Speaker 1: Okay, ready to go. Uh gimmick is up here? Have
Speaker 1: we have many gimmicks today? So to kick us off,
Speaker 1: I have another one of my beloved coasters. This is
Speaker 1: uh Danil Ricardo is on this in his McLaren gear.
Speaker 1: Lily handed me a paster of Daniel Riccardo in the
Speaker 1: quote beneath his characature drawing is sometimes you gotta lick
Speaker 1: the stamp and send it. Sometimes you just got to
Speaker 1: lick the stamp and send it. A lot of the
Speaker 1: time you get one chance to try. So I made
Speaker 1: the most of every opportunity. Man. From what I can
Speaker 1: tell about him, likable guy, very across is likable guy.
Speaker 1: And we will get to the ballad of Danil Ricardo
Speaker 1: very soon. From I Heart Radio and Sports Illustrated Studios,
Speaker 1: this is choosing sides. Yes one Wow. So first and foremost,
Speaker 1: we're talking about a team that is historic, It is revered,
Speaker 1: it is storied. It is the second winning ist team
Speaker 1: on the grid end of all time in F one.
Speaker 1: That is a ton of races, second only two Ferrari
Speaker 1: and they have had a rough go of it as
Speaker 1: of late. The team we are talking about today, which
Speaker 1: is America's kind of informal team is McLaren McLaren. So
Speaker 1: who is McLaren. I've heard this name all the time,
Speaker 1: and even as an American, I feel familiar somewhat with
Speaker 1: the brand, but I really don't know a whole lot. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so McLaren is definitely one of the more historic teams
Speaker 1: on the grid. It's one of only three that's been
Speaker 1: around for decades that has kept the same name over time.
Speaker 1: The other two are and the other Williams. Yes. So,
Speaker 1: McLaren was founded by a New Zealand racing driver named
Speaker 1: Bruce McLaren in nineteen sixty three. He won four Grands
Speaker 1: Prix and got twenty seven podiums during his time and racing.
Speaker 1: Uh it's great, except that he died in a test
Speaker 1: driving accident in nineteen seventy at the age of thirty two. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that sucks. Ended obviously a very storied career tragically
Speaker 1: and abruptly, But they kept the McLaren name alive. McLaren
Speaker 1: really had its initial heyday starting in the late seventies
Speaker 1: into the early two thousand's. It was known for really
Speaker 1: having a lot of innovative engineering, playing around a lot
Speaker 1: with like weights of cars and aerodynamics and kind of
Speaker 1: trying things out and obviously after a certain point that
Speaker 1: attracts some of the best drivers. They're also home to
Speaker 1: some of the greatest rivalries on the grid. In the
Speaker 1: late eighties early nineties, for instance, they were two drivers,
Speaker 1: a Land Prost and Ayrton Senna. They both won several
Speaker 1: World championships. Yeah, same team. I think everyone knows pressed
Speaker 1: by now. He's always complaining that he's never his fault.
Speaker 1: If I find him again in the same way they
Speaker 1: push him out, that's for sure. The way he's doing,
Speaker 1: he's behaving like a coward. They're kind of the quintessential
Speaker 1: example of rivalry within a team and how that can
Speaker 1: almost tear the team apart. Right. Yrton Senna died back
Speaker 1: in a very tragic accident that was very public during
Speaker 1: a race weekend, and it's it's very much an accident
Speaker 1: that you can see online which is very grim and morbid.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it was very public. A driver had already
Speaker 1: died that weekend. It's all just very sad. He was
Speaker 1: actually carrying the driver's like country flag in his car
Speaker 1: to wave it after the race. Like it's just all
Speaker 1: really depressing. That doesn't happen in golf. Yeah, so so
Speaker 1: basically McLaren historic team, not a nail unfit in the
Speaker 1: McLaren garage r and success today meant that they finished
Speaker 1: the Constructors Championship. I really can't find any words absolutely right.
Speaker 1: They were the number one team for a while. They
Speaker 1: were number one team and Lewis Hamilton's won his first
Speaker 1: World Championship two thousand eight in a McLaren, so he
Speaker 1: was really a McLaren guy. That's why it was so
Speaker 1: shocking when he left. Lewis Hamilton's is set to leave McLaren.
Speaker 1: The two thousand and eight F one World champion will
Speaker 1: race the Mercedes. The team took a real nose dive
Speaker 1: starting in the early tens. They didn't really nail the
Speaker 1: new regulations in two thousand nine, They had really ineffective leadership,
Speaker 1: a lot of drama between team co owners behind the
Speaker 1: scenes kerfuffles if you will. They had mechanical problems, they
Speaker 1: had if the drivers at times, and had some other
Speaker 1: kind of inner team drama that all kind of led
Speaker 1: to a real slump knoween around this time where it
Speaker 1: just was really not looking good for them. That the
Speaker 1: long time McLaren fans were really not feeling great, really tough. Yeah,
Speaker 1: quite embarrassing really to be floating round at the back.
Speaker 1: Before we get to the present day and kind of
Speaker 1: their their upswing, We're going to talk about one of
Speaker 1: the great F one scandals, and of course you know
Speaker 1: it's serious. It's called Spygate. It must have a gate.
