The Late Braking F1 Podcast - 2022 Azerbaijan GP Review

Episode Date: June 12, 2022

For Episode 200, Sam, Ben and Harry review the 2022 Azerbaijan GP. The boys discuss the implications of Ferrari's double DNF, whether they think Perez can challenge for the championship and review their Bold Predictions from the preview episode. JOIN our Discord: https://discord.gg/dQJdu2SbAm SUPPORT our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/latebraking TWEET us @LBraking BUY our merch: https://late-braking-f1-podcast.creator-spring.com/ SUBSCRIBE to our podcast! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network. Thank you for listening to the Late Breaking F1 podcast. Make sure to tune in for new episodes every Wednesday and Grand Prix Sunday. Hello and a very warm welcome to the late breaking F1 podcast presented by Harry Eid, Sam Sage, and me, Ben Hocking. Azerbaijan Grand Prix review time where Red Bull took home maximum points. Max Verstappen taking the race win. Sergio Perez in second with the fastest lap. And perhaps even more importantly for Red Bull,

no points whatsoever for Ferrari opening up the gap in both championships. What about that one? I don't think Red Bull could have asked for a better weekend, right? I mean, any Ferrari engine score a point at all, right? I mean, boss-hast can make it into the points. Joe was out. Nick Schumacher was literally still. racing in F2 this weekend.

Both main Ferrari drivers out, magnusing out. This is a disaster. This is almost as bad as the outroes were when I wasn't on the podcast. That's how bad it is. Whoa. Come on.

I'm going to keep doing. Well, yeah, it was pretty shocking. I mean, hello viewers, listeners, whatever you may be. You can't see us. I think I call you viewers. Loving people. Hello to those of you in America

who are a lot of sleepy. Higgs we're hearing. Hope you made it up. Hope you enjoyed it. It wasn't the all-time thriller we were hoping for. But yeah, Red Ball come out of this one.

They must be having a bit of a smile, a bit of a, well, we've made up for the early reliability issues that we've come across. It's going to be an interesting one, that's for sure. Do you remember, like, after Australia and we were like,

foff, Red Bull, man. You can't keep breaking down if you want to win the championship. Good times. Good times. Do you think? Ferrari actually listened to it and were like, hmm, that sounds like a good idea.

Let's go with it. Because you're right. It hasn't exactly gone to plan since that moment really for Red Bull. And of course, today, maximum points that they were able to take home. We'll, of course, be discussing a lot when it comes to Red Bull and Ferrari coming up. We'll be looking at bold predictions, whether we were right or wrong. Spoiler, it wasn't the first of those two options. Driver of the day, worst driver is.

the day, that's to come as well. McLaren, we're going to be discussing their team order discussions throughout the day. Aston Martin, we've got plenty coming up on today's show. If you do end up enjoying today's show, thank you. No idea why, but thank you. Please leave a review. It helps us out a lot and we just love seeing five-style reviews because they don't really happen very often. So, you know, we are fickle. That is why. We'd appreciate it. But let's start with how much trouble are Ferrari in? That's essentially the question, Sam. How much trouble are they in after scoring no points today? I mean, Ben, I don't like to agree with you ever, if I can avoid it. And yet a little while ago on an episode of the podcast, you said, I'm not putting any faith in Ferrari. I'm waiting

for the implosion to happen. The time that, you know, the bomb is ticking, so to speak. You know, the countdown is on. And you nailed it. And I hate it. I hate saying that you've got something absolutely bang on, but you did. You absolutely nailed it. And this. And this, you know, This was the implosion that Benjamin rightly called. It's not looked good for a little while, has it? They've had moments, but you think, okay, we can recover one car doing well still in some races, you know where Sikes had a couple of bad points, or LeCler had back DNF a couple of races ago. But now you look at the stats, right?

You look at LeCler as chipped off, what was it, four poles in a row without a win. The last time that happened was Mr Chunky, Pan Pablo Montoya 2002. too. It's not a good look. You kind of look at the fact that it's not just them as the manufacturer of Ferrari engines. It is all their customer teams as well, showing that there is some form of reliability issue flowing through that power unit. Botas or Resion is their power unit of the season. And when it's not just the engine, it's also the suspension, the hydraulics that cause sights to fail, you've got to be scratching your head thinking, how does it go from such a high where shoulder the Claire was having to calm his team down

after such a strong start to the season to Ferrari packed up by a lap 40. You looked at the bloody pit wall and it was like it was available to rent on the high street, you know, like they moved out and it was an empty lot and you can walk you can pick it up at a discounted rate because this is shocking.

It can be turned around. Exactly. Ferrari are the Woolworths of the Pit Lane High Street. And they are in a recession right now when it comes to points. Even they're doing bad of Woolworths, come on.

I don't know. If you're Australian, I think Aussies still have Woolworths. You have Woolies, I think. Let us know.

This is going off topic. Nonetheless, Red Bull had a similar start to the season, right? You know, when you looked at how many DNFs

they picked up, we looked at their 50% rate. We've discussed multiple times. We said how if Perez and the staff when only finished

50% of the races, can they win a championship? Well, it's amazing how quickly they've turned that reliability around. We heard some panics, Regia Meskis come at the end, but that was more for DRS,

due to the fact that obviously they've struggled with it, they saw Yuki struggle with it, and then they thought, we may as well just play it safe. That's not having any problems of coming in with a split DRS wing for some bizarre reason

and having to take a pit stop and some Gaffa tape. But they're playing it safe. They're playing it well, and they're delivering where they need to. So, Ferrari need to now take inspiration from Red Ball, their nemesis,

their rivals of the season, pull it together, turn it around, saw it out that, that reliability. Red Bull have nailed it on. They built a quick car. They made the quick car reliable, and now they're setting it up perfectly for raised conditions. Ferrari should be panicking. But I would argue that now is not the time to panic. Now it was a time for level heads and you need to sort out your strategy for that four or five races and going into the summer break

as close as you can with Red Bull on points, because otherwise it will rapidly slip away and Mercedes, you never know, could come up to bite you from behind. Painful. Yeah, very painful indeed. What do you think, Harry? I mean, this is essentially a complete role reversal versus the Bahrain Grand Prix, where it was two retirements in Red Bulls' favour and a one-two in Ferrari's favour. So do you think Ferrari are in trouble here

or is this just the natural ebbs and flows of a season? Look, it's far from over the championship. I think that's fair to say because clearly that Ferrari is a fast car. I think what's slightly worrying for Ferrari is that whereas when Rebel had those issues at the start of the year, when they weren't having the issues, they were winning the races. And it's not quite translated the same way for Ferrari at the moment. So yeah, it's worrying times, especially, you know, it's not just the main team's power units that's going wrong. it's the likes of Aframayo and Hath, as Sam's already mentioned.

