P1 with Matt and Tommy - Reaction to Austrian GP qualifying

Episode Date: June 28, 2025

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Hello everybody and welcome back to the P1 podcast with Matt and Tommy. Austrian Grand Prix qualifying. Well, that prediction for smallest poll gap of the year went well, didn't it? My God, that was a strange qualifying session. And we're going to reflect on all of it, aren't we, Tommy? You're, of course, not in your home. You've not moved. You've not decided to downgrade your setup.

You are, in fact, about to go to a gig, aren't you? Indeed, it could be worse. I feel like this is an all right setup, all things considered. On the road, normally we have our setup involves some kind of bin, no bin today, so that's good. No bins at the Ritz, London, where of course you'll be staying. Yeah, yeah, that P1 money going to good use. Premier in purple lighting as well, you know. I picked it for the branding.

You're like purple hotels from here, and that's it. Now, before we dive into everything, Austrian GP qualifying, a big shout out, of course, to our P1 live show tickets that are selling fast. We've sold out London, San Francisco, Glasgow and two shows in Amsterdam, so get them while you can to avoid being disappointed. Otherwise you won't be able to see Tommy just being gorgeous on stage and everything else that happens at a P1 live show. Right, okay, let's get into it.

Q1 and the bottom five were stroll, Ocon, Sonoda, Sines and Holcomberg. Let's sound the claxon. Let's talk about the Red Bull Seat. Shall we? P1 patron member Georgina. Are we going to have to really start looking at the Red Bull second seat again? How many times? Do we have to talk about this?

I mean, look, it's, nothing has changed. This is a constant, isn't it? So Red Bull at this stage now have proven that it's something more than just the driver. So for me, how I'm. see this and I think I will constantly see this as the situation. Red Bull are going to own it. They're going to have Sonoda in the car. They'll do the best they can. Try and score some points if they possibly can throughout the rest of the year. And then 26, yeah, and then 26, we, well, they will pray that it's an easier car to drive for two drivers rather than one. I guess so. But this is what

they've done and they've backed Max Verstappen all the way. And you, in a lot of, weird way you can't really argue with their logic because he's won four championships. Now they're obviously feeling the absolute wrath of it because the car is a mess. The second driver can't drive it at all. But yeah, it's rinse and repeat every single weekend because, you know, we were there looking at Sonoda and we know it's not his ability because you've got literally the guy who started the season. It was P20 up in sixth. Like what on earth must Yuki Sanoda be thinking that he,

finally got that promotion up and he's starting at the back again and the reason i think maybe even though some people are going oh you need to be more harsh on yuki and i do understand that it's not it's not great but you know in a weird way you've got yuki snowdo was closer to vestappen than like piastri was to norris like it's just how the cookie crumbles with with formula one and the red the red bull is just a mess it's insane It is a mess. And yeah, when they're not winning, it makes the team look worse, doesn't it? When Max isn't able to haul that car into winning positions,

that's when they really have to have a much harder look at themselves. Of course, other drivers to mention Ocon, again, out in Q1, my biggest good surprise, Olly Behrman, making it through to Q2 and then ending up 15th. I'm like, for goodness, great. It looked like he was maybe 12th, 13th. I was feeling quite good for Olly again, but then it just has to. don't have any qualifying pace. It all comes in the race with some master plan,

one-stop strategy where they go 60 laps on the hard tires. Yeah, Hasse's a very confusing team this year. They do just seem a lot worse than they were. Last year, obviously, you know, Stroll looked much better in practice and looked like you, you know, might be able to even challenge Alonso, but had as usual kind of qualifying problems. And then, you know, the back two row on the grid,

I guess the big shock is science, but just mentioning Holkenberg as well, because his teammate who will talk about later, did an absolutely unbelievable job. He did. It's weird to think that a Williams and a Saaber 19th and 20th is seen as a shock. Shock and a red boy 18th. It's not a shock. No, yeah, no, that is so weird, isn't it, to have to readjust our brains and how we think. Question for people on Patreon, remember, Mary M.M.

What do you think about Carlos's radio at the end of Q? What's really going on? So Carlos's radio at the end of Q1 was, there's damage in the car for sure. The car is undriveable. When I say undriveable, it's pulling under braking, no load in high speed, undriveable. That's quite the statement to be making. It wouldn't be the first time that a driver feels something in the car that teams may not see on the data, you know, whether there's small cracks in the structure of the car. car and things that Formula One team sometimes don't pick up.

