The Late Braking F1 Podcast - 2022 Italian GP Review

Episode Date: September 11, 2022

A weird episode this week with two thirds of Late Braking in other countries/continents. Nevertheless, Ben soldiers on to bring you a review of the Italian GP, looking at our bold predictions, and naming his driver and worst driver of the day! 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 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 me, Ben Hocking, and live from Monza, Harry Ead. A bit of a different episode coming to you today. We've got no Sam, we've got Harry and Monza. I'm still here holding down the fort somewhere

and we've got a special guest coming later on. There's a lot happening which is actually a bit against what happened at Monza because not a lot did happen apart from booing at the end Harry. How was that? Oh, I enjoyed it a lot actually. It was really pleasant, the most pleasant part of the day.

Yeah, hello everyone. I am in Monter. A bit of a shame the race was dull and I'm really sorry if you hear lots of background noise because I'm sat by the track and everyone, like people are walking on it. And then behind me is the, is the F-on fan zone. And there's a very terrible DJ on right now. So this could be catastrophic.

This could be the worst thing we've ever recorded. But I'm only on for one topic, so fear not. I mean, to make it is the most catastrophic thing we've ever done, that would take some doing. But I believe in us. It could happen. It could happen. I mean, it sounds not here, so probably not, but it could happen.

yeah that's a good point actually as Harry says very kind of him to stop by given he's at Monza but he will be here for just one topic as mentioned there will be a special guest who will go unnamed for now

not for any specific reason other than to build tension I guess and there'll be some solo bits from me in and around because you know you need to hear from me of course by Jason's a row let's start with

exactly, yes. People do often on the streets compare me to the one and only Jason the Rulo. Should we start, not at the beginning, should we start at the end instead? Because we had a safety car

finished to the race. First time that's happened in a while. Rather than red flagging the race with about seven so laps to go, the decision was to get out safety car for Daniel Ricardo's stricken vehicle by the side of the track. And that's how the race ended.

It wasn't cleared in time in order to get the race back underway. There have been a lot of arguments from people that it should have been red flagged and we should have had a proper green flag racing scenario to the end of the Grand Prix. Would you agree with that, Harry? Yes. Yeah, I would. It was, I don't understand why that didn't happen because we had the same. this morning there was an F3 race the championship deciding F3 race

and they red flagged it because there was a safety car and then they didn't restart it so it was decided basically in the Stewards office afterwards but yeah it just made so much sense to red flagged this one it was I was getting real Abu Dhabi PTSD the PTSD from this it just it just really really made me think of last November

but yeah they should have absolutely red flagged it from what I could see there was I don't know why first of all they were they should have red flagged it and then secondly there was also issues with letting lap cards go whilst Danny Ricardo's Strick and McLaren was still at the side of the track so yeah it feels like they were a bit scared to do it

I think off the back of Abu Dhabi and that doesn't that doesn't make any sense because that's not a lesson learned that's just making that's like looking at the bad thing that happened and then trying to make it better

but make it worse almost so yeah it should have been a red flag should have had a couple of lips lap lips a couple of laps sprint towards the end and everyone would have been happy when they announced over the radio to LeClau

that it would be finishing behind the safety car basically the entirety of the crowd it just got up and left they went home and i'd be fair fair enough because there was nothing left to watch at that point but you know wrong decision by the fia yeah i mean i i think the red flag was necessary um just based just based on safety because that's the number one reason you throw safety cars virtual safety cars red flags is because of safety it's kind of in the name right and ultimately we know um to the absolute worst situation possible what can happen when these big

vehicles, these cranes appear on circuits. We've seen it before and end in disaster circumstances. And I appreciate it's under yellows, but they're still going quickly enough. This should have been red flag the second they realized they needed to get one of those vehicles out there. You know, the safety has to be paramount in that situation. The sporting arguments, the entertainment arguments, they are all secondary and tertiary. They're not primary. The primary concern is making sure that the drivers out there are safe and I don't believe they were with that vehicle with that vehicle out there. So yes, it actually would have also been in terms of entertainment, probably the best finish as well, but I actually don't think that matters. I think it should have just been a red flag

based on the fact that Ricardo was not in a safe position. That vehicle was not in a safe position and we did have a real muddle in terms of lapped cars. You know, the safety card didn't actually pick for Stappen up until four years after, you know, the, the, um, the, the, um, the, um, flag came out in the first place. So I would have I would have called a red flag here. Probably not for the same reasons that most others would have called for a red flag because, you know, as the booing indicated at the end, Harry, this was probably more in terms of an entertainment rather than a safety thing that people were annoyed about. At least how loud was that booing? How disappointed were they? Yeah, it was it was.

It was a lot. I mean, I don't even know how to compare it. It's not like indie 2005 levels of booing, but it was a lot. There was some disappointed, disappointed fans there. I think the only ones that weren't disappointed, but obviously the Max were Stapin fans. And look, up to that point, he'd done nothing wrong.

So, you know, they'll take the win. But, yeah, there was just a general, even from fans, you could see there were Mercedes supporters. Because, look, a two or three-lap shootout, Russell's lying at third, Hamilton was in fifth, wasn't he? So something could have happened, they could have won it. So yeah, like I say, from an entertainment point of view, it was a shame and clearly people were disappointed.

But it's weird because I saw a tweet and it said this is how Abidabu should have ended effectively, but how it should have been the same thing. She'd have had a red flag. And I don't get why they throw the helicopter overhead. I don't get why they're so happy to throw it. red flag in lower formulas, but not so here. And I guess it's because they think of the time constraints in lower formulas, it's more than an F1. But from an entertainment point of view, why not, why not throw it? So yeah, you're right. I think obviously safety first. And I can

totally see the, the, the, all the, all the, all the, all the action whether, where Ricardo broke down, but, but, but it was clearly in a pretty dangerous spot. And to let lapped cars go just seems a bit bonkers, to be honest. I think in all likelihood, the end result probably wouldn't have been any different to what we actually got because Max Verstappen did seem to be on another level. And I think in terms of tyres, if it was going to be a straight shootout between Max Verstappen and Charles Leclair, and definitely with no DRS, I don't think that there would have been any opportunity for him to get past. I guess if the red flag was thrown early enough, then they would have got had DRS for the last couple of.

laps, but I honestly don't think Vastappen would have been in DRS range by the time that came about. He was, he was that much quicker. We saw that fresh softs for Lecler versus not even exactly fresh mediums for the Stappen, it was essentially the same pace. We saw that Lecler had about a 20 second gap to catch up to Vastafin and ultimately that gap didn't really change much. It went down by a few seconds, sure, but when it's 20 seconds, you need it to be more on the few seconds. So I don't think the result would have actually ended up changing at all. I think the booing, by the way, and I'm glad Harry's got headphones in right now, otherwise I might be sounding to his death.

But the booing was disgusting. You know, Max Verstappen did nothing wrong. Max Verstappen drove his own race. And in many senses, I do think it was just a backhanded compliment, I think, because it's taking you back to the days of Schumacher where you're not booing them for any real specific reason other than the fact that they're pretty good. Same with Vettel. Yeah. Yeah, it's yeah. Just like think about what you're doing before you do. I mean, for goodness sake, you don't want it for any driver. Like they're risking life on them out there.

