to be able to take a selfie with with the ferrari garage behind them so that

they just sort of show it off to the world or here i am in the pad you know i could go down a rabbit hole of things that you see of people just posing and yeah yeah it's a whole it's a whole space we could we could probably go down this rabbit hole all day long i'm sure but let's talk about let's talk about this is the first weekend we're recording in the middle of the first weekend of the season did you get a chance to watch either practice session already because the i don't know what the time difference is for you guys but it's crazy in the uk it's it's like i think it's 10 or 11 hours ahead so so we are from us on our time zone new york time zone a lot of these in toronto same time zone though 8 8 30 p.m for practice one and then 11 11 or 11 30

for practice two so it'll be the same thing for fp3 and quali so but we haven't asked you either what team do you support what driver no wait wait she said it was what time was it in the uk i gotta know i don't actually know what time the free practice is but i know that race the race is at four in the morning which i know you guys have to do that for the european races and we're sorry we do that too so but it's okay i guess it is early vincenzo especially you and i because now they're a little bit more favorable for eastern time vincenzo and i grew up with the 4 a.m the 4 a.m the 3 a.m the two yeah all that kind of stuff i mean i'll wake up for it don't get me wrong i am i'm awake and ready at 4 a.m for for the australian grand prix but yeah so but i haven't

actually watched any of the free practice yet i will watch quali definitely but i also think i don't know how what you guys think about this but everyone gets so excited because ferrari do really well in free practice and they go this is it this is it this is it and then no i know no i know is that i've done this for 30 plus years the pain is real do you love ferrari i would say ferrari got me into formula one because as everyone says you know you draw a race car it's red right but I have been incredibly disappointed with how they've run their strategy and how they've sort of treated Lewis last year I think was was disappointing obviously we all never know the ins and outs of the of the organization but from the outside yeah

they could have done it better um and I've been incredibly interested in the rise of Williams big Carlos Sainz fan I think you know yes he's good looking but that's absolutely not the reason why i'm a fan of him i think he's not at all not at all none like sad we'll say five percent i mean i'm a carlos science fan because he's so good looking i'll just be he just happens to have a great head of hair he just happens to be good looking but he's also a strategist and he really cares about the sport he's got this sort of empathy for his teammates which you know it's not a coincidence that he's friends with everyone he's ever been on a team with you know it's and you know from being a kind of an empath myself i'm like you know loving the story of f1 i think what

williams are doing and how they brought carlos signs in and he got a podium in his first year with them from leaving ferrari like oh my god the story that writes itself it's so exciting he's the whole williams story is fantastic i mean to me formula one is not formula one if if williams and ferrari are not doing well right if if ferrari and williams doing well or at least giving us positive stories most of the time formula one is more interesting to me i've always felt that way yeah and i think what they've done bringing in james vows was genius and genius genius and he he really likes his two drivers i think that and they're both really committed to not just like short term they're they seem both really committed to project

williams and making that team go back to where the glory days are intense so just where they should be it's such a it's such a remarkable story the the whole the whole arc of that team and that we've been sort of in the in the lowlands for them for for so long it would be so nice to see them yeah it's just a good story amazing story and maybe this is an unpopular opinion but i would love to see claire williams return at some point in some capacity bring it back home i love her and somebody sent me a text message recently that i completely disagreed with they said oh claire williams was on drive to survive i don't know if that's a dated choice and i said absolutely not a dated choice absolutely not she's wonderful she's so knowledgeable i was

immediately i was like nope i disagree with this it's she's a wonderful choice it would be great to see her back in the paddock regularly it would be great for them to find a way to get her involved again it would just yeah that whole situation is is interesting is it and and there's a lot of stories to be pulled from that from the way the whole williams they are a story waiting to happen And sometimes I wish they would tell some of those stories, but it's just me saying it. Well, we're here, you guys. You know, the product journal, Business of Speed.

We're ready for them to tell those stories with us. We do need some good photography. Might know a photographer. We keep saying, actually, Lolly and I keep saying we need professional photos of, like, ourselves at the track. So we were at... Miami, by the way. I'm going to be at Miami.

