The Late Braking F1 Podcast - 2024 Austrian GP Sprint & Qualifying Review

Episode Date: June 29, 2024

The duo of Sam and Ben are on hand to discuss a duo of sessions in Austria! First they tackle an entertaining battle for the lead in the Sprint, followed by a look at the second qualifying session of the weekend featuring a mega lap for pole position. LONDON LIVE SHOW! Join us as we preview the British GP live in London on 2 July, full event info + tickets HERE FOLLOW us on socials! You can find us on YouTube, Instagram, X (Twitter) and TikTok SUPPORT our Patreon for bonus episodes, historic race reviews & more! JOIN our Discord community JOIN our F1 Fantasy League: SIGN UP & create your team, and JOIN our league (join code: C3PHEQHPU04) BUY our Merch SEND us something! We have a brand new PO box - address: Late Braking Podcast, PO Box 821, TRURO TR1 9PE EMAIL us at [e-mail] & 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 check out new episodes every Wednesday and every Sunday. And a very warm welcome to the late breaking F1 podcast presented by Sam Sage and me, Ben Hocking. Today we are reviewing two sessions, the sprint that happened this morning at Austria and then qualifying this afternoon, both of which were won by Max Verstappen. I hate to do it this early on, but your bold prediction is in the mud, along with mine. I'm sorry, it's all right, because it's not just mine that's gone already.

But, yeah, I mean, I should have predicted that Max of Staffen would lead absolutely everything across the entire weekend and go the total other way. But I had to try and be bold with it, and I'm wrong already. At least it's kind of like ripping the Band-Aid off early. At least I haven't got to wait till tomorrow and almost be right. Like, you have been so many times. Yeah, and I've decided I'm just going to make bold predictions that are about qualifying, so I can watch the race in peace. Not that there's anything on the line for these anyway.

But we'll do things in chronological order as we usually do on these Sprint Saturday sessions. So we'll look at the sprint this morning. And then in the second half of the episode, we'll have a look at the qualifying session that's just happened as we're recording this. So the sprint this morning, Max Verstappen was starting on poll, but he was challenged early doors by Lando Norris. It took a re-overtaking of Max Verstappen to eventually get by Lando Norris. and then go on to take the race win. But of course, Oscar Piastri found a way past Lando Norris

in all of that melee, meaning that Piastri was second overall, four and a half seconds back, and Norris rounded out the podium in third. I guess with the sprint, that was certainly the main event was the battle between the two McLarence and Vastappan. How did you see that?

Is it a disappointment from Lando Norris's side that he's walked away with just third here? Yeah, he'll be disappointed. I mean, he is disappointed. He came out in his interview afterwards and said he was disappointed. He said it was such an amateur. mistake that he made leaving that door wide open when going for a move like that and when he let

you know a multiple-time world champion back down the inside of such an obvious overtaking area he should have covered that off so hard he should have been really ruthless with himself and it was very interesting to watch the almost the transformation of pace throughout that sprint race it looked like max got away initially and then d rs kicked in and mcclaren suddenly cruised right up to the back of max for staff and showing you just how powerful dRS could be around here And Norris really, really puncty, looked like he was really strong, much stronger than Piastri

in the early stages of that Grand Prix. And then, of course, the move happened. And the move went from being an offensive move for Norris into being a defensive move for Norris having to defend from his teammate Piastri, who absolutely sent it around the outsides of, I think it's turn of five, as he came up through the gravel trap

with that around the outside there. And it was such a great move from Oscar Piascri, really kind of taking advantage of a situation, really, you know, he was on the bubble the moment and opportunity to present it itself. And that's what you've got to do. That's what the best races do. They make it count. So he went from looking like he might win the sprint race, Landon Norris, to immediately

being behind his teammate. And after that, he dropped back, dropped back significantly. It's like the ties family were cooked. He was unable to keep up with his teammate. Piashtra was unable to keep up with the staff in the gap, as you make sure he goes out to four and a half seconds. But then right at the end, Norris looked like he found out of a little pace again, closing the gap. But overtaking seems harder than expecting.

