Speaker 1: That's right, but Dory, I'm hot, are rolling? Okay? Alright, Michael, Hi,
Speaker 1: I have another little goody for you today. My gosh,
Speaker 1: you always do such a good job with this, Lily.
Speaker 1: Thank you. It is my pleasure. So do you want
Speaker 1: to tell everyone what I have gotten here? So you
Speaker 1: tell them what I did. So in my hand is
Speaker 1: a nice cold, sugar free red Bull. This is actually
Speaker 1: my preferred red Bull. There we go, so maybe team
Speaker 1: or your preferred red Bull adjacent team, so we'll find
Speaker 1: out true. Okay, I'm gonna crank this open. Let's see here.
Speaker 1: It sounds sugar free, sounds sugar I would have been
Speaker 1: able to tell that with sugar free. So today, as
Speaker 1: we established with Alpine, we are we are comfortably in
Speaker 1: the midfield at this point, we're in the middle of
Speaker 1: our season. We're in the middle of the grid. That
Speaker 1: does not mean, though, that these teams are boring or
Speaker 1: that they've got nothing going on. So today's team middle
Speaker 1: of the pack. I would say, Alpha Towery has got
Speaker 1: real younger sibling who's got everything to prove and nothing
Speaker 1: to lose energy. Well, are you a tennis fan, Lily, Yes,
Speaker 1: for the sake of yes, anybody else a tennis fit.
Speaker 1: Can I call this the Patrick McEnroe of the UH
Speaker 1: Formula one? You know, John McEnroe, Grand Slam champion, super loud, boisterous,
Speaker 1: got all the attention. Meanwhile, Patrick was pretty solid tennis
Speaker 1: player as well. I had no idea there was a
Speaker 1: Patrick adds color boom hit the theme from I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and Sports Illustrated Studios. This is choosing sides? Yes one? Wow? Okay,
Speaker 1: so alpha towery. As we previously mentioned in our Red
Speaker 1: Bull episode, they are the sister team to Red Bull.
Speaker 1: The team nowadays is very very careful to call it
Speaker 1: a sister team and no longer a junior team, so
Speaker 1: they do not want to be seen as lesser than
Speaker 1: at least in terms of public persona. But let's let's
Speaker 1: back up a little bit back in the mid two thousands.
Speaker 1: As we know, billionaires get bored, and when they do that,
Speaker 1: they buy sports teams. So our friend Dietrich Mata, ships
Speaker 1: founder of Red Bull, buys n F one team, names
Speaker 1: it after Red Bull, and then, since he seemed to
Speaker 1: have nothing else to do, he said to himself, what
Speaker 1: what could I possibly want? Within a year of purchasing
Speaker 1: this team, another one? Yes, so a year later or
Speaker 1: within about a year, Dietrich purchases a Formula One team
Speaker 1: called Minardi have stored on the grid. The two cars
Speaker 1: are being pushed off the grid, so they got about
Speaker 1: as far as the start finished line, which despite being
Speaker 1: one of the not greatest teams on the grid, had
Speaker 1: a humongous and very passionate fan base. He renames it
Speaker 1: to a Rosso, which is the Italian phrase for Red Bull. Creative,
Speaker 1: very clever. The original idea though, was that this Toro
Speaker 1: Rosso team would be like a junior team to Red Bull.
