The Late Braking F1 Podcast - 2026 Austrian GP Race Review

Episode Date: June 28, 2026

Well that Ferrari hopium was short-lived... The LB boys cover the day's action at the Red Bull Ring that saw Verstappen back in the fight, but it wasn't quite enough to catch Russell who held onto victory and ends a winless streak. Get involved in F1 Fantasy this season! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Join the Late Braking league⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and see if you can beat us... LEAGUE CODE: C6Y6R4ZUY02 Want more Late Braking? Support the show on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and get:Ad-free listeningFull-length bonus episodesPower Rankings after every raceHistorical race reviews& more exclusive extras!Don't forget! You can also gift a Late Braking Patreon subscription—perfect for loved ones or your own wish list. Choose anything from 1 month up to a full year of top-notch F1 content: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/latebrakingf1/gift⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Connect with Late Braking:You can find us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X (Twitter)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Come hang out with us and thousands of fellow F1 fans in our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Discord⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ server and get involved in lively everyday & race weekend chats!Join our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠F1 Fantasy League⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and see if you can beat us!Get in touch any time at [e-mail]  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Thank you for listening to the Late Breaking F1 podcast. Make sure to check out new episodes every Wednesday and every Sunday. A very warm welcome to the late breaking F1 podcast presented by Harry Eid, Sam Sage, and me, Ben Hocking, reviewing the Austrian Grand Prix won by a Mercedes, but for the first time since Australia won by George Russell. An important victory for him just one week before his home race as well. joined on the podium by his teammate Kimi Antonelli in P3 and Max Vastappen in a somewhat improved Red Bull

finishing within two seconds of the victory in second place. Sam, did you enjoy that one? Yeah, that's Yabba Two wings for George this season. No, no, today it wasn't yabba, it was, was it? Wee! It's like an ambulance in the background. Yeah, right. That's like what you're doing, George.

You can only win at race tracks that start with OS. So Oskine, I assume, he's going to come up at some point and I'll win that one. And that'll be, pack it here at that point. Move on. Come back again next year. Just the three wins for George Russell this year then. Yeah. Yeah.

It might be actually. If he's only going to win one every seven, it genuinely might. That's fair. It's good like Alice is a regular start of the show. I'm glad this hasn't gone too badly, yes. Harry's barely got a voice. Sam's loving life. And here I am.

My toilet has broken. I'm very annoyed. On a Sunday afternoon. Of all the days of Sunday. Come on. It could have been so many other things. Why has the toilet got to break? Sam, mate.

Let's take your mind off it with the beauty of moment of the race, with our driver of the day, worst driver of the day, and so much more about this Austrian GP. Let's start out front with that George Russell victory. Of course, got pole position yesterday in, should we say, somewhat controversial circumstances. with the whole discussion of single wave yellow versus double wave yellow,

George Russell ultimately understanding the flags correctly and taking that poll and from there able to convert it into a race victory. He didn't have it all his own way, Sam, but what did you make of his win? I thought it was strong from Russell. There were moments where the pace was not as expected, and we saw in that big part of the race, I'm going to jump around a little bit on the timeline here, that Max was closing him in, and actually I think it was more of a failing of Red Bull rather than a strength of Mercedes,

that the charge was saved off, essentially. But I thought Russell did enough through the whole Grand Prix to manage the tyres, manage the gap. It was only that few-lap period where Max Verstappen was about a second and a half, two seconds away. It looked like it was ever in doubt. Great start off the line. No issues for that Mercedes car.

Go away from the likes of the battling Ferraris and the McLaren's trying to get involved. Of course, Max had car through quickly. And from then on, it only looked like there was really one or two opportunities to ever really disrupt him. I thought he handled the pressure pretty well. What did you make of the win, Harry? Yeah, I agree.

Of course. I agree. This could be a long hour. I thought it's wrong. And to your point about obviously getting pole, the fact that he was on pole and converted that to a good start, I think that was a big part of him winning this race because all of the other contenders for this win,

like Antonelli, Vastapp and Duke of Dughey, maybe Hamilton, they were all getting in scratch. in the early part of this race, we just allowed Russell to always have a gap to whoever was behind him. So I think that in itself should be credited to him. And yeah, he soaked up the pressure well from Vastappen. I know it was never like, right until we got to the end, it was never really, really close. But he still was being hunted down for the most part. And he had maybe one or two offs, but that everyone was having sort of weird offs lockups today.

so I don't think you could really really criticise him too much for that. So yeah, strong and an important time to do it because I think, you know, as we said in the preview, he, despite getting points in Anthony, was still overtaken by him in Barcelona. So the fact that he's converted the poll into a win, I think it's a big moment for him.

After a couple of instances where he wasn't able to convert pole positions into victories and there were varying reasons as to why, obviously Canada very much not on him. Barcelona, Ferrari were much better. And here's an example of where George Russell can go and do the business on Saturday and then fully convert it into that race win on Sunday. I was going to touch on the exact same point that you just made there, Harry, which is I really think that pole position lap, and it sounds really obvious, but that pole position lap was so important for George Russell. But not only him getting poll, but crucially, who was directly behind him. And we'll talk Ferrari later on in the episode. The reason why we'll talk about them later on in the

episode is because they weren't in the mix for this victory. And if, I think if Antonelli or Vestappen had lined up second or third on this grid, I think there is a reasonable chance we could have been looking at a different winner here. And as weird as that is to say, George Russell, it's going to sound like an insult and instead it really isn't. It's a compliment. it takes a lot to win a race when you are the fastest driver. It takes even more sometimes when you're not the fastest on the day and you still claim the win. I'm not convinced on that podium he was the fastest driver out there.

I think he might have been slower than both his teammate and Vostappen as well. But where Russell got that pole position and got that early lead and Harry, as you say, was clear of that battling that Vastappen was having with Hamilton, Antonelli was down to P5 very early on. he was able to build a bit of an advantage and just give him that buffer that ultimately he kind of needed as we got towards the end of this Grand Prix.

And I think in hindsight, we had a team radio message from Marcus Dudley about a third of the race before the first stop, actually, where I think Russell maybe had a three second advantage or so on the couple cars behind. And there was a message of encouragement from Marcus Dudley to say like every second we can get here really helps us. In hindsight, yeah, it really did because that was the time at which Russell could

extend that advantage and therefore maybe not play into pit stops as much as the other teams would have wanted to. And he crossed the line only a second, a second and a half ahead of both Verstappen and Antonelli. So congratulations to George. I thought he managed the race very well, particularly in the final. I thought the final stint was actually its strongest. The middle stint, I thought it was a bit dodgy, but I thought the final stint he did very well just to see off the threat of Vastappan as he was starting to close.