around a track like Austria. You think with the heavy braking zone to turn three, the DRS that is allowing for the toe to be increased. I thought we see far more moves than we did. What do you think, Ben? I'm not overly surprised because I think sometimes with this Austrian track, because there are three DRS zones, you can get something of a DRS train going,

which certainly happened further back than the battle for the lead. There wasn't really a lot of changing of position at all from about position five downwards, Not that we'd know about it. The timing tower didn't exist for the majority of that Grand Prix. But there wasn't a lot of movement at all. So I'm not overly surprised in that respect. I think if a car such as Vestappen or another car in the midfield

can have good straight line speed, and we'll get onto that in a little bit, then you can, if you can find a way to use all of your battery to essentially stop any overtaking moves happening into those two heavy braking zones, it's going to be very difficult to get by. In terms of what happened out front, I think McLaren have proven that they're good in that first sector because even, I know Landon Norris's move up the inside happened, but even before that, he was threatening it. And even Piastri afterwards was threatening a little bit, that that was their best opportunity. They managed to close up to a couple attempts on a few occasions. But where Lando Norris says that his move was amateurish, Yeah, it was. I think it was massively disappointing from him. And I think Lando Norris has matured into the type of driver that is more often than not a nine out of ten. The problem is when Vestappan is

driving as good as what he is, even small mistakes will be absolutely punished. And that's what happened. He made the right calling going up the inside, I think, into that corner, into turn three, because that's the way you get Max Vastappen. You have to surprise him. It was a completely surprising move. He nailed it on the brakes. But why on earth he doesn't defend the inside line going into the next corner? It kind of baffles me because Vestappen's been around for a while. We know that he's not just going to go, well, I'm doing quite well in the championship. P2's not too bad here.

Only one point. I'll just settle him behind now. Of course he's going to go up the inside. At which point you do leave yourself open to the likes of Piastri coming up the inside of you. So I don't understand why he didn't go for the inside. inside. Even if Vostappan does, and I think he would have tried, to go around the outside, you've at least made him work for it. And I just didn't think his tactics were very good. And then obviously, yeah, it's cost him second place as well. Piaastri, I think Piaastri at this point

in his career has a certain amount of, as any driver does. He has a certain amount of, you know, good points and bad points. He's very good, though, wheel to wheel, I think. And he is very good. tactically in that sort of position. Piahtri knew exactly what was going to happen, and he just positioned his car perfectly to take advantage of that. Like he said afterwards, he was hoping that both positions might open itself up. And to be honest, it wasn't far off happening. So, yeah, I think Piastri played it well. But this is just another instance where Lando Norris is close, just not quite there yet. I said this on the live stream as well. Someone asked, you know, do you think that someone like Max or Oscar Indivicular are good enough to take it?

sorry, Oscar Orlando are good enough to take it to Max individually across the season. I think on a race by race basis, if they're absolutely on their A game, I think they could probably hang around with Max Verstappen, but across the entire season, the consistency of making that right call, being as quick as you can, delivering the same level of excellence that Max does every single race week and week out, was evidenced by that move from Landon Norris. The fact that he didn't shut the door down the inside,

the fact that he wasn't seemingly aware of how to deploy the rule set that if you're on the inside, you're the defending driver, and you're ahead at the apex, you've got every right to essentially squeeze out the driver trying to come around your outside. Because as much as we don't like it, that's how the rules are these days. You're allowed to do that however you want.

And he should have closed that door off immediately and he paid the price not just by not getting first place, but by losing out to his teammate for third. And I actually think Oscar Piazzii once again showed how little he gets flustered. He remained calm. He nearly took his front wing off on Max Verstappen at turn through when he did the switch back to align the ties up better

for a possible run into turn four. He picks up a move. Like you said, he thought he could get both. He got one. He held his nerve around the outside to get past his team, which is no main feat. So Piazsche has stepped up in that sprint race. I dig what I asked him to do. He's really started to deliver.

I think Mando will come away disappointed. Yes, indeed. 4th, 6th and 7th were the Mercedes and Ferrari drivers. So it was Russell in 4th, signs in 5th, Hamilton in 6th and LeCler in 7th. Have we reached a point, Sam, where Ferrari are legitimately the 4th? fourth fastest car. It's like their upgrades have done what RB's upgrades have done and sent them backwards.

It's very confusing, isn't it? Where Mercedes have had a little bit of a change. And I don't know if Mercedes have improved, or if six Ferrari have gathered their upgrades and started to apply them, they've somehow stepped backwards because those things seem to have come in tandem. They seem to have come as a pair.