Speaker 1: So they were thinking, Okay, this can be a great
Speaker 1: training ground for up and coming drivers. They can give
Speaker 1: you know them a little bit of an area to
Speaker 1: prove themselves. We can also kind of test people against
Speaker 1: each other. And it's just great to have, you know,
Speaker 1: four seats on the grid instead of two seats. So
Speaker 1: currently with ten teams on the grid, Red Bull basically
Speaker 1: controls the seats. It just feels to me like, if
Speaker 1: you're gonna be in Formula One, you gotta be trying
Speaker 1: to win. It's an interesting question with them of is
Speaker 1: there a ceiling to how well Alpha TOWR is allowed
Speaker 1: to do exactly because what would happen if Alpha TOWERI
Speaker 1: consistently had drivers who beat Red Bull drivers and you
Speaker 1: can be certain if you're on Alpha Tari you're like,
Speaker 1: let's really throw a wrench in this ship and be
Speaker 1: better than them. Exactly. Yeah, okay, So Toro Rosso is
Speaker 1: the name of this team until two years ago or
Speaker 1: to see sasons ago. So it's had a lot of
Speaker 1: really iconic drivers who got their start through Red Bulls
Speaker 1: Junior program and then we're funneled into Toro Rosso. So
Speaker 1: even just speaking to some of them who were on
Speaker 1: the current grid, we've got Sebastian Battles gets its moment
Speaker 1: in the Sun. Sebastian facts all he's a crow Prix
Speaker 1: winner for the first time. He's the youngest ever and
Speaker 1: that's one of the greatest things I've ever seen in
Speaker 1: crowl Prix racing. Current world champion Max for stepping please
Speaker 1: welcome the rookie of the Year, the flying dutch Man
Speaker 1: Jenna Ricardo from McLaren from Perth, Australia and I'm twenty
Speaker 1: two years old. And then also Carlos Science. I think
Speaker 1: it's my only chance of getting to Formula one seat.
Speaker 1: So the interesting thing is that It doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: when these drivers were on tour a Rosso that the
Speaker 1: team necessarily did super well. They've often been somewhere in
Speaker 1: the midfield, right, so whether that was a little bit higher,
Speaker 1: like a sixth versus a seventh or eighth in the
Speaker 1: championship standings. So why did they switch it to Alpha Tarot?
Speaker 1: What is Alfa Tower? Yeah, so two seasons ago they
Speaker 1: made a change. They got rid of the Toro Rosso
Speaker 1: name that had been around for about fifteen years. And
Speaker 1: the reason is very simple. Red Bull fun Fact has
Speaker 1: a clothing line. It is called Alpha TOWERI and they
Speaker 1: decided to use what's basically free advertising space to rename
Speaker 1: the team, kind of like Alpine is a Renault brand.
Speaker 1: Reno said, let's you have a better use for the
Speaker 1: name of this team. And also it sounds cleaner and fresher.
Speaker 1: Alpha Towery also, you know, has a little bit of
Speaker 1: a different flavor than Toro Rosso. I mean in America,
Speaker 1: being an Alpha is just it's not as appreciated like
Speaker 1: it used to be. Sure that's has nothing to do
Speaker 1: with their clothing line. I looked at the clothing line. Yes,
Speaker 1: I have some photos for you. So what's really funny
Speaker 1: about Alpha Tower is they do have professional models that
Speaker 1: model out of the clothes, but then they'll randomly put
Speaker 1: in various Red Bull and Alpha TOWERI drivers and team
Speaker 1: members to model the clothing. And it's kind of funny
Speaker 1: to watch these drivers, some of whom couldn't care less about.
Speaker 1: They probably have to do this, yeah, exactly, it's like
Speaker 1: contractually obligated. So here, so I have I have the
Speaker 1: current as two Red Bull drivers Alpha Towery drivers, and
Speaker 1: then a special appearance by a certain team principle. Well
Speaker 1: I know who the team principle is. Christian Harner looks
Speaker 1: like he's trying to be he's doing a Zoolander face.
Speaker 1: Zoo Lander. Now the ones that are the models, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say, are down below. Oh all of them are drivers. Okay,
Speaker 1: so we've got okay, sorry, tell me who we got here.