It shows that being clinical and overtaking as well can make or break a Grand Prix. Again, that feels like a really obvious statement to make when it comes to motor racing, but getting the job done on track quickly shows that if you can't do that, you lose out because the way Vastappin and Hamilton were jockeying for, it felt like a couple of laps, and that gap

was he had three seconds and four seconds and five seconds back up the track to Russell. You look at the gap at the end of the Grand Prix, and if the staff can just execute the overtake within two-corrhors and drive off, there is every chance that actually that two-second gap at the end doesn't need to be two seconds at the end. It's actually minus two seconds. And he's got the overtake done and Russell a couple laps before the end. So ensuring you can get the move done, understanding how the battery works, understanding how the level of the track works is really quite crucial for later on, the knock-off effect that every second you lose will have on the later

race. Just a quick question that I wanted to address about race starts, because certainly the narrative towards the beginning of this season was that's where Ferrari can thrive and get leads into turn once and then see if they can hold it. After the last few, can we put that to bed now? Like, it seems fairly even now. I think the saying is sorted the problem out. The stapler is clearly more comfortable in the car.

And the upgrades that Red Bull brought this weekend were clearly strong. So, yeah, I think it's pretty level footing now. Russell did a pretty good job into term one and indeed on all of that one, whilst there was some incidents happening behind him. What about the two drivers that ran him as close as he did? His teammate Kimmy Antonelli, who takes P3, and Max Verstappen, who takes second. Harry, should we go with Vastappen, first and foremost,

started to really prove a bit of a pest to George Russell as this race went on. And we were questioning midweek whether these upgrades would be enough for him to contend for a victory, not ultimately to take one, but he was definitely in contention. Yeah, I think what, you know, the real sign for Vastappen of his pace was

how disappointed he sounded on the radio at the end of the race. He's like, yeah, you know, a podium. I think he knew they had the pace today to win this one. But this is a very encouraging day for Red Bull and for Stappen because it's the most competitive. they've looked at here. Obviously he has picked up a podium previously but these upgrades do seem to have worked

here definitely. It'll be interesting to see how that converts when we go to Silveston next week but in qualifying trim obviously he found the limit of that car but in race trim it looked really good so yeah I think that should be a really encouraging

sign for them and you know give a step on a car that's competitive and he was delivering right and like you said I think if he, again, this is a criticism on him, but if he'd start to slightly further up, or hadn't got involved in those scraps at the start with the Ferraris, etc, then we may be looking

at a Verstap and win. So, yeah, a good, good day, good day in the office for him. And I will give, they spoke about this on the Sky Commentary, you know, Red Bull were pretty confident that if they'd give him a good car, then he'll stick around. Now, that's a good, it's a good starting point. It sure is. and we know how effective he's been at this track in the past.

And we felt that if Red Bull were to give him something of a car to go fighting with today, he was going to at least take advantage to be in that fight. And it's up to you, it's up to your opinion as to how much you believe the whole home crowd, how much of an advantage it actually gives you. But if it does give you any advantage whatsoever, it's here. because that crowd, particularly after the race as well, Austria was rocking for Max Verstappen. I know we've seen it in years past,

but today felt like another level again. It's insane. Yeah, the fact that you can hear them singing do, do, do, do, Max for Stapberg, as they're walking towards the podium at that level. It hasn't even won the Grand Prix. And you can just hear that over the TV comes is pretty phenomenal.

I'm very excited for it when we go to Zandvot later on in the year. I think it will be a lot of fun. Two crucial moments, I think, for Red Bull, for Max Verstappen, specifically, this Grand Prix, because I thought his actual race pace was phenomenal. I thought he was almost flawless in how he drove this Grand Prix. He needed to get through Hamilton faster, and I do criticise him for not to be able to get that job done better,

because I thought the first time round, Hamilton was fantastic up against him. The second time round, Verstappen does a very good job, and getting the move done. He drove on nicely. The second part that I think really let them down was their strategy. I think that they stayed out

too long when Russell had pitted, and Russell was just a second and a half faster, a second and a half faster. And that turns from a two-second gap, which Verstappen was kind of right on the back of Russell before they pit into a 10-plus second gap. And that's a real mission to recover. And we saw that was a difficulty for Verstappen,

the fact that he was unable to ever get properly close again until the very last lap, which is no time. You can't get the job done when it's that close. So I would have liked to have seen them bring him in a little closer, preventing an undercut of that level, and actually see them go toe to toe to a more similar-range tires. I think that was probably the only time that I think cost him. Yeah, I think strategically they were caught in this middle ground

between the two Mercedes because Russell was kind of the instigator, not of the first stop, but certainly of the middle stop. He comes in around lap 43, whereas Antonelli goes nearly 10 laps longer than that, and they kind of had opposite strategies, whereas Verstappen was kind of sat in the middle. I think he created a five-lap tire delta for that final stint for Stapen, which proved enough for him to be faster, and he definitely caught Russell, but it wasn't quite enough to catch him,

firstly, fast enough, and then secondly, probably not enough of an advantage to actually get the overtake done if he had got there. I think they maybe needed to commit one way or the other, either follow him in straight away, or maybe try and again do a second undercut,

or essentially do what Antonelli did, and who knows maybe you get lucky and you go one lap far enough, and the VSC helps you to a race win. But overall, very, very encouraging for both for Stappen and for Red Bull. You mentioned two key points in this race. I would 100% agree with you that today they were the two key points for Vestappen and whether he could win this race.

I think the third one didn't take place today. The third one took place yesterday when he crashed. And to be clear, car issue, not for Stapton. Yeah, just so people are aware that fast mode, the rear wind doesn't shut properly going into that postment corner. If he, again, I think if he gets on the second row with the grid or if he gets second or third, I think he might win this one because that Hamilton battle slowed him down a great deal. Good news for all of us in that we got to see that battle unfold between two absolute legends,

but for Vastappen's race didn't help him out. Yeah, what did you think of the TV direction? I think it was a little bit lacking. Horrendous today? Yeah, really bad. I like back of headshot of management. What is that? What is the backwards cap shot going on there? Overtake happening? Ridiculous. At least the drone looks cool. I did that a lot though, didn't they? Oh yeah, yeah. They got their full worth. Got the money's worth. Yeah. I know this is got, going to be kind. It's very sky specific here. So sorry to those of you, they don't have Sky TV. That wasn't good enough from Crofty today, I don't think. I thought the commentary was really subpar. I'm, I'm, I'm, I mean that kindly in terms of like, you know, it wasn't up to scratch for Crofty's

standings anyway, I don't think, and I think that needs to get better for next time, please. In terms of TV direction that you mentioned, I would have liked to have seen some more replays of the Hamilton for Stappen Battle because at this point, like I was thinking, we'll come on here today and give our view about whether it should have been a penalty, as Vastepen said in the car. Didn't really see enough of it to be honest. were obviously, we were looking overhead at times, but like we never got anything on board. They cut the replay. They cut the drone can, didn't they? Before we got to move on the pivotal

corner, it was quite frustrating. But it was fascinating to watch between those two on track, as it always is. They both have voice that they really enjoy now battling each other. And it was fun to see them going into Wheat. We've come so far. We're all very growing up now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Man, look at us now. Hoogethal. Who'd have not me. in terms of Mercedes, I think leaving Barcelona, we had two big questions about the rest of this season and how they would fare. Question one is on the battery side of things, their reliability, and would they come acropper at these really high-temperature Grand Prix?

We're going to tick that box, at least for this race. And the second thing was, you know, Ferrari had really caught them in Barcelona. Would they be able to return to the top step? So I guess a bit of a test for Mercedes, Harry, coming out of the last race, quite encouraging for them that they've passed it here. Yeah, and no real complaints on the rate, well, apart from the water, the drink's not working for Georgia. Both, actually.