Mercedes unlocked back in front wing and thought that they kind of, you know, we had the comments that came out of the team that said, we were really stupid, got to recognize these difficulties. and now they're seemingly taking these steps forward. Ferrari applied these new upgrades in Canada, came out and said, oh, that was a outlier, that's not how it's going to run. But since then, haven't really troubled the front of the grid at all. I've actually been fighting the who have been well off the pace for the whole of the season. So to see them too, essentially,

going at it almost like a team of four at this point, whether they can't run past each other particularly. You know, Russell ended up getting away from science despite having a bad start. Hamilton couldn't overtake science. The clerk got through the traffic initially to begin. in with couldn't get near Hamilton. So it was so interesting to see how each one of them essentially didn't have the pace to get past the other and maintain it. They're essentially driving the same car, which is if you're Ferrari, devastating. If you're Mercedes, that shows good progress.

Yeah, I think it's a combination of both in that, you know, Ferrari aren't as far forward as they'd like to be, but Mercedes have definitely made progress because, you know, George Russell, as soon as he was passed by Carlos signs, I was expecting. Yeah, they're close enough that that. will probably remain the same for the rest of this Grand Prix. And of course, Russell found a way to get by again. And it's not like Russell was able to make any impression on the three drivers in front of him. But equally, without that battle with signs, if you were to put them on a level playing field,

would Russell have been that far off the McLaren duo? Maybe not. I'm not too sure. It's not like it was a massive difference between them anyway. And then like you say, Hamilton is all over the back of Carlos Sines. and you are thinking at any moment, okay, Charles Leclair is going to come into this fight as well.

It makes sense that it will, and it never happened. Lecler was really struggling just to get DRS off of Hamilton in front of him, which I think goes to show that, yes, at least here, Ferrari do have the four fastest car, and it's becoming somewhat of a pattern over the last few Grand Prix.

Well, were you surprised that Hamilton could get past sites? Um, a touch, I guess. think the fact that Russell didn't really go off into the distance would have would have helped that. But we've seen all weekend long, really, that Russell is just a bit more comfortable with that car than Hamilton is. So of the two drivers, I'm not surprised it was Russell that was able to get by relatively comfortably. And whilst Hamilton was pressurizing, never really got that opportunity. So, yeah, a mild surprise, but I guess based on what we've seen so far this weekend, maybe not too much.

Yeah, Hamilton is definitely struggling this weekend. A couple of other things that happened in the sprint race. So a bit further down, Kevin Magnuson, he finished P9. Kevin, you don't get points for ninth in the sprint. You've done the wrong way around. What are you doing? Yeah, sorry about that. Yeah, Kevin Magnuson managed to finish in P9,

and actually in the end was quite comfortably ahead of Landstrol and the two Alpins. That's a good showing from him. he's like a really good weekend so far that you know the whole sprint section of this weekend for magneson might be it sounds horrible for him because he's going to get nothing for it but it might be the highlight of his season so far he was genuinely impressive in comparison to holkenberg in the qualifying session that we had on friday and in the race he was the next fastest car you had the top eight that were gone you know even sergey perris who had detached himself from the back of lecler and couldn't catch up to that lecler science hamilton russell battle um was miles ahead of Magnuson.

And honestly, in a hearse, I don't really expect him to be beating Perez of the Red Ball. But he was comfortably clear of everyone else. And if points were down to 10th place, he would thoroughly deserve a good handful of points because he really showed that actually, if track and car work well for him and he feels comfortable, Kevin Magnuson still got all it takes to pull out a really solid performance. Again, gutting for him, though, no points for 9th when it comes to a sprint race. Yeah. he did a very good job and I think he did somewhat benefit from Alpine shooting themselves in the foot

so both Ocon and Ghazli were back three positions on where they qualified early on in this Grand Prix and were stuck behind Landstrol for the entirety of this Grand Prix in the DRS of Stroll but unable to get by him I think in terms of true pace if they had been unleashed from Stroll it would have been quite close I think or unleashed is a kind word for Alpine well yes If the door has opened. Come on out here. Door creaks open. They might be like a sneak along. Yeah, exactly.

But yeah, I think they would have been competitive with Magnuson, but hey, I mean, that's why you get a good start. Yeah. You can't erase what you're up against. Yeah. He did a very good job. And it bodes well, unfortunately, not as much for him, but it bodes quite well for Holcomburg tomorrow in that that has seems very, very quick in the first sector. I think they've set it up basically that we're not going to be overtaking.

which I can respect is something that Hasse have done before with their setups. And it could just mean that Holkenberg, you know, tomorrow who is ninth and that best of the rest spot, as I think we can call it now, he might be able to keep positions ahead of the cars behind him just based on even with DRS. I think Stroll had a similar setup as well where it's just very difficult to get by a team that has focused so much on that first sector, including Hasse. So yeah, unlucky for Kevin Magnuson because he deserved points and doesn't get any. Yeah, and of course, we'll get on to qualifying in a minute, but Holgerberg out does him in the one session that really puts him in a contention for actual points when it comes to race day tomorrow, as we record this. I think if