So worrying times for Ferrari, because as obvious as it seems to say, if they want to fight for their championship, they can't keep doing this. And when they do have a reliable car, they've also got to execute their races properly, something that we saw they didn't do in Monaco last time out. So, yeah, it's been, in terms of the last three, races horrendous, horrendously, badly wrong for Ferrari going from where we thought that Spain, LeCle was going to dominate, then obviously he broke down, and then, you know, Ferrari

ballsed up the strategy in Monaco, and again today they've both broken down. So, yeah, it's worrying for, as a, as a fan who wants us to go down to the wire, today was a, was a worrying site because arguably, I feel like Red Bull may have been too, or at least for Stapham. I think maybe both of them were too quick for the Ferraris anyway, certainly signs. And, you know, they've not scored any points anyway. So for the sake of the challenge, I hope they can turn this around as we go into Canada straight away. But it is a worry considering that that's two engine blows for LeClaire already. Yeah, it's interesting that the one Pablo Montoya statistic came up during the race,

because even before that was said, I was actually thinking, who do Ferrari remind me of? And it is the Williams with that BMW engine of 20 years ago, where Montoya and indeed Ralph Schumacher did very well in qualifying. But the BMW engine broke down once every three laps. And it's not quite that bad, but it's certainly heading in the same direction where they've got this unbelievable qualifying pace,

or at least definitely LeCler has this unbelievable qualifying pace, that they just cannot convert due to various reasons. including reliability, but also in some Grand Prix, they just don't have the pace. And it is worrying on both fronts, really. From a reliability standpoint, if they could have the reliability advantage over Vestappen, over the defending champion, someone as talented as him, as talented as the team of Red Bull, that will give them such an advantage when Vestappan, you know, presumably Vestappen's only going to get better as this season goes on.

and to have an advantage in terms of DNFs, that would be great for Ferrari, but it doesn't look as if that's going to happen now. And in terms of reliability converting into pace, you have to remember, with the DNFs we've had so far, it hasn't been all doom and gloom with Ferrari, because they might well have had a DNF in Australia with Carlos Sines, but Charles LeClaire had the pace to win that Grand Prix.

And you could say the same thing about Spain, where Leclair retired, but Leclair did have the pace to win that Grand Prix. He would have gone ahead and won if he didn't retire. That probably wouldn't have been the case here at Baku. And I think to an extent, at least in terms of Carlos Sites, I'm not saying he's going to be delighted by the DNF, but actually the whole discussion about reliability is a bit of a saving grace for Carlos Sines

because it's going to take attention away from the fact that he was a long way behind the other three drivers, even before he retired. Perez and I actually know he would have been Vastappen at the time was building a really comfortable gap and whilst Lecler was struggling to keep Vestappen behind he at least was in that fight he was at least able to battle with Max Vestappen Sain wasn't even in the discussion to begin with so Carla Sines from that point of view might actually be happy the discussions happening about reliability and not about his lack of performance but certainly wherever there's been

unreliability so far this season for Ferrari, there has at least been some pace to go with it. Here, I don't think there was. Maybe strategy would have brought them back into it. I think that's one of the biggest shames of this Grand Prix is that we didn't see how that might have escalated, how that might have resulted. But certainly on pure pace alone,

Red Bull had the advantage here. And we've had a couple of Grand Prix so far this year, most notably Monaco and Barcelona. owner and actually Albert Party, you throw that one in there as well, where overtaking is generally pretty difficult, which just seems to be what Ferrari need in terms of they have great qualifying pace, but they don't have the race pace to match Red Bull eight times out of ten. And they just need to, and so you could argue they need races where overtaking is difficult, but that's generally speaking, not what's coming up. You know, Silverstone, Circuit Jilvilnove next week, Austria,

These tracks that are coming up, overtaking opportunities are all of them. So if Red Bull keep up this race pace advantage, they will have the pace to convert overtakes in the Grand Prix. I think it is worrying for Ferrari. There is that obvious strategic question as well. Do they have the strategy calls to match Red Bull? At the moment, they're not even getting in the positions to be able to ask that question. So, yeah, I think it was a worrying weekend for Ferrari. In terms of Sergio Perez, so Perez out-qualified.

Max Verstappen for the second straight race, which is the first time that's happened since the Daniel Ricardo days. So that's a noteworthy point to begin with. But Perez is now P2 in the championship behind Max Vastappen, and at least right now, is his most direct challenger. Harry, do you think Perez can battle Vastappen for the title based on the evidence of the last couple of weeks? Oh, tough one. I think Sergio Perez is in the form of his entire life at the moment. He's He's driving excellently well. I just worried, you know, is it a worry?

I don't know, but I just, you know, a concern that he just doesn't have that last little bit of pace that the Max Verstappen does. And I think we saw that in the race today. And let me, maybe that was race specific. But even in Monaco, you know, there was a section of the race where his tyres had gone. And he was only kind of really kept that lead because it was Monaco. and that's not to take anything away from the way that Perez is driving because like I said I think he is in the form of his life can he challenge max

anything as possible but I'd err on the side of no possibly possibly not on that one if it was Leclair on the other car then I'd maybe go with I would go with yes yeah tricky one because I'm interested to see how this develops because it's been a it's almost like a new lease of life for old Sergio or a young Sergio I should say so yeah interesting but I'd say I'd say no but it's it's a red bull that it this has been a

it's a perfect scenario where Perez is quick enough in collie and then he's he drops back a bit in the race and they get a one-two but he's quick enough for them to get a one-two so Christian Honour must be delighted but yeah can you challenge for the championship maybe but probably not Sam I'm interested to get your view on this In our Discord server, link is in the description to join that. I noted a comment from you after qualifying where you put out a couple of key points. Yeah, I'll do it. I'm going to do it.

You put out a few key points saying Perez was a contender. Do you still stand by what you said after quality? If Perez can carry on delivering those level of qualifying performances, he was driving the nuts and bolts off of that Red Bull in that qualifying performance, despite what God LeCleur did, which by the way was a generationally good qualifying lap on that Saturday. My good Lord LeCleur, that was fantastic.

But we're not comparing Perez to LeCleur right now. We're comparing Perez to his teammate, the Stappan, who is one of the best talents with singing in Formula One, four. You know, Strait probably Hamilton looked into the sport and better, you know, I argue for more so. Can Perez challenge for Stappan all the way to the end of the season? I think he's a contender.