Speaker 1: At the end of I was gonna say the gate
Speaker 1: comes in Spygate. We're gonna go back to Ferrari for
Speaker 1: a second. So Ferrari at this point is in a
Speaker 1: championship battle with McLaren. McLaren has two different drivers, the
Speaker 1: rivals Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, in the hunt for
Speaker 1: that same title. So they have a at Ferrari a
Speaker 1: higher up employee named Nigel Stepney. He starts publicly and
Speaker 1: privately complaining about being unhappy with the team. He doesn't
Speaker 1: like them. He's kind of over it with Ferrari. All
Speaker 1: of a sudden, one day, Uh, Ferrari alleges that this guy,
Speaker 1: Nigel Stepney, gave almost eight hundred pages of confidential Ferrari
Speaker 1: information to a McLaren senior engineer named Mike Coglin. Oh,
Speaker 1: Nigel and Mike, what are you doing. So that's already
Speaker 1: like Nigel and Mike doing a lot. But here's where
Speaker 1: it gets very funny of how they discovered this at Ferrari.
Speaker 1: So here's what we know, is that or the belief
Speaker 1: is that Nigel gives these pages to Mike Coglin, Mike
Speaker 1: Coglan's wife, just like a random other lady takes the
Speaker 1: seven hundred and eighty pages to like a printer store,
Speaker 1: remember those back in two seven, to a printer store
Speaker 1: to have them photo copied. And the person, the employee
Speaker 1: who works at the printer store who's helping with this
Speaker 1: is a Ferrari fan who realizes that they are helping
Speaker 1: print confidential Ferrari information called Yes, the Folcy came through
Speaker 1: so hard in this story, and so then the to
Speaker 1: Folcy person goes to Ferrari's like, hey, whistle blowing the
Speaker 1: ship out of this. Someone came into my store and like,
Speaker 1: it's printing out documents. So obviously that's crazy, it's fucking nuts.
Speaker 1: It's part of my French the f bomb was necessary,
Speaker 1: just like the wildest, weirdest coincidence to have a Ferrari
Speaker 1: fan running the printer shop that day. What does it
Speaker 1: say about me that I blame the wife. You know,
Speaker 1: it's like, of all the places, you're gonna pick that place.
Speaker 1: But maybe I mean, where do you go? Where do
Speaker 1: you copy eight? You can't copy it at home? I
Speaker 1: bet you this happened all the time that we don't
Speaker 1: know about. I wouldn't be surprised. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: as we know, teams will be very hush hush, but
Speaker 1: every team is not hush hush about every other team. Correct.
Speaker 1: That's how we know driver salary estimations is not from
Speaker 1: the teams. But everyone loves to gossip in the F
Speaker 1: one paddock. So Coglin from McLaren and Stepane from Ferrari
Speaker 1: are very quickly dismissed as soon as this all comes
Speaker 1: to light, you know, the f i A is the
Speaker 1: governing body, is immediately like, well, we gotta do something
Speaker 1: about this. We gotta have hearings, because we know briercrats
Speaker 1: left nothing more than a hearing. It gets them going
Speaker 1: in the morning. And they're big question mark is did
Speaker 1: McLaren have access to these documents, you know and mass
Speaker 1: and did they use the information they got from them
Speaker 1: to get an advantage in the sport. So initially they
Speaker 1: say we have not at any stage used any intellectual
Speaker 1: property of any other team. Oh no, this guy Coglin
Speaker 1: acted alone, as did stepped me. It's very contained. No
Speaker 1: one at McLaren saw these documents. I don't believe that
Speaker 1: we'll get into all of that right after the break.
Speaker 1: Let me do a quick recap just so I understand. Recap.
Speaker 1: Lewis Hamilton and Fernando both race for McLaren. Yes, at
Speaker 1: this point McLaren is in a tight race with Ferrari
Speaker 1: for the titles. For the titles, Nigel Ferrari secretly gave
Speaker 1: Mike McLaren eight hundred pages. Mike McLaren's wife photo copied
Speaker 1: it at the local kink Kinkos that the Ferrari fan
Speaker 1: works at the Kinkos, and turned him in. Okay, so
Speaker 1: I got that right, Thank you did. You did a
Speaker 1: great job explain that to me. And I would also
Speaker 1: think this is not the first time this has happened.
Speaker 1: And I would also think they did use this information,
Speaker 1: and I would also think more people were involved. But
Speaker 1: that's just me. Here we go, Okay, here's what's also
Speaker 1: going on. So the backdrop of this whole thing is
Speaker 1: Lewis Hamilton's and Fernando Alonso they're really duking it out
Speaker 1: for this title, absolutely hate each other, and basically Louis
Speaker 1: does something that could have been seen as like borderline
Speaker 1: not kosher, and Fernando gets angry at it and sort
Speaker 1: of tries to sabotage the race because he's so piste
Speaker 1: not getting on with it. On a minute forty to go?
Speaker 1: Is he flocking Hamilton? That was a little bit of
Speaker 1: nualtyall think. And then the fa basically says, McLaren, you
Speaker 1: gotta get your ship together. Your drivers are like putting
Speaker 1: putting the sport at risk and making us look bad.