I think I told you didn't either. By the way, on that. Russell trying to get something out of Vastaffin at the hour. I was done, oh, do you have your drinks going all right today? And Vastaffa's like, it doesn't really matter, does it? just goes really warm. And Russell's like, I'm really proud that I finish this race

without any water. It's so pick me, in it. It comes over the line, into the, it's the winger of the Grand Prix, and my drink didn't work. Can me answer? I like, yeah, I think I'm my either.

Anyway, sorry, yeah, this happens, response really made me laugh. Yeah, no, I don't normally drink. Never, never really. Yeah, it was encouraging. they and like said no real complaints over there about temperature and stuff we had Ferrari at one point tell Hamilton to switch right engine modes because he was

having some temperature issues there was something about Antonides's breaks but for the most part they were all pretty reliable so that were given some good encouragement I think for other hot races that we'll have in later in the year because yeah they must be getting a little bit worried about about that issue there's cropped up a couple of times. So it could still happen again. But today, which was quite a hot day out in the Austrian hills, it worked for them. Last question, Sam, before we head to a break, just wanted to ask you about Antonelli, obviously one lap away from being able to take advantage of the first virtual safety car, one lap away from being able to take advantage of the second virtual safety car.

Lucky, would have been lucky if he got either of them. Oh, God. Having the same opportunity as everyone else, and then having the same result as everyone else, doesn't mean you're unlucky. That's got how luck works. That's not how that works, okay? No, he ran a normal race and didn't stop under the BSC.

It would have been very fortunate if it worked out for him, but he had to run a normal Grand Prix, and I think actually, young of the top runners benefited, even Hamilton, who put on the soft tires randomly under that BSC, it didn't really cause any difference. So I'm not going to really act, like that shape that it might have helped if he did get it, but we'll never know.

And that's in a different world where he did. So, oh, well, I do think that we saw a slightly scruffy Antigley in the first portion of this Grand Prix. And I do think that cost him a result at the end of this race. He mentioned even sewing his post-race interview with David Kautau, but he was uncomfortable with the brakes. Actually, that was causing him to make those mistakes. Goes off at turn one, goes off at turn three.

We see a repeat of that, I think, on the next couple lapses as well, where he leaves the track again. had no confidence on this break. So Bono comes over the radio and says you've got break split where one break is hotter than the other. You can hear him that he's not confident going into these braking zones. In Austria, you basically need to be confident at two things. How quickly can you get up to top speed and how quickly can you slow back down again?

And it looked like 50% of that he wasn't very happy with. So unfortunately, that affected the race pace. I do think that in turn meant that he was unable to get that move down on the staff. And maybe his teammate at the end of the Grand Prix. So yeah, not his finest, but to walk away with third place and to keep the gap pretty minimal, I'm sure he'll take that. With the whole virtual safety car stuff,

I feel like people forget sometimes that, because I don't think he was unlucky, but if he took advantage of, if he went one lap later and did take advantage, that wouldn't have been lucky either because one of the main reasons you go far into a Grand Prix and try and create that offset is because you are playing into a potential safety car situation.

And a lot of times it won't work out like today, and then on the odd occasion it will. That's why you try it. It's an intentional scratch. Right, yeah. A good result for him, and he doesn't lose too much in terms of his championship lead versus George Russell, who, of course, now is second place, having recovered that from Lewis Hamilton. Speaking of Lewis Hamilton, we'll take a quick break. We'll discuss his and Ferrari's race on the other side, as well as McLaren.

2-3 into 5-8. Maximum point possible. We so back. Welcome back, everyone. Let's move on to McLaren. Fourth place and seventh place for them with Oscar Piastri, the lead driver today. Sam, it was a bit of a stinker from Oscar in Barcelona,

and it's been a bit of a stop-start season for him, a lot of which reliability-related. This feel like quite an important result, even though it's not a podium. It was a stinker in Barcelona, but he clearly went back to the MTC. Zach Brown was running a nice bath, giving him some soap and say, clean yourself up, Oscar.

Come on, come out, smell him from him. It's fun fiction out there somewhere about that, isn't it? We won't go even further on that on the podcast, thank you. But he has come out as far as fresh. And I thought he was really good today. I thought he put in a really solid shift. And Landon Norris is, you know, no easy competitor to go up against. And it looked like the pace difference was pretty strong after the first few laps.

When Piastri did the job to get past him, essentially, when they were right next to each other. He did well, I think, to hold off the Ferraris. The hard tie clearly working and more favourable for McLaren over what the Ferraris were experiencing. And there was a moment where it looked like the Claire Hamilton, Piastri were all kind of in it together. And one of the Ferris could have come out on top. They didn't. I think Piastri's race management at that point was really strong.

It never looked like they had the pace to catch up to Antigelli, the Stapen further ahead. But I do think that Piastri was a good step above the likes of Hager, Norris, the Ferraris. So, yeah, made the difference, I think. Are we calling that best possible result, Harry? I think so, given where they are they, they do. I didn't think they were ever going to challenge the Mercedes and, you know, for staff. But you're right. I think it was a solid race from Oscar.

And like one of the most anonymous ones out there just sort of, he just did 71 laps and all by himself for most part. He was a bit involved with Hachar and Lickler. Late on, he still needed to, you know, get those. The pace was there. The pace was there. So, yeah, I think he made the most of the car he had underneath him, kept out of trouble. a little bit of contact wasn't there with Lecler, but it was fine, really. So, yeah, they're not going to be pleased with it, obviously, but I think from his point

of view, it was a good, good way to bounce back after, like I said, a stinky Barcelona. Yeah, and I don't think one individual result at this point in Piastri's career, I know he's not the most experienced driver on the grid, but he's been through enough of these situations already in his career that I don't think one race was ever going to derail him completely. But it's still useful to bounce back after. after such a result. And to be clear, it wasn't awful. It's not as if he crashed out or anything.

It's just his pace was quite lacking versus his teammate. But a really good turnaround here. Solid enough start. And then, yeah, whilst we didn't get a huge amount of his coverage, a lot of that was just based on his strategy not really featuring with the top drivers.

And then getting the moves done where he needed to to ultimately get ahead of the two Ferraris that he obviously started behind and indeed his teammate as well. I thought he drove a very, very sensible race. And conditions were quite similar, I thought, to Barcelona, which should give him even more encouragement in that we were looking at two and three-stop races, quite high tire wear, similar-ish sort of track, same compound of tires.

So any concerns that he had about Barcelona, I think he probably put them to bed here. And I don't know if we can call it important, given he was competing for the championship last year. but that result does actually put him marginally ahead of both his teammate, LeCler, and he's out of Vastappen as well. He's got 80 points, 79 for LeCler and Norris, 73 for Vestappan. So he's now P4. Considering the amount of races he hasn't started. It's not too bad.