Do I think it's a two to one, you know, contention? Do I think it's, you know, the old show that he'll battle all the way down to the wire? No, I don't. I think the tide needs to turn a little bit in Perez's way in other factors. I think he'll need a DNF issue, a reliability issue rather for the Stappen. I think he'll need the Stappen to have a bit of an issue with the car development or the direction the car goes in. Something that Perez has always been fantastic, or always accredited for, rather, in his career is his ability to manage. manage his tires. And that's always giving him great finishing spots from a mid-team car, you know, like when he was in Force India or racing point, the amount of times that Perez has picked up podiums because he's made a one-stop work when everyone else had to go for a two-stop, right? The amount of times that that's happened. And that's why we view Perez as a stronger driving than the likes of Holkenberg who he regularly went up against, because he just had that little

extra. Now, what's interesting is now you see Perez in a top car, a top car that, the likes of Lewis Hamilton has been in for many years, that Bostappan is now making his own, that we've seen with the likes of a long-so beforehand, you know, the big guys, making the big cars work for them. The moment Perez is getting out front, he's obliterating the ties. He's almost panicking.

He's going, I'm in the lead, I have to go now, as if the race is going to end in a few laps time. And I don't know if he needs his engineer to sit him down and just go, mate, remember what you are good at. You're bringing up your other stuff, but don't forget what you're already very, very, good at, and that is the longevity of a race that's managing your performance throughout a race. And I think we saw the biggest slip up of that so far for Sergio Perez, the fact that

Verstappen was stuck behind the clerk for quite a significant period of time of the race, well over 10, 15% of the race at least until that VSC came out. And then Perez had already shot his tyres. And by the end of the race, as we all saw, there was over a pit stop difference between those two drivers. Now, Max Verstaffing is able to battle with the rival. he's able to sit in the dirty air of a car in front of him, he's then able to push to catch up to something in the same machinery,

he's able to pass and then pull away by that much. That tells you someone is looking after their tires properly whilst being able to deliver absolutely immense top-end pace. Do I think that Sergio Perez could do that week in, week out, and fight for the championship? I'm not sure. As I said, I think Sergio Perez needs some external factors to get involved to make sure that he can be there

come the final race of the season for a chance to win this championship. But it's looking very good for him. I am very impressed. He's essentially doing right now what Valky Bostas is so well at from the Sages over the last four or five years. He is finishing that second place.

He is challenging what Lewis Hamilton did in qualifying with what the staffing is doing in qualifying, right? And he's there to pick up the second place podium. It's what every manufacturer wants in the second driver. But can you take that final step up? I don't know. I'd love to see it happen. I mean, external factors might well put Sergio Perez in contention. For example,

you know, Max Verstappen could get hit in the face with an asteroid. You know, Danny Kviat might accidentally take out Max Verstappen when he's taken out the rubbish for the Redcores is his next job now. I don't know. Those external factors might bring him in, but I don't see anything else happened. On the preview podcast, we discussed Sergio Perez getting that new two-year deal. And I was absolutely in favor of that. And that has not changed and probably will not change throughout the duration of this year because I agree he is driving at a level that is far beyond what he was last year. Certainly a long way clear of what he was driving in the first half of last year. However, he'd still need to up about four more levels in my opinion in order to get on to

Max Verstappen's level. And Vastappen hasn't been perfect so far this year. Vestappen has had a few iffy races, at least by his meteoric standards. But Perez, even though he's had some great races, even though he might well be driving at the best he's ever driven, it's still not quite enough to get there. And I think the last couple of races have somewhat baited people into thinking he might be a contender because Spain looked pretty good because of the Vastappan error, quite frankly. And again, you know, maybe it's those external factors that would bring him in, but that's probably a lot of spins, a lot of DNFs, a lot of trips across the gravel before he gets on the same

level. And then you have Monaco where Perez did a very good job in qualifying, strategy helped him out, and you can't overtake it, Monaco. And I think in terms of true race pace, he wasn't there with the Ferraris and Max Verstappen, but ultimately it's Monaco. You can't overtake there. So I think the last couple of races have perhaps given us a false horizon when it comes to Sergio Perez and here at Baku. Again, qualifying was very good. Can't take that away from him. But in the race itself, it was a no-brainer. And, you know, there was a decision made in terms of asking Perez not to fight Verstappen, which might be controversial in some people's books, but it was so plainly obvious that he was going to get it done without even trying that there was no point in him fighting.

And as soon as he got passed, I think he was two seconds clear, almost immediately. So Perez, he did everything he needed to do, ultimately in a race where no Ferrari finishes, he can't afford to finish any lower than second, and he was a long way back, 20 seconds or so. However, he took the fastest lap point. He did out-qualify Max Verstappen, so it's not a bad weekend for him. But in terms of overall championship contention, I can't see it happening. We're going to go on to bold predictions, driver of the day and worst driver of the day, right after this.

Bold predictions Oh no If you're new to the podcast We met bold predictions on a prime new podcast We might stop because It's not good as it Let's go through them Sam will start with you

You had a two-parter And you were You were consistent In that you had the same for both parts You were wrong on each Which is great Yay You said Vettel would be top five

which he was not, although in fairness that was pretty close. And you said that there were going to be two safety cars of which there were none, but there were two VSCs. So if you were just yours ever so slightly or right, unfortunately if you had wheels

and you were my grandmother, you'd be a bicycle. So it doesn't. Oh, Gino, the Canpo reference. Nice. British reference. So there we go. It's almost like the world of racing presenting me with two 50-50 choices. managed to get them both wrong in one one-vold prediction.

And now I've just been Gino de Campos, which I never thought was going to happen on the podcast. But yes, wrong again, on to next week. Yeah, like Vettel, top five or bottom five? Safety car or VSE? And Sam went top five in safety cards, please? Not good. Not good.

My one wasn't much better. Again, it wasn't a million miles off. I said that Pierre Gazley would get a podium, and he did have his best race of the year so far. I think what happened, he was in fourth place. So it was looking like, hang on a minute, one more DNF this might happen. And then Al-Fateri realized I might be right about something. So they said, we're not going to box you here because it's a bad strategy.

We can make sure Ben's wrong. So, yeah, if I went for P5, if I went the top five, like Sam did, I'd have been right. But I overshot, went for the moon and missed. But it's all right because Harry, I know, Harry's wrong as well. You said, let me get this right, you said that only one, and again, you were pretty close in this as well. You said only one of Red Bull and Ferrari would actually get on the podium, as in one of the four drivers would get on the podium. Yeah. And you're two out of four.

Yes, it's true. I mean, granted, you can't get any worse than three out of four, but still. We are aging closer to a trio of correct answers, I reckon. It's getting there. Did you imagine it? One race. imagine one race we all get one right I think we'd just hang up our

hang out of our microphones and the world would rejoice yeah finally all right let's get on to some driver of the day and worst driver of the day selections we'll give our own ones first of all

and then we'll hand over to some Discord submissions that we ask for straight after each Grand Prix so if you'd like to get involved in that get involved in the Discord, put your submission in, and you might be lucky enough to not be selected. Sorry, lucky enough to be selected. We'll go with that.