Speaker 1: This is a couple of weeks after the initial photo
Speaker 1: copy whistle blowing incident in the f AI hearing. But
Speaker 1: what comes out of this whole issue is so basically
Speaker 1: Fernando Alonso being piste off in a petty person, goes
Speaker 1: to the f i A and he he's like, hey,
Speaker 1: me and the reserve driver at McLaren, This dude, Pedro
Speaker 1: de LaRosa have emails that prove that McLaren know about
Speaker 1: these documents, have read them and have like used them
Speaker 1: to our advantage, snitching on his own team. Stitching on
Speaker 1: his own team because he's pissed about how he feels
Speaker 1: like they're treating him versus Lewis Hamilton's and so, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is your employer, sign your million dollar check. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So so then of course the head han show at
Speaker 1: McLaren at the time, Ron Dennis is saying that, you know,
Speaker 1: Alonzo is just trying to blackmail them because he's pissy
Speaker 1: and but hurt, etcetera, etcetera. But of course the f
Speaker 1: A look into this, they claim that they get substantial
Speaker 1: evidence that this is in fact the case, and they
Speaker 1: hand down a one hundred million dollar fine McLaren unprecedented
Speaker 1: in the history of Formula one, if not just sports history,
Speaker 1: hundred million dollars. And don't left points from two thousand
Speaker 1: and sevens championship withdrawing them from next year's championship as well,
Speaker 1: which makes it even more draconian. You had different team
Speaker 1: members and personnel coming out with all sorts of statements.
Speaker 1: I'm absolutely appalled. I'm disgusted. There is a great possibility
Speaker 1: of it wiping McLaren off my Formula one map altogether,
Speaker 1: true madness. So here's the funny thing where I love
Speaker 1: like the ethics of F one are very inconsistent. Is
Speaker 1: you would think they would say, oh, if we're just
Speaker 1: qualifying and giving this huge fine, we'll just qualify the
Speaker 1: drivers too. But no. Good news for Lewis Hamilton for
Speaker 1: his teammate Fernando Alonso in the McLaren team are that
Speaker 1: they won't be punished, their points won't be taken away
Speaker 1: the f A as official reasoning as they say, well,
Speaker 1: you know, the drivers are really honest with us and
Speaker 1: we appreciate their honesty in actuality. They were locked in
Speaker 1: a very compelling championship battle with this third guy at
Speaker 1: the other team implicated in this whole situation, and they
Speaker 1: didn't want to suddenly have two to three drivers go
Speaker 1: poof in the night. So so the team is in trouble,
Speaker 1: but not the individual. That's interesting and it's very It
Speaker 1: adds to the complexity of Formula one and that there
Speaker 1: is also this engineering component that's so that that's there's
Speaker 1: there's also a race for the engineering exactly. Yeah. So,
Speaker 1: as I said, this is two thousand seven, McLaren a
Speaker 1: couple of years later starts to have a little bit
Speaker 1: of a slide down the rankings. Yeah, this is gonna
Speaker 1: be a lot of drama. Is gonna hurt you? Yeah,
Speaker 1: this seems like a lot of drama. Like I said,
Speaker 1: they had leadership problems, they had some driver issues, they
Speaker 1: had mechanical problems. Just everything was not adding up for them.
Speaker 1: It was poorly managed. There was money problems. The list
Speaker 1: goes on and on. However, they made a couple of
Speaker 1: big changes towards the end of this downturn one a
Speaker 1: lot of the original you know owners who are causing issues,
Speaker 1: like Ron Dennis. They end up leaving, but not without again,
Speaker 1: lots of drama. A guy named Zach Brown ends up
Speaker 1: coming in and he's an American, he's the California dude bro. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And and they make some other big changes to their leadership,
Speaker 1: and basically by they end up in third place in
Speaker 1: the championship. And then this past year they were in
Speaker 1: third but ended up in fourth. So they went from
Speaker 1: kind of being in in you know, bottom of the
Speaker 1: grid to being kind of in that best of the
Speaker 1: rest category where them in Ferrari were sort of you know,
Speaker 1: duking it out for that that unofficial informal title, which
Speaker 1: is exciting in terms of leadership. Yeah, they have this
Speaker 1: guy Zach Brown. I'll show you photos of Zach Brown,
Speaker 1: so uh not to be mistaken with Zach Brown band
Speaker 1: No spelled slightly differently, but Zach Brown is from California,
Speaker 1: was born and I think Los Angeles, so here is
Speaker 1: Zach Brown. Zach Brown doesn't doesn't really fit the same
Speaker 1: kind of mold as the rest of these guys. Zach
Speaker 1: Brown looks American silver foxy probably, you know, how do
Speaker 1: I say this kindly? He's not as fit as the
Speaker 1: other team principles Uh interesting. He actually used to also
Speaker 1: be a racing driver, not enough one or anything like that,
Speaker 1: but he's he's very knowledgeable at cars. He as his
Speaker 1: own giant car collection. Not as alpha male ish looking.
Speaker 1: Yeah you know you look at it red Bull and
Speaker 1: they're pretty tough on their drivers publicly, That's not my approach.
Speaker 1: It's more of a we're in this together. What can
Speaker 1: I give you or do for you? Good time? Guy?
Speaker 1: Arry gets very enthusiastic and we'll shout in woo a
Speaker 1: lot when when they win or do well. Zach is
Speaker 1: so ingrained into that McLaren racing team you're hearing from
Speaker 1: Popular f one TikTok or Josh Marsh that like people
Speaker 1: like all the time are like what is that? Like,
Speaker 1: what is his role? Like? Is he team boss? It?
Speaker 1: Like what is He's like, Oh No, he's just the CEO.
Speaker 1: He's just always there. I love that a CEO is
Speaker 1: around all the time, Like he's there on the pit wall,
Speaker 1: he's there with the engineers, he's like with the drivers.