Trying to end up saying, all right, this afternoon wasn't a thriller, but they do their best every week. And they don't deserve it. So yeah, stop it. there you go stop it says harry ead um i have to i have to say in terms of the red flag itself and whether it should have been thrown i will say that this probably won't be very popular amongst a lot of people uh in the fan base but if you were up in arms about abby-dabby i don't understand how you can also be up in arms about what happened today because you're right if if they had followed the rules, then the same thing would have happened at Abu Dhabi

versus what happened today. And ultimately, okay, maybe you don't like the rules and maybe you do think that, and I've seen a lot of people suggest that if a safety car comes out in the last five laps or the last 10 laps or last 10% of the race, that there should be an automatic red flag to cause green flag running at the end.

It's much more akin to what NASCAR and Indy car would do versus what F1 does. And that's fine. You can have a problem with those rules and suggest alternatives, and I'll hear you out. But based on what the rules are right now, they played it straight down the line. And I don't quite understand the arguments that are coming about. If you were very angry about what happened in Abu Dhabi, where the rules were not followed for the sake of entertainment, how can you be annoyed about what happened today, where rules were followed?

where entertainment wasn't the priority. I appreciate it's a boring finish. I really do appreciate it's a boring finish. But ultimately that sport, it's not a film. It's not, it's a sporting occasion where you're not always going to get the result that you want. And certainly if you look at other sports, if you look at other sports, take football,

and I mean football on UK side of the pond here, UK side of Lay Big Wet, if you will. If it's a nil-nil draw and league match after 90 minutes, you don't get Crowell booing because nobody won. You don't get, oh, okay, let's just, let's stop the match here, let them rest up for 10 minutes, and then we'll have another half an hour in a league match at least, and go for it and see who can come away with the win. You wouldn't get that.

You wouldn't get that in pretty much any other sport. you wouldn't sacrifice the rules for the sake of entertainment, so I don't understand why it would happen here. If you have a problem with the rules, fair enough, but they were followed today. Switching gear slightly, it's rather unusual that we would produce a tweet any of the three of us that is seen by, you know, thousands, thousands of people. But today was that day. Unfortunately, I wish it was under better circumstances, Harry,

because you captured something live from Monza that just absolutely shouldn't happen. Yeah, I mean, what a way to get a load of views on a tweet, which is not the way I wanted to do it. But yeah, there was, look, atmosphere in general, 95% of people here. I know there was a lot of booing at the end, so maybe 90%. But 95% of fans here have been all good-natured, cheering for both. When we had the driver's parade there was cheers for Vastappen, cheers for the Ferraris, obviously. Cheers for Hamilton. and cheers for even Fernando Burns, Bridges, Alonso.

So, look, for the most part, it was all good nature stuff. But yeah, there was a point. We were standing just before the first Lesmo. And there was a couple of fans, Ferrari fans, unfortunately, in the grandstand, who were basically harassing Max Versteppen fans who had caps on and telling them to take them off. And obviously, you know, we're all here for, all here. for fun, but it was quite intimidating for those people.

And they were taking their caps off and feeling embarrassed to be Max Verstappen fans. And look, I'm not picking on, I'm not saying this is just a Tophosi problem. I'm certain this is happening at other rate. We've had reports from Austria's and Vort, et cetera, that this happens at other races. But, you know, it's just why should we come to a race and not feel, it's not even a safety thing, but just feel uncomfortable to be there supporting your favorite driver. It's just that's not what Formula One is about. So it was,

it was such a shame to see that. We've seen reports, but actually to witness it first time was just, just crap. It was just rubbish, especially for, you know, I've been to a few races in my time,

and I've never seen that before. So, yeah, it sucked. And I'm glad in a way that lots of people have seen it, but it's, it's not, it's not something we want to, to carry on in Formula One because that's not the way

the sport should be at all. So, yeah, hopefully action is taken. Something that can be done. The problem was, there was no one even security-wise to go and talk to and say, look, these guys are being horrible, which is an issue in itself. Because I think even if there was that there,

that it would be, you know, even as a deterrent, because I think that would be the case. but there was no one really there. So, yeah, step it up. I know I'd tagged Monza as this, but it's not just a Monza problem. I think it's an F1 problem as a whole.

There needs to be more action done to make sure that fans feel safe because F1 is so much more popular now. I haven't been to an F1 race for a few years, you know, COVID, etc. There's so many more people here now, which is amazing. It's great to see,

but we've got to keep it accessible because otherwise that's going to be the downfall at the end of the day. I agree with everything you said. I agree with absolutely everything you said there. And it's, it is important that this isn't, as you've already mentioned, it's important that this isn't like focused purely on one fan based and on one circuit because that's, that's not an issue. It's not an isolated issue amongst one group of people or one circuit. This has happened multiple times this season already and that should prove that

it's not isolated, it's deeper than that and it's bigger than that and it's something that not necessarily an individual circuit organiser needs to deal with by themselves this is an issue that Formula One needs to be directly involved with because you're absolutely right, it's live sport

we want people involved, we want as many people loving this sport as we do as possible and these idiots are getting in the way of that And making someone feel uncomfortable, unsafe at a racing track is just absolutely ridiculous. And more needs to be done. Ultimately, we know the popularity of the sport is only going one way. And it's almost now what we're doing is setting the foundations for what F1 will be in years' time, in five years' time, in ten years' time.

And if action isn't taken now, it's going to become more commonplace to the point where it's going to be even more difficult to stamp out. The more you normalise something, the more you see of it every time out, the more difficult it is to stand up to it and to really get some progressive action behind it to stop it. So I think there just needs to be a zero tolerance policy on this. Stamp it out now before this becomes even more of a problem than what it already is. And I would just say to, and it is a minority. You're right, it is a minority.

See, the problem is that that minority is, it's very vocal and it's very in your face. And these sorts of incidents happen. I would say to anyone who considers this kind of behaviour acceptable or okay or funny, just get some level, get some perspective. Please, people are there or should be there for one sole reason. And that is to enjoy the event that's happening, regardless of whether you support Vestappan or Hamilton or, or Leclair, it doesn't matter. You're still there for the same primary reason of enjoying sport.

Let other people enjoy their time, enjoy your time. You don't need that kind of behavior. And it's incredibly sad to see. And I'm glad from your side, Harry, you were able to capture this footage and share it. And it has been seen. There is that traction. There is that visibility. And hopefully, you know, we don't want to see this sort of thing happen. But where it does happen, if we're able to get more visibility on it, then that should enable action to come a bit easier. Yeah, and also the brave man that I am, they, someone, one of their friends, I should say,

called me recording, so they challenged me on it and I swiftly ran away because I am a coward. So there you go, folks. I'd have done the same thing, quite frankly. But yeah, anyway, the second stop. bit of the day, just stop it, okay? Stop it. So the two stoppits for today are booing and abusing fans. Yeah, please. That's fair. I mean, if you do have any difference of opinion on either of those two, please do let us know at Lbreaking, but you might not have much of an audience.

Or tweet Sam. I need to run for my bus. So sorry, everyone. Well, thank you very much for joining me and not leaving me completely on my own, very much appreciated. Have a safe trip back to the UK and, well, you'll be back Wednesday anyway, unlike my part-time sage. Can we call him late breaking light now? Yes. Okay, great. That makes me happy. Anyway, thank you very much for joining Harry and I'll try my best to see everyone through the rest of this episode.