Driver of the day for you, Harry, who've you got? Hard to see past Max Verstappen on this one. A few contenders. I think if Sebi Vett hadn't decided to do a, you know, Yuki Sonoda and this a turn-three breaking zone, could have potentially given it to him. and he recovered very well, must be said. But, you know, he still made that mistake.

So I'll go with a go of Vestappen. I'm also going to go with Vestappen. George Russell's another shout-out. He was excellent. You could argue he didn't have to do much, but you could also argue he was good enough to the point where he didn't have to do much. So I'd say he's a contender,

but I am also going to go with Vestappen. It would have been even more impressive if he could have proven that he would have beaten the Ferraris, even if they had finished, but ultimately you can only do what he can do. And he took a very comfortable win. Sam, your driver of the day.

I'll give it some variation because, you know, that's what I'm here for. I will go for Pierre Gazley. I think he got a little bit mucked up on his team strategy, which I don't think was fairly his call. There was a lot going on. But he drove fantastically well. He defended brilliantly against Hamilton, who was on much fresher tires.

And I think despite a car that has not delivered for most of the season, and against his teammate, which I don't think he's been with Vesabang so far, he really delivered to gay. I think he was clear about the rest of the midfield teams. So, Pierre Gaslight, rather than a day. And who was your worst driver in the day, Sam? There were some proper contenders this time around for worst covers. There were some races where we go, oh, it's a tough one,

but there are a few games. I'm going to give it to Mick Schimacher. It's getting to that point now where we're well into the the season, right? People are starting to get comfortable with their cars. The other rookie, if we're going to be that nice to Mick Schumacher, Joe Guan Yu is comfortably for what was beating Boss House this race. And it's just nowhere near Magnuson. Absolutely nowhere near Kevin Magnuson.

30 seconds off Albonne at one point. It's a bit of a shocker for him. And unless it's something I've completely missed as to why he was so far away, I'm not sure. So for me, Nick Schumacher, worst try of the day. I'm not sure it's the only answer in terms of Mc Schumacher, because he is a contender for me as well. I'm not going to give it to him, but I will give him a break just because of Hass's incredible strategic call. So you'll remember when the first VSC came out, everyone on the medium tires

thought, oh, we're on the softer tire here, might be a good idea to pit for hards, which they all did. And everyone on the hard tire thought, oh, well, we've only done so many laps. We've only done nine laps on the hard tire. I might want to go a bit longer and not pit here. and everyone followed those two with the exception of Mick Schumacher who was on the hard tire and they decided after nine laps, best put the medium on. Let's go 42 laps on the mediums, lad. So I'm going to give him a break because of that, although I don't think he was brilliant anyway. Another shout out goes to Lance Stroll.

So Lance Stroll managed to have a teammate who crashed in qualifying, went too far in trying to overtake Esteban Okon and had to do a spin. Try to overtake Okon again and nearly had contact in not being able to do it. And that driver still finished, would have finished, about eight positions higher than Ladström if it actually made it to the check and flag. So not great for him, but I'm going to go for Latifie because, I mean, reasonably, I don't need to explain it, do I? Oh, that man.

Nicholas. Nicholas, Nicholas, Nicholas. Who was your worst driver of the day, Harry? just on the Aston Martin front wings are they made of iron because both of them went into the tech row just nothing happened

Alphatar might want to use them for their rearwinds Exactly I was shook up And the fact that stroll they went on to That same lack to do another lab And then thought well I didn't do a good enough job of that I better do it again Anyway

I have heard they've made them out of the original Nokia mobile phone more research is needed. Bricks, love it. Yeah, I mean, that would, if it was Nokia phones, it would have broken the concrete rule rather than the other way around.

Oh, that's a whole meme. Oh, that's classic. Nokia classic, nice. Anyway, Lance Stroll, I'm going to give it to him, worst driver of the day slash weekend, to be honest. I think it was almost

every session he hit a barrier there. It seems like quite a few of them anyway. And then, yeah, just his pace. His pace today was bad, very bad. Just didn't really go. We've had it before where people on the Discord have given him worst drive of the day because he didn't do anything. And that was today.

He didn't do anything. You used up all his doing things on the Saturday. That was the problem. Exactly. Before we get on to the Discord submissions, moment of the race, Sam? Oh, I don't know. I think I'm going to have to throw it back

to when the race actually finished and we had to spend four hours watching Lewis Hamilton try and get out of the car after his poor elderly bottle had been brutally destroyed by the porpoiseing for the entire race. I've never seen a man get out of a car so slowly. That's like you getting out of the backseat

of my Mingi keeper for crying out loud. I'm delighted whenever I can get out of the backseat of your mini Cooper's bless him it was the fact that the camera stayed on him for so long like leave the man to get out of his car yeah it was quite amusing I'm sure he'll make a joke out of it later on you know but yeah that was the moment of the race for me and we will discuss paupersing and the controversies around that in our preview podcast for Canada when we've got a bit more time

to look at that. Harry, your moment of the race. I've got a couple, but I'll also ask another one. First one, Honourable mention, is Alpha Gaffer Tabe Tari. Because that's, I mean, look, it probably shouldn't have gone back out

with Gaffer Tep on it, but just sensational. They're like, well, that'll do. That's fine. We'll just Gaffer Tape it. Anyway, I'm going to go for, and I already mentioned, I'm going to go for the Sebastian Vettel cool as ice flick spin.

That was, I mean, it wasn't needed, obviously, and that's his fault for making the mistake. But it was swish, to be fair to Seb. And almost did like a Sim racer rejoin. We're just like joining in front of Yuki Sonoda. And then it was like, oh, wait, wait, I'm not in a sim. A better break. But yeah, I'm going to go for that one for my moment of the race.

My moment of the race goes to Hugh Bird, because we had an incident where Max Verstappen, who was cruising, was basically having a full-on discussion with his race engineer about what he should do. And Hugh Bird asked him to do 145, whatever it was, 147-5. And he came back and said, no, I can do that flag. I can go half a second quicker than that just to keep the tires warm. And Hugh Bird shows basically like, yeah, go on then, go on.

No, if you want me to go forward. No, honestly, I don't care, mate. Just do it. Do that. You want one. I just love the nonchalant approach. Yeah. You know when, harking back to Harry's moment of the race,

you know when Sebastian Betel did the old swish-swish flick and came back onto the track? Do you think Yuki, turning up to that corner, did the old Spider-Man meme of, hey, I know that game. That's usually me. without a doubt. Well, that's our thoughts on moment of the race, but also driver of the day and worst driver of the day.