Speaker 1: Um So that like kind of camaraderie and like that
Speaker 1: dedication the team. I I love to see because just
Speaker 1: as a team, the things that they do as a
Speaker 1: team is so like so different. Yeah. So, Zach Brown
Speaker 1: actually had a really fun bet going with Daniel Ricardo
Speaker 1: at the start of Daniel's first season where he said, hey, Daniel,
Speaker 1: you're new to McLaren. If you get a podium, I
Speaker 1: will let you drive one of Dale Earnhart's cars. Because
Speaker 1: he knows that Daniel Ricardo is the biggest Dale Earnhart fan.
Speaker 1: He decided to race under the number three because of
Speaker 1: Dale Earnhart. He loves NASCAR, and sure enough, when Daniel
Speaker 1: Ricardo won Manza, he got to drive that car at
Speaker 1: the U S Grand Prix no less. And then similarly,
Speaker 1: when when when Daniel want to race last year one,
Speaker 1: Zach Brown and him had another bet going, and Zach
Speaker 1: got a tattoo of the Manza circuit on his arm
Speaker 1: with the date of the win. And of course they
Speaker 1: brought every with cameras there. It was all over social media.
Speaker 1: But he's the kind of guy who will do kind
Speaker 1: of funny stuff like that that's kind of absurd, and
Speaker 1: he holds up his end of the bargain. So and
Speaker 1: as a player, if your coach leader is doing that stuff,
Speaker 1: you love that exactly. The other thing too that McLaren
Speaker 1: did really well kind of as they were building up
Speaker 1: is around the time they were really having trouble is
Speaker 1: when that company, Liberty Media bought f one from our
Speaker 1: our our old friend Bernie from way back. When McLaren
Speaker 1: around the same time decided, hey, we're going to kind
Speaker 1: of do almost like a brand refresh. I think I
Speaker 1: enjoyed watching that shift of watching McLaren go from like
Speaker 1: a yes, we are all business and no fun to
Speaker 1: like a lighthearted team very like more fun, more enjoyable. Um.
Speaker 1: And then I saw McLaren was one of the first
Speaker 1: teams to do a lot more on the social media
Speaker 1: side of things, you know, with like TikTok with YouTube videos,
Speaker 1: funny little things like hey, we're gonna you know, we're
Speaker 1: gonna play songs for you and you're gonna guess what
Speaker 1: the song is. Just basic stuff that kind of gave
Speaker 1: fans more of this inside look at the team to
Speaker 1: make them feel like they were part of it online
Speaker 1: on our Hi, I'm Daniel mcconder, which I'm sure the
Speaker 1: athletes hated, but fans love exactly. And now it's it's
Speaker 1: more part of the course. You know, coming in f one,
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to do that. That was not the
Speaker 1: case even you know, five, six, seven years ago. This
Speaker 1: was all brand new. But McLaren also, for instance, has
Speaker 1: a very popular race weekend recap series called Unboxed where
Speaker 1: their their media team just goes around filming things. There's
Speaker 1: no narration over, it's just filming what goes on over
Speaker 1: a race weekend. The Senna Monuments where he had his
Speaker 1: fatal accident May one, and I remember it like it
Speaker 1: was yesterday. There's an unbelievably sad and fans immediately, you know,
Speaker 1: loved it. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I'd like to check
Speaker 1: that out. It feels like you're not just a fan
Speaker 1: of McLaren, like you're part of the McLaren family and
Speaker 1: like that's pretty sick, like that they can make you
Speaker 1: feel like that. So this all coincided to with the
Speaker 1: launch of that show Drive to Survive on Netflix, which
Speaker 1: started airing in McLaren had already started building up this
Speaker 1: really strong social media presence, this digital presence and Drive
Speaker 1: to Survive was aimed at a lot of North American fans,
Speaker 1: particularly Americans. So despite the fact that Bruce McLaren is
Speaker 1: from Note New Zealand, them claren team is based in
Speaker 1: the UK, it's become the the unofficial American team on
Speaker 1: the grid. I think some people have like adopted almost
Speaker 1: Zach Brown as the unofficial American mascot. And now obviously
Speaker 1: we want to talk about the drivers, but before we
Speaker 1: do that, we are going to take a quick ad break.
Speaker 1: We're back from the ad break. I want to hear
Speaker 1: about the McLaren drivers. So they have two of who
Speaker 1: I would argue are the most marketable drivers on the
Speaker 1: entire grid. That is, they have Lando Norris and they
Speaker 1: have Daniel Ricardo. Lando and Daniel are fun and that
Speaker 1: they are so different from each other, both in terms
Speaker 1: of personality and in terms of where they are in
Speaker 1: their careers, and then also where they are in terms
Speaker 1: of McLaren the team. So we'll start with Lando. Lando
Speaker 1: is twenty two and as Ferrari is a big Charles
Speaker 1: Laclard team, and as Red Bull is a giant Max
Speaker 1: verstaff and team McLaren is a giant Lando Norris team.
Speaker 1: So Lando, yeah, is from the UK. He's British. His
Speaker 1: family does have wealth. His dad is worth two hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty million pounds at last calculation, and for some
Speaker 1: reason this is available on the internet that at one
Speaker 1: point his dad was the five dred and first richest
Speaker 1: person in England. We've talked about some drivers who you
Speaker 1: other families had a really struggle to make ends meet
Speaker 1: and have them race and even krding. This is not
Speaker 1: necessarily the case for Lando. I would say the Norris
Speaker 1: family seems very fun though, like his parents seemed relatively normal,
Speaker 1: like they they aren't like like whereas Max's dad. We
Speaker 1: all the stuff to say, they're kind of in the background.