Good luck, everyone. Massive thanks to Harry for joining me on what must be the most disjointed episode of this podcast. And we've done a fair few by this point. To the point where we've got solo breaking. If you've got a better name for it than that, please do let me know. But solo breaking, at least temporarily until I bring along my esteemed guest that I'm still keeping close to my chest in terms of who that is. Again, all for tension, marketing. I'm excellent at this.

Probably one of the leading topics from this weekend that was certainly unexpected up until the point of Saturday morning was at Williams. Now, we thought that Williams would have a fairly good chance coming into this race weekend just based on how their car is. We've seen them very slow

at pretty much every circuit that we've gone to this year. And more specifically, any circuit that has corners, unfortunately for Williams, that covers nearly all of them. But there are a few circuits on the calendar that are a lot more straight dominated, where it is more down to your lack of drag, which William seems to have nailed. Apparently the only thing they have nailed, but they have nailed it. And it meant that they were pretty good at Belgium a couple of weeks ago,

weren't so good at Zamvort, of course, in between this weekend and spa. But we thought coming into Monza that they would have a reasonable chance of back-end points. they've only got eight all year for a good reason. And generally speaking, whenever Alex Albon, and I say Albin rather than Williams, because all the points are coming his way so far, when Albin was, you know, there was some discussion about Albin being 8th, 9th,

could that happen this weekend? A real opportunity for him. And now, of course, that was all thrown up in the air on Saturday morning. When the announcement came out that Alex Albin was suffering from appendicitis and of course myself and both Harry and Sam, I'll say it for them as well, wish the best for Alex. I'm sure he's obviously gutted to miss any race, but probably

particularly gutted to miss this one. And of course, Nick DeVries takes over. Very weird circumstance given Nick DeVries raced for Aston Martin in FP1. So here you've got Nick DeVries racing on Saturday for Williams after racing for Aster Martin on the Friday. I think managed to work it out that it was not far off 50 years since the last time the same thing happened. But, you know, there was a bit of question marks, particularly in terms of what would Nick DeVries do? What would Nick DeVries do versus Nicholas Latifie? And quite possibly would Williams end up with zero points at a race where they desperately need to pick up a few? I mean, we know at this point they're not going to be fighting for anything better than 10th,

but there's a difference between a respectable 10th and a not so respectable 10th. Now, Nick DeVries, I'm not quite sure what the expectations are. Obviously, Nick DeVries is a Formula E champion, so this guy is not to be messed around with. He knows this stuff. He's a Formula 2 champion as well, a Formula 2 champion that ultimately didn't get the progression that other F2 champions have had. Slightly older starting point, I think he's 28 possibly. So, you know, versus some of the other. youngsters coming through. It's certainly a bit of an anomaly to debut at that age nowadays.

And he did a good job. He deserves congratulations. He got the driver of the day and I'll leave who my driver the day was for the next segment, but you can't really go against that too much. Ultimately, he scored points on his debut. There aren't many that have done that. And ultimately, there's a difference between scoring points on debut and scoring points on debut in the circumstance that he managed to achieve it in. So it's always going to be, it's always an achievement. It's always worth congratulations when you're able to do that. But in most situations, when you're scoring on a debut, it's because it's the first race of the season, right? It's because you've had all of the time in the winter period, you've had testing to get ready for your debut. And then the

first race of the season comes around. Potentially you're in a good car. and you're able to score points. Nick DeFries, a long way from that. He did not know he was racing until Saturday morning. He had FP3 in the Williams to get up to speed, at least with that car versus the Ashton Martin that he drove on the Friday, has qualifying and in the race. So he was really, he was really thrown into it.

You can look at it two ways, really. He was really thrown into it from a this weekend perspective. You could also argue, given his age, given all of the teams that he's been involved with practice sessions, overall, he might be more prepared for an F1 debut than anyone else. It's almost two sides of the coin there. But I think it deserves a lot of congratulations. In the race itself, honestly, he didn't have to do a great deal in terms of overtakes.

It was almost his qualifying effort plus the penalties from other teams did the work for him. And that was the crucial thing because that car is quick enough in a straight line that it could essentially attach itself to Daniel Ricardo. I think it was Ricardo for most of the Grand Prix, but also Pierre Gasly. And just basically stay in that slipstream, stay in that DRS. And no, realistically, you're not going to be overtaken. There were a few dodgy moments with Jo Guanyu from behind, but mostly it was comfortable enough. And I don't want to put down his performance, but it wasn't necessarily something that he needed to make overtake after overtake to get to that spot.

But he held his own very well, and you wouldn't have suspected it was his first F1 race. not by a long shot. The problem is, how do you rate his performance truly, right? How do you really evaluate a performance where your teammate is Nicholas Latifie? And that sounds incredibly harsh, but it's also very honest. Nicholas Latifi is not just the worst driver in Formula One. He is very comfortably the worst driver in Formula One. So the point where any sort of comparison is really difficult.

Now, ultimately, I think being a reserve driver and having a one-off shot in a car is actually one of the best spots you can be in as a driver because there are zero expectations and anything you do as a bonus. We've seen that pretty much with every rookie, every reserve driver that's come in and done a job, right? Nika Holkenberg, we've seen it with Jack Aitken and Fittipaldi over the last couple of years. if they have the worst race of all time, so what. They were brand new in the car, is to be expected. If they do one or two good things, suddenly they're brilliant and deserve all the accolades in the world. So I think it's a really good spot to be a reserve driver. You can't lose almost.

And really, Nick DeVries had an even more of a can't lose scenario, because whilst normally a reserve driver probably wouldn't have a realistic shot against the teammate, here against Nicholas Latifi, you very much do. We saw in qualifying through the first couple of qualifying sessions that it was nip and tuck between them, which doesn't bode well because Latifi's very accustomed to the car. DeVries is not. So the rate of progression session to session for DeVries

should be better than that of Latifi. And that is what happened ultimately. Latifi didn't progress from Q1. Nick DeVries did. And he put on an OK show in Q2 as well. If Albin is in that car, does he potentially make Q3? I think he's probably on the cusp, but ultimately Albin is a better driver than the TV. DeVries starts, I think, four positions higher than he would have done if not for the penalties.

No fault of his own. You've got to take what you're given when it comes to this sport. And I think he did a solid job. I think he did a very solid job. It's very difficult for me to heap praise on him, again, because it's difficult to know what the full potential of that car was, because Latifie's in the other side of the garage. But getting points on debut and holding your own, I think is probably enough. Does it cement his seat for next season?

Probably not cement, but it certainly helps his cause a great deal. And I think it helps his case a lot in a scenario he couldn't lose. I think this weekend was perfect for DeVries. And it really does. For all the attention Nick DeVries deserves for the drive and the congratulations he deserves, really for me my focus is on Latifi here because it's not necessarily news that he's not quick enough but this was almost like the number one highlight like this was at the top of the highlight real there have been so many occasions this year that points to the fact that Latifi's not

quick enough to be in this sport and it should be a meritocracy and I'm not saying if Latifi goes it automatically becomes one but he's almost the shining light on what is the system in Air Force one at the moment. And it's, it's annoying because we want to see the best drivers in these cars. And whilst Latifi is there, we're a long way from that. And I say that with regret, because quite honestly, I think Nicholas Latifi's a great guy. He's one of my favorite drivers on the grid from a pure personality standpoint. He seems absolutely lovely. But when it comes down to F1, it is X as an O's, its results. And he hasn't been delivering. And he is now firmly behind Nick DeVries in the championship because of the two points that DeVries was able to pick up.