So it wouldn't be the first time that that's been a thing and they've had chassis replaced and et cetera, et cetera. And Carlos is sort of suggesting that, yet you'd have to say because it was scruffy. Whenever we were riding on board with Carlos, it was not a clean lap by any stretch of the imagination. His teammate ended up 12th. But we don't expect this from Carlos, do we? He is a phenomenal talent, someone that would have definitely.

stayed at Ferrari had it not been for Hamilton. He's not a 19th fastest driver and we coming into this season thought he would be a match if not clear of Albon by a reasonable margin. So it is very much a head scratching problem at the moment. He is. He's really struggling. This is, you know, he's had so many Q1 exits it feels like and it just can't get any confidence in that car and, you know, he's resorted to some frustration and just, you know, he's resorted to some frustration and just maybe just feels kind of a bit hopeless with how the car's feeling and thinking, you know, there must be damaged because just something's not right here is really struggling to adapt. And we kind of saw this early in the season, but you thought maybe they'd have a bit more of a

handle on it now. So for it to, you know, keep continuing is a big, a big shock. It certainly is. It feels like any time that Carlos has had a poor weekend, he's had an intense. view where he said something's wrong. He doesn't hold back, does it? He really does not hold back. There's damage, the car felt really off, whatever. It feels like this is a recurring trend for Carlos this year. So maybe not a happy camp at Williams at the moment. Despite them taking what felt like a massive leap forward, it's certainly not been easy, an easy sort of sailing along this season like

we thought it might have been from the start of the year. And that pretty much sums up Q1, I would say. of course Stroll, you mentioned him, P-16. A lovely little Q1 exit for him to add to his tally. And then Holkenberg, very surprising to see him 20th when his teammate, not just a few positions ahead, getting into Q3. Like, Hulk is a driver that, we would expect that to be. Yeah, yeah, and he was, he was far,

like, I think a hundredth off at one point, maybe in Q2 versus Max Verstappen. Anyway, speaking of, let's go to Q2, where the five drivers out in this session, Alon, Hadjar, Colapinto, and, Bearman. Obviously the big talking point, Tommy, has to be another grass fire. It has to. That was of course where Hamilton, or I believe that was the cause of it, where Hamilton just ran wide, felt like he sort of lost bearings of his car slightly trying to minimize the distance to the line, but went slightly off the grass, onto the grass. And then a little grass fire, which caused us a red flag. I saw some people in our watch along saying, a red flag for that.

It's like, we can't leave the grass on fire. It's not Mario Cup. Because it's going to spread. Imagine they just drive around. I mean, it makes some cool pictures. I'm surprised they didn't add that to the F1 movie of some grass fires because that would have looked quite cool. But, yeah, it's continuing to happen quite a lot this season.

It's not kind of a farcical situation where it's happening every single week, but it's happening more than Formula One would like. And you do wonder if this trend continues that they're going to maybe do something different with the skid blocks because, yeah, we can't keep red flagging for grass fires. Absolutely cannot. But back to the actual action.

Alonso, 11th is not a completely horrendous qualifying for him, just missing out. You have to say, just Williams in general, Pee on Patreon member Ruben 4.0 asks, is the Williams hype train derailing? I think if Albon had been out in Q1, you could definitely start locking that in. probably locked in his biggest flop, or sorry, flop of the predictions weekend already, but Albon trying his best

to make sure that Tommy doesn't score any points. Yeah, there's still the race. There's still time. Yeah. But the hype is, you had Spain, Canada, it hasn't been a great role of form. You had Miami where we're talking about Williams,

you know, oh, Carlos Sites has made the right choice leaving Ferrari and Williams looked like they were literally, yeah, better than Ferrari. And they've had an absolute stinker of run, haven't they?

All the way going back to, I think, Imler, where, you know, they had a really poor triple header and it's continued into Austria, which, again, is that you think Williams, lots of straits, this should be where they're good, but they're not. No, there was talk, I think, coming into this weekend that Williams probably wouldn't be that great, not just from the P1 podcast and Tommy's predictions, but the fact that the Williams doesn't essentially do very well with the mixture of low, high and midspeed corners. that Austria does, even though there's only seven corners that feel like their actual corners, there is a mixture of speeds.

And I think that Williams are showing that they don't have the overall package that perhaps we saw at the start of the year. Hadjar, my goodness gracious me, outqualified by Lawson, down in 13th. Of course, it's small margins, right? If you make one tiny error on your lap, you're done. You're done for around a place like this. I know Q3 was quite big margins, but it was still very close in the midfield, especially in Q2. So that was a slightly shocking one. Colapinto, okay.