Yeah, not too bad at all. In terms of McLaren's overall pace, Sam, again, it didn't feel like it was quite there with certainly the Mercedes or the Red Bull of Vastappen. I think it got better as it went on. I was thinking in the first stint that this doesn't look great for them and it's not like they were competing for the win at the end

but I thought they found their way a little bit. Yeah, I'd be a little bit worried if I was McLaren. I think the fact that they were so far clear of Red Bull at the start of the season and Red Bull have clearly made, I mean, they brought a huge upgrade package here to Austria and it's clearly works, right? You see how fast for Staples throughout that race stints.

They were neck and neck at the start of this season. I know obviously we had a couple of grandkids, where they couldn't really feature because of failures within the car. But when they were having pace, they were regularly better than Red Bull. We saw in Japan, for example, in Suzuki, Vestappen was fighting with gasoline. They couldn't get out on the midfield for the most part. And Piaastri could have won that race. Right, yeah, but that's a flip.

Now you come to Austria, I only want four Grand Prix later. And now Vestappen finishes less than two seconds away from a race wing, Hajar is beating Lando Norris. And Piazri was having a very good Grand Prix. is it exactly down the road. It's only what four seconds clear of Lewis Hamilton here, and I think that's a bad day for Ferrari. I think this is almost an outlier.

I think this has gone well for them, rather than it being stupendously good for McLaren. So I actually think they're in a bit of a worrying position. I think they need to sort something out and bringing upgrade or get it together because Piastri got the best result, but I think that was because he had a really strong drive. But he usually killed being X and Norris

and they kill up being, what, 7 and 8? Yeah. I think it's a bit a head scratcher for them because I think exiting Barcelona, it's like, well, Ferrari got the better of us, obviously, but equally Norris was right there with Antonelli and Russell, before Antonelli's retirement, at least. And then if you go to this race and you say, well, actually, your result relative to Ferrari is going to be better than it was. You probably is Andrea Stella or Zach Brown think, oh, that probably means we're competing for the win, right? But no, Mercedes are that much clear of you again.

It's just, it's an odd one for them to try and figure out ahead of Silverstone, believe to be something of an upgrade weekend for them. Again, not a massive one like Red Bull this weekend or Ferrari last race, but maybe that can help them get in the mix a little bit. Speaking of Ferrari, we did our question of the week earlier on in the week. We asked the question, you know, how would Ferrari after the, win in Barcelona. How would they follow that up here in Austria? If you said three stops a piece or P5, P8, well done. You're correct. Um, uh, Harry, it ain't good, is it?

Uh, proper stinky. New spoke about McCle, Oscar Piastri. Um, it was, it looks horrendous to drive that car, especially in Lecler's hands, like, awful. just no couldn't keep any of the tires alive especially the hard tires they just looked terrible on those every time a bit better on the mediums maybe but yeah their tire deck was one of the radio messages that came through

was tired deck is as as expected to Charlotte Claire what were you expecting like good bad terrible because it was terrible yeah they seem to suffer with that a lot more than than others. And I think it was noted in the in the common of the commentary that towards the end of that race,

Pierre Gassie who'd come out on some fresh softs was actually trying to get past Leclair, unlap himself. That's how slow he was going. So that, like you said, with McClare, a bit of a head scratch. I think Ferrari will go away with a few people scratching their heads there because it wasn't,

it was not a good afternoon, especially considering where they came from in Barcelona. So, yeah, they'll be a little bit concerned. It may just be a track-specific thing, because at least in Colorado find they looked to be there. Obviously, at one point, they were going to be a one-two on the grid. But yeah, their race pace, they really struggled, which was surprising. Incredibly rough calculations here,

but looking at the strategy of, like, LeCleur versus someone like Vestappin or Russell, Lecler did two stints on the hard tire in the middle of this race that collectively went, I think, about 46 laps. Vastappen and Russell, you know, they were able to get to the end on just one stop after doing like lap 18. Like they weren't even considering going for these three-stop races or starting to introduce the soft tire at the end as Shal LeClaire had to do. is it a bit confusing, Sam, as to why this just didn't work on the same level that it did last time? Yeah, there's a lot to worry about. And I think Ferrari will hope that this will must be another outlier type Grand Prix for them. It also puts proof into the pudding that the battery is so important.

Ferrari bringing an engine upgrade here, and they thought they found maybe between five and eight break horsepower for the whole power curve, which in theory should be a really strong upgrade for an engine. And yet, you can see in the straight, so they were by far the slower. Do you hear the call-down room moment where Antonelli's like, and nearly went into the back of LeCler at the end of a straight?

Yeah, because it's so slow. It's so slow at a straight line. And the Mercedes battery and the Red Bull battery battery clearly so superior over the Ferrari battery. And that, remember, isn't part of the EJuo process, does not get looked into at all. It's such an important part of this overall engine, though. Ferrari, it's so, I mean,

how can you go from winging in Barcelona to doing so many things wrong in a Grand Prix? the fact that you can't get the tightest to work. You then clearly are overheating the car having to swap the engine into the cool down area, which we heard, of course, from Sancy to Hamilton. Charlotte-Cleur's pace is nowhere to be found. He's so far off the mark.

And when that's happening, we realise that the Claire hasn't got the pace versus Hamilton, do we make it easy and we let one car come through? No, we don't. No, we make them fight. And Oscar Priyastri goes, yeah, cheers. I'm just going to drive off down the road now. Don't worry about me. And then it takes another whole lap to swap them round.

And then they battle for a call. again. How are these two side by side ten times more often than any other teammates? The best bit about it as well was that they battled on Shalda Claire's in-lap

like one more. Yeah, yeah. Charlotte-Clau goes, I'm going to fight you. I'm going to fight you. I'm going to pick up here. Bye-bye. Thanks for making this really hard.

What are you doing, Ferrari? You just won a Grand Prix. You know, the worst thing is like normally, if we were expecting like this weekend to have been something of a back down to earth moment for Ferrari,

we would have said, ah, the strategy, that's really, really undone them here. Like they had the pace again, but this time the strategy didn't go right. I don't think it mattered that they three stop. Like, if they two stopped, maybe Hamilton gets P4 instead of P5. I don't

think that pit stop management was rubbish. I don't, I don't think it matters. I don't think it changes to the world. I think he might have been Piascary. I think he might have. Maybe. I didn't stop under the BSC onto the soft tire was unneeded. I just think it added.

You got stuck in traffic, had to overtake Hajjar, had to get past his teammate. The amount of time he's losing on these warm soft tires. But equally, like, if your tire wears that high, like, again, that's another problem is that they felt the need to do this. It's odd, though, because they've not experienced this problem before. Yeah. And they've used this tie. It's not like this is a different compound.

No, no, it's exactly the same as what we had last time out. I just maybe again with the heat hazard that was sort of issued this weekend. I know we will have some other hot races, but this is probably going to be top three, I reckon, throughout the year. Maybe we don't get too many more of these. I don't think it's going to be quite that warm next week at Silverstone. Please, please go.

Please go. No, please. 21 degrees of the light breeze would be great. Thank you. You know, maybe the most worrying thing about pace-wise about Ferrari was when Hamilton went over team radio was like, you know, how was my pace?