And is anyone out there going to seriously say with much confidence that Latifie will end up picking up more than those two points? Even if he does, it doesn't matter, right? Let's say Latifi manages to pick up a P8 in a crazy race towards the end of this season. It's not as if people then turn around and say, oh, Latifie did beat DeVries forward points to two. He's fine. everyone will still say DeVries did it in one Grand Prix. So it almost doesn't matter what Lissifi does between now and the end of the year.

Rumors are that he is still in with a chance of that seat. That was more said before this weekend, so I'm not quite sure how this has impacted it. But apparently he is still in contention for it. I think if you've got one side of the garage and Alex Albin, who's done a really good job this year, he's been really solid, and you've got Latifie and the other side,

seat and Williams want to be in a position where they're not just competing against themselves. They want to compete against at least the lower parts of the midfield. If you have Latifi in that car, it will expose you and it will probably cost you championship position if your car is competitive enough. And if you're doing everything you can to make that car competitive, you need to apply that same philosophy to the driver lineup. There's no point spending all this time and effort on this car to get it up to speed. if your lineup is not going to be good enough

in order to take advantage of it. A lineup of Albon and DeVries is a far better chance of doing so than the lineup of Albin and Latifie. And I'm not massively high on DeVries either, but if it's DeVries versus Latifi, it's a fairly simple choice. Take Zamvort last week for an example.

I can't remember if I did say this on the podcast or not, but he was, If it weren't for Sebastian Vettel's qualifying attempt, I think the gap between 20th and 19th, so Latifi and whoever would have finished 19th, and the gap between 19th and 1st, there would have been about the same. Around a lap that's, what, 80 seconds long?

That's not good enough. I hope something has done about this situation. I feel like Latif was let off the hook somewhat last week. sorry, last year as a result of Mazapin being in the Hasse, because it was shared about a bit, whereas now he's very much exposed. And I think DeVries has done a good job and probably solidifies his case.

And he's not the only one as well. I know Logan Sargent is still potentially in the running for that. But if you're Williams, if you're one of the hardworking people at Williams and you're seeing the results that are being churned out, it's hard to think that anything other than Latifie going would be a good result for. you. A quick mention on Carlos Sines and Sergio Perez just to switch gears before we go on to

bold predictions. Carlos Sines, of course, had a grid penalty. Sergio Perez, of course, had a grid penalty. Sergio Perez's was less significant. His was only 10 positions. So he started, I think, four positions higher than Carlos Sines did. Sines was but further back. Sines had to make his way from P18. Perez had to make his way from P-14, I think it was. And it was a real question as to how far they could get. And Perez has really struggled in this second half of the season. I cannot personally understand it. Because the first half of this year, or at least the first third of this year,

Perez seemed to have made a massive leap forward versus where he was in 2021. And it made sense. You know, 2021, Perez was getting used to this new car. we know what Vostappen did to his old teammates. Vestappen held a significant advantage early in 21. Perez got a bit closer by the end of the year. And it was just logical to the point where we'd get into 2022 and Perez would be that much closer again.

We know that Perez isn't good enough to challenge in week in week out. We never thought that was the case. But we always thought that there would be that gap, that sort of two to three attempts gap per lap, that Perez could slot into and stay at to be this consistent. consistent number two driver. And he's just not there anymore. And he's gone backwards versus where he was at the beginning of the year.

That does raise the question as to whether Vestappen has pushed ahead and got more used to the car or whether Perez has gone backwards or not. That question is there, but it almost doesn't matter because the result is exactly the same, Perez being less competitive versus his teammate. Now, of course, Red Bull are in a position where it don't really matter. It doesn't really matter because Ferrari are strategically so inept that there's no competition. There are Mercedes. We know where they're at. But that's not always going to be the case. And they need to ensure that when one of those two teams steps up and actually is able to deliver a championship fight, that Perez is on the pace that is good enough.

Let's not forget last season. Whilst Verstappen won the driver's championship, Red Bull did not win the Constructors Championship. So a repeat of that can't happen. And I think it's up to Red Bull to manage this because the last, probably since the summer break, but even the couple of races before the summer break as well, Paris has been nowhere. I can't remember what the gap was exactly in Q3, but it was far closer to a second than it was, I think even half a second, which around Monza seems a bit ridiculous because there isn't that many places where time can be made up around Monza. versus your teammate in the same machinery as you.

So I can't quite work out. And we saw in the race that kind of continued today. Whereas Sines was able to make solid progress throughout the field from a further back position, he was able to pick off drivers one by one with what looked like relative ease. That might be putting down what a good job Sines did. But there weren't any close calls to my memory. Whereas Perez made a few spots. but it was much more difficult.

Certainly in the first sort of few laps, he wasn't really making any progress whatsoever, whereas Sines was easing his way through. And I think Red Bull did a good job of identifying that very early on. I think lap seven and pulling him in for hard tires, which we thought was going to take him to the end of the Grand Prix. That seemed like the best call because of the lack of progress that Perez was able to make.

And does anyone think that Vostappen would have struggled to that same degree? I think if you do think, think he would have struggled to the same degree? You're probably lying to yourself. And it's, it's confused. We know that Perez, his, his qualities aren't necessarily making those overtakes, those drives back through the field. We know that his expertise comes in tire management, which I think they put him on a strategy that played to that advantage. But he was, he was just not in that same, same class as science. And I don't know if this is foreboding possibly for if we get a eventually a Red Bull versus Ferrari proper title fight, because if Sines is able to pull out that

sort of drive and Perez is not, that could be the difference. We know Vastappen's great. We know Lecler's great. They will keep being great. I'm fairly confident of those things. It is often the second driver that will determine whether you're winning a championship or not. Sines did a good job out there. I was impressed by Sines. Perez, I think after he went on the hard tires, he did an okay enough job, but I think it was more strategy driven versus what he was actually able to pull out of the car. It's going to be really interesting to see what he does for the rest of this year, whether that gap closes back up again or whether we stay in this gap. Because at the moment, let's be honest, outside of the gap between Alman and Latifi, is there another gap on the grid

that is worse right now than Vastappen-to-Perez? I'm thinking on the fly here. I don't think there is. Norris and Ricardo, sorry, I forgot about those two. But apart from those two, I think, you know, it's right up there. And it needs addressing. I don't know what the answer is. I think it deserves an investigation. And it makes some of the decisions that Red Bull have made even more puzzling with Perez's struggles in terms of keeping Gasly on, for example. No disrespect to Pierre Gasly, but they have no intention of putting him in that car. So why are you not preparing the next generation, whoever that might be, whether that is Drugovich or one of your actual junior drivers in Liam Lawson or someone else, why aren't you progressing their careers into

Alfa Tauri now if Perez isn't able to improve from this level? Because surely long term, that isn't good enough. Interesting stuff. We're going to be going over to a special guest for reviewing driver of the day and worst driver of the day submissions. Join me for that right after this. Very warm, welcome back to the podcast, this very strange episode that's unfolding today. As promised, there is an esteemed guest.