Oh, will you? Okay. Could be. Come to Miami. We'll do this. Interesting. It has to happen. Like, I'm...

Yeah. I am sick of using photos that we hand, like, yeah, anyway. You're a genius. Yes, Esme's gonna do our photos that we've been wanting forever. Well, there's no, but I had already asked her, I was like, at some point,

I want to get professional photos. Like, I want to hire you to do photos for us. And now I'm like, oh, wait, we both need, like, we need photos together. So anyway, throwing that out there. You're crazy correcting it, Esme. Start thinking, I'm willing to do anything. All right, predictions for the season.

What are your expectations and predictions for the season? Two different kinds of things. what's your expectations and then what do you actually predict is going to happen curious my expectation for this season is that everybody stays on track I have a feeling that it's going to be chaos I'd like to oh no I'd like to be right I want there to be a bit of chaos this year I want these new regulations to flip everything on its head I'd love to at the time of recording Aston Martin are not going to compete in the Australian Grand Prix right is that is that happening still there is said not compete but alonso didn't go out for practice at all stroll ran a few laps but

they say that like it can cause nerve the car might cause nerve damage so i can't see those guys being if they do turn a couple laps it'll be like 14 15 laps and that's it from what the speculation is as of today which is friday we'll see i mean that's insane yeah insane and absolutely and say obviously i wish no ill will on anybody and i don't know if damage involved but i do think that these new regulations are going to cause chaos i think there's some teams have found loopholes some teams are finding loopholes and we're going to see some some really interesting racing and i think my predictions are do you know what i don't know i think actually my predictions are that lewis is going to do much better this year in ferrari i think he's got i think well

from what we've seen in testing right he seems to have a real handle on the on the new car which is exciting i think i'm gonna speak this into existence and i do hope but i think he's gonna do really well this year potentially win or at least top three um and then he's gonna retire no darling sorry he just said that he won't retire until there's an african grand prix okay okay he has just said that so we have okay hopefully he stays true to that yeah he wants to race in africa but he wants to race in africa okay let's get him into racing in africa i'm up for listen listen from what i know about the team in maranello is that they can really wear you down and even the strongest of humans can be worn down so even if lewis wants to race there it may not be

in red i'll just say that it's true true true true it may not be in red but we'll see hopefully hopefully the leaf a leaf has turned i will say the cars being lighter you can break later do fit into lewis's style a little bit who i would have loved to see under these regulations as danny ricardo oh yeah he would have really been i think taking advantage but yeah i who who's gonna win this is a question for all three of us let's all give our predictions right now who's gonna win who's winning the championship the driver's championship this season esme first esme first okay i would i think oscar piastri has a really good shot i think he was he had he had a good shot last year he just i don't know what happened he bottled it something happened

i think this year might be oscar's year you're looking at me like i'm crazy no he lost he basically had it in his hands and back and then he basically lost it after baku so you're you're not he's an assassin he's like incredible we love we love oscar piastri on the show big oscar piastri fan like i've never met a more ice cold assassin it's like he really is incredible vince you go next i want to leave mine for last so i don't love the mclarens this year if this was last year's mclaren i would have you know and it was another year in the regulations i would have said piastri because of the set the regulation set and seeing kind of you know what's going on i am actually going to go with someone who i have not been a big fan of i like him

george russell which which pains me to say because i obviously i don't want to see mercedes win i'm not a mercedes fan but uh i am i say i'm not a mercedes fan as i drink out of my mercedes mug yeah no i think i think george russell he he was so consistent last year so I think his like the story of his season was so underrated it was almost like he just flew under the radar because of everything else happening in the top three battle

and just obviously Verstappen coming back was out of this world so I think George Russell went so far under the radar if Mercedes did really nail this engine reg which we'll find out in quality we'll probably find we won't find out until the race really but I think quality will really see what that thing