And the response was, yeah, your pace is great versus Charles. It's like, yeah, but the problem is he's really slow. So that does... Charles, it's the slowest man on the track at this moment. You know, last time it was like, you can catch him, come on. This time it's like, you're doing great

versus the other guy that's not doing great. The actual phrase was, from Hamilton, was just, He said pace okay, question mark. And then race engineer was like, better now. Yeah. Better now? Yeah, because it was rubbish. But now it's a bit better.

Bit better. And he's on new tires. Yeah, it's probably going to be a bit better, isn't it? It's so, sorry if you're a Ferrari fan. It must be rubbish. Yeah. You've hit the earth hard for this week. Are we put into bed?

Ferrari championship chances. Rest in peace. June 2026, June 2026. I hope he's still on. I have joking. We got a long way to go. We got a long way to go. Also, just, again, the qualifying versus race pace.

We've seen them before, like, not be very quick in qualified, and then not be very quick in the race. You're like, well, that adds up. They could have had, they could have had pole. They could have had a one-three or something along those lines. It felt like Ferrari really built into the weekend up to when qualifying stops. They were Friday to Saturday. Rubbish.

Rubbish F.P.2. Hamilton's a 10th away FP3. qualifying right until the last moment they got a one-two and then they may as well be fighting with the midfield. It's amazing they beat anyone in that top eight. I mean, but fortunate actually that Russell didn't have poll in the end

because imagine if they converted a one-two into a five-eight. We would have consent for the worst part is you could pick up this segment and you could pull it into so many years. We're not here. The last 10 years you could go, yep, that happened then and then and then and then and then.

We'll see how they go at Silverstone. Shall we review our bold predictions because there are plenty of points to give out here, right? Technically the points are there to be giving out, but whether they will be giving out is another question. They're all up for grabs. Yeah, yeah. We can grab them.

I can't reach. Let's see how we start. Sam, what was your bold prediction? Berman Top Six. Where did you finish? Not there. Yeah. Harry, what was your bold prediction?

Oh, no Mercedes on the podium. I saw two of them. Yeah, both on the podium. Cool. My ball prediction was that Audi would be both drivers in the top 10. What happened? They finished 11 and 12. Every time.

Oh, we'll chat about the midfield a little bit more after the break. I'd just give me a couple of DNFs, people. Come on. They did, but from the back. Yeah, right. William Lawson is literally shouting about the fact that he's on fire. I'm still on fire. Wait on my, Liam.

He's actually just really good. I am on fire this season. Wow, man. Wrong time to use that phrase, Liam. Oh, I just, yeah, I feel like I made a plea to the grid. Like, can I just have a couple of DNFs to get this bold prediction? Right. And the Cadillacs were like, reporting for duty.

Hi, hi, I got your boss. Again, my chat about Cadillac in a little bit. Can't wait. All right. Let's take a break on the other side. We'll go into driver of the day, worst driver of the day, big brain strat and into that midfield battle. Welcome back, everyone.

A good day for racing balls, 9th and 10th. Unfortunately for them, couldn't get any further than that, again, based on the golfing class at the moment between the midfield and the top runners. No DNFs or no poor racism amongst the top eight. But still, 9th and 10th, another double points finish. I was having a look, Sam. It's now four straight races that Lawson have scored in.

And it's four straight weekends that Limbauder scored in. One of them he scored in the sprint, but not the main race. But it shows the consistency that's coming together for this team. Suddenly that team has found something because I think we were giving them some real criticism after Japan period where they looked like they were slipping further and further back. And I actually expected them to almost be where Williams are now. I thought they'd be that third last team because of having that little golf on their own. And yet they've stepped it up.

It's actually they've taken the place of Alping. Now, the marks of Gas in Colopinto really unable. to touch that racing ball at the moment. Nimblah's in his rookie year. He took a great job, but I do just want to take a moment to praise Liam Lawson because he went through the ringer.

He was not good enough. He got that early promotion up to Red Bull, which was silly. He got reduced back to a racing ball driver imminently afterwards. And you can understand how that might really knock you for six. And it was worrying when he went up against Hajjar,

didn't fare too well, and he went up against Limbalad. And that first race, Limblard did so well, scoring points in his first Grand Prix. You're thinking, oh, is this going to go the wrong way for Lawson? And here he is. Maybe

the most consistent driver in the midfield right now is clearing up his racecraft. The consistency in pace is great. Even when he's on fire, he's quite literally on fire. I thought he was really, really impressive. Really, really impressive. So good to see that the car has improved, but he seems to have really improved with it. Impressed by what they were able to do, Harry? Yeah, really good day for racing bulls. Right. They were just, they couldn't catch the top eight.

but the pair of them were together for like the whole race basically. Yeah, yeah. The second apart. Yeah. And, you know, they had a good gap to the Audi's behind. So I don't think they could have done much more, to be honest. Just, yeah, really strong. The car looked good and also both drivers delivered on that pace.

So, yeah, I think they can be very pleased with how that day went. Yeah, I was trying to work out strategically what they were doing exactly. And I feel like this makes sense. But again, we are recording this very shortly. after. So if there was a different reason, we'll find out soon enough. But Lawson obviously had the advantage over Limbludd in that first stint, but then Limbludes one lap before Lawson does, therefore getting ahead of him and getting the undercut, which I thought was slightly odd. I'm a guess, I'm guessing maybe protecting against some undercuts from drivers behind, because as soon as the second pit stops

come around, they just reverse it. And Lawson is the second driver pit first, then Lindblad pit after, and Lawson gets the undercut back on him. But you're right. in saying that they were essentially attached at the hip throughout this entire Grand Prix, really nothing to separate them, which is really good for both drivers, but also the team, because that should give them quite a lot of encouragement that they've got something that they can work with, not only here, but for what they will hope is a long stretch of the season. You're right, Sam, they were struggling. And I guess it made sense in that it kind of followed where Red Bull was struggling as well,

and they've kind of picked up together almost. but the consistency that they've been able to deliver is something that they have really been missing over the previous years. It always felt like even when they were doing quite well in the midfield a few years ago, they took it in turns to have a good race weekend. Here we're having them quite consistently,

like 7th for 9th or 9th and 10th. And sure, it's not big point scoring finishes, but at the moment that's kind of all they can get. Lawson was great. He was on fire, no doubt. And he had a really good race here last year as well. So he's proving that this is a track he enjoys. And Lindblad, he's continuing to impress.

And he is the only rookie on the grid. That has to be remembered as well. He doesn't even have other rookies to be compared to. And he's doing a really good job. He doesn't look much like a rookie at this point, which is fairly high compliment. I don't forget that he is actually a rookie. Right.

Which I think is a big compliment. He doesn't make many mistakes. He doesn't. As a team, there are only 13 points off. Alpine now as well. You know, you keep this up for got of three or four races and they will find themselves in fifth place in the championship. So a great job. Yeah. And today was also pretty good because where racing balls have been fast in qualifying in previous races, they maybe haven't converted that fully into race pace. It's been like the racing balls has had the advantage

on Saturday and then maybe Alpine has had the advantage on Sunday. Here, it actually followed through and they were quite comfortably clear of everyone else, starting with Audi, Bortolef. Elkhamburg just about holding off Pierre Gasly for P12. So I don't know about this one, Sam. Obviously, it's bittersweet in that again, it's no points for the team. But this felt like a more complete race than what they've had previously. This is the first time with Audi that I can't pick out almost a little notepad list of mistakes or issues that have happened with Audi's weekend. So regularly there's a problem with qualifying or we see an overheating issue with their car or their start is so,

awful that they go to the back of the pack and they've got to overtake everyone again, or a driver gets a pebble that hits his kill switch button and he hangs about the Grand Prix. That's your fault. I'm joking. But the point is here, I can't really find much that went wrong for them. And I think that's really solid. And considering that, again, while they got a brand new team in that sense like Cadillac are, there's still a new outfit and there's still a lot that's going on there.