Speaker 1: They randomly show up to races. In a very cute
Speaker 1: moment after Lando one podium, he got a podium at Monico.
Speaker 1: There's a clip of him in a McLaren unboxed video
Speaker 1: of him talking to his mom while he's holding his
Speaker 1: trophy and he's like, yeah, you were right. Yea. His
Speaker 1: teammates are kind of making fun of him. They're going like, mummy,
Speaker 1: so he's at he's he's a kid, he's a mom's boy.
Speaker 1: Uh So Lando, Yeah, grew up racing against a lot
Speaker 1: of these other people we talked about, like George Russell,
Speaker 1: another person who's in the mix of guy Alex Alban.
Speaker 1: All these drivers on the grid who are kind of
Speaker 1: from the UK had to race in karting together at
Speaker 1: some point. They obviously also race people like Max Verstappen.
Speaker 1: There's like hilarious photos online of Lando who is the
Speaker 1: tiniest person. He's only five seven now, like this tiny
Speaker 1: like shrimp of a kid, and then Max Verstappen looks
Speaker 1: like a giant next to him, and they're like thirteen
Speaker 1: years old. You know, it's it's it's very funny. So yeah,
Speaker 1: Lando was sort of um. He started driving under a
Speaker 1: McLaren McLaren's Young Driver's program long ago. He became an
Speaker 1: F one driver when he was only nineteen years old.
Speaker 1: And you think he's tiny now, he looked tiny then
Speaker 1: as a barely nineteen year old, you know, barely legal
Speaker 1: adult who was on the grid. I think there were
Speaker 1: some people who were really skeptical despite him having a
Speaker 1: very good race record of him coming on, especially that
Speaker 1: young and in the midst of the McLaren team really
Speaker 1: not doing well. You know, Lando showed up and McLaren
Speaker 1: was not great, so it was probably hard for him
Speaker 1: to be like, well, I've already put so many eggs
Speaker 1: in this basket. I'm gonna go you know, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with my gut and go with this team.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so Lando came in very much as the
Speaker 1: golden boy or sort of. The idea was, we're going
Speaker 1: to build this program around Lando. Not to say that
Speaker 1: they're going to ignore the second driver like Red Bull
Speaker 1: almost does in a lot of cases, but the idea was,
Speaker 1: you know, we invested all this time in Lando's career.
Speaker 1: He's coming in. This was happening right after you know,
Speaker 1: Zach Brown had only been with the team for a
Speaker 1: little bit. He really loved Lando. They have a great relationship,
Speaker 1: and the idea was, we're all going to build together.
Speaker 1: So Lando comes in, he's doing great. He also at
Speaker 1: the time when he came in, he drove for his
Speaker 1: first two years with Carlos who's now at Ferrari. They
Speaker 1: have a very close friendship. They're called Carlando by the
Speaker 1: fan base. It's better than Lando's exactly, Yeah, Carlando. I've
Speaker 1: seen I've seen merch that has like gravestones that say
Speaker 1: like r I P. Carlando on them, like people were
Speaker 1: very passionate about them as a driver pairing. But on
Speaker 1: that in that dynamic, Carlos was faster than Lando both years. Yea.
Speaker 1: So on top of that one makes Lando a little
Speaker 1: different than other drivers. He kind of is very public
Speaker 1: about having a life and a career outside of F one.
Speaker 1: So whereas you know, we all we know about Max
Speaker 1: ver Staff and is he is like all about driving
Speaker 1: seven In particular, Lando is known for doing a ton
Speaker 1: of Twitch streaming, and he has an e sports slash
Speaker 1: lifestyle brand and team called Quadrant. His number on the
Speaker 1: greatest number four. It's it's it's quintessential, Like some teenager
Speaker 1: came up with this and they think it's brilliant, and
Speaker 1: you're like, okay, we're lucky. People were getting to play
Speaker 1: F one twenty one and we're doing it at no
Speaker 1: other right, and as a vision where I'm racing this weekend.
Speaker 1: Obviously it's not for money, but it's it's smart from
Speaker 1: a marketing standpoint that he has something else going on.
Speaker 1: But of course when he first entered at nineteen, there
Speaker 1: was a lot of criticism of him being interested in
Speaker 1: other stuff like twitch streaming. Right. People were like, this
Speaker 1: kid is not, you know, taking this sport seriously, This
Speaker 1: little punk is not focusing on his racing very hard apparently,
Speaker 1: and it was also hard because McLaren wasn't doing well,
Speaker 1: so he wasn't necessarily killing it on the grid because
Speaker 1: he was a rookie at a team that was really
Speaker 1: trying to build back up, and having all this criticism
Speaker 1: at that age is hard. He's actually talked a lot
Speaker 1: about it, and he's one of the only drivers who's
Speaker 1: very open about his mental health and the toll that
Speaker 1: being enough one driver can take on a person which
Speaker 1: is definitely very different. You know, it's good that their
Speaker 1: necks are so strong because there's so much going on
Speaker 1: in the head. I don't know, you can edit that
Speaker 1: at or or replay it many times. I mean, Lando
Speaker 1: does have like a very thick neck for his like
Speaker 1: big heads their next are unbelievable. I'm I'm I'm baffled
Speaker 1: at their next strength. Okay, so that's Lando. Who's the
Speaker 1: other driver, Dania Ricardo. Technically his name should be pronounced
Speaker 1: Richiardo if we're going by the Italian pronunciation, but Daniel
Speaker 1: the Australian does not care Daniel. There's a reason why
Speaker 1: if you watch the show Drive to Survive, Daniel is
Speaker 1: the first driver you meet in the very first episode
Speaker 1: of the first season. And it makes complete sense because
Speaker 1: this happened to me when I watched Drive to Survive.