Holgerberg maintains the strategy of keep inside the DRS of the cars in front of him for as long as seemingly possible to drag him along, as every chance that he will be able to separate himself from the cars behind, because the order behind him, of course, is a little bit more jumbled up than what it was for the sprint race qualifying. Yes. Last point in terms of the sprint race. So we saw that Sergio Perez finished in eighth, which is good for one point in a sprint race. But he was, I think about 17 seconds back from Vostappen's race winning time. And he himself was unable to get in that Mercedes and Ferrari battle. At least if we're comparing this sprint race to other sprint races that have happened so far this year. Of course, Vastappen's won all

of them. This was the furthest away that Perez has been time-wise from Vestappen at the flag, which is not the right way. No, no, quite the wrong way, actually. This was, dare I say, diabolically bad from Sergio Perez. And I think it would have been forgivable if he was right on the tale of Charlotte. I mean, he shouldn't be overtaken by Charlotte Clare in the first place, obviously. LeCleur starting behind him, ends up comfortably in front of him. And it would have been slightly more forgivable had he been right behind LeCleur, Hamilton, Science and Russell.

And we have seen evidence that actually it was a lot hard, to get by due to DRS trains and actually the car is just not that much better at the moment and so he can't get through. But that isn't the case. He was absolutely dropped by everyone that was in a competitive car in front of him. And I think he was maybe a little bit fortunate

that as we've already stated, Magnuson and Scroll were the two cars behind him because I think that Haas is good, it's got great. I think it's set up for qualifying and defensive workers we've already mentioned. And I think that Aston Martin doesn't know what it's doing with itself. So I think Perez was essentially only

in the last points paying position simply because there wasn't anyone else available to be in the last points paying position. So I think it looks bearable. But if they want to win this Constructors title, I think it's lucky that they had such a good start to this season because I think Sergio Perez is throwing it away for them at the moment. Yeah. It's a tough one for them again, because there are essentially three teams between Vostappan and Perez. And it's not like, we'll get onto qualifying again after the break, but the same thing happened in qualifying, where it's Vestappen, Maclaren, Mercedes, Ferrari, Perez. Like, that's the running order as it is at the moment.

And in terms of the sprint race, Vestappen's doing all Leekan claiming eight points for first, with the one point that Perez got, that's nine points for the team. McLaren got 13 between their two drivers for second and third. And even if you look at... And fastest lap? Yes, which doesn't matter for the sprint, does it?

Do they not get one for the spring? I don't think so. Oh, flipping hate the spring. But if you look at Mercedes, for example, they got eight points from fourth and sixth, which you wouldn't say as much of a standout achievement, but that's only one point fewer than Red Bull got. So it does matter, that second driver picking up the points.

And yeah, he, like you say, he couldn't close onto the back of that Ferrari and Mercedes battle. And he essentially had clean air the entire Grand Prix because he couldn't. So what we saw from him would have been his true pace. It's not like he was stuck behind in another car, not able to show what he can do. that what he can do is exactly what we saw,

which quite frankly just isn't anywhere near his teammate. Well, I mean, if you transfer those positions to the main Grand Prix, I think what, Red Ball end up with 29 points, and McLaren would walk away with 34 points if they pick up the fastest lap again. So, you know, overall, I've lost 10 points across the whole weekend. So someone like McLaren, you do that for the next 10 races, that 100-point gap they've got is no longer 100 points. It's down a pretty much zero.

Yes, indeed. We'll take our break on this episode. We're going to be looking at qualifying after this. Welcome back, everyone. Moving on to the session that we've just had as we're recording this. Now, Max Verstappen, after taking the sprint win earlier today, has claimed the double, the Saturday double, because he's got pole position again ahead of Lando Norris.

No change there in terms of the front of the grid. But one big change is the gap that's separating them. Shees! Yesterday, it was just under a tenth, separating for Stappan and Norris. Today, Sam, he has dunked four tents on him. And again, to be clear, Norris is the closest anyone got. Yeah, four tents. Around Austria, someone worked out in chat that one second of this lap would be 0.9% overall.

So he is 0.5% clear of the next driver, which is pretty crazy in terms of the difference in Formula 1, in terms of time differences there. I think obviously, so they're allowed to break part firmate. That's the right word for it. Essentially, they can change their setups after the sprint race. And I think Max has gone away, make some alterations, and he's gone, right, I've essentially had my practice runs here. I know how I want the car to feel now.