And a lot of changes that have taken place, even with the likes of Wheatley leaving, of course, so soon into the season, they've still got to adapt to these things. So you can see Bortoletto and Hulkemberg so close together, only a few seconds between them at the end, and they were the ones trying to push for the points. It's promising. It's promising. I'm not going to shower it with praise, but it's a promising and positive weekend for them. I'd agree.

It feels like a promising result. I guess if you're picking out drivers as well, Harry, Bortoletto has maybe been a step behind Holkenberg more often than not recently. So this is quite a good result for him. Yeah, he looked comfortable versus Hulkenberg today. sorry yeah I I agree with what you said

Sam it was just it's a positive step they just we obviously joked about it with your ball protection but they just

they can't really do much more at the moment apart from hope for some retire retirements in front and that you know being from the top

obviously the racing balls are the ones who did score points but Audi weren't that far off it so it's a positive

to step. I felt like a clean day, which as you mentioned, Sam, has been lacking all year, basically proudly. So, yeah, I think they can be positive about it. Yeah, I feel like as well, whilst 11th and 12th was probably the optimal result, I felt they were the sixth fastest team, in terms of margins separating themselves and racing balls, they were quite hurt, as they often are with lap ones. It wasn't even awful from their side this time. It was Ocon, at such a great start on lap one, that Bortoletto was kind of tucked up behind Ocon for a little bit. And once he'd got away from that fight, it was fairly level with the racing balls. He wasn't catching them, but equally he wasn't really going adrift of them either.

So I feel like if he'd stayed ahead of O'Con on lap one, he probably would have just been a few seconds behind that fight. Again, I don't think he had the pace or Audi had the pace to actually beat them. And Holkenberg was similar. Holcomburg was further back and on medium tires rather than soft tires, so it took him a bit longer to get through that traffic. But overall, yeah, a pretty clean weekend for them. I think consuming this comes at a race which is so power-heavy. We've just found out how down on power the Audi engine is as well. So when they bring those upgrades, it can be interesting

a sea, because the shattery's clearly got some promise to it. So if the engine can start to match that, it'll be really fascinating. And that might be Alpine's worst weekend of the year? Very anonymous, wasn't it? Yeah. Gazzley tried to do something a little bit different with that soft tire at the end, but equally even if you got the move on Holcomb, It's not, they're not there with a racing bulls this time out. Yeah. It's pretty poor, frustrating. You kind of think that maybe Alping have cracked the code.

And when McClare and very much Mercedes look like they're in the fight each weekend, you think that Alping might have a bit more consistency, but it doesn't seem to be ringing true. Well, the good news is whilst everyone's starting their derriggering process at Austria, I think Cadillac are already at Silverstone. It helps when the car impacts itself on the race train. Yeah, they were there by lap four. Yeah. Yeah, they're already gone.

Just as soon as the first one came through, which was Bottas, you're like, you kind of felt the next wasn't too far away. But even my brakes are on fire. It's just like, of course they are. But even worse is two separate. It wasn't the same problem. No. No. What a week of the Perez, by the way.

Just like, can't do any of practice because his car keeps breaking down. Don't worry. It will get better in the race. four laps in, he's out. Yeah, like the car has got to stop falling apart at some point. You know, the pace was technically, technically better for the three laps that we saw of it. I mean, they were much faster than Ashton Martin, which I'm sure we'll get to. But yeah, you've got to finish a race.

There's no point being quicker if you can't actually get through a Grand Prix, and this is another problem that can't like I'm really experiencing. Yeah, Kuali versus Aster Martin looked all right. But, yeah, you kind of have to go more than four laps into a Grand Prix. and at least a long so finish the race.

Arguably. Arguably. Oh, I can't wait to go that. Yeah. Yeah, I just think Cadillac have a long way to go.

And I don't even mean that disparagingly like that it was always going to be a tough journey for them. It's just results like this evidence that when it comes to

more extreme conditions and these other teams are a bit more well equipped to deal with them. Cadillac are learning these things and finding these things out for the first time this year.

You're going to get results like these, unfortunately. Now's the time to have them. Rather, you have them when you're 20th and 21st, then when you're maybe fighting for your first points. Sure. Well, I don't think either driver is going to feature in this next discussion, which is asking, who was driver of the day? The verdict is in.

You're the driver of the day. You're the driver of the day. You're good at driving. Unless there was a massive vote swing in the last couple of minutes, I believe Vestappen won driver of the day. Oh, I am shocked. It was a fairly big advantage when they showed it a few laps from the end, so I'm going to assume he did get that.

But would he get your driver of the day, Sam, or are you picking someone else? He's definitely involved in the conversation. And I still haven't really made a final decision. I've got his game in the pot. I've got Liam Lawson's game in the pot as well. I think, you know, he's a really good race. And that's not the first time I've said that this season. I've played love Liam Lawson this year.

You famously love Liam Lawson. Famously. I don't think anything's changed. You've always love Liam Lawson. I do this all the time. Yeah, yeah. LL. L. L. I love me a bit of Lawson.

And Russell, I thought, did a really good job maintaining that Grand Prix. He mentioned Ben, not actually the fastest on track, I think. So to bring home the wing was really positive. There were a few mistakes here and there from pretty much having involved. I'm going to go Lawson. It was mistake free. Everyone else had something that I can critique.

not with him. Who are you going for, Harry? Yeah, I think they probably certainly are my contenders. I'd chat, maybe Lynn Bladden there as well, because I think both of them were as good as each other. I'll go with Russell, though, of this one, but

I think there's a really good drive. And like you said, Ben earlier on, he won the race, even though he wasn't the fastest on the day, which that's credit to him. I kind of went through the same process as you did, Sam, which is Russell was very impressive, but equally,

I think he didn't have the best pace within his own team. Vastappen, arguably, if he gets by Lewis Hamilton the first time of asking, he has a chance to win this race. And Antonelli, very scruffy, first part of this race, that again might have cost him a chance to win. So once I dismissed those three, whilst they're all in the conversation, I also landed at Liam Lawson, a very good performance. Wow.

scenes at the late breaking headquarters. Indeed. What about worst driver of the day? Get in the bin, bin, bin, bin, bin, worst driver of the day. Ben, bin, bin, worst driver of the day. You suck at driving.

I like to think he's saying bang, not Bing, in the background of that son. Ben, bang, bang, bang, bang. Your head in the Ben. Oh, geez. Oh. It's never gone down well that one, weirdly. Harry, who's your worst driver of the day?