Speaker 1: All of my friends, regardless of gender, this happened then,
Speaker 1: where they said, Oh my god, I am so invested
Speaker 1: in this one guy. He is personable, he is very positive,
Speaker 1: he's very funny, and he's great with press. He's great
Speaker 1: with the media, is great with fans. It seems effortless.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen Drive to Survive. I was specifically told
Speaker 1: by Sports Illustrated not to watch it. But you meet
Speaker 1: Daniel Ricardo over the Internet and you immediately like him
Speaker 1: because he's not putting it on. Isn't you like it
Speaker 1: at least? Yeah, that's just how he is. Now. There
Speaker 1: are other drivers who do have personalities on the grid,
Speaker 1: whether you like them or not, they they're giving us more.
Speaker 1: But especially when Daniel even started, you know, over a
Speaker 1: decade ago, that wasn't necessarily the case. And he was
Speaker 1: always very open and fun even with the media back then,
Speaker 1: in a way that other drivers weren't or really tried
Speaker 1: hard not to be. So he always stood out, not
Speaker 1: just in terms of the personality he has, but in
Speaker 1: comparison to literally know of the Grid. Was your relationship
Speaker 1: with the Nicol Hackenberg compared to your relationship with Max
Speaker 1: are you always doing? Um? I mean they're both non sexual,
Speaker 1: which is certainly beneficial for the working environment. Is Daniel
Speaker 1: one of the better drivers? Yes? So Daniel is an
Speaker 1: interesting case. So Daniels a very fun driver to watch.
Speaker 1: He can be aggressive when he needs to be. There's
Speaker 1: just something about the way that Daniel races Josh marsh
Speaker 1: He is like aggressive and he's very bold and ballsy
Speaker 1: with the like with the moves that he will make
Speaker 1: UM and I really like that. I like the risk
Speaker 1: that he's taken races UM. He's had a lot of
Speaker 1: race wins. He was really considered at one point to
Speaker 1: be a driver who was going to win a championship. Uh,
Speaker 1: here's how it went for him. So Daniel started out
Speaker 1: in Red Bulls young driver program. He distinguished himself very quickly.
Speaker 1: He was really talented, very very early on. He got
Speaker 1: his start on a very short lived and disastrous team
Speaker 1: called HRT not important, but within a year he went
Speaker 1: over to that junior sister team at red Bull Toro
Speaker 1: Rosso now Alpha TWI. He was there for a few
Speaker 1: seasons before he was promoted to the Red Bull team, right,
Speaker 1: and he was like a perfect person for Red Bull.
Speaker 1: He's positive, he's fun. They would make him do these
Speaker 1: weird challenges and drive the car in weird environments and
Speaker 1: he loved it and you know, the crowd would eat
Speaker 1: it up wherever he was. He's just like the perfect
Speaker 1: encapsulation of that brand and in a slightly less kind
Speaker 1: of Alpha match away, he's just very fun. Right. He
Speaker 1: does something that he has coined a shoey. If he
Speaker 1: ends up on the podium where he takes off his
Speaker 1: racing boot, you know he's had on for a whole
Speaker 1: race that is smelly and disgusting and like is like
Speaker 1: hot and gross. I know where is he dumps his
Speaker 1: champagne on it or in it and then drinks out
Speaker 1: of it. I want some tennis players to do that.
Speaker 1: It had some pizzazz. Shoey shoey. Yeah, of course he
Speaker 1: says it with his like Australian accents, so it sounds
Speaker 1: cooler and hipper than when I say it. I feel
Speaker 1: like I dug a hole for myself for this one.
Speaker 1: I'm just like walking along minding my business and they're
Speaker 1: like doing shoe I don't actually just take my shoe
Speaker 1: of while I'm looking in the street and drink out
Speaker 1: of it. However, by his teammate is Max for Steppin
Speaker 1: and as we know Dr Evil, as we know Red
Speaker 1: Bull has made a very clear that Max is their dude. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: they are like all in. We'd love to know how
Speaker 1: exactly that happened. All happen, but we'll talk about that
Speaker 1: in season two. Yeah, it'll take a while. But so Daniel,
Speaker 1: obviously he's older than Max. He's thirty two now, he
Speaker 1: was in his late twenties. Then he's aware of what's
Speaker 1: going on. He feels like, hey, Red Bull might not
Speaker 1: be prioritizing me the same way, and in a somewhat
Speaker 1: surprising announcement even to Red Bull, he says he's leaving
Speaker 1: the team at the end of and even weirder, he
Speaker 1: is moving to a team called Reyno, which everyone was like,
Speaker 1: rend out there, kind of lateral move maybe exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was kind of a weird move, and he was
Speaker 1: there for two years. It was kind of a weird fit.
Speaker 1: He didn't do poorly. He actually finished fifth in the
Speaker 1: championship his second year there, but it's just yeah, it
Speaker 1: was kind of an odd time for him. And again,
Speaker 1: he's the same personality, still very happy, go lucky, very
Speaker 1: work hard, play hard. But he then announces that he
Speaker 1: is going to move at the end of to McLaren.
