Speaker 1: I'm Barry rid Holts and I'm Hannah Elliott, and this
Speaker 1: is Hot Pursuit. So today we have a special tree.
Speaker 1: Barry Redholts's back again to co host with me. Matt Miller,
Speaker 1: our usual co host, is out because his wife is
Speaker 1: having a baby this week. So I guess that takes precedence,
Speaker 1: and rightfully so, over recording a podcast. But we have
Speaker 1: a lot of really fun things to talk about. First up,
Speaker 1: Asen Martin owner Lawrence Stroll has sold a minority stake
Speaker 1: in his Acid Martin Formula One team. Then we'll talk
Speaker 1: about the Formula One race in Las Vegas, which was
Speaker 1: a wonderful, glittering circus, so we can get into that
Speaker 1: that was fun. And then I want to talk about
Speaker 1: this Michael man Ferrari movie that we've been hearing about.
Speaker 2: And then let's see I.
Speaker 1: Drove the Audi Sq eight Etron last week. We could
Speaker 1: talk about that, and then what are you driving over
Speaker 1: the holiday? So let's get right to it. Barry, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for joining us. Let's talk about this
Speaker 1: Aston Martin sell off. Did you see the news and
Speaker 1: how did that strike you?
Speaker 3: You know, it's not a wholesale transaction, it's a minority stake,
Speaker 3: suggests ay, you know, F one teams have gone up
Speaker 3: in value dramatically, partly due to drive to survive on Netflix.
Speaker 3: It looks like someone is taking a little profits off
Speaker 3: the top. I'm not reading more into that unless you're
Speaker 3: gonna break some news.
Speaker 2: No, you know, it's really interesting.
Speaker 1: I did talk with Lawrence Stroll in Las Vegas, and
Speaker 1: you know, you kind of hear things trickling through the grapevine. Oh,
Speaker 1: this is an indicator he's not committed. He's just trying
Speaker 1: to siphon off some of his shares. But you know,
Speaker 1: he really really tried to reiterate the fact that that
Speaker 1: is not the case. He's one hundred percent committed. He
Speaker 1: did say repeatedly that the racing team is profitable, so
Speaker 1: this wasn't about raising cash. This was more about trying
Speaker 1: to leverage some of the other franchise. Is that this
Speaker 1: equity firm, it's called Arctos Partners based in Dallas, and
Speaker 1: they do on a lot of other properties, so it
Speaker 1: seems like this is more of a strategic thing. But
Speaker 1: Lawrence really did say, you know, Formula one has been
Speaker 1: He used the word transformational for Aston Martin's brand I
Speaker 1: think you're an Aston Martin fan. I think I seem
Speaker 1: to remember that Barry Well.
Speaker 3: I'm a big fan of some of the older dB fives.
Speaker 3: The challenge with some of the newer cars is that
Speaker 3: they're festuned with a lot of two generational Mercedes technology,
Speaker 3: but they're still amongst the most beautiful cars on the road.
Speaker 3: And that's the car lover's dilemma. Do you go for
Speaker 3: the looks or do you go for the brains? And
Speaker 3: Aston Martin has fabulous looks but not necessarily great brains.
Speaker 1: You know. Sometimes that's a dilemma, and more things besides
Speaker 1: the cars I seem to remember from my dating years.
Speaker 1: That's right, I mean we all can relate, right, Why
Speaker 1: does it have to be one or the other?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, you know, if you look at the
Speaker 3: history of Aston Martin, this is a relatively new thing.
Speaker 3: That these teams are worth a billion dollars. The sport's
Speaker 3: been around for decades and it's been a wealthy person's
Speaker 3: hobby because it's so expensive and rarely profitable except for
Speaker 3: one or two of the teams. So I'm not surprised
Speaker 3: that somebody has been carrying a team for as long
Speaker 3: as Aston Martin group has been carried by Stroll. For
Speaker 3: him to say, yeah, I'm gonna sell a little bit
Speaker 3: because it's worth twenty x what it was ten years ago.