I'm going to have to go for Charles, Claire. Did he, whiffy? Yeah, exactly, make real whiffy. I just, the Ferrari pace, as we said, was not good, but his was worse of the two drivers. And he just spent all afternoon defending from something or something or something. Being overtaken by Lewis Hamilton. There was always, he was always being,

attacked and never being the one doing the attacking. So, yeah, sorry, Charles, but it was from P2 to P8 is that is not ideal. Yeah. What have you got, Sam? I'm very much in the same line of thinking here. Out of that top eight, it's hard to find anyone else like critique more, being Charles LeClair. Ockle wasn't brilliant again.

Also, blue flags. What are you doing, man? Get out of the way. He's got to fight someone, all right? Yeah, he's teammate. For the start line, he really drives into him because he has a better start, sure. Yeah, I'll go, a shawl, but Ockon was my other consideration. I didn't, not that I had him in driver-a-day contention either,

but I cut O'Con a bit of slack because his strategy, again, was not great, whereas Berman took advantage of the virtual safety car. So I think the gap between them was slightly manufactured for that. reason. I had two drivers in contention. Whilst the Alpine wasn't great, it was at least somewhat competitive in Pierre Gasley's hands, not so much in Franco Colopinto's, who was a long way off. So I did consider Colopinto, but could this be a first? I don't know. A triple. A triple Shaula Clair, worst driver of the day. There's... Stinky. It is, and this isn't just this, race, this is this year, it's very

square peg round hole stuff here. There's something not clicking. And it's odd. It is. And it's like these cars, like you can't get us headed around the way to manage these cars, because there was one when he was defending from, for someone, I can't remember, because he was everyone who's defending from, but he

used all of his battery up. Oh, is Antonelli? Because then Antenade does him into the penultimate corner because he's a completely out of jigs. And it's like, I know they're probably struggling with that. Sure. No one else is making that mistake. No.

But Hamilton has grasped it a lot better than LeCler has this year. I will say that. Everyone has. You can see a single other move like that all grown pre-lung. He was the only person that made that mistake. Yeah, I just think with the battery, again, Ferrari do seem at a disadvantage in that regard. And I just think Hamilton's, it's not great because he's still having to deal with the consequences

of it. But LeClaude just doesn't seem to have the handle on it. Yeah. And I know I shared a stat midweek that is now true, which is this is the first time since beginning of 2019 that he's gone five straight races, Charles LeCler, losing to his teammate. And I don't believe he's ever had six

if he were to lose to Hamilton at the British GP. Let's do Big Brain Strat. What? What? It's not even raining out. What are you talking about? Yeah. Just sensational.

Just sensational. A lot of strategy going on out there with multiple stops across all drivers. Sam, a big brain strap from you? Yeah, Ferrari. Get out of each other's way. Actually, communicate it. So that takes it for me.

It's good to give it to Ferrari. The OGs of big brain. I get your point, but also boring, man. It's boring. Like, just daven race. It just gives us the content. Think of the content, man. also you're absolutely right

Harry what was yours yeah I'm just kind of Ferrari generally that was one of the points Hamilton's race engineer telling him to box as he's midway through the final corner yeah Tremano Hamano stay out

and then again I know why they did it but the the cord's gone to softs I don't think it works I know they were I won't give too much stick for that one because I think they were just throwing stuff at the wall, see what was stick. We did say, didn't we, after Barcelona,

then you're just going to do three stops, go. Because it worked once. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's what they did. They're like, well, we can't get another stopping. So stop to do it somewhere. Yeah, just generally fraud. I do feel the soft tire had some potential in the, like,

again, with Audi, like Bortoletto taking the softs at the start, and Holkhamberg didn't. Probably a good call in that that likely gave him the pace to get past Ockon, where Holkenberg took a lot longer to do it. But it was where you used those soft tires that were important. Gadsdi did it at the end, and he didn't quite pay off for him because he didn't get past. But that made sense. Yeah.

Plonking it in the middle of your stints felt just a bit. It's like they went VSE. You meant to box something. It's faster. Do a box. It says so in the manual. Yeah. Faster under yellow.

Do that. And you're like, when it doesn't. It's because that graphic always comes up when a VSC comes out about the pit stop the time you game. They probably see that and go, we've got to do it. Obviously, we need to gain. time. I wanted to go with one that it's good, this is a weird one because it doesn't really actually pan out. But I wanted to give Red Bull some credit here because Vestappen was essentially the

only driver going into this race strategically that had both two sets of medium tires, new medium tires, and two sets of hard tires. Now, the way that it worked out is that he did the same strategy as the likes of Russell anyway, but he had the flexibility. And I just, Red Bull seemed to be more on about these things than other teams do. There is another version of events today where Vastappen could do with a late safety car and Vastappen could really do with, maybe not the soft tie,

but it could really do with a new medium stint. That could give him the win. Again, didn't quite work out for them, but I want to praise Red Bull for the way in which they manage their tires throughout a weekend because it's giving them more flexibility going into race days. That's going to do it for Big Brain Strat. Let's take our final break.

On the other side, we've got moment of the race. Welcome back, everyone, to the final part of today's review of the Austrian Grand Prix. Quick note, Sam, if you want even more chat about the Austrian GP, we've still got something coming up tomorrow. We're going to do some power rankings. We've got power rankings coming, which is always a lovely sign. When we go through every single driver in detail, we give them a ranking between zero and ten, and you get a ranking too.

So, I mean, we all get a rank Patreon, by the way, because we can go do this. You get to be involved in the conversation. So we send out a form, you get an average ranking of all Patreon members who put their submissions in. And it's really interesting to your feedback. You really get a chance to be involved with the conversation. So if you want more content, more race content after every single Grand Prix as well, check out Patreon. It's the price of a cup of coffee, as I like to say. And you can't sit after a month.

And look, Patreon city is the best city. So move on in. Come here yourself a little flat. It's comfy. And if you are on that top tier, you have availability to power rankings and the form that Sam has just mentioned there is already out for this Austrian GP that's taken place today. So make sure you get your ratings in, and that will be included as part of the Patreon average.

Moment of the race. We've got some Discord submissions very shortly. Sam, what was your moment of the race? There was a few to pick from, actually. And the likes of Liam Lawson being on fire was amusing. I'm glad that he's fine, by the way, but it wasn't amusing radio message. But another radio message that's still out to me that we haven't discussed yet was towards the end of the Grand Prix, where Sharman.

McClo was discussing having his final pit stop, where Norris had just caught him. And Charles goes, have we got the ability to do another stop? Are we going to lose anything? And the UK comes back, not anymore, no. Now they've been overtaken, mate. Now you're last of all the top cars. No.

So, yeah. Very classic. I've also gone with a Ferrari team radio message. It's the one that you mentioned just before the break. which is the opportunity to pit Lewis Hamilton under VSC. Just about too late. Box, box. Ah, you tell me too late, man.

And just the, we tried. Tried. We tried. I feel like we tried is Ferrari's motto. How about doing that? We tried. Harry, can you break the streak of Ferrari team radio messages for a moment of the race? I can.

I haven't gone for that. I want to shoot, this is quite sky-specific. So I'm only shouting this out. But at the very stark commentary, Crofty said, to paraphrase, it's hot and stirry. Yeah, I heard the word steery, and I vomited all over the floor.