Speaker 1: So up in the purple in the upper left corners
Speaker 1: pere Ghastly, who I think works at the most like
Speaker 1: he's really trying to to like the Tyra Banks smiles
Speaker 1: it up. You're right then below him, you have Max
Speaker 1: for stepping Poor Max, who you know does not want
Speaker 1: to be there. He looks like he's looking for the exit. Exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like he's where is the exit out of this shoot
Speaker 1: right now? Uh? Then you have Noda never quite know
Speaker 1: what to do with Yuki because he's five two and
Speaker 1: really tiny. For a while, they kept dressing him in beige,
Speaker 1: like fully beige outfits, which doesn't look good on pretty
Speaker 1: much anyone. To begin with. What is his nationality? He
Speaker 1: is Japanese Japanese. It does seem like they don't know
Speaker 1: what to do with him. Yes, and then his hair
Speaker 1: cut is kind of flat, it's weird. I don't mind
Speaker 1: the clothes, you know, clean. I think the lines they're
Speaker 1: so expensive like these are it's unicloe but like three more? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and what's fashion anyways? What's what's a three shirt a
Speaker 1: fifty dollar shirt? I don't know. I think it's just
Speaker 1: also like I don't know anyone who necessarily would be
Speaker 1: like a, I need new clothing and I have seven
Speaker 1: hundred dollars to spend, let me go to the Red
Speaker 1: Bull fashion collection. It's similar to how Ferrari has an
Speaker 1: atrociously ugly fashion slection. Again, this is my opinion. Now, okay,
Speaker 1: al right, guys, I just wanted to remind you quickly
Speaker 1: that this is an f one podcast whatever. Yeah, suck
Speaker 1: my balls mate, slowly turning into part in the interruption. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So so basically they in the early twenties switch over
Speaker 1: to Alpha Towery and with this, yeah, they really start
Speaker 1: to hammer home this whole idea of this is a
Speaker 1: sister team. It's a separate entity. It's factories in Italy.
Speaker 1: So yeah, So anyway back to a little bit of
Speaker 1: their history. So when they were still tour rosso yeah,
Speaker 1: they were, but until probably there were a bunch of
Speaker 1: different like reliability issues at times. They had some really
Speaker 1: rough years where you had drivers, you know, having to
Speaker 1: retire the car in two thirds of races in some cases, Yeah,
Speaker 1: due to issues with with the car and not with
Speaker 1: necessarily the driver all the time. However, then it wasn't
Speaker 1: until nineteen they actually start to move up the ranks
Speaker 1: a little bit. They ended up finishing Pie six that year.
Speaker 1: They then had another Piece six finished last season in
Speaker 1: one and now generally, especially because there are some teams
Speaker 1: that have have really had some some bad times, they've
Speaker 1: kind of moved into being a comfortable midfield team nowadays,
Speaker 1: or at least that's kind of what they're thought of.
Speaker 1: The Other thing that I think Alpha Towery has tried
Speaker 1: to beef up, especially since their rebrand and how they're
Speaker 1: trying to both distinguish themselves from Red Bull while still
Speaker 1: not pretending that they don't have a connection to Red Bull.
Speaker 1: They actually have a really really fun digital presence. They
Speaker 1: use the drivers really effectively. For example, on top of
Speaker 1: the fact that they obviously use them in their marketing campaigns,
Speaker 1: Pierre and Yuki, the two drivers do wear Alpha Towery
Speaker 1: close to the track. They also make them do a
Speaker 1: lot of like video challenges with the Red Bull drivers
Speaker 1: five o'clock begun to meet here in the morning, of
Speaker 1: course not. And then they also make them do challenges,
Speaker 1: like they had them do a chopstick challenge I think
Speaker 1: with like coffee beans or something. What are you doing?
Speaker 1: Get out on my room now? Okay, close the door,
Speaker 1: Alfa Tori, I think is trying to mimic the social
Speaker 1: media um success of McLaren that was Ashley Khalita, an
Speaker 1: f one Twitch streamer, And they do a really good
Speaker 1: job posting the teammates Pierre Gasoline interacting and such, and
Speaker 1: they definitely have chemistry and they definitely care about each
Speaker 1: other and want to succeed in Formula One and do
Speaker 1: well both of them, and they definitely cheer each other on,
Speaker 1: so I think they definitely bring that relatability side. Maybe
Speaker 1: it's not as strongly pushed on social media like McLaren
Speaker 1: does with their team, but I really think pure Ghastly
Speaker 1: and Yuki are onto something. My initial thought would be
Speaker 1: that Alpha Towery is going for a younger market, but
Speaker 1: Red Bull is already pretty young and Alpha Towery clothing
Speaker 1: is too expensive, so I don't disagree with you. In
Speaker 1: terms of Alpha Tauri this season, things are going not great.