Speaker 3: I don't have any problems with that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And Stroll did say, look, last year, more than
Speaker 1: half of the people who bought a new Aston Martin
Speaker 1: were new to the brand, and he attributes that rise
Speaker 1: basically solely to Formula one, which I thought was really interesting.
Speaker 3: That's enormous. That's a tremendous you know. The old expression
Speaker 3: was when on Sunday sell on Monday. Sure, and that's
Speaker 3: why you have whether it's NASCAR or any else in
Speaker 3: the United States. Not a big surprise that when the
Speaker 3: team does well, hey they sell more cars. Not that
Speaker 3: the purchasers of the Aston Martin DBX suv is going
Speaker 3: to be you know, racing that, but the fact that
Speaker 3: you could go buy a seven hundred horsepower suv after
Speaker 3: watching the team do well on Formula one not completely unrelated,
Speaker 3: So I'm not surprised. He mentioned the relationship between the
Speaker 3: team and Aston Martin proper.
Speaker 2: Speaking of Formula one, did you watch the race at all?
Speaker 2: I did not.
Speaker 1: I was at the race and it was a success,
Speaker 1: and we can get into that for a second. But
Speaker 1: unfortunately the TV time did make it a little bit
Speaker 1: hard for those of you on the East coast. I mean,
Speaker 1: the race started at ten Pacific, so that's a bit
Speaker 1: of a tricky time to watch. I think that time
Speaker 1: was linked to when European fans could watch on Sunday morning.
Speaker 1: I was there for four days, which is probably one
Speaker 1: day two long in Las Vegas. But the race itself
Speaker 1: there were some hiccups. Of course, I'm sure you've heard
Speaker 1: about the manhole cover, yes, and I was actually physically
Speaker 1: trackside when that happened. That was unfortunate, But you know,
Speaker 1: from what I understand, that in itself wasn't a demerit
Speaker 1: on failure to plan on the part of Las Vegas.
Speaker 1: But what was kind of a demerit was the fact
Speaker 1: that they kept fans in the stands while they tried
Speaker 1: to fix the manhole cover until two thirty, almost three
Speaker 1: o'clock in the morning. They resumed racing at three in
Speaker 1: the morning, but they kicked fans out at two because
Speaker 1: they didn't have enough staff to cover security. So people
Speaker 1: were kind of upset about that, which was unfortunate.
Speaker 3: That's poor planning. How do you have contingencies for well, hey,
Speaker 3: it's not like there are races where there are I
Speaker 3: don't know, crashes and things go wrong. I mean, how
Speaker 3: this happens on a regular How how could they not
Speaker 3: be prepped for that?
Speaker 1: And you'd think, out of any city in the city
Speaker 1: besides New York City, what city is a twenty four
Speaker 1: hour town that's Las Vegas. How can you not have
Speaker 1: another shift of guys you know coming on. It's kind
Speaker 1: of a head scratcher on that. But you know, the
Speaker 1: actual race itself turned out to be really exciting. Obviously
Speaker 1: we all knew Max Verstappan was going to win, but
Speaker 1: the race for second was really exciting. I thought, and
Speaker 1: you know who doesn't love a Sergio Perez Charles Leclerk standoff?
Speaker 2: And I have to say, everybody was in a really
Speaker 2: good mood. People were happy.
Speaker 1: The logistics were easy, there were signs everywhere.
Speaker 2: I didn't have a trouble getting around.
Speaker 1: I thought it might be a bit of a circus,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I mean, Barry, we got to get you
Speaker 1: out to Vegas.
Speaker 2: I know you say you don't like it.
Speaker 3: Well, I'm going to be in Vegas for the market.
Speaker 3: Council conference in December, and I actually have the better
Speaker 3: part of half a day free, and I'm looking for
Speaker 3: something away from the strip to keep me entertained. I
Speaker 3: don't know if I could do half day of driving
Speaker 3: school at Lamborghini, but that might be fun.
Speaker 2: That would be so fun.
Speaker 1: Speaking of Lamborghini, our tribal Ferrari, I did watch that
Speaker 1: movie when I was in Vegas. I bet you they'll
Speaker 1: have screenings when you go to Vegas, maybe of the Frari.