Let's make these alterations. And boy, they'd be working. They know what they doing, because to move from having a gap that was under a 10th, which is a very respectable gap for two people around somewhere like Austria, to nearly half a second is just Magnus. It's so impressive. I cannot keep coming up with these complimentary words for him, but that is so impressive that your teammate can't get into the top six,

but you're half a second almost clear of someone like Lando Norris. I mean, Peres was almost a second behind. Almost a second behind his teammate. It's atrocious. So I'm blown away by just how good Maxwell Staffen was. we saw at the beginning of this season Max Verstappen was picking up every single poll position. He picked up the first

however many it was. Seven, I think. Something like that, yeah. But the last couple obviously have changed about a bit. So Landon Norris had the poll last time out in Barcelona, Russell had the pole in Canada. We had LeCler getting pole in Monaco. So it's actually been a little bit of a while

since he's been on pole. I could be wrong on this. I don't remember any qualifying lap that he's had so far this year where he's had over four tenths of a second clear to second place, which when you consider, again, we are talking about 64 second laps here, not 90 second laps as we get at some other circuits. That is ridiculously impressive. And I think you're right in that they've clearly made some progress day to day because I was going back and looking at the SQ three times from yesterday to see where is this difference that's emerged.

Lando Norris has essentially set exactly the same lap day to day, 104-7. I think there was about half a half a tenth. That's all that separated his best time yesterday versus his best time today. So that difference is all Vastappan. He's found three and a half tenths from yesterday to today, which is, first thing, I guess you can say quite impressive from McLaren's perspective in that they pretty much found their max very early on in this weekend. But it's very impressive from Vastappen and Red Bull that they've managed to extract even more from that car overnight or at least after the sprint. So, yeah, that is one of the...

And the thing is, he didn't even need the second lap. His... Sorry, his Q2 lap time was good enough for pole. His Q2... And not even close either. He's, I think his Q2 lap time was like 104, 5 or something like that. That would have gotten him on pole by not far off two temps. That, which, again, around Austria, that would be a pretty impressive margin.

So we've had a qualifying session here where Vestappen has done no fewer than three laps that were good enough for poll. Pretty damn good. I mean, Martin Brando over Sky Coms, he said, go on. Before he did he dig his fastest run, the last run,

he said, go on, Max, get your deck chair out, put your feet up, have a can of Red Bull. Just let everyone else have a go. Let everyone, he could have done it. He'd still be walking away

on pole position, sipping a lovely cold drink. So, yeah, we are, and again, we really glaze over. Same with things like Hulkaber getting into Q3, right, which has happened again,

which we'll get onto. But you are witnessing history, you are witnessing greatness. Max Verstappen is one of those. drivers that you will talk about for years to come. It's performances like these that we will go back to and go, bloody hell, how has he done that? And it needs to be recognised because it was sublime.

Behind him, it was looking like we were going to get a very similar, if not an identical grid to the sprint. It was spot on for a while. It was. So it was looking like it would be Norris and second, followed by Piastri, and then we get into the Merck's and the Ferraris. But Oscar Piastri, similar to what happened in Barcelona, a track limits violation on his fastest lap means that he drops all the way back from third

down to seventh place. Given the pace he had, he finished second obviously in the sprint. He's going to have to work a bit more to get back up there. I've watched the replay of Oscar Piastri supposedly running wide. And boy, that be a very close track violation. If he has indeed, I think McLaren might protest this. I think they might try and submit evidence to show that he didn't run wide. because it was not clear.

I don't think it was clear. I've watched multiple replays. I've asked people already, and they've stated that they don't think it was a particularly large track limit violation, if I'm at all. So I'm very curious to see if McLaren do anything about it or they just accept it,

because even the commentary team were unsure if it was actually a track limits violation, which is interesting to hear that it was such a big dispute on that. So Piastri, if he has, I mean, we'll run with the facts. For now, he's lost his lap. This is now two in a row from Oscar Piascrii.

and I put him under pressure, and for the first half of the weekend, he absolutely delivered. You know, qualifies right behind his teammate, beats his teammate in the race. Great. That's all you can ask for, and well down from Oscar.

And here, he looked like he was absolutely on the pace again. He was going to qualify right behind his teammate, and that would allow McLaren to have that two, three, Pinsor movement, deploy the strategy, potentially get past Max for staffing if they could do it nice and early. You never have to start, might be different. DRS might play out differently. The track conditions tomorrow might suddenly change.