What? What you say, man? Who are you paraphrasing? Yourself? Why have we gone from steer to steery? Anyway, my actual one is the Hamilton-Ve-Stappen battle. Yeah, it was so good. Yeah, just so fun to why. watch. And a shame it didn't last longer from our point of view. Obviously,

for Vastappans he needed to get past. I should have done quicker really. But it was great, great to watch those two go go wheel to will. Also, just separate note, the fact that we get these battles is great, but also we've said this so many times. We get getting three stops or two stop strategies. We're getting some good races out of it. Yeah. Please let it continue. Oh, one more was in a shout out. George Russell saying, I think I could do a one stop. Shut up, man.

I'm not. My man is saying with his little fishing rice, a bit of bait on the end of it. You could, if you were running around after like 50 laps, sure. I mean, the tyres aren't going to get you that far, mate. Yeah, you're just fishing, any? They turn into an ambulance sitting at the Grand Prix. What do you want from the man?

Very true. I was just going to say on your moment of the race, Harry, with the Vastappan and Hamilton battle, It's like, it seems a recurring theme at the moment with these Grand Prix. Like, we are getting incredible, like, first quarters or first thirds of races. And then it's a bit of a question mark as to how much that carries on for the rest of the race, depending on strategy. But the first, like, 15 laps of nearly every Grand Prix at the moment is just full of action.

It at least seems to be, anyway. Yeah. We've got some moment of the race submissions from our Discord. Thank you very much to everyone who's popped a submission. in the submissions channel. If you're not part of our Discord already, you can follow the link in the description.

We are going to start with cannibal beef. Hello, been a while. Moment of race, Ferrari converting a P2 and P3 to a P5 and P8. I love my team. Okay, bye! What's the cannibal thing about?

Yeah, I don't know, man. Are we talking cannibal as in human, is in human, a cannon ball from a ship. The first of those two. Oh. Canibal. Okay. Wow. Gosh, what's beef been up to whilst I've been away?

I guess that name is a beef anymore? No. Human. And by the way, Ferrari doesn't have to be your team. Like, you sign up for this when, you know, you put Ferrari as your best team. You know what's going to happen at this point. Come on. Yeah. Next up, it's been a while since we've heard from Real Dad.

moment of the race from Real Dad. No, James, he is currently surfing. Don't some people have the best life. George Russell saying yabababadoo at the end, it doesn't get any better over and out from Real Dad. Bye-bye. Yabababado do. I guess I thought this phrase would make such an appearance in our lives again. Jabba-dabba too, obviously. That's what you should have done. He's really missing opportunity there. Thank you very much. I also appreciated the team radio from the ambulance. Let's go to Nick the Quick.

What's up, leg breakers? Nick, the quick moment of the race. Got to say the classic Verstapp in Hamilton Battle. Love to see it. Also, hey, great battle with McLaren and Ferrari, and let's zoom in on the back of a guy's head. Great job, TV direction. Anyway, keep breaking light. So longchalantly said, that was great. I feel like back of head guy is belonging in the Hall of Fame with, with, what is it, flag waver.

You know, you know. Yeah, every exciting flag waver. I might do the next episode in the same way they've done that camera show and I'll just sit back with the cap on at which point we've moved on from the joke and no one understands why you're doing it but clearly a really good camera angle

so the podcast should get views on YouTube true, can't fault that logic. Let's go to Lance. Better than stroll here with my moment of the race moment of the race has to be Fernando Alonzo getting a five second time the penalty for somehow speeding in the pit lane in an and Ashton Martin.

And then two minutes later, getting noted for ignoring blue flags. Classic Alonzo, he's definitely over it at this point. I felt this penalty was going to come up at some point. Yeah. And we haven't even talked about the fact that he only got lapped by a Williams. It was the place ahead of it. Yeah. You're getting lapped by 17th place.

Cricy, that's bad. He was happy with the progress in qualify yesterday. They so, well, he hasn't got a money-making machine at the rest of the teams. For unlimited upgrades. It's been a great weekend for Alonzo. Really, us. Yeah. Yeah, very good shout, Lance.

Very much agree with you. Let's go to Blazy next. All right, boys, moment of the race. The Ferrari Hopium was very short-lived as Louis Hamilton was called into the pits. He told them it was too late. And Ferrari simply responded, we tried. Yeah. Let's add that to the words of wood.

them, I see. If memory serves me correctly, Blaise had a submission on our last one, the Barcelona GP, and was very animated about how Ferrari had finally won a race. Sorry, Blazy. It didn't last for you, mate. One of those I've just seen out the window

falling very quickly back down to Earth. Yes. Up next. George Russell's tears. Oh. George Russell's tears, guys. These are tears of joy, because my moment of the race was when I beat all my bullies.

I beat Kimmy Max. I beat Lewis. I beat all of them today. And now Tony said I could keep my job for a little while. Yamadamadoo. Haters will say that's not George Russell. Soving through the yababadoos. Well, well done, George Russell's tears for standing up to your bullies.

Bugety, boogie, boogie. Bugety, boogity, boogity, let's go racing late breakers. My moment of the race, just like we predicted at the beginning of the season. Aston Martin in front of the Mercedes and the Red Bull,

right at the end of the race. Oh, he's three laps down. Sorry, Fernando. My mom, when that happened, what's like, oh, it's Aston Martin? She'd forgotten who the Green team were.

Or they'd actually caught up and were actually in the lead battle. It's actually that far ahead. Yeah. Lastly, for today, we have Arresta. Hi, it's Arista here. My moment of the race was those first few laps in the beginning

where seemingly almost everyone's car was catching fire. And as someone who is currently in Switzerland during this heat wave, I could not relate more to that. Arresta? I hardly know. I was opening the same thing. Yes. Come on.

Come on. Oh no. It was killed back. top tier banter. Arrest has been on like so many times. Why now? Always seize the day. Caste dame.

Carpe deemes. Carpe the DMs, lads. That will have DMs in a carpe. Thanks very much to everyone who submitted. Sorry for those that we couldn't get around to, but you've got plenty more opportunities as the season unfolds. We do these moment of the race submissions after every single Grand Prix. Of course, the next.

of which the British GP in a week's time. Good for us, Sam, that we're going to be there on race day, but of course we'll be there ahead of time in terms of the preview as well. Yeah, preview midweek. And then we will be at the racetrack. So if you happen to be attending Silverstone on the Sunday, and you see these three absolute wambles walking around with Kirstie McGregor, our wonderful producer in tow,

ferrying us along to do things that we should be doing, because we are quite useless. They do stop and say hello, because it's always lovely when we bump into listeners. But we'll be doing our reviews straight after. So we're heading back off the track to sit down and do the review. So that will still happen as expected. And then, of course, the usual weekend content we provide for a race weekend

and empower rankings again on Patreon on Monday. So make sure you get back involved. Enjoy the ride. Get into Patreon City. It's a grand old time where the aircon is delightful and the flats are comfy. Right. See you then. In the meantime.

I've been Samuel Sage. I've been bedhocking. And I've been hurried. And remember, keep breaking late.