But what do our Discord members think? We're going to start today. We're going to start with Akemp. What's up, nerds? First off, difficult, difficult day to be a Canadian F1 fan waking up at 7 a.m. for this race for the European Grand Prix. My driver of the day today is the honey badger Daniel Ricardo. First of all, for having more pace than Lando and getting destroyed by McLaren's team strategy. Apparently, they are allergic to points this weekend.

And my worst driver of the day goes to Yuki Sonoda's rear wing for just completely quitting in the home stretch there. Cheers, guys. Well, I was going to say, I appreciate it, but you call us nurse. as if that's untrue. Yeah, well, interesting one. We'll get through some other ones as well. Let's go to Cheyenne. Driver of the day is going to be Gasly Boy for me.

While he did let Hanney pass him, I think he had a very solid drive. Yes, he only moved up one position, but it's a good point finish for him and Alfa Tori, especially what happened to Yuki. And you know what? I just think it was really good drive. Worst drive of the day for me is going to be

boatas just because he didn't perform to what we know he's capable of you know what no I'm going to revoke that worst drive the day is not even going to be a driver it's going to be the Ferrari engine and I think we all know why that was very heartbreaking we live for a bait and switch huge bait and switch love the bait and switch and I just love hammie it's just just incredible shiang has a place in my heart this podcast the constant naming of driver she knows How is to get into my good book? Casley boy is such as Sam, a sage way of naming someone. It's true.

Very true. I'm going to sing it all the time. Gasly boys. Like Danny Boy. Oh, Gasly boy. Oh, dear. I'm going on to the next one. Let's go on to Hechtie.

Driver of the day. Nice comeback for Bill's Mafia's finest. Danny Ricardo. Worst driver. of the day. You can pick either of the Canadians, but I'll go with Latifi. One more person. One more person says Daniel Riccardo, drive the day. I've got a flip. I'm going to flip a loop. Right. Well, since I've got the power who's going next, and I have an idea of who might, this next person might have gone for. Not Katrina May.

Evening, fellas. Driver of the day. We're going to go for Mr. Danny Rick himself. Oh, try out loud. him to do, did what he needed to do, still ended up in front of Lando and made sure that they remembered everything that he did for Lando in the previous laps so that he stayed in front and got P8, Danny Rick is back. Worst driver of the day is going to be Goat Teefe because I don't think there is really anyone else who could have been worse. I don't even know how many penalties he got, though one of them was not his fault, but

you know, five seconds for ignoring a blue flag, I don't know how much worse you can get. yeah Sam how angry would you be if someone else went for Danny Riccardo I mean I'm on about an 8 out of 10 right now so you cap it off nicely Cali 70 what's going on before I start gotta say a partial bull prediction correct with the Mike McLaren's both finishing in the points

I know Lando didn't get his podium but who's Mike moving on that brings me to my driver of the day Danny the Honey Badger Ricardo gets his strives side back, finishes in front of his teammate again, starts from 12, finishes in eighth place, got to love it. Worst driver of the day? I mean, it's kind of like an engine provider.

We're just going to go Ferrari power units. Both Ferraris, Alpha Romeo, and a Haas, all going out with power unit failure. Well, I guess one Ferrari went with suspension, but still. And then we just got to give an honorable mention to the rednecks down and, Al-Fatari putting on that DRS wing to get that sucker shut. But yeah, we had a good race in Baku. Got to get that sucker shut. Oh, no, no.

Yeah. No. Dallas Cowboys are going to back. Thank you. Thank you for joining everyone from the USA. I'm sure you're all leaving now. But thank you. Right guy 26.

This is May Baku. driver and worst driver of the day. My driver of the day has got to go to Max Verstappen. I really thought Chekko had that race for the first like 20 laps and then suddenly Verstappen just flipped a switch. And my worst driver of the day goes to the mechanic that gave Nicholas Latifie a 10 second stop and go penalty. It's called start procedure, bro.

You're a mechanic. Figure it out. Oh, man. absolutely love it let's go on to sleepy Skyler oh bless hello people

my driver of the day for the Asher Bay on Grand Prix is probably max first happened I will be honest I fell asleep midway through that because I woke up at 6am for this so I'm not 100% sure what happened

I feel asleep for a lot 20 he was in first when I woke back up and he was literally the last lap and he was still in lead by like 20 seconds so he's my driver of the day I love the oldest thing love the honest thing like you don't know what happened

but he won so it must be driver of the day obvious obvious choice it's a better analysis than what Daniel Ricardo had been driving the day was so well done last submission for today Brexit beef is absolutely hammered on patriotism, so let's see what she has to say. Hello, it's Brexit beef and Miranda here.

We're pointing to duty. Our driver today is Sebi Vett, because only a world driver's champion can recover from that absolute monstrosity of trying to get past. What's a monocity? We're very happy. We've had a few drinks. We've had a few drinks. We had a few drinks. I'm a giggle in the background.

I'm not saying to all you listeners, if you want to get on, I'm not saying that being drunk will help your cause, but it will. Please drink responsibly, we do not kudging here this. They're still funny. It is still funny, very funny. I think, I suppose I should probably clarify my Daniel Ricardo frustrations for those that have given him prior to day.

But when you only moved up four places from start to finish, and three of the cars that were in front of you in the race either had serious reliability problems or failed to finish the race, Nuki, the Kerr, Science. And you made one place overall and you finished next to your teammate showing you have the same pace.

You didn't do anything spectacular. You didn't do anything good. Daniel Ricardo did exactly what he was meant to doing a Grand Prix. I love the East Gold Point. I'm a big Danny Rick fan, but this was a very normal race for Daniel Ricardo.

So those were saying, he's back, baby. let's not jump the gang here folks, okay? Let's just give it a moment. He beat his teammate by three tenths after team orders were employed. Let's just chill out. Come on. The worst thing is the one position he did, I guess, legitimately pick up,

didn't actually result in anything positive for the team because he just overtook his teammate. So they ended up with the same amount of points anyway. Anyway, at least beat Lando Norris, which is something we identified he needed to do. We're going to be discussing McLaren themselves. We're going to be discussing the team order situation. rider. So, Lando Norris and Daniel Ricardo started alongside each other just out of the points

at 11th and 12th and they both progressed into the points finishing 8th and 9th. But whereas Norris qualified ahead of his teammate, it was Daniel Ricardo who finished ahead of Lando Norris at the end of the Grand Prix. Now, they did essentially the reverse strategy to one another. Daniel Ricardo started on the hard tires and went to medium tires. Landon Norris started on the medium tires and went hard tires and it resulted in two situations where they were basically together on track and had to go through the rigmarole of should they be allowed to overtake each other or not. Sam, do you think McLaren managed the McLaren situation as best they possibly could? When your teammates start right next to each other, it's always a tricky one.