You never know what might happen. We might get a complete. different racing. McLaren having two cars right out there at the front is a huge advantage. But this puts him back in seventh. And we've already seen from the likes of Russell trying to get past science, from Hamilton trying to get past science, from the Clur trying to catch up, Perez as well. Overtaking is not the order of the day at Austria. It is not a simple task. So even though Piastri has got the car under him, he's got the performance. He has got the pace. It's not going to be easy, I think, to find himself moving up. I think he could make some moves.

I think strategically, if they're clever, he could get past, I think at least one of the Merks and one of the Ferraris. The car is capable. I think he's capable. But he's making it so much harder for himself. He will have got that position anyway, even if he didn't push that corner. So it feels like a silly mistake to make. And this is where we're seeing that young, raw talent that hasn't been fully harnessed. It hasn't got that consistency to it at the moment. And this is the mistakes that Piastrian needs to eke out of his game to make sure he really is a true asset to a race team. because currently he's going to cost his team points. And McLaren don't need that. They need to get onto the back of Ferrari

in the Constructors' Championship and try and work their way back up. So a bit of a tough order for him. Let's see if you can actually make some moves. Yeah, it will be difficult for him. Strategically, I'm not sure how much they're going to be able to do just based on if it does end up being a one-stop. That really does limit the amount of things you can do.

It's not like on the medium tires in the sprint race, a third of a grand prix, obviously, didn't look like they were really struggling all that much. So I'm not sure how much he's going to be able to do. Like you say, there is a chance for him to get by one of the Merks, maybe one of the Ferraris, but he's going to have to work for it. In terms of the lap itself, it is, like you say, on board, there didn't look to be anything in it.

I have seen a few different angles of it. I think it is off. I think it's the most marginal call you can, make, but similar to any other sport, doesn't matter. Does not matter. A line is a line. It is. And that's how it would work in any other sport.

It's how it should work here as well. I know Oscar Piaastri is Bruno fuming about it. And he thinks that it should be allowed. I disagree with him on that. I think it's the rule is very clearly there. And it is marginal. It's not like he gained a lot of time by being there, but you have to be black and white with it, I think.

So yeah, it is disappointing for him. It's a very similar situation to Barcelona. I'm not sure what a good result will look like, but even if he does, you know, even in a best case scenario, let's say he gets back up to third, he's going to find it very difficult to go any higher than that because of the amount of time he'd have to lose to get by the cars in front of him. I think he's got a hope for a safety car. Yeah, I think it will take some, or a great start, obviously. But yeah, he'll be disappointed with that. Another car that struggled quite a lot on his last lap was Shao LeClaire, who went for a rather bumpy ride. And as a result of that, even though it's an improvement on where he qualified for the sprint, he'll be just sixth place behind his

teammate and both Mercedes. For such a great qualifier, it's been a tough weekend for him. Oh, he's absolutely bottled it. Absolutely bottled that. I think he's doing what old Charles LeClaire used to do. We pulled him up on this. He's overdriving the car. He's getting frustrated, the car is losing performance. It's not able to fight up there where it was a few races ago, where, of course, he won Monaco and Science won Australia. I think what LeCleur does is he goes, well, I'll have to overcompensate then.

If the car can't do it, I'll do it. And I think this is when mistakes come out with Charles Lecler's game. And that's what we're seeing it. In a track where the finest of skill gives you the biggest of margins showcasing a prime example of Max Verstappen taking pole by that level, he is trying to ekewk out of that car. And by doing so, he's not driving smoothly. He's over kind of rushing the car through calls.

It's causing it to snap on him, causing it to run wide. Has he had track limits applied to him? Because he should have done. He definitely ran outside the track limit session. That wasn't his, wasn't his fastest run, was it? No, because of how wide he went to have done. But I think he would have been, yes. Yeah.

I think so. My point here is, he's letting himself down because I think he's getting emotional behind the wheel. I think he gets frustrated. He gets wound up and he's not able to deliver. liver the overall performance that he's able to do. Whereas Carlos Sainz, who has been, you know, kind of missing consistent so far this weekend, not set in the world a light, but he's been right up there with Mercedes. He's been right up there pushing. He starts P4, because of Pastery's relegation

down to P7. If he gets a good start, gets in front of Russell again, it could be opposing for Ferrari, because he's getting the lapsing. He's being consistent. He's being a safe pair of hands. And Lecler, I think, is overstepping the mark a little bit. Yeah. And the thing is with Carlos Sines himself is a good qualified. Don't get going to be wrong, but we have seen Charles LeClair more often than not get the better of signs on a Saturday.