Speaker 1: So when from being a guy who seemed almost like
Speaker 1: a one team guy with the whole Red Bull organization
Speaker 1: to kind of bouncing around a little bit. So here's
Speaker 1: where things get interesting. So McLaren announces this driver lineup, right,
Speaker 1: Lando and Daniel. The fan base is like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: these two fun person guys that we love on the
Speaker 1: internet are going to be together. This is gonna be dope,
Speaker 1: Like everything's gonna be great, like people were so hype.
Speaker 1: But unsurprisingly, Lando is kind of used to being, you know,
Speaker 1: the keeper of his own domain. And I would say Daniel,
Speaker 1: despite being a cancer on the zodiac sign, very much
Speaker 1: has like Leo energy, Like he loves to be like tall.
Speaker 1: It makes sense like three percent of the people listening,
Speaker 1: but he has like a lot of he likes to
Speaker 1: be the center of attention. I'll put it that way.
Speaker 1: He likes to ham it up. Lando hams it up
Speaker 1: in a different way. But these are two people who
Speaker 1: are kind of used to having the spotlight on them.
Speaker 1: I'll be it very in very different ways. Lando can
Speaker 1: be a little more quiet and a little more reserved
Speaker 1: than you have Daniel coming in just like WHOA, let's go. Um.
Speaker 1: So a lot of these initial videos you were seeing
Speaker 1: coming out from McLaren, it would really be Daniel carrying
Speaker 1: these videos and like trying as hard as in. Lando
Speaker 1: was like he didn't really care to hang out with
Speaker 1: Daniel as much. Um honestly, like, oh, maybe this relationship
Speaker 1: is not working. Um, And in reality it was just
Speaker 1: it's a very they're very different people in the way
Speaker 1: that they approached racing, in the way they approached life.
Speaker 1: It's almost like there's a weird passive aggression to some
Speaker 1: of their interactions of like I can't tell if he's
Speaker 1: kidding or if he is serious, and that is a problem,
Speaker 1: Like all their jokes to each other have that quality
Speaker 1: to them where you're like, oh, this body language is weird,
Speaker 1: and so what makes us worse is Lando, despite being
Speaker 1: behind Carlos for his first two seasons and being a
Speaker 1: rookie and making you know, some mistakes, even in his
Speaker 1: sophomore season, he has this gun's blazing breakout season, particularly
Speaker 1: in the first half of one, so he's killing it.
Speaker 1: And on the flip side, Daniel isn't just kind of
Speaker 1: liking a little bit behind. He is struggling at McLaren.
Speaker 1: There's lots of theories and reasons as to why. A
Speaker 1: big one that he brought up is and everyone has
Speaker 1: said the McLaren car, regardless of season, is just kind
Speaker 1: of built differently. Daniel has said that he almost had
Speaker 1: to relearn how to drive in F one to drive
Speaker 1: the McLaren car, like it doesn't you know, he kind
Speaker 1: of doesn't doesn't break the same way he's used to.
Speaker 1: He can't really use his natural strength to drive this car.
Speaker 1: So you have races where Lando is qualifying, you know,
Speaker 1: like P. Five, and Daniel's qualifying like P. Sixteen, Like
Speaker 1: it's it's just huge discrepancies. So it's very obvious that
Speaker 1: Lando is just killing it. And of course he's had
Speaker 1: this car now this is that was his third season.
Speaker 1: He's now been in that car for over three years. Uh,
Speaker 1: but you know, Daniel's just having the hardest time getting it.
Speaker 1: And obviously to a lot of Daniel's whole vibe and
Speaker 1: persona and quote unquote brand is that he's winning. He's
Speaker 1: this fun guy. It's a little bit harder to be
Speaker 1: like the positive fun guy when you're not yeah, when
Speaker 1: you suck, and the guy who's beating you on your
Speaker 1: team is a decade younger. And it's also really well liked,
Speaker 1: really popular. It's not even like a less press requests
Speaker 1: you get. You get to show off your personality a
Speaker 1: lot less and no one even wants you to thanks
Speaker 1: for your unwavering Yeah, it's one that everyone The McLaren's
Speaker 1: story in two is turning into one where you're seeing
Speaker 1: two drivers on completely opposite traject trees. So on one
Speaker 1: side you've got Lando Norris, this young, dynamic driver who
Speaker 1: had this breakout one season. The world is his oyster.
Speaker 1: Even if the McLaren Carr isn't quite there in two.
Speaker 1: There's still a lot of hope for him. He's still
Speaker 1: in conversations about one day being this championship caliber driver.
Speaker 1: And then the opposite side of the garage, you've got
Speaker 1: Danil Ricardo, who has a massive fan base, is very beloved,
Speaker 1: but he has just been having a slog of a
Speaker 1: time for a year and a half at this point,
Speaker 1: and even some of the most die hard Daniel Ricardo
Speaker 1: fans out there are worried that this is in fact
Speaker 1: the beginning of the end, you know, the real high
Speaker 1: points of his career are behind him. I think he
Speaker 1: has what it takes to be a champion. I just
Speaker 1: don't think he's in the right on the right team
Speaker 1: to be a champion. And I think that that is just,
Speaker 1: unfortunately the way the cookie crumbles right now. This is
Speaker 1: Nicole Seevers, a co creator of Two Girls, One Formula
Speaker 1: and Danny rick Stand. He's just all around a happy person,
Speaker 1: you know, just spite his dumb comments, he makes every
Speaker 1: now and again real Golden Retriever energy. You know, um,
Speaker 1: just happy, go lucky. Hard not to root for him
Speaker 1: when he's buddies with everyone in the paddock. Always like
Speaker 1: cheering people on. He's got drive, and I just want
Speaker 1: I just want what's best for him, and I want
Speaker 1: him to succeed and I hold him close to my heart.