Now, you've probably thinking, who on earth could this be? Who could I have roped in from the world of Formula One? Well, and we actually asked this in terms of Twitter and Discord, you know, who do you think it might be that we've roped in? And there were a couple of people

that got this right. Only a couple of people who got this right. Somebody did suggest, what about the partners of late breaking? That's exactly what we've got here. Hello, Laura. Hello, Ben. How are you today? I'm very good. Thank you. This is weird. Isn't it? Now, I mean, you probably feel like you're on the podcast more than you actually are based on. You always have to hear me anyway. So I guess this isn't that much different. No, I mean, it's different that I'm having to contributes but I'm always in the house when you're recording I can hear the excellent job that you do so yeah I do feel you don't usually compliment me I can compliment you on occasion I mean the public are listening now so yeah yeah we need to put on that front yeah to be honest

you've probably got a lot of fans already in terms of that they will understand you because they know what I'm like and they know what my Ferrari rants are like and my sprint race rants are like and this could go on for a while but sure you actually have to deal with that real time so there's going to be sympathy. Absolutely. I mean, you guys, you get the edited version. Yeah. I mean, you get the version that's been cleaned up a bit, that's been maybe thought about, you know, that Harry's maybe cut a couple of bits out for the sake of everybody's sanity. I have to live with this guys. I have to sit next to him while he's watching the race. And it's not just the Ferrari strategists we're dealing with. Sometimes it's the commentators. Ben is a very, very level

person. He's chill. Six days of the week, come Sunday afternoon, all hell in leashes. I mean, I don't know how to feel about that. It's true. And I feel like that's probably not going to surprise anyone, actually. No, I reckon not. But it's official now. It's officially out there. We're going to go through driver of the day and worst driver of the day submissions and also give our own and our moment of the race as well. We will quickly review the bold predictions that we made on the preview podcast. Harry, I can't actually remember exactly what he said, but he said something along the lines of there would be like half a second between first and 10th in Q3. It was something along those lines, but I'm almost dead certain it was really wrong.

Yeah, I think so. But it's probably also the one that was most right, which says a lot about how well these predictions when this week because I said, I said Alonzo would be on the podium. Ah, well, it did you remember Alonzo didn't end up on the podium? If we're watching the magic Alonzo video tomorrow, well Monday, he may well be on the podium, but in real life, slightly, less magic. Alonzo, sadly, was not quite any of any of the podium. But I don't look too bad. That sounds weird because that was an awful prediction, but I don't know too bad. What did Sam say? Because of what Sam said. Sam's bold prediction was that Alonzo, would win the race and Ocon would be in the top four.

He didn't pick up one point. Well, that was a little off sum. Maybe not your closest prediction. No, I mean, we've had a lot of, like, we've had a lot of really close calls recently. We even gave Sam a point last week, because he actually got his poll one, two, three, right, just out of pure sympathy, to be honest, I think.

But we've actually had a lot of close calls recently. But this week, there was nothing of a like. No close calls whatsoever. Close call free zone. All right. I'm going to go, Driver of the day for today. Obviously,

we know that the official vote went to Nick DeVries, who I've just spent like 15 minutes talking about. People have probably already turned off because I was just on a bit of a soapbox around about it. But I think he's a contender.

I'm actually going to give Driver of the day to Max Verstappen, though. It feels like, as Sam actually tweeted about this, like, 10 minutes ago, it feels like it doesn't matter what you do to Max Verstappen now is just he'll win. You could probably blindfold him, put him like the wrong way around and three laps down,

and he'll probably be leading after 10 laps. That's what it feels like right now. Yeah, I'd agree with that. There's definitely that sense of, I call it leaders look, you know, that kind of gold dust effect. Lewis Hamilton had it in 2020. Max Verstappen has it in 2022. I mean, you could put him on a child's tricycle in 20th.

That could be fun. It would be fun. He would still somehow just drive through the cars, get to the front, effortlessly win. He's just got that gold does sparkle about him at the moment. He will win. He will rise to the top. He will get there. We can probably blame the Ferrari strategists for some of that.

But he is... I haven't said anything bad about the Ferrari strategist today. Have you not? No. The thing is, I've said something bad about them, like, last three races in a row. They've given you plenty of content. I'm not going to say anything bad. I feel like that they actually...

just didn't stand a chance. They were that, they just weren't quick enough. Yeah. So I'm actually going to give them a week off. Fair enough. We'll give them a break. I'm sure they will all be relieved today.

Have you got for driver today? Well, after what you've just said, I feel like I might need to do an emergency change my mind because I was going to say Nick DeVries because... I think that... Can I still... You're going with a popular vote. Yeah, okay.

Well, as it's a fair choice. As it's my maiden appearance on the podcast, I'll maybe lean into popularity. You know, this was his first time racing in F1 on a very tricky. circuit and he not only finished it, kept his nose fairly clean, he got points. Yeah, inner Williams. Inner Williams.

And out did his teammate this week. Yeah, I don't think there's any Canadians still watching or listening based on the last segment. Yeah, so my vote was going for Nick DeVries because I think that was a sterling job for your debut, F1 appearance. Well done, Nick. Good lad. any other contenders that narrowly missed out

well Michael Schu Mike had a great race yeah that would have been an excellent comeback Mickey Shoe largely because there were only three interesting moments in this race and he was responsible for one of them that overtake on Latifian lap 42 with his lockup still managed to save it and get the move done

the only time in the race I think where we both leant back in the sofa and went ooh. So yeah, Schumacher gets an honourable mention, I think, for providing us with some actual entertainment this afternoon.

To be honest, that's probably not a name that's going to appear much in these submissions as driver of the day and hasn't got a mention up until now. But I think it's a very good shout even outside of that overtake because that house was awful this weekend.

And he still managed to do a pretty good job on it. So I think that's a pretty good shout, actually. Do you have a worse drive for the day? Do you know what this was tricky because no, No one really stood out as the worst driver of the day for me today. So just because I had to choose someone, I gave it to Magnuson, formerly known as Box Office.

Yeah. I'm stripping him of that title. I feel he could have done more today. I don't know. I was just... I find myself missing the Box Office Magnuson of old. There's just... I want a bit more...

Give me a bit more entertainment. Maybe I'm just relying on him in a boring race to bring a... bit of bring a bit of fire and we were a fire free zone now just a bit for a bit of insight to those listening along so you you actually listened to the podcast a bit more in our earlier days not because we were good then and we're not good anymore no just because i fancied you yeah fine um you know it was you did so because you had more reason to with like driving and the like um And that was probably more in the box office days, right? Yeah, definitely.

So just for a bit of extra context, when Ben and I first stayed seeing each other, I was not into F1 at all whatsoever, like at all whatsoever. And that's no longer the case, which is entirely Ben's fault. But when, yeah, in the early days of our relationship, I was listening to the podcast and watching the content, like I say largely because I fancied Ben, I didn't really have any interest in F1. You've lost the people like that. I've learned a lot since then.

But in those days, that was when box office was worthy of the name, causing a lot of problems. You know, often cited as the most dangerous driver on the grid. I'm not saying we want dangerous drivers on the grid, because obviously we don't. But, I mean, you couldn't deny he was entertainment. Yeah, yeah. But it's just something we've actually brought up quite a few times this year.