Speaker 1: They have had reliability issues with the car, as have
Speaker 1: a lot of other teams on the grid. With the
Speaker 1: new regulations. They currently as of the summer break, which
Speaker 1: we're in right now, there's no races coming up for
Speaker 1: a few weeks. They are currently in P eight. To
Speaker 1: again contrast that they were in Peace six last year
Speaker 1: when they finished the championship. So obviously, for a team
Speaker 1: like Alpha Tawari that's spent a lot of time bouncing
Speaker 1: around the midfield, they were hoping to maybe spend this
Speaker 1: time moving up to best of the rest of us,
Speaker 1: or at least really get in there, and instead they
Speaker 1: unfortunately are almost relegating themselves to rest of the rest,
Speaker 1: or or the worst of the rest. They're not quite
Speaker 1: there yet, luckily, but it's not what they want. It's
Speaker 1: that looking good. It's not the best yea. So who's
Speaker 1: in charge of Alpha? Yeah, so they have this team principle.
Speaker 1: He's been part of the Alpha Tari tour Rosso brand
Speaker 1: for a very long times. Frands Tossed or Toast depending
Speaker 1: on who you ask, Uh, he's he definitely has a
Speaker 1: bit of a personality, but he's not always the central focus,
Speaker 1: like someone like Christian Horn. Right, you're telling me his
Speaker 1: name is French Toast, Yes, keep that in, please high
Speaker 1: promise me that you'll keep it in. Or guy French Toast, Uh,
Speaker 1: despite the name, does not have as much of a
Speaker 1: presence to the extent. But I think it's because Christian
Speaker 1: Horn or Helmet Marco from Red Bull or such big
Speaker 1: personalities that's kind of hard to compete with them. And
Speaker 1: then you have people like Total Wolf at Mercedes who's
Speaker 1: also a presence. So there's a lot of midfield teams
Speaker 1: where their actual team principles or head haunchos are not
Speaker 1: as I don't know, they don't have as much of
Speaker 1: a kind of following just because they're they're hanging out
Speaker 1: or chilling or or whatever. I will say one of
Speaker 1: one of the most interesting things about friends is back
Speaker 1: in our French if we want to call him, that is,
Speaker 1: back in two thousand seven. Uh, there was an American
Speaker 1: F one driver at the time with the greatest race
Speaker 1: car driver name of all time. It was Hi, guys,
Speaker 1: I'm Scott Speed. Scott Speed. That's a great name. It
Speaker 1: sounds fake, right, It's Scott Speed. And Scott Speed alleged
Speaker 1: fifteen years ago that France had assaulted him over an
Speaker 1: incident on the track. Speed claimed in an interview that
Speaker 1: tossed grabbed him right below the neck on his fireproof
Speaker 1: shirt and jerked him back and forth, let go and
Speaker 1: then pushed him into a wall. So, of course Frances
Speaker 1: Toast completely denies this whole story. And regardless of Scott
Speaker 1: Speeds not having a correct time in their car in
Speaker 1: the Tora Basso car, not driving fast, and so soon
Speaker 1: after the incident, he is fired for low performance. And
Speaker 1: of course his whole spin on this is that, you know,
Speaker 1: almost conspiratorial idea that he hates them, it's terrible working
Speaker 1: with them. He never wants to work with France toast again.
Speaker 1: So with Scott he left the sport quickly. One could
Speaker 1: say it was a speedy exit for that was what
Speaker 1: we need, that was what we needed. But I will
Speaker 1: say the overall I think good thing about alf A
Speaker 1: towery is you know there are a team that's sort
Speaker 1: of known to help funnel in champions right because we
Speaker 1: have a Sebastian battle, you have a max for staff.