Speaker 1: Sounds like she's talking about an X. McLaren has been
Speaker 1: hard for him this past season. So at this point,
Speaker 1: I think Danny Rick is a little bit of an
Speaker 1: underdog and I want to see him return to his
Speaker 1: former glory of being Red Bull. Danny finishing for a
Speaker 1: second podium after podium. I just don't think that a
Speaker 1: championship is in his future unless he gets like pulled
Speaker 1: up to Mercedes or you know, back to Red Bull,
Speaker 1: which I don't want for him. Um. I just I
Speaker 1: don't feel good about it, unfortunately, And I really hate
Speaker 1: to say that on the record in case you know
Speaker 1: that sever comes up in the court of law. Um,
Speaker 1: but like, I'm not feeling good. He did have some
Speaker 1: some real high points and he did win a race
Speaker 1: at Manza, but generally speaking, in one not gonna lie
Speaker 1: or mince words here, it's been a pretty bleak for
Speaker 1: most races. If you're Dana Ricardo, hey, maybe he completely
Speaker 1: turns it around and has this gangbuster second half of
Speaker 1: the season, But right now, there are a ton of
Speaker 1: rumors swirling around what Daniel Ricardo is going to be
Speaker 1: doing next year. He is supposed to have a contract
Speaker 1: with McLaren through three, but they're just being incredibly opaque
Speaker 1: about what is going on with him. Yeah, so, how
Speaker 1: how does McLaren stack for you compared to the other
Speaker 1: three teams that you've heard about this far? I personally
Speaker 1: and more attracted to grit than shine. McLaren feels shiny
Speaker 1: like with their marketing, and Daniel is so fucking likable,
Speaker 1: Like it's this guy TV hosters. He a professional competitor.
Speaker 1: But I get, I get what everyone's saying. I'm I'm
Speaker 1: buying what they're selling. I think that's cool, But I'm
Speaker 1: I'm a I might like a little more street fighter
Speaker 1: one Daniel like crash into someone. You'll be like, yeah,
Speaker 1: like we've got so I don't want that. I want
Speaker 1: Daniel to lose his ship on a reporter, you know.
Speaker 1: And I want to see I want to see like
Speaker 1: the fire in his belly that for a moment doesn't
Speaker 1: care if he's accepted or liked by others. He's just
Speaker 1: ready to function up. He went like slightly unhinged behavior.
Speaker 1: I want a little bit unhinged behavior. And Lando seems
Speaker 1: like a really excellent driver who's slowly climbing and he
Speaker 1: has the foundation to stay there when he gets all
Speaker 1: the way up. I like that too. Tennis has these
Speaker 1: guys who are so good, so young, but you can
Speaker 1: tell they're kind of like foundationally aren't aren't set up,
Speaker 1: and then they get there and they blow it or whatever.
Speaker 1: But it seems like Lando is slow and steady, young
Speaker 1: going to the top. That's that's cool. It's one of
Speaker 1: the youngest two out there and still still really holding
Speaker 1: his own. They say in show biz, the longer it
Speaker 1: takes you to go up, the longer takes you to
Speaker 1: come down. And maybe that's what I was thinking about
Speaker 1: with Lando. I like that. Yeah, so yeah, so are
Speaker 1: are like the Chuckos and the Georgia is still at
Speaker 1: the top for you. I do like those guys. I
Speaker 1: don't know how to answer that, but I do like
Speaker 1: the the Lando Daniel team. I do like that. Um.
Speaker 1: I like the teams where the two drivers are can
Speaker 1: both win. I know right now with McLaren it feels
Speaker 1: like Daniel maybe kind of isn't there, but maybe he'll
Speaker 1: get there. So if that's an answer. That's my answer. Okay,
Speaker 1: So next episode, we are switching gears. We're moving to
Speaker 1: a team that is almost like the true midfield. We
Speaker 1: are moving to a team called Alpine formerly called Reno,
Speaker 1: and they are also one of the teams that is
Speaker 1: responsible for another one of the biggest scandals in F
Speaker 1: one history. It's got everything, it's got crashes, it's got
Speaker 1: people turning on one another within the same team. We
Speaker 1: love to see it. And it's got two very different drivers,
Speaker 1: one of whom is a scrappy young kid just trying
Speaker 1: to make his mark. And then you've got one of
Speaker 1: the titans in the sport of Formula one. Who's who's
Speaker 1: still out there twenty years later, So that will be Alpine.
Speaker 1: This has been Choosing Size f one, a production of
Speaker 1: Sports Illustrated Studios and I Heart Radio. The show was
Speaker 1: hosted by Michael Costa and Lily harp. This episode was
Speaker 1: produced by Lily Harman and our senior producer Hi mi Ta,
Speaker 1: who also did the sound design at the cutting room studios.
Speaker 1: We are recorded by engineer Robot Larry, the second mastering
Speaker 1: by Cello Wisblue. Max Miller is the executive producer and
Speaker 1: Brennan get us his head of audio at s I Studios.
Speaker 1: At I Heart Radio, Sean Titon is our executive producer.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I
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Speaker 1: And if you want more F one goodness, follow us
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