Speaker 2: What'd you think of it?
Speaker 3: Well, by the way, you lost me at Michael Mann's Ferrari.
Speaker 3: You lost me at the first two words.
Speaker 2: You're not a Michael Man fan.
Speaker 3: I could watch the first Transformers movie if I have to.
Speaker 1: Well, the verdict on Ferrari for me was Penelope Cruz
Speaker 1: was the only thing that kept me in the theater.
Speaker 1: Let's say that she's always great. She's incredible. She's incredible
Speaker 1: both her acting and her character. She plays the wife
Speaker 1: of Enzo Ferrari, Laura, who actually is really an equal
Speaker 1: partner with him. She sort of runs the books and
Speaker 1: keeps the house in order as best she can. In
Speaker 1: terms of the racing team, and I think Adam Driver
Speaker 1: did a good job too with the acting. But this
Speaker 1: CGI effects of several different crashes in the film, which
Speaker 1: takes place just during nineteen fifty seven, just the one
Speaker 1: year where they're really trying to win the Millimilia race
Speaker 1: in Italy, some of the crashes just looked ridiculous.
Speaker 2: Oh really, it just.
Speaker 1: Was so fake and kind of gratuitous.
Speaker 2: I don't know, do you. Are you a fan of
Speaker 2: car movies?
Speaker 1: Bary?
Speaker 3: Of course, of course. I watched a YouTube documentary on
Speaker 3: the making of the Fast and Furious films, of which
Speaker 3: I am not a giant fan. However, one of the
Speaker 3: things that was so fascinating is they used as little
Speaker 3: CGI as possible. When you see these cars flip and smash,
Speaker 3: or or when that Honda goes under the tractor trailer
Speaker 3: and that very famous scene. Yeah, those are real drivers
Speaker 3: doing those actual stunts. There's very little green screen. In fact,
Speaker 3: they won an Academy Award for creating this new type
Speaker 3: of rig that allows the actor to sit in what
Speaker 3: looks much more like a real car than just the
Speaker 3: usual you know, the projected screen behind you, and you're
Speaker 3: actually out there doing the stunts as they're filming. It's
Speaker 3: really quite fascinating approach. Sometimes you have to forego the
Speaker 3: technology and actually get a couple of cars out on
Speaker 3: the road and see what's gonna happen.
Speaker 1: I totally totally agree. There's nothing that can really be
Speaker 1: actual driving. I mean even the shifting, you know, the
Speaker 1: gated shifting in the Ferraris, It just seemed.
Speaker 2: A little off to me. Yeah, I don't know. Did
Speaker 2: you see Ford versus Ferrari?
Speaker 3: Oh God, I love that movie. That Yeah, that was
Speaker 3: great as a car movie, but it was also a
Speaker 3: great movie and if you can check both of those boxes, yeah,
Speaker 3: that's a winner. And I'm obviously not the only one
Speaker 3: who thinks that way. It did great at the box office.
Speaker 3: I haven't rewatched it. I wanted to let enough time
Speaker 3: go buy so it was fresh again. But that's in
Speaker 3: my list of films to see again soon.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, so let's talk about what we're driving over the holiday.
Speaker 1: I just drove the Audi SQ eight E Tron, that
Speaker 1: is their luxury electric big suv. I liked it, surprisingly agile.
Speaker 1: Have you driven any of the Audi E Trons Berry.
Speaker 3: I have not. I've driven the Takehand from Porsche, which
Speaker 3: is the same platform. Yeah, just tuned to be pure
Speaker 3: sport as opposed to more functional, but it's a very
Speaker 3: worthwhile platform and it delivers a pretty robust performance. What
Speaker 3: was your impression of the big Audi.
Speaker 2: I have to say I liked it.
Speaker 1: And the interesting thing, it's interesting that you mentioned Porsche
Speaker 1: because Audi's going to be building a lot of their
Speaker 1: upcoming evs on the same Ppe platform that Porscha developed,
Speaker 1: So I mean we are talking very very close siblings here.