He's actually a lot less box office this year. Yeah, he's calms down a lot. For good, mostly. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, it's nice. to see a driver come back and to come back maybe with a bit more maturity, a bit more wisdom. But I think, I don't know,

I just wanted a bit more excitement today, Ben. Yeah, I think we all did. Monza did not deliver today. Worst driver of the day for me would have actually been Magnuson if Nicholas Latifi didn't exist. But unfortunately, for Latifi, he does exist. So you can't allow your teammate to get points on debut and not score any or even get close to any yourself.

That's dodgy. Yeah, I mean, it was obviously started in a pretty good position, thanks to all the penalties and whatnot, but it took a quick tumble. It was sad to see. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know.

I don't know. Do you have a moment of the race? And as you've already said, there might be less to choose from versus normal. So you know what, guys, I've been looking forward to doing this podcast all week because it was Monza. Monza is exciting

Monza is a temple of speed Monza gives us moments like Ghazley winning like super crashes, cars ending up on another you know it's an exciting race track and I was just I had there I was sat there with my notebook

and my pen watching intently ready to list all these exciting moments that I would choose from I managed three and I feel like I was scraping the barrel it was gonna go to Ricardo's retirement

for providing a bit of end-of-the-race excitement until we had to finish under a safety car, which is never exciting at all whatsoever. So that one's out. The previously mentioned Schumacher overtake on Latifie, I did enjoy that. Thank you, Mick Schumacher, for that moment of interest. I do appreciate you.

I think I'm going to go for the moment when Norris came out of the pits. Yeah. There was the overtake with Gassley. Hamilton comes in, overtakes them both. It's a good shout at that. I enjoyed that.

enjoyed that moment, I want to have a quick minute to chide Croftie. Oh no. This is usually my job. Well, sorry, I'm stealing it today. Because when Hamilton took that move, which was a good move, Crofty then dared to suggest that because of his age, he maybe shouldn't have done it, that maybe the younger drivers who were more alert shouldn't have let him do that, that maybe, you know, they could have caught him napping.

I'm almost exactly the same major's Hamilton there's literally 48 hours between our ages so obviously I'm going to pick up this on his behalf we're not that old guys we're not past it even in F1 terms you know Hamilton is a seven time world champion he may not be in the fastest car this year

but that does not mean he's no longer one of the best drivers on the grid he almost got an eighth world championship last year let's not forget he was very close and he's still had some good drives this year. He has not lost it. He's not over the hill just because he is 37, Crofty.

Standing down off soapbox now. Can you understand why we're together? My moment of the race, and to be honest, my moment of the race is almost exclusively Ferrari Pit Radio, over the radio, like Team Radio, every time. Yeah. And today is no different.

because I absolutely love all of the strategy decisions that Ferrari make because, you know, fantastic content all round. But, you know, generally they go crazy with their letters like plan A, plan X. Do you want to do plan Z, then plan Q? Exactly. Like, it's all over the place. But they took it to a new level, like they evolved today. They took it to a new level.

They've started giving letters to other team strategies. They gave a letter to Red Bull strategy. That's like next level thinking. So I had a good chuckle about that. That was quite funny. I've been developing a theory today. Go on. I think there is a spy somewhere between Red Bull and Ferrari.

I'm developing this theory. I will keep you posted. I think there's a spy somewhere between those two teams. A spy between two top teams? That's never happened before. Stepney. Let's get into some submissions. Go over to the sound.

This is the soundboard, by the way. Oh, it looks beautiful. I like how powerful it is. I've uploaded all of the submissions here. Some of them are rubbish because, you know, I'm kidding, they're not rubbish. They're all great. We just have to choose for time reasons.

And there are some funny names that will come up. But we do enjoy a funny name, don't you? Yeah, we do. Currently loving Splunk, by the way. Thank you, McLaren, for that one. Yes, good word. Good word. All right.

Let's go to Norm from Texas first. Can you guess where Norm's from? Wrighton. No, he's from Arkansas. No, he's from Texas. All right. So the volume up. Here we go.

Honestly, it sends me for a bag of chips. Every week does this soundboard. But I want to hear none from Texas. I know. It's not going to happen. I'll tell you, it's probably because I took the headphones out. You know what I'm going to do? What are you going to do, Ben?

I'm going to stop recording here. Yeah. Right. We're going to reload it. Okay. And then it's going to work. Okay. Okay.

Yep. Okay, so I definitely haven't been sat here the last like 15 minutes trying to work out why the soundboard wasn't working. This is our first attempt at getting this right. Very first attempt. Yep. No doubt about that whatsoever. We are going to go to Norm from Texas, who is indeed from Brighton and Arkansas. And Arkansas.

Yeah. See who he thinks is driver of the day. Norm from Texas here and figure I'd give mine driver of the day and worst driver of the day. Driver of the day goes to Nick DeVries in a Williams. Who would have guessed that?

But hey, worst driver of the day has to go to Kevin Magnuson. What are you doing, bro? What? What? Anyway, love you all. Keep breaking light. See all the next race. Bye.

Complete agreement with you. Yeah, absolutely. Well done. I'm from Texas. You're clearly a highly intelligent chap. We appreciate it. Very good. Speaking about having the podcast now, are you? We do actually appreciate it. A great guy. Let's go on to Joy. Hey, Ben. Hey, random person that I don't know just yet.

I know I'm going to sound like a broken record, but Nick DeVries drove an amazing race. He was even voted driver of the day. You can't go wrong with that. Obviously, worst driver of the day has to go to Latifia. I mean, didn't even match his teammate. This was his teammate's first run. He scored points. Like, dude, he's going to take your seat.

Just accept it. Complete agreement with you this time. Yeah. I don't know. I just like, I love how it's the acceptance stage of grief. Like, it's already there. That's where we're at. Yeah, wow.

Let's go to Callie. Callie regularly puts in submissions to us. This can be anything, quite frankly. Okay. How's it going? It's your guy, Callie. Coming back at you again. I was really good forward to this race,

and the end of that race really bummed me out. But best driver of the day, got to give it a science. Coming from P18 and P4, it was a great race for them, cutting through the field. Worst driver of the day, I'm sticking tired of it.

McLaren's stupid strategies. They're putting Macardo on the worst strategies possible to make Lando finish in front of him, and then they ask him to help out Landau's written the race. I'm just sick and tired of it. I'm done with, I'm done with McLaren for a while.

I like the passion there. There was a strong feeling. Yeah. I will say this. I think McLaren have got away with a lot this season because of how bad Ferrari have been strategically. Yeah. Because they have got a lot of the same things wrong that Ferrari have got,

but it's just less noticed. Does Callie feel about McLaren's strategists, the way you feel about Ferrari strategists? It's probably correct, yes. Yeah. I mean, I do have to say, I think Norris was just generally quicker than Ricardo. I know might not like the strategy on it, but Ricardo was basically being Yarno Trilly in the Trilly train for the majority of this race. So I don't know.

But, yeah, I can understand the hatred towards McLaren at the moment. This is a good name. You ready for this name? I'm so ready. Give me. Choco drizzle. I like that. You're a big.