It's okay. It's not that bad when you see where Gazley was. It's obviously not great, but it looks like a little bit of the pressure has eased off Colapinto. I think Briatore mentioned that, you know, Dune's not coming back. And despite the rumors that Colapinto was on a kind of five race run, you wonder if the last race in Canada, and how well he did there compared to, you know, what Gassley did and kind of maybe put them at ease after a very difficult start. Obviously, he didn't do amazingly well, but enough to kind of go, okay, we'll just stick with this now. Yeah, it sounds like, or at least what was being reported,

is that he's now on just a race-by-race sort of deal. And to be honest with you, I know you say that there's a bit less pressure now. How do you have less pressure when you report to Flavio Brio-Briotori, I would like to know? I still think that Franco, be feeling a lot of pressure to deliver because yeah, Dewan might not be waiting in the wings and be the one to take his place. But Briatore is so cutthroat. There's 800 other Alpine drivers as well. Yeah.

Breitori is very cutthroat that I think he still has to deliver. But it's not a bad quality at all. And we've already touched on Olly Behrman. Let's go to Q3. The final session of the day and the top 10 were Norris, Lecler, Piaastry, Hamilton, Russell, Lorson, Vestapp and Bortoleto, Antonelli and Gazzley. So the first question is a absolute jab at my prediction, crazy prediction coming into this weekend.

Mr Jack and Coke from the P1 Patreon says, what happened to the closest qualifying of the season? It went up in flames, just like the grass did. Landau Norris happened. Landau Norris happened, but also more importantly, Pierre Gazley happened. Pierre Gasly was the reason that we didn't see a lap, a final lap, for Vastappen. And Vastappen had done an initial lap, which of course is just under a second off pole, but that was on a used set of tires.

It wasn't representative. And I am seeing Max so easily slotting in ahead of Charle-Clerc in that half a second void. There is between first and second. Of course, Oscar Piatri as well also caught out with the with the Ghazli issue. So it kind of gave, it was an open door for Lando to, he didn't even need to put the second lap in. He did. I still think Lando is 100% getting pole with a 103-9. He looked at a 10th, two, maybe even two and a half tenths clear of Oscar the entire quality session, and then he stepped it up once again in that final lap. And I think Lando was set for poll no matter what.

Absolutely. Yeah. It was never not going to be Lando minus a Q3 problem, but even after that first run, he just looked so good. And, you know, the, the, the, understandably there's been a whole kind of talk of and that the commenters kept saying it that's like surely it's going to be this time and you know we joke about the curse something on predictions yeah exactly surely you know surely it's going to happen this time um but yeah you're going to be very worried if landa doesn't deliver austria because he's so good around here and he just shared that i don't think it was ever going to be piastri on on pole even if he'd got his um run in so um of of course that the gap flatters him,

but I don't think it's a case of, are we only got pole? Certainly not. I don't think for one second it's that he got pole because of it. He was absolutely sensational and just looked absolutely rapid today. So, so, so quick.

For sure. Had he not put that 103-9, and I think he was sitting on a 104-2 before, and maybe he made a mistake on his final lap, then I would have opened up the discussion of whether he would have got pole, had it not been for Gassley's spin. But he delivered,

on every single lap and I am pleased to announce because I found out that during the watchalong that I have not had a pole position prediction correct since Austin 2024. What? Wow. Should we be saying please keep listening? So I'm pleased to announce that I have finally got a poll position prediction. Wow. I do get other things right, okay, but just not poll.

All right? It's a very close, very close qualifiers across the... Just not today. Because the board, but just not today. Over half a second, which is wild. Question from P1Petri member Mike Savage F1. Is Charle likely to hold up Oscar? And with Landau's pace, is anyone likely to challenge him for the win?

Yes, Charles is likely to hold up Oscar, if I'm being completely honest with you. Ferrari should not. And I know that I'm wearing a Ferrari shirt right now, and I'm very happy to see Shal on the front row of the grid. They should have been fourth and fifth on the grid at the very best. Max and Oscar should have been ahead of Sharl, in my very humble Ferrari opinion. So I think Oscar just needs to clear Shal if you possibly can into turn three.

And then we get the, finally we get the McLaren fight. But we just know the universe is just not going to allow us to see these two fight for the win. It's just not going to happen. Like how has Charlotte, if you had told me coming into this, Charles Lecler is 0.521 of a second behind pole. I'm thinking he's starting ninth. Yeah, or he's out of key two. Yeah, I'm thinking he is miles away.