Speaker 2: Anyway.
Speaker 1: In terms of the SQ eight E Tron, I have
Speaker 1: to say I drove a sportback version, which basically just
Speaker 1: means the roofline is a little bit more aggressively sloped.
Speaker 1: No difference in the in the performance, but I really
Speaker 1: liked it. Ultra ultra quiet inside, like as quiet as
Speaker 1: an A eight sedan, and very surprisingly nimble for a
Speaker 1: six thousand pound suv. Audi's nice because if you don't
Speaker 1: like all of the screens that you're going to find
Speaker 1: in a Mercedes and you want something that's a little
Speaker 1: more intuitive and less crazy inside than some of what
Speaker 1: BMW's doing, out as kind of a nice in between.
Speaker 3: To me, I totally get that. Yeah, you look at
Speaker 3: how funkified, if that's a word. The things you see
Speaker 3: from Hyundai and Kia on their EV side and the
Speaker 3: whole BMWi line of evs. They all have like this
Speaker 3: attempt to be a little different and set aside from
Speaker 3: what the internal combustion cars look like. I'm not the
Speaker 3: biggest fan of that the audies unless you know exactly
Speaker 3: what you're looking at and say, I know this is
Speaker 3: an EV they don't look all that different from the
Speaker 3: rest of the AUTI line.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and which is good to me. I agree.
Speaker 3: I don't think that just because you want an electric
Speaker 3: platform doesn't mean suddenly you've given up everything you know
Speaker 3: and love about automobiles and the way lines should be
Speaker 3: in the way a car should be designed. And I'm
Speaker 3: with you. When I first saw that the EQS screens
Speaker 3: on the interior that are the size of a small
Speaker 3: movie theater, it's like, Wow, that's really technologically impressive. And
Speaker 3: then it's like, hey, wait, everything goes through the screen.
Speaker 3: Can I just raise the volume of the radio or
Speaker 3: lower the fan on the heat? Do I have to
Speaker 3: always go through a screen? So I'm hoping people find
Speaker 3: a happy medium in terms of usability and ergonomics. It
Speaker 3: looks like Audi seems to have gotten there first.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I agree. Are you driving a Mercedes over
Speaker 1: the holiday?
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, I'm driving a seven thirty seven
Speaker 3: to Chicago, Okay, God, but when I'm there. My brother
Speaker 3: in law has had a series of very interesting cars.
Speaker 3: I used to enjoy his Camaro Z twenty eight back
Speaker 3: in the day. The problem is, if you're in Chicago
Speaker 3: in late November, those sticky summer performance tires turn into hard,
Speaker 3: useless rocks. I'll be in a cls AMG version, which
Speaker 3: is it is the beautiful older model that he can't
Speaker 3: bear to part with because the new one is a
Speaker 3: jellybean and the previous generation has just lovely lines and
Speaker 3: a serious bit of horsepower under the hood. He was
Speaker 3: looking at a take hand and what prevented him from
Speaker 3: pulling the trigger on that is you can't put two
Speaker 3: golf bags in the trunk, And apparently this is a
Speaker 3: big issue for a lot of buyers. Can a golf
Speaker 3: bag fit into the trunk? Yes, which it supposedly can
Speaker 3: do in the new Corvette. I never would have even
Speaker 3: thought to ask about.
Speaker 1: So that's it for this week. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for tuning in. I'm Hannah Elliott. You can find all
Speaker 1: of my work on Bloomberg dot com or on Instagram
Speaker 1: at Hannah Elliott XO.
Speaker 2: That's two h's, two l's, and two teeth.
Speaker 3: I'm Barry Ridolts. Check out Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio,
Speaker 3: and be sure and check out our new podcast, At
Speaker 3: the Money. That's on Apple Podcasts and it will soon
Speaker 3: be everywhere.
Speaker 1: Matt will be back next week. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for Barry riddholds my special cos today and really the
Speaker 1: best friend of the pod.
Speaker 2: I'm Hannah Elliott and this is Bloomberg