If he out-qualifies Carlos Sines by just 0.0.0.1.2 of a second, which is definitely within his capability to do, that's third on the grid. Because Sines was right behind George Russell. So if he just out-qualifies Sines and Russell by a little bit, that that's good enough for third, which, you know, the difference between six and third

could be massive at a circuit where like we mentioned earlier, it's maybe not as easy to overtake as you think it might be. And now he's going to be essentially in the same spot that he was in the sprint race, where he's on the back of this group of three. And at least in terms of the race, but I'm not sure what adjustments they would have made between the sprint and qualifying. But if it's a similar story, he's going to find it really difficult to get any overtakes done from there.

So, yeah, he'll be naturally disappointed because he's always searching for the best possible lap. He is known as a qualifying expert, and that's not what we saw from him today. No, very harsh on himself with Charlotte Clare. So we'll see how he bounces back. Indeed. A little bit further down, let's have a look at Aston Martin, because it's not like they were set in the world of light.

But equally, Landstrol was arguably a good corner away from making it to Q3 yesterday in spring qualifying. Today, he's knocked out in Q1. and this isn't a stroll dig because Alonzo squeaks into Q2 and then is the slowest driver in Q2

to start 15th and as the commentary team were debating or mentioning they might now be the eighth fastest team on the grid it's just quite dire

again isn't it? God, the demise of Aston Martin begs to be studied at the moment because to see them drop from having regular podium you brought up

those brilliant stats about how I long so kickstarting these 2023 campaign last year, you know, never outside the top 10, multiple podiums, and nearly one in Monaco, to go to now this, where they're essentially going to be 15th and 16th. It looks like they're more regularly than not both being knocked out in Q1 or threatening to be anyway. The fact that the only cars that seem to be actually slower than them is salver guaranteed,

and then one other car maybe, like, you know, one of the Williams got in front of them. Okay, great. What about when the other one gets in front if they develop better? what happens? They end up being the ninth fastest team. It's such a fall from grace. And this is the kind of thing that Fernando Alonso will get sick of.

He will quickly lose his temper and lose his patience. And we've stated that we don't think he's going to go anywhere, but a happy Fernando will get you better results. And you want a nice, cohesive team with Fernando Alonso at the spearhead of it. But I'm just baffled by it. I don't understand how they have dropped so far. We kind of diss Mercedes from their fall from grace.

You know, we understand that an active dominance has to come to an end, and that's fine. But they kind of never dropped below this fourth place team. And they've always still picked up podiums. They've always been in the mix with Ferrari and McLaren, and they're beating another Red Bull regularly. So it's not disastrous. It's just not what we're used to seeing. Aston Martin, were there with them. And now they could barely get a point on the board at the moment.

It is atrocious how that car is operating. As I said yesterday, after sprint qualifying, the car is the problem. if strolling along so are neck and neck at every single session, that is as good as the car gets. I'm amazed, though, that stroll was able to get himself into the top 10 in the sprint race, and yet their qualifying pace has dropped them even further down the order. Maybe they've set themselves up entirely from race pace, who knows,

but it doesn't look good. That leads me quite nicely on to what I'm most concerned about here, because, I mean, you're right, the drop off across the whole season, and really compared to the beginning of last season needs to be studied. It's pretty crazy. But if we're looking at just this weekend in isolation,

I am most concerned by the fact that other teams, I think, have made good progress between the sessions and Aston Martin of not. I think Aster Martin were as quick in practice as they are now, whereas if you look at the likes of R.B, now they didn't have a great starting position, I think RB have done a good job in that they are far quicker now than they were in yesterday's qualifying session

because of changes they've made. They've taken Ashton Martin's place. Yes, exactly. It's swapped. Yeah. Like I say, Stroll, on pace, I think, should have been in Q3 yesterday. Today, that car had nothing more than 15th place. And I think you can say the same about Hasse, actually.

Hasse and R.B have both made some good progress throughout the weekend as they've refined their car. I think Aston Martin got everything they could out of the car in practice, gone, okay, we're here. other teams have made progress and they haven't been able to, which has led to, and that's worrying because I think what we've seen here today is a truer representation of where the cars are. We often see in these sprint weekends that sprint quality can be a little bit different because teams only have one hour essentially to set up their cars and refine and tweak

in any other normal weekend you get three practice sessions. So you get a truer sense of where the pace is at by the time you get to quali. here it's a little bit different. I mean, the example from earlier is that Max Rastapp and Lando Norris, very close yesterday. Red Bull, able to extract a bit more. There's now three and a half, nearly four, just over four tens between the two of them. It's a similar story for Aston Martin and RB, where RB have managed to make some, at least in the case of Yuki Sanoda, they've made some significant changes to the setup of the car.