Speaker 1: These other other guys going further back who are are
Speaker 1: kind of in that similar boat. So I think if
Speaker 1: you're if you're someone who wants to root for people
Speaker 1: who could potentially do a lot in the future, they
Speaker 1: can be sort of a great a great pick. And
Speaker 1: also certain people, yeah, like to root for midfield teams
Speaker 1: and don't want to give all that credit to the
Speaker 1: guys at the top. Yeah. So, and it takes a
Speaker 1: while to become comfortable racing at this level. I'm sure
Speaker 1: Red Bulls sees Alpha Tower is a way to give
Speaker 1: championship drivers who are very young experience exactly, and also
Speaker 1: a good time to kind of see, okay, can you
Speaker 1: handle any form of pressure of one without necessarily which
Speaker 1: unfortunately have Red bull has been handing over the car
Speaker 1: too early to someone unproven in there. They're kind of
Speaker 1: mainstable drivers. So who are the drivers. We got French
Speaker 1: Toast as the team principal. Who's driving the cars. We
Speaker 1: have French Fry. We see number one um and we
Speaker 1: have scar Go in the other seat. So yeah, we're
Speaker 1: all good. We'll get into the Alpha TOWERI drivers right
Speaker 1: after this short break. All right, we're back from our
Speaker 1: break and we are diving right into the two drivers
Speaker 1: at Alfa Towery. We have Per Ghastly and then we
Speaker 1: have Yuki Sonoda, two very different drivers. They do get
Speaker 1: along very well. So let's start with Pierre Ghastly. As
Speaker 1: you can probably tell from a name like Pierre, he
Speaker 1: is French, Verry French. So Pierre comes from a family
Speaker 1: that has been in motor sports in somewhere or another,
Speaker 1: not f one level, but his grandfather competed in carding.
Speaker 1: His grandmother was actually a carding champion. Grandmother act feminism,
Speaker 1: love to see it. His father dabbled in a number
Speaker 1: of different motor sports, so we did like carding, rallying
Speaker 1: and Durrance racing. So he's kind of jumped around. Pierre's
Speaker 1: also the youngest he has I think four or five
Speaker 1: half siblings who are older than him, so he's kind
Speaker 1: of the the youngest of of the bunch. Basically, he
Speaker 1: takes up carding, is successful, moves on to the junior formulas.
Speaker 1: He ends up winning, so he's you know, he's well
Speaker 1: on his way. He's also competing against drivers like Charlotte
Speaker 1: Claire who is er Monico but obviously races a lot
Speaker 1: in France, as well as estemont Ocon. They grew up
Speaker 1: forty five minutes from each other growing up, They've they've
Speaker 1: spent their their lives compete against each other just because
Speaker 1: they're literally from the same area of France. So Pierre
Speaker 1: makes his Formula One debut back in for Toro Rosso
Speaker 1: what it was called then, and it ends up racing
Speaker 1: full time for the team through He's looking good, he's
Speaker 1: looking promising, you know, getting his his sea legs, so
Speaker 1: to speak. He had a couple of very impressive qualifyings
Speaker 1: in his first full season. He had a P four
Speaker 1: and there, a piece six, a piece seven, So in
Speaker 1: some cases he is out qualifying the machinery that he's
Speaker 1: been given. Pierre ghastly, the young French, absolutely unbelievable. Fourth
Speaker 1: position Now, granted, he would often lose places in the
Speaker 1: actual race, you know, because the car just can't keep
Speaker 1: that pace over an extended period of time. But the
Speaker 1: fact that he everyone agreed he was way over qualifying
Speaker 1: the car like what it should have been, which only
Speaker 1: speaks to his talent. But as we know, for Red Bull,
Speaker 1: this cataclysmic thing happens where Dania Ricardo surprises them by
Speaker 1: not re signing, and as we know from that episode
Speaker 1: as well, Dana ricardo leaving creates another sort of domino
Speaker 1: effect of other things that end up happening, one of
Speaker 1: which is that Red Bull didn't really have a successor
Speaker 1: to Danna Ricardo at this point, but had also made
Speaker 1: it very clear to everyone that Max were Stapping was
Speaker 1: their guy, So it led to this this bizarre void
Speaker 1: to be filled by his by his labsence. Also, Dania
Speaker 1: Ricardo was a huge personality, as we've discussed, so they're
Speaker 1: kind of trying to figure out what to do. This was,
Speaker 1: you know, several years ago, Piers in his early twenties,
Speaker 1: so they end up saying, hey, let's let's call him up,
Speaker 1: despite the fact that you know, he'd only competed in
Speaker 1: his second season of the sport, and unfortunately he ends
Speaker 1: up crashing and burning spectacularly. You've got to say, only
Speaker 1: one side of that garage is consistently delivering. At the moment,
Speaker 1: Pierre Ghastly qualified six cents off his teammate, Ghastly finished
Speaker 1: p eleven. There were a lot of races where Max
Speaker 1: was lapping him. He just got absolutely walloped by Max.