Chocolate fan as well. And I love the rain, so I appreciate that on two counts. Is this actually you? Let's listen. The fellow's chocolate drizzle from Texas here. My driver of the day has got to be Alex Albon for taking the day off to give Nick Debris his chance to get Latifie out of there. Worst driver of the day has got to be Latifie. He got dunked on by someone doing their first Grand Prix in Formula One. you all have a good one. All right, so it's just a fair point, you know, Albon,

did selflessly go into surgery today just so that Nick could get in that drive? I didn't know quite where it was going with the Alex Albin's suggestion, but I can't disagree with it, you know? Yeah. I understand it. Let's go to not Katrina May. Okay, so this isn't Katrina May. Not Katrina. It could be anyone, but it's not Katrina May with you.

And this definitely won't be biased towards Daniel Ricardo at all. Okay. Morning fellas, it is 20 past midnight in Australia. I'm about to pass out. But driver of the day and worst driver of the day. Driver of the day is Nick DeVries because of course it is. He gets two points on his F1 debut after only being in the car for two sessions before the race, including qualifying. Obviously, driver of the day, go to race, write him really highly. Comparatively, worst driver of the day is Nicholas Latifie.

got outqualified by his teammate who'd been in the car for two sessions. He also got beat by a driver who was in the car for two sessions. I'm sorry, Latifie, I know you're the goat, but if you're in F1 next year, I'm, I don't know. I don't know what that threat was going to be at the end there. And I mean, not Katrina May usually stands up for Daniel Ricardo and didn't today. I mean, that shows how strongly not Katrina May must feel about this. whole Nick v. Nick situation. That's fair.

And thanks for staying up late. Yeah. You know, as someone who needs a lot of sleep, I appreciate the, you know, the hard work that can be. Hope you're sleeping well. Sonic F1. A Late Breakers, Sonic F1 here from Colorado, USA. Coming in with my driver of the day.

We're going to go with Nick DeVries, hopping into the Williams seat at the very last minute, killing it. P9 the point. My worst driver of the day is going to have to be the FIA. They just can't seem to get the safety car things right.

I don't understand it. I'm sensing a theme on the driver of the day front. It's hard to argue, I understand that in terms of driver of the day. I'm actually surprised that's the first call for the FIA. It was worst driver of the day. Because I know a lot of people weren't happy with how that race finished.

Yeah. Got a few more to go. Let's go. Let's go into Card Jam next. Hey, y'all for my submission, I'm going to try to make it quick. For driver of the day, I'm going to have to split it up with signs because he absolutely deserves it. He drove the wheels off that car. I think if there's no flag, he catches Russell for P3.

And I don't know to say his name. DeVries, DeVries, DeVuie, one of those. He drove great. He obviously deserves it. Worst drive a day on the same coin. Latifie. Man, it's time for him to leave because there's a gun slinger coming through.

Poo-poo! Yeah, it's a good point in terms of signs Russell, because I think that's one of the things that we were robbed of in terms of the end was would he have caught him, would he have passed him? We would have had a much more interesting end, less predictable, yeah. Because, I don't know, shaping up, that could have been last lap.

Yeah, we could have had a last lap battle. And we love a last lap battle. We do. So the next submission, so there's someone called Skylar, right? So Skylar is like my worst enemy. Oh. Right. So she's my nemesis, basically.

So whenever I put anything in our Discord chat, usually relating to polls, I'll either put option A or option B for people to choose. Skylar will always custom choose option C. And then everyone joins her in voting for it. Basically, she just exists to annoy me. Okay, more so than Ferrari strategists? More so. Whoa.

Strong words. By the way, Skyla is like 13. So I'm basically at war with a teenager here. Okay. That puts you in a very good light. Exactly. Usually, Skyler's submissions are like five seconds long. She doesn't waste words straight to the point.

This one's 10 seconds long, which I think is a new record for Skyny. So I don't know. This could be very in depth. So at first I was going to say Ferrari is my driver of the day because they didn't screw up. Then I remember DeVries got ninth. He's my driver of the day. Yeah, fair enough. Yeah.

I mean, you know, we've already touched on Ferrari screwed up less today than they normally do. Yeah. Yeah. Let's go on to Lucy next. This is a first time submission. So thank you for coming in with this one. Lucy coming to you from hot and humid South Florida My driver of the day is Nick DeVries

First time out getting in the points Worst driver of the day Goes to Latifie Dude you literally just lost your seat I feel like I'm gonna need to go and give Latifia A ginger biscuit and a cup of tea Maybe like wrap him in a blanket after this I mean you know I get it

but I'm a sensitive soul. Yeah, I know. I don't quite him on the head at this point. Just, you know, tell him everything's going to be okay. It probably isn't, but, you know, I want to tell him that anyway. That's that. I really like him. That's it. This is the thing, isn't it?

He's a really nice guy. It just didn't happen, though, is it? No. Last submission. So this is from someone, her name's Beth, but she's very rarely gets called Beth on this podcast. It's usually beef or brefling. Brexit beef because she basically hates anyone that isn't British.

Okay. That's not actually true, but it winds are up. But she's also had other nicknames. She was helter-skelter beef because she was at Alton Towers last week. She's been Vomi beef. There's been a lot of nick – I can't remember them all. Does she have more nicknames than Chocolate LeClaude does? It might be close, actually.

That's impressive. Anyway, and I guarantee you she'll kick off with it. she'll go. Hello. Looking forward to it. Ready. Hello. Driver of the day is Nick to phrase.

He didn't just get one point. My man got two points. If he's not in the William seat next year, I'm going to fight yoss. What's drive for the day? Where's Maglinson at the moment? Like he's a ghost. Let's give it to him. Yeah, I mean, I agree with the views there.

Yeah. There are selections as spawn. Yeah. And I'm looking forward to Brexit beef versus Yoss Capito. I think that should be televised. Yes. It's only because Yoss isn't British. That's the only reason.

Okay. I'll probably leave you with that image. Thank you very much for joining me on Drive-R-Ber-Ber-D-You're very welcome. Thank you for having me. I'm sure the listeners would have gladly listened to you more than me. So they're probably quite happy about this. but yeah, I'll be back after this short break because I've got something to say on qualifying

and I need somewhere to vent it basically. See it a bit. And so that was going to be the end of the podcast for this week. What is undoubtedly the strangest podcast we've done in a very long time. But I couldn't leave without venting about something. Ferrari, as much as they didn't win the race, ultimately they just weren't quick enough, I think. I don't actually want to go after their strategy team today,

which is the first time in about four races. And it leaves me a bit empty. Like, well, I need to rant about something, right? Otherwise, what's the point in my existence? And there is something, fortunately, that I do need to get off my chest. And it's not even something that transpired today. It's something that transpired yesterday in qualifying, because it was an utter shambles

of a session. And I'm quite angry about this because I love qualifying. And I love qualifying in its current format. You know my opinion on sprint races and sprint qualifying and how I think it's a complete waste of time. And I like anything that takes the argument away from sprint races. And generally, the number one argument for my side in terms of not wanting sprint races is how great qualifying usually is. It's usually brilliant. Three, sessions of go out there, do everything you can set the fastest lap. It's really simple as a concept and it works. And it does mean that if you make errors early on in the session, generally you've only got one or two attempts to nail a lap and if you don't do it,

you're out. That's how it works. Unfortunately, yesterday's qualifying session was at least somewhat impacted by the ridiculousness of the penalty situation. We saw something similar from SPAR two weeks ago. We're getting to the point of the season where it's becoming tough on component parts and using them all up and, you know, reliability throughout the year. There have been some issues and there comes a point where you need to start taking extra ones that are not in your overall allotment. And that comes with a penalty in the form of grid positions. And it makes way more sense to use them. firstly at racetracks where it's easier to overtake so you don't want to use them at monaco or

zanvort that's why we didn't see many last weekend and secondly you like to use them where other teams are also using them so it becomes a bit of a domino effect where if you know four drivers are already taking penalties it might make sense for you to take yours as well because you could start ahead of all of those and we saw that at the weekend you know we've got people being sent to the back of the grid in quotation marks, but actually not being sent to the back of the grid because there are already drivers there, right? So it makes sense from the constructors' point of view to take them on tracks like Monza and when they pile up, it makes sense to almost join the crew. And it was essentially a 50-50 split between drivers who did and did not have a penalty.