Astor Martin have got the eight fastest car and that was exposed. Yeah. It's really disappointing. I'm so surprised at, there's a couple of examples where there's no pace found. You know, Logan Sargent now starts right at the back of the grid after having such a brilliant sprint qualifying. And I said, I'll review.

It can't be a one-off. You can't just have this one moment where you end up beating your teammate and it drops back and it's exactly that. Alba completely beat him. Salba found no time between sessions. And again, both been knocks out in Q1. The car looks like an absolute dog round here. It's really struggling.

Ricardo beats Senoda this time around in terms of qualifying. So that was nice to see him make some progress and clearly become more comfortable out on track. And we'll be interesting to see what the Alpins are going to be able to do. Because of course, neither of them make it through to, or one of them, sorry, makes it through to Q3, whereas they both make it through to SQ3. So it's interesting what happens to their race pace, especially with Ocon with that lighter chassis, as he was able to make use of it. Yeah, I think in that in that midfield battle, Ocon, Ocomon will start 10th.

It was a similar situation to yesterday and that he didn't extract his best time in Q3. If he had, he would have been ahead of Holkenberg. And to be fair, Holkenberg set a faster lap time in Q2 compared to Q3. I think, again, if I've read them set, if either of them set the same lap time in Q2 as they did in Q3, they would have been right on the door of Sergio Perez. There wouldn't have been much between them.

I think with Ocon, so he scraped through into Q3. I think that time was beatable from the likes of Rakar. It was very close between Ricardo, Magnuson and Ocon. I think they might be a little bit disappointed, Ricardo and Magnetton, that they couldn't quite overhaul O'Con there. Gazzley, of course, he had his lap time deleted. Otherwise, he would have been 12, but instead drops back to 13th place. But yeah, the one thing I did want to say about Alpine that I found quite funny

was we know how both of their drivers were impacted yesterday as a result of going out very late in Q3 and not putting together a good session. They were the first team out in every opportunity to... Right out the door, weren't they? Yeah, yeah, they were just... I appreciate the overcorrection, but yeah, they were not having that happen again.

It's almost like you're now hindering yourself by being so far the other way that actually you can wait just a couple of minutes and have some good track conditions. Yeah, exactly. But even so, you know, Ockon getting for into Q3 again, is a good achievement even if... Some consistency.

Yes, yeah. I mean, he... Like I say, I think... he might be disappointed. He's not one position higher. Gassley, again, maybe one or two positions he could have got, but it's still, it's still pretty solid for the team. Yeah. Yeah, I think there'll be some very big smiles and there'll be some very grumpy individuals up and down this grid. Driver of the session was? I'd have to go back to Westapen. So whack on another three and a half tense over what you did

yesterday is just for me dab. It was honestly incredible. That was one of the best. You know, that was a fantastic qualifying map. And it really deserved. to be highlighted. I really think he was astoundingly good. So, you know, big shout out to Max Verstapp. He just keeps impressive. Yeah, you can't really not give it to a driver that's put four tenths on the entire field, especially when you consider Q1,

there were four tenths separating first and 15th, just under four temps, I think. So, yeah, very impressive gap. Do need to shout out, Nick Holcomberg as well, being, I think, eight positions higher today than he was in qualifying yesterday. So it'd be interesting to see if he can hang on for some points. Right. Speaking of tomorrow,

we're going to be back, of course, for our third episode in three days. Crikey, yeah, we're going to be live streaming on Twitch for

the whole race. So we're going to do watch another and that go and subscribe to our Twitch channel and then join us for the race review.

We're going to be back for a full review of all the action that happens on Sunday. And then we're going going to be doing our power rankings on Patreon on Monday. So the content is endless.

And don't forget this week, we're coming up next week, midweek rather. If you're kind of dipping in and out, we have our Silverstone preview, which is going to be our live show, Chappans, in London. There are still a few tickets available if you'd like to pick one up and come and join us out there. And that will be getting filmed on Tuesday and it'll go out normal time on Wednesday. But yeah, make sure you join us. Join the guest

school before we get involved. You can hear yourself potentially on the show in our race review. And we look forward to having you there. So in the meantime, I think Samuel Sage. And I've been Ben Hocking. And remember, keep breaking late. I'm back.