Speaker 1: And the standings, yeah, it was. It was bad. He's
Speaker 1: gone to unlock that part of him that we know
Speaker 1: is capable of bringing home better results. He ends up
Speaker 1: only completing twelve races before Red Bull yanks him from
Speaker 1: the seat and demotes him back down to the then
Speaker 1: Toro Rosso team. That's humiliating, Yeah, really harsh. And on
Speaker 1: top of that, a big issue that's come up since
Speaker 1: then in retrospect is people feel like the car was
Speaker 1: much more tailored to Max's strengths than Pierre's. So if
Speaker 1: you're Pierre, you're a very talented driver, you just don't
Speaker 1: drive like Max. So if you're in a car that
Speaker 1: is not made for it is very much made for
Speaker 1: your your biggest competitor, you know your teammate, you're really
Speaker 1: setting someone up to fail Max is uh, you know,
Speaker 1: he's a rocket ship and his whatever they call the
Speaker 1: like all the fire and all the smoke that comes
Speaker 1: out of the back of the rocket. It's too big.
Speaker 1: Whatever's around just gonna get sucked up into Max, you know.
Speaker 1: So I wouldn't want to drive under Max. So Pierre
Speaker 1: is in this tough position. Obviously, it's devastating and humiliating
Speaker 1: to be demoted, not just demoted in general, but halfway
Speaker 1: through a season that's pretty pretty bad. And then to
Speaker 1: make matters worse, he's back at Toro Rosso and his
Speaker 1: best friend Antoine who Bear was a very promising driver
Speaker 1: in Formula two. Antoine who Bear dies in a race
Speaker 1: in Belgium. This is during also an F one race weekend,
Speaker 1: so Pierre is there at the track. It's incredibly sad.
Speaker 1: This is this is bottom. I mean, there's career abouttom
Speaker 1: and then there's death. That's that's this is This is
Speaker 1: a new level entangling personal and professional tragedy. In the
Speaker 1: span of a few weeks, we lived in the same
Speaker 1: flat full five years. We went to same school where
Speaker 1: in the same classroom. Um, I've just known these guys
Speaker 1: in so long. We've shared so many moments on track
Speaker 1: and off track, especially um that yeah, honestly, I still
Speaker 1: have believe it. He actually a really extensive personal essay
Speaker 1: on the Internet and about the experience, but basically one
Speaker 1: of the last conversations he had with Antoine was about
Speaker 1: his emotion, and Antoine kind of told me, you'll keep going.
Speaker 1: You're prove them wrong, like you've got this. So obviously
Speaker 1: he's devastated that his friend has died, but also feels
Speaker 1: really motivated. Interestingly, we actually talked to another driver for
Speaker 1: this podcast, taughtinga Calderone. So she was Antoine's teammate when
Speaker 1: this accident happened, and she said something very similar to
Speaker 1: pire because I I sort of pose the question of well,
Speaker 1: did did watching your teammate die make you fear racing
Speaker 1: more or whatever? And her and here actually very similar
Speaker 1: in terms of saying For me, it opened as well
Speaker 1: in my mind, I respect what I do much more now, Um,
Speaker 1: I don't. I'm not afraid of it. I think you
Speaker 1: know that I was maybe not enjoying it as as
Speaker 1: much as I should because because of the pressure that
Speaker 1: I was putting myself. That reminded me that what the
Speaker 1: most important thing is if unfortunately I and up dying
Speaker 1: in an accident or whatever. I know that I'm doing
Speaker 1: what I love most. You you have to be able
Speaker 1: to to do what you love most to be happy,
Speaker 1: and we'll see how much we we get to stay
Speaker 1: in this world doing that. That's a beautiful delusional mind
Speaker 1: that you need to be a world class driver. Driver. Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, big time. So anyway, after this happens, he
Speaker 1: does start to improve back at at then you know,
Speaker 1: at Torboso Afatari uh and eventually actually in it's really
Speaker 1: exciting Castle is in France for the Alpha Tsari. He
Speaker 1: ends up winning his first ever Grand Prix. Is Alpha
Speaker 1: Tari Pia Castle when is the Italian Grand Prix? Oh my,
Speaker 1: oh my. Alpha Tari had a couple of podiums and
Speaker 1: obviously points to their name, but this was their first win.