Obviously, it's an ideal situation. It shows that both drivers have deployed the same pace. They put themselves in the same spot. But then you get to a point where your drivers start to moan. that they get frustrating at each other, and they're not able to see the full picture. We've said this a few times. A race driver cannot see what's happening

four or five cars in front of them. They can't see if someone's going slow or if there's a reason why people aren't overtaking, nor can they see what's happening maybe behind them, or have the foresight to know what's happening in five or six laps time. So when they decided to split the strategy, and I think they did it intentionally to almost stop the weird argument that Ricardo and Norris were having

through their own engineers, It really played out well because they ended up on exactly the same spot of the track again. But at the same time, Ricardo's strategy, I think, was the better one. Norris got pitted too early. They tried this weird over-cutting Alonso. I don't know who was doing the maths for the times that was going around the track because he ended up five cars behind Alonzo and stuck in traffic with stroll and Album. It was a terrible strategy call.

And then Ricardo did very well to go long. He held off the Alpha Tari of Gassley to a strong point, I think. Hamilton made it look a little bit easy, but that's okay on old ties. We're not expecting that McLaren't necessarily beat the Mercedes there and then. And they end up at the same point again.

And do I think they manage the bickering well? Not really. They didn't make one executive decision. They kind of half promised something to one driver and then at the end, promising other thing. We heard on the radio that Ricardo would give back position to Norris and then Norris got told actually whole position. It was all a bit confusing.

And they seemed like they didn't want to take the dive and make a call on who was their lead driver at that moment and was favourite the car that was in front, which would make sense to do, it felt like they hadn't been in this situation and they were a bit confused as to how to execute it. So it felt they almost took a bit of a leaf out of a Ferrari book when it came to strategy and team orders and understanding what might be best for the team across a race concept. So yeah, I wasn't particularly impressed. And they did well to pick up a double points finish. But they only picked up a double points finish because of the chaos that ensued.

with Ferrari power cars and Yuki-Songas DRS in front of them. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been as much of a successful Grand Prix. And I think maybe only one car would have finished maybe in 10th place had that been the case. So it looks a lot better

than it actually is, I think, for MacLown. This race is a very complimentary Grand Prix for them. And I think if you were to break it down into what actually happened side by side, it could have been a lot worse for them. They could have been lucky to pick at one point, I think, if everyone else had stayed in front of the race in front of them. So, no, I don't think it was managed particularly well.

And I don't think the drivers need to know how to communicate to their engine is probably when they're frustrated like this. It was not a great Grand Prix for McLaren. Harry, what did you make of the McLaren team orders situation? Could they have done a better job at managing their drivers? Yeah, I agree with Sam. It was, I didn't quite understand that not letting Ricardo go through at the start and had not doing that

then led to this old situation at the end of the race. So it's clear it's not something that's happened a lot this year but I think Ricardo was on a similar if maybe not on a better pace slash drafty than Norris was this race.

But it's yeah it just didn't they gave themselves an unnecessary headache and I didn't quite make sense to me. Why not let Ricardo through at the start if it doesn't work out or whatever and maybe swap them back at the end, but doing that at the start then led to this, yeah, like Sam said, they're having an

argument with each other, but via the medium of their race engineers. It was, yeah, obviously it's a situation they've not found themselves in a lot with Ricardo in the team, but, you know, if they want Ricardo to be on a better pace, they expect them to be at the same level as Norris. So this might happen more than once. Yeah, it's a, it was a bit of an odd one. And then you had, yeah, that situation at the end where Norris was quicker than Ricardo and they went lem through it. Whether that was right or wrong, I don't know, because I think they shot themselves in the foot to begin with. So yeah, need to do better on that one. I think Macca, it was a bit of a mess.

I'm going to do it, guys. I'm going to do it. All right. American football referencing coming. Yeah. I'm going to make a tear. And I'll leave the Dallas Cowboys out of this one. But I need to figure out which franchise do I pick on. I'm going to annoy some section of American. I'll go with Detroit. Apologies, Detroit.

The Detroit Lions, not a very good. Rar! The Lions! I should have been better than match, am I? Detroit Lions, for you to... They're not very good. Again, apologies to people from Detroit. It's like the Detroit Lions going up against the Los Angeles.

Angeles Rams, who won last year's Super Bowl, or this year's Super Bowl. Can't do it. So, yeah, I know, right? It's like they're making the decision. How do we beat them? Do we go with a run attack? Do we go with a more past-oriented attack? Which one do we do in order to get the win?

And they've spent so much time debating with each other. Wow, we should do it this way. No, we should do it this way. We should definitely do it this way. No, we should do it with the run, the past. And actually, it doesn't matter. Because it doesn't matter which one you go for. for, you never be in the Rams anyway.

And this was basically the situation that unfolded in Baku. Did you see how quick Alpine were in a straight line? They weren't getting past Alonzo. Alonzo would have made his car the width of the Caspian Sea in order for them not to get past.

And he was going at 478 billion miles an hour anyway down the straits. You weren't catching him. He was. So what was the point? Well, they were bickering, you know, bargaining with one another, bartering, you know, do you want to do this? Well, I'm happy with this. Are you happy with that? Yeah, you're happy. They spent so much time bickering about something that wouldn't

have ended up mattering anyway. They wouldn't have got him. In terms of the first thing, I think you're absolutely right. In terms of the first thing, the hard tire was the better tire here. I think everyone could really notice that. The medium tire might have had an advantage for, I don't know, five laps maybe, maybe not even much more than that, before the hard tire really took over. The first stint, I couldn't quite understand why they didn't let Daniel Ricardo pass. They said it was for strategy. I didn't really see why. And yeah, you're right. It caused this weird situation in the second stint where if you allow Norris passed, suddenly, it looks as if they're favouring one driver over the other. The hard tire was the better tire.

They should have just favoured it on both stints. It's as simple as that. And I think one worrying thing from this race. Daniel Ricardo did finish ahead of Landon Norris, so he might take solace from that. But did you notice when Daniel Ricardo was overtaken by Lewis Hamilton into turn four, three, four, I don't know which one is. He put him no defence. We saw Ocon multiple times into that corner versus Vettel and others, take the hog the inside line, do everything they can to hold the position, not just him as well. We saw it with other drivers as well, trying to defend the position on the inside of that. Yeah, exactly.

Daniel Ricardo didn't even bother. He just let Lewis Hamilton have the inside. First time of asking, he was able to go past. That looked like an incredibly demotivated move to me. Maybe he decided it was a done deal and he wants to focus on his race. I don't know. I thought he could have fought that position a lot more, a lot harder than he did. A bit worrying, actually.

Yeah. Yeah, I don't know whether maybe he just didn't think it was worth a vibe. But I'm with you. I don't like, Travis just letting each other throw. It doesn't seem, that's not why I watch F1, so odd. Follow up question on this topic. Obviously, it looked like they didn't favour either driver here in that they treated them the same on their respective stints.