The fact that he's second is ridiculous. But yeah, I think Oscar's race very much hangs in, hangs on the fact of getting through on Lecler quickly. It's a minor miracle, isn't it? That Charles is P2. it flatters them massively with the pace but I mean I'm I do think

it's maybe a bit of a surprise that Ferrari been quicker than Mercedes maybe they looked like they could have could have just beaten the Mercedes they look quicker than the Mercedes anyway which may be a bit of a surprise but yeah

they weren't going to beat Oscar and probably not Max either without the kind of yellow flag situation So it's all going to come down to just can, can Charles, maybe he just needs to run his own race in a weird way and let the McLaren's go and just focus on the podium. However, though, did we not speak in this literal Friday practice podcast just gone? I know exactly what you're going to say. All they need to do is be somewhere near the front.

So I take it back, absolute send and turn wrong from Charlotte, only chance to get a win. If Charles takes the lead, yeah, I mean, it might well be. Well, Lando with his start is not his strongest point. Maybe that is, maybe that does go through Charlotte Clare's mind. You know, the championship is not on. Why not go for, he's got nothing to lose. Lando's got to think more of the championship. Maybe that is going through Charles's head that, you know, nine out of the ten races,

the person leading into turn one. And it's a short run down, but there's also the opportunities with slip streaming into turn three as well. so yeah. So tell me this chance, Tommy. We've really gone from Charles holding up Oscar to Charles winning it all in the space of about 60 seconds. We absolutely love it. Okay, next question and away from Ferrari,

that larp chick, will people finally stop calling Liam washed? I mean, I don't know. Impressive. It was a very impressive qualifying session. Don't get me wrong. I think Lawson was very much, I think that he deserved the criticism he was receiving, just purely because Hadjar was outshining him pretty massively this season. So it's such a great performance from Lawson to put it sixth on the grid.

Of course, ahead of Max, Max didn't get his final lap in, but he was still quicker than Hajjar. That wasn't luck, that wasn't good fortune. He just looked quicker. So I don't think it's a case of stamping Lawson is now back, but it's a good building block to sort of getting some sort of momentum back now for Lawson. Like he needs to score good points tomorrow. Of course, Verstappen's going to come through very easily. Antonelli's probably going to be on his heels as well.

But he's got a great chance of finishing in an eighth or a ninth place. It does feel like he's slowly getting his confidence back a bit and having these moments where it was a bit of a worry, wasn't it, when we first, he first went back to V-Carb and you thought, actually, it's going to be really quick. And it took him a while when Hadja was still really delivering. But it's had some strong moments like Monaco, for example, and here is definitely the standout of the season.

You know, I think if he had ever, if you'd have told him that your best result of the season in qualifying is going to be when you're demoted to the V-Carb. And it's, you know, by a long way of what he managed in the Red Bull just shows how that car is and that that team situation. But it was a, it was a, can't take anything away from Lawson. It was a fantastic lap and a brilliant result to be P6 in that car. Absolutely. I wonder how quickly Max will come steaming up the inside.

I'm thinking turn three, it'll be done, dust. You mean how quickly how that Marco comes on the radio and goes, remember Liam if you want to? It'll be a nice little inside line that Lawson offers the Stappen into turn three. Okay, next question. People on Petrie. remember TVR driver, the Red Bull looks like a handful. Will Max have any race pace to move up? I think that Lawson, as we mentioned, is going to be easy pickings. But then after that,

I genuinely don't know if he'll even beat the Ferraris. Red Bull look bad around here, if I'm being completely honest with you. Like Max has been struggling a lot. Don't get me wrong. I still think he could have hauled that car into third position had everything been uninterrupted. but the fact that he's lost track position now to both Ferraris and George Russell as well, he doesn't have that much of an advantage to be able to clear them in my opinion. I think that it will be interesting to see what strategy they go for. They've been loving a little three-stop masterclass at Red Bull at the moment, whether that will work around here is yet to be seen.

But yeah, I genuinely think he will struggle after Lawson. I do. It's a massive worry for Vastappen. if he had any chance of a championship fight, it's going to be very, very difficult with seemingly McLaren just so, so quick around here, feeling like it's one of those circuits that maybe not wouldn't suit McLaren

because they do always do well at Austria, but maybe gives the others a bit more of a chance, but it's quite the opposite actually, and McLaren and particularly in Lando's hands look unbelievable. So Max is going to probably get past Lawson, and then he's going to have to try and get threw on I mean

take a miracle for him to get anywhere near the McLaren's I don't see that happening and then you've got two

two Ferraris and a Mercedes and of course I know he doesn't like talking about it but of course he still has the penalty point

situation so he can't go for absolute sense and kind of hope people just dive out the way

he does have to be a little bit cautious and think about that as well will he will Max be cautious Or will he just go into combat and then go, oh no.