is made of if they did then I think it's going to be George So I was going to say George, but for fun, I'm going to say someone else because then it won't be any fun. But I agree with everything Vincenzo just said. A hundred percent. I think George has it. I'm going to put an outlier there and I'm going to say that Max Verstappen gets his

fifth. Yeah. I mean, that's very, yeah, it could very much happen. But I do think George has got, I think George has got a really good chance. He's kind of got that energy of a kid that's like been, a kid that's been reviled. for his exam for years and years and years and years he's got all of this knowledge behind him now and this is his time yeah he's primed he's primed as they say it's also hard it's hard to bet against Verstappen but also again new new regulations say it looks like he might actually

have a decent teammate behind him this year which would be great for for the team the team looks rejuvenated now getting rid of Horner which just seemed to be more of a cancer than anything over the past couple years like this is they they feels differently sorry it feels different and i was gonna say laurent mechies is is running the team differently everything just feels a lot different coming out and then i think that the variable was the ford power unit or the oracle whatever red bull power unit for whatever they're calling it now i think that was the variable but it looks formidable so i i would it max verstappen best driver on the grid by far you can't bet against them i do like I know, but you already bet on George, so I'm sorry, Max.

I said George. No, no, no. I'm sticking to George. So we have George, Oscar, Max. I mean, you'll probably see a lot of those in the top three this year. That's also a good prediction. Could you imagine having this conversation two or three years ago? It would be Max, Max, Max, Max. Do you know what I mean? That would put three very different predictions is great. Great for sport, great for the fan.

What I think is very telling is that none of us picked... Lando. No. Which, I'm just going to leave it at that. I'm going to leave it at that. Yeah. I'm going to leave it at that. Because he's lovely.

He's lovely. He's a great guy. We love Lando. He's a great guy. We love Lando. And Lali and I have talked ad nauseum about Lando on the show. All right, Esme, it has been fantastic spending time with you. I want you to let, actually, before I let you go, tell us one big thing you have coming

up with the Paddock Journal or in life that you want to share that's coming up. okay oh my gosh yeah so the most exciting thing we've got coming up at the minute is we're doing a huge uh what would you call it i'll start me i'll start again so the biggest thing we've got going on this year is that we're partnering with the pop-up hotel and we're producing a thing called the paddock journal atelier which is a showroom and shopping concierge service at the monaco and the silverstone grand prix so you're going to be able to come and shop fashion brands that are related to f1 and not related to f1 and it's going to be like something you actually never seen an f1 before and i'm really excited to be part of that girl it only took us 55 minutes

to get to this i didn't even ask good for you you should be so freaking proud of yourself that's amazing yeah i think it's one of those things that when i'm there and it's and it's created and it's done i will be able to relax but until then we are duck under the water any way we can support we are happy to support feel free to reach out genuinely like whatever we can do amazing that you're doing that by the way thank you amazing yeah it's I think things like that taking experiences to the next level and keeping them within your niche yeah just makes so much sense yeah it makes so much sense people want people get off the internet they want to come and you know come to Grand Prix's read magazines they want to get offline and we want to be there

providing those experiences for them so yeah i'm excited where can the audience find you online obviously it's the only place they probably could yeah we don't want we don't want to let them know where you live that's not what we want to do where where can they find you how can they connect with you how can how can the brands reach out to you to work with you yeah sure well you can find us at the paddockjournal.com we've got a proper website now and it all links to our sub stack and all our email addresses are on there and you can also find us on instagram at the paddock journal and yeah send us a dm it's me that runs the account so i will be the one responding what an absolute delight to meet you to talk to you it's amazing what you're doing what you've

accomplished in such in a year basically because we're recording this in march so in a year look how far you've come anniversary there you go it's absolutely you are like you're a powerhouse i'm so i'm so happy to have met you to have connected i'm sure that a lot of people will be inspired by your story so this is this is lovely thank you so much for joining us oh it's lovely to meet you both likewise what you guys are doing is unbelievable and you deserve like all the flowers and i hope you keep growing as well yeah thank you thank you that means a lot thank you so much for joining us ciao