The question is, should they have done? Sam, do you think that McLaren are getting towards a time where they need to prioritise Norris as the number one driver? No, no, I don't. They're not fighting for a championship. They're not leaving anything. they're not, you know, taking the fight to Red Bull at this point. It's not like, oh, if we let Norris stay in front, he'll pick up a third place.

But if Ricardo gets in the way, we might drop all the way down to eight or nine. They were next to each other regardless of who is in front. Their place was incredibly equal. And when Ricardo is on it, as he can be, he's not far away from Norris at all, if not quicker in some areas. But for the most part, your drivers are very competent. Your drivers have been very successful in what they've done so far. and you're over-managing, you're micro-managing. You know, you're getting involved.

It's like me going to McDonald's and saying, hello, I'd like a double cheese burger, please. No pickles. No, no, love that. But then halfway through them making it, it's like, oh, I'll cook the first burger, you cook the second burger. You know, I'm, why?

People are confident at what they're doing. Why do I need to get involved? I don't. I can just sit there with my order number and wait for it to be called, whenever that might be. They're doing the same thing here. They are not in the place where team organs are required.

I'll tell you who did Team Morgan's very well. Valky Bottas, Zheurnau, We saw a very easy pass down the back straight of jogging past Bottas with a simple, thank you, over the radio, and there was no fuss, no one known,

no even really picked up like it happened, but they made it easy and they did exactly what they need to do. They do not need to be meagling for a team that could be scoring one or two points a race because you're just causing frustration and toxicity between your drivers

who are two very positive people and they need to be upbeat. They need to be happy. You need to keep your drivers warm and comfy and nestled. You can't be horrible to them and hope that it's going to work. Daniel Ricardo and Landon Norris will not drive to their best ability if you shut one of them down to a second driver. Let them have creativity, let them have freedom.

I think they're getting overly involved. I love how drivers now need to be taken care of, like their baby birds. I mean, that's fantastic. Correct. Do you think there should be any number one, number two situation going on? McLaren Harris? No, I don't think there should be. Look, clearly Lando's had the better year

so far, but this is what made that call at the start. The race so odd to me. It's not like Lando needs to score the maximum points for the team. The team need to score the maximum amount of points available rather than just Lando. So, yeah, it's not like he's in a tight fight

for the championship. Yeah, I found that one a bit strange. So maybe they've already made that decision. I don't know, but in my view, it's not needed. So, yeah, they definitely don't, definitely don't need to do that. I'm not going to make any analogies about cradling F-1 drivers, but that relationship does, I saw you, Sam, that relationship does seem a bit frosty, to say the least.

A lot of Lando, well, both of them, they're both doing it, you know, get them to get a move on, I'm faster, if this is his pace, I'm faster than him. A lot of get out the way messages. Yeah. Like Sam says, I think we need to watch that. Yeah, just a lot of, well, yeah, but get him to get a move on.

I'm like, well, when Lando was saying that, and I know they're both to blame for these sort of messages, when Lando were saying, they were like, if Ricardo can't get past Lanzer, we'll sort of you rounder, then you can have a go. And then Lando was like, well, yeah, tell him to get a move on then. And he's like, two and a half.

have three seconds back. And I'm like, it's not like you're crawling over the back of him. You're both sort of not, you're both doing the sort of same speed. So, yeah, it's just a bit. I think I need to watch out. McClare need to watch out because that could turn

sour if it carries on like that. I think you were right to bring up the Alpha Romeo comparison, Sam, because whilst we might not have heard all of the radio message that transpired between those two, I would find it very difficult to believe that Valtrey Botas put up much of a fight when he was told to do

so. I mean, Bottas was a long way off the pace this weekend. I'm assuming there was something wrong with the car. We'll find out soon enough, I'm sure, but it seems weird how far off he was all weekend. But even so, it was a very easy pass. Joe, thank you. And that's done. No drama whatsoever. And it just seemed to be pure drama when it came to the McLaren situation. And it was completely unnecessary. And you're right in what you say, that unless you are in the lead of the championship, or you're fighting for a championship, these sorts of team orders aren't necessary. And if you're not competing for the championship,

your number one and really only concern should be, why aren't we, and how do we get there? And the only way you can do that is to build up the team. And the only way you can build up a team is to get the input from both sides of the garage, right? If you're dominating a championship, as say Mercedes were in the early part of the hybrid era, you can be forgiven for being a bit more secretive.

about how you're doing things or how your setup is going versus the other guy. Why can you afford to be that way? Because you're so far clear of everyone else, it doesn't really matter. But when you're not in that position and McLara definitely are not in that position, they need to work together. They have to work together to ensure that they both have the best setup and they're both doing everything they can secure maximum points for the team. Doesn't matter where it's coming from. They are both contracted until the end of next year. So neither of them are in immediate contract danger. either. They just have to work together. And I think that responsibility falls on both drivers here. Yeah, Landon Norris has had the better season so far and he had the better last season two.

And he might well think that he should get priority because of that. But ultimately, it's not actually going to serve him in the long term, I don't think, because he's going to be stuck with a McLaren team that can't advance further than, say, fourth on the grid. So, yeah, I don't see any reason for these number one, number two decisions to be made at a midfield team. We've got one final topic to go, and we'll get to that right with this. Yuki Sonoda was behind Pierre Gasly the entire Grand Prix, but he was having an okay enough race. He was in the points for the entire race, qualified in the top 10 as well, and then it all went south because apparently Alphataria is no more and the team is just called Alpha. At least that is what you would believe if you were to look at their rear wing, because half of it decided it was.

done for the day about 10 laps before the race was actually over. Alphateri had this great idea. You know, pinnacle of motorsport Formula One, they decided to put some gaffer tape on it. Sam, do you think that the team should have pulled that car in? Do you think the FIA should have overridden the decision and disqualified the car? How do you think that was handled? I actually think Alfa Tauri to get everything correctly. Something might be confused or shocked at that decision, but what more can a team do on a fly when they're fighting for points? You keep saying I going to have

a really good Grand Prix. He wasn't beating his teammate. It wasn't his best Grand Prix of the season so far, but it was still really good. He was consistent. He stuck a good cut of the moves on people. He drove well around the track that has caused him some difficulties previously. He was going well. He was doing what he needed to do for a team that has been struggling on points.

And so disaster strikes, for some reason, half his DRS decides it doesn't want to be attached to the other half, which we've never, I don't think I've ever seen that before since DRS has been active. And they go, well, how can we fix it? Well, we stop him from using DRS anyway, and we gaffer tape it down. What more can you really do? They haven't been told to disqualify the card by the FIA. So I think as a team, Alfred Tower, he did everything they could do.