But the problem is with these cars and I, you know, do watch because it's still going to be a good race. And we'll be there no matter what. And as soon as the red lights come on, we'll be giddy. But it's just so hard to pass now. And, you know, we've had this conversation about getting into turn one is everything. In this championship, you don't want to be starting 7th. And, yeah, so it's a shocker for Max. It certainly is.

I think if you'd have been told that Bortoletto was, starting next to him tomorrow without watching qualifying, you would have really wondered where you, where Max was going to be starting. And speaking of Gabriel, P. on Patreon member, Lumixion, where has Bortoletto's pace come from?

He's had moments of showcasing this. It hasn't been every single race weekend, but I also can't say that it's been a complete miracle that he's put it in P8, especially this weekend. I mean, Tommy, you literally text me saying, God, Bortoletto's been cooking in practice. Yeah, he was really quick.

And I was skeptical as to whether or not he would actually be able to translate that into Quali. But he was phenomenal the entire Quali session as well. He is dialed in around here. Of course, Formula 2 drivers have driven around the Red Bull Rings. There's a bit of experience there as well, if you can call it that, in a completely different car. But it still helps. So yeah, Gabrielle P8 will have a tough time with Antonelli behind him. but he's at the head of a, we could see a nice little Bortoletto train for the final point or two.

Potentially, but yeah, he's done an amazing, amazing job. And I think he's been a little bit underrated this season in terms of, I know when Dewan got fired, some people were jumping on, well, Bortoletto's been rubbish. And it's like he definitely hasn't. Holcombberg's got the headline drives where he's, of course, got points. And Bostletto is unfortunate not to get him. any yet. But for quite a lot of the races, he's been there or thereabouts with Holkenberg. He's been very good in qualifying against Niko Holkenberg. I qualified him quite a few times, I believe, as well.

And yeah, it'd be amazing for him to get a point because I think that him kind of sat right at the bottom of the World Championship and where Holkenberg is, I don't think, fairly reflects what job he's done. You know, I'm not saying he's been absolutely unbelievable and he's the next at and center but you know he's he's done a very good solid job and you know people kind of forget that you know he's a one formula three and formula two as a rookie had this amazing run up and he's showing a good pace against a you know very highly rated and experienced teammate yeah highly rated experience one of the most one of the most experienced drivers on the grid is Holkenberg or even you could probably say ever. He's been around a long time as Holkenberg now.

Yeah, and Borteletto is a rookie. He is learning. He's going to have moments where he doesn't deliver to his full potential. And Hulkenberg, I think, you know, you quite rightly said, has taken some big headlines. I think that's the thing here is that Hulkemberg has done some miraculous drives, which has then caused people to be like, well, where's Bortoletto in all of this? Well, here he is. And hopefully for his sake, he'll be able to score a point or two tomorrow. And that is it. We are done. That is qualifying wrapped up.

Tommy shall return after his Iron Maiden gig, as long as he doesn't get sort of bust up into a million pieces. Until a moch pitting tonight, Tommy. I'll be crowd surfing and all the good stuff. It's like the, you know, you have like acts before the main act. Is it you?

Are you like doing some sort of like P1 live show? Yeah, yeah. Solo P1 live show. I'll be talking. I'll be analyzing more about boss letters, incredible P. live at the London stadium. Please welcome Iron Maiden.

Absolutely love it. What are your final thoughts, sir? My final thoughts, I can't believe we've just had a qualifying session around Austria and not mention track limits. Who knew that you could actually fix it with putting gravel down what everyone's been saying for the last 10 years

actually works. So well done Formula One. You've finally realised. Natural deterrence is the way forward. And that is it. We'll see you tomorrow. Sorry about the issues that we had with the watch along today. I'm hoping fingers crossed, it'll be fixed for tomorrow. Got an idea as to why. So come join us there.

Matt P1, Tommy. Tommy will be back as well for that. So look forward to seeing you there. And, of course, for all the podcasts coming as well. We'll see you very soon. Lots of love, take care. Bye. What's your chore, Tommy?

Like, you're going to Iron Maiden. So should it be that people need to go and buy a music gig ticket, like, you know, go see live music. Go support live music. Yeah. It's important. I love it. I love it.

Bye. Bye. P1 is a stack production and part of the ACAST creator network.