I think it was 11-9 in the favour of those who didn't in the end. We saw Landstrol. I think he was the slowest driver who started without a penalty and he almost made the top 10. So there's something not quite right here. I think it's utterly ridiculous how we get into this situation because we are at an important point in Formula One's history where it is growing rapidly. And I mentioned this earlier on in the podcast on a different point. The foundations that are set now are vital because they will set what is coming in the next decade. It will keep growing as a sport. Already a fantastic job has been done in the States and elsewhere all around the world

in growing this sport in terms of popularity. That will continue. And we need to make it as accessible as possible for everyone who wants to come into Formula One. There are some parts of F1 that you can't get around are technically complex. and I'm not saying we should take away from that. But cordon it off, be appropriate, common sense here. There are some parts of F1 that are technical and will stay that way forever and will only be understood by those that want to dive deep into the area.

Fine. But from a pure sporting perspective, we need to do everything we can to make sure it's accessible. And not knowing your own grid, five minutes, let alone five hours after the session is finished. It's utterly ridiculous. It should be very clear. The rulebook is there. The FIA should be on top of their rule book enough to know exactly how the penalties are applied, in what order they're applied, and what that means for the grid. You can't have a situation where the media center, five minutes after the session is finished, you've got different people in there giving different grids because they've all got their own interpretations. Now, a few of them ended up being wrong,

but you can't blame them for it because the FIA didn't know what was right. or wrong until hours after the session was complete. How can you possibly end up in that sort of scenario? You want to tune into a session from an entertainment point of view and know that what a driver is going for is what they end up going to get, right? That's what you want to see. And what we saw was almost like a dead rubber situation because everyone knew exactly what the result was going to be, regardless of who actually got pole on the day, where you've got essentially four drivers fighting for pole in Perez, Vastappen, Science and Leclair, and you know three of them have got penalties.

There was really little doubt that LeCler was going to get the job done and get Paul. And there wasn't really any chance of a surprise from Mercedes or McLaren or otherwise. Lecler had Paul sewn up from the moment he entered Q3. That's not entertainment. We don't want to go into a session knowing what the end result is going to be. it just took all of the excitement away. And we need to find a way to figure this out. And a lot of people are suggesting that this is almost a penalty shootout scenario

in that people are almost unified, or a lot of people are unified, that penalty shootouts in football aren't great. But is there a better alternative? If there was, one would have been presented and we'd be using it. That's the argument a lot of people are making. Is it great? No, but what else are you going to do? What else is going to be better than that? And I've seen a few alternative solutions thrown around. Constructors' points being docked for one.

I don't agree with that as a solution personally because I'm always of the belief that the constructor and the driver wins and loses together. You know, if the team makes an error and you lose positions as a result of that, that affects your driver's championship. that affects your Constructors Championship. If a driver makes an error that affects the Constructors Championship just as much as it does the driver, it goes hand in hand. And I think that's what makes F1 a wonderful sport. And when you start to divide out those points

and you can say, you know, you lose a percentage of points based on if you take an extra power unit component, I think it gets, firstly, I think it gets complicated and we don't want to make it more complicated. And secondly, I think you start to distinguish between drivers and Constructors' Championship so that I don't think is necessary. I might be missing something here because I think the solution is actually really simple.

We never used to have these penalties a long time ago because essentially you could use unlimited amounts. Now what was the downside of that? There was a very clear downside. Firstly, if you were a rich team, you could just basically, you know, if you wanted to, you can have a brand new component every single weekend and wouldn't get penalized for it. The only penalty would be the cost. But because you've got all of the, that all of that value as a team, all of that money to spend versus some of the smaller teams, it wouldn't matter. So, you know, that's why it didn't exactly work beforehand. The rich teams got richer essentially and it benefited them. And also, I mean, from a pure environmental and cost standpoint, you know, it wasn't great in that you just had unlimited use. So I understand

why this rule was implemented and why the old system wasn't working. But have we not already got a solution in place. I feel like I'm going a bit mad on this because correct me off I'm wrong, we've got a budget cap, right? And we've got, whilst it's a bit murky as to what they are, we've got penalties for if teams go over that budget cap. So if you're having to overspend on the amount of power unit components you use, surely that has an impact on your budget cap. And if that then sees you go over the budget cap, you are therefore penalised in the way. way that it is already somewhat outlined. We didn't have the budget cap before. So these rich teams could essentially keep buying and buying and buying with no penalty. If they do that now, they'll go over

the budget cap and they'll be penalized for it. What am I missing? You know, the budget cap, that's the whole reason it's there is that you have to, it's a pie chart, right? You have to assign a certain percentage to all of the departments included in this budget cap. And it doesn't include drivers and there are some other exemptions but you've got a very clear list as to what falls under that 145 million cap so surely if you're overspending on that you're then penalised and that's the penalty i would unless i'm really missing something yet and the system just isn't working that is enough and you you get rid of all these grid penalties i please let me know if there is something I'm missing in our Discord or Twitter or otherwise.

But I feel like we've got a ready made simple solution for people to follow that's already in front of us. But regardless of what you think about that solution, I think it is somewhat unanimous that this can't happen. This can't happen where qualifying, which is very often the most exciting session on a weekend, particularly at Monza, it can't be a given as to what the result will be when the session happens. It needs to be a frilling dash for the line, as it usually is when penalties aren't included, and anything we can do to get that to be far more likely is good with me. And with that, ladies and chants, I'm going to call it a day. We will at least be somewhat back to normal for our next episode,

which will happen midweek. It will be myself and Harry. and then Sam will be back the podcast after that. We'll be back as a trio and normality will resume. But as disjointed us today was Harry and Monza, who obviously joined us for this first segment today, Sam enjoying himself on the west coast of the US and myself here in a pretty dismal Cornwall.

We were desperate to still put on an episode for you. because it's what we absolutely love to do. So if you haven't enjoyed as much as you normally do, I'm very sorry, we tried our best. But if you did enjoy at least somewhat, thank you very much for listening. And as stated, normality will resume midweek. You can follow us on Twitter at our breaking.

We're on Instagram. At Lay Breaking podcast, maybe. I don't know, give it a search. Someone will come up. Discord. That will be in the description. fortunately for everyone i'm still not editing the podcast that will still be harry so you know should still be okay on that front um we've got merch we've got patreon you know the usual stuff sam

says i can't be bothered to say it all quite frankly i've gone on long enough and i'm starting lose my voice so there you go keep breaking late cast is part of the sport social podcast network