They brought him in within a safe period of time, two laps, I think it was. They stuck it down, and he finished the race, right? There was no issue with it. I'm complaining about it further after that point. It worked. and he had to drive with a damaged car. Real wings are notoriously harder to sort out than front wings, right? There isn't exactly a quick all-going-off procedure that you can do it under five seconds

like you can for a front wing. I think they did the right thing. In terms of the FIA, you have to address it with several ways of thinking, I think, a train of thought. Right, this is a danger. Okay, there's a loose part on the car that could come off and hit a driver. As we've seen previously, your heart back to maybe the Massa incident, of course, right? we saw what happens when a bit of a heavier part of a car can fly towards a driver's head. That could have happened with part of the DRS.

It could have come off. So they're right. Wave the orange and black flag. Bring him in. Have they fixed it? Yes. They got to the end of the race without a single issue. Okay.

Do we need to do anything further? No. Have that conversation. Maybe come up with a rule because of this. Maybe go if you've got a damaged rear wing DRS flap, you have to disqualify the car. That's fine. But this was a new precedent. And I actually think that it was handled relatively well by Alphrates.

Tauri, and I don't think the FIA overreacted. I don't think it was a rash decision from them. Just a bit of a shame for Yuki, because those were good points. It was a good race for him. So I'm actually okay with it. Harry, are you okay with the decisions taken by the team and any intervention from the FIA? Yeah, I think, I think so. I was kind of unsure at the time, I was like, that's a bit ridiculous. it's they've gaffer taped an f1 car but but like sam says it i don't see how that was going to um look i think if if a car is broken and it's posing a danger to the driver

uh or or other drivers on track then fair enough you bring him in you tell him that's you can't go any further sunshine but um as sam said they brought it brought him in they did gaffer tape it admittedly and told him not to use DRS. So I don't, the whole rear wing, I don't think was going to fail from that. It was obviously just something in the DRS mechanism that are broken. But yeah, I think I'm okay with it. But the other thing I thought was, well, if they just told them not open DRS,

might have been okay. Did it need to be gaffer taped down? I know for safety insurance is on that one. But I don't know. I've ever seen it happened when the DRS was open rather than shut. So yeah, I don't know, I think I was okay with it. I think if it had been something slightly, I don't know, more sinister in terms of what the issue was,

then I'd say, yeah, they'd be right to tell him that's enough. You can't keep going. But I think the FIA were okay on this one. It's a tough one. I'm not overly happy with it. I've struggled to get behind the idea, of F1 is these cars are engineered to the nth degree, right? They are models of perfection when it comes to the amount of time it takes to put them all together where everything goes and how it's

constructed. And then you also present the idea of, well, when one part of it breaks, a car that goes at 200 miles an hour regularly around the lap, we can gaffer tape it together and everything will be fine. And it was fine. I just struggled. with that concept a little bit. And if something had happened, then suddenly a lot of difficult questions are asked to Alfa Tauri and indeed the FIA as well. I don't know.

I think I would have heard on the side of caution here and retired the car. It broke fundamentally and it wasn't. It's not like they replaced it. It was a bit of a botched job. Let's be honest. And you can't tell. I mean, in that sort of few seconds where you're making the decision of putting the gaffer tape on,

what's the level of risk in terms of someone not putting it on correctly or it not being as attached as it could be? Yeah. Like I said, I'm not flabbergasted by the decision. I'm not completely taken back and think that they should be punished or anything like that. But I think I probably would have looked on the side of caution just based on the risk factor here. Does this may be cool for a rule to be written in? If you have a failed DRS, you have to retire the car? Is it as simple as that?

We obviously don't have that rule or it's not explicit because otherwise they've been told that. But sometimes things have to happen before we write rules into the book. Is it now a time for the FIA to evaluate that as an outside option? If you have a failure of your DRS mechanism, which it can't hold itself closed to a single piece, you'll have to retire the car. Quite possibly.

And I mean, the FIA and the teams are, going to know far better than myself in terms of how safe it really is for that sort of thing to happen and what are the dangers of continuing after that. And it might well be that they do some sort of risk assessment and decide that actually no, it's perfectly fine for that situation to unfold. But like I say, it's a bit of a tricky concept for me to completely get my head around based on how to the millimeter these cars are designed and then you just gaffer tape a bit up in the middle of the race. So we'll see how that goes.

We've got a preview episode coming up midweek, because it's the Canadian Grand Prix, the classic back-to-back of, you know, middle of Asia and Canada. So we've got the preview coming up mid-week, and then back in a week's time for a review episode, busy time here on the podcast. Sam, if you wouldn't mind getting us out of here.

Folks, I hope you enjoyed the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. It was not necessarily the chaotic race that we were looking for, but it's definitely raised some questions and change the face of the championship. So do make sure you come back for the preview for Canada and, of course, the review after that race.

If you haven't, we recently released a Friends of the podcast episode, a brand new series for us. We interviewed the F1 and FE commentator assessing Jack Nichols. Go to give it a listen if you haven't already. It's a very fun episode. It's quite upbeat.

It's something a bit different from us. And I urge you, we don't often do this, I urge you to stick around after we say keep breaking late because there is a, we may have received a submission that we thought was so different, shall we say, to all the rest,

we thought we'd sign off with it after we leave. So just stick around for the final minute also if you've got this far. Discord is available over 750 people who are very nice, non-toxic, calm, lovely people all talking formula one and other like-minded things. Give it a go. The link is in the description.

It's a lovely place. Merch is available in the link in the description. Patreon is also there if you have the ability to do so. We know it's tough times at the moment. And follow us on our social media, Twitter, out of breaking Instagram, a late-plated podcast, and the one where we do dances, TikTok, late by the podcast. That is all there as well.

In the meantime, we'll see you in the next week. I've been Samuel Sage. I've been Ben Hocking. And I've been Harry Ead. And remember, keep breaking late. And good luck. It's been two weeks without sleep. Even longer since I've felt the warm.

of the day's sun or the soft touch of a woman. Anxious. My soul cannot rest. I sit here in the darkness in the shadows of my home. I've been waiting so long, breathing in the stale air, and yet now I am here. Knowing the time has come, the time has come to give my opinion on the best and worst driver of the day, for the eyes of the day. For the Azerbaijan, Azurban, Azurbleu, g, no. Baku, Brandtri.

Is this hell? This is something so much worse. This is the Discord server for the late breaking F1 podcast, hosted by Ben Hocking, Harry Ead, and Sam Sage. Sam, Zame. Licker of Discord. My best driver of the day is Botas and Q1

And my worst driver of the day is Ferrari engineering God have mercy on my soul And all your souls You mother flippers Oh boy Well Bye folks

Ram's go ram Rams go bram Past is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network