Speaker 1: So this was a very big deal multiple front. It
Speaker 1: wasn't an extra big because it was in Italy and
Speaker 1: it was in their home Grand Prix, so it's just yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just one of those feel good stories. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: what did we do? Like he's like you can see him, like,
Speaker 1: you know, pumping his fists and he's so excited. God, guys, again, God,
Speaker 1: that was a beautiful moment. And I don't know anything
Speaker 1: about this sport, but when they when they show you
Speaker 1: the driver and you get to hear the audio of
Speaker 1: when they win, it's just it doesn't matter if you
Speaker 1: know anything or not. It's beautiful. Yeah, it's awesome for me.
Speaker 1: The driver that gives me the most excitement is somebody
Speaker 1: like a Pier Ghastly. You're hearing from Magnus Grieves, co
Speaker 1: founder and publisher of Race Weekend. He always has the
Speaker 1: potential to do better than anybody anticipates that he's going
Speaker 1: to do given the car that he's in, and and
Speaker 1: he seems to really appreciate a great result. And also
Speaker 1: you want to see Pierre Ghastly get another chance on
Speaker 1: a big team. If you want to just cheer for
Speaker 1: somebody who could win, you're limiting yourself to a pool
Speaker 1: of about four or five of the twenty drivers. You
Speaker 1: need to understand the story of that person. You need
Speaker 1: to understand where they're coming from, where they're trying to
Speaker 1: get to because you need to be able to cheer
Speaker 1: for somebody when they finished fifth and get as much
Speaker 1: joy as somebody else finishing first. So Pierre, nice guy.
Speaker 1: Everyone likes some that can't be the whole story, Lily.
Speaker 1: He must he must have some controversy, He must have
Speaker 1: some some dark secrets. The biggest problem with Pierre and
Speaker 1: his career, so he's reached twenty six. It's basically middle
Speaker 1: aged in the sport of f one, which is sad
Speaker 1: to say and making me feel very old. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: And the problem he has is this, So obviously he
Speaker 1: got promoted to the Red Bull seat, he tanked in
Speaker 1: the Red Bull seat. Hellman Marco, the very brash advisor
Speaker 1: and and kind of you know, person in charge of
Speaker 1: all the driver development, has made it clear that Pierre
Speaker 1: is most likely never going to get back in that seat.
Speaker 1: So if you're Pierre, you're asking yourself, Okay, I'm stuck
Speaker 1: on this sister team that's kind of the junior team
Speaker 1: that basically has a ceiling to how well they're gonna do.
Speaker 1: But I've also been a Red Bull driver my entire career.
Speaker 1: Where can I go from here? So that's I think
Speaker 1: what he's dealing with right now. And there's been a
Speaker 1: lot of questions and speculation because yeah, he is kind
Speaker 1: of stuck. If Pierre has self belief, which I think
Speaker 1: he does, someone's going to pick him up. Also, funk
Speaker 1: that guy who says he's never going to get in
Speaker 1: a red Bull seat again. If he keeps winning races
Speaker 1: at Alpha Torre, maybe he'll say, I don't want your
Speaker 1: dumb red Bull seat. I want my Alpha Tori seat,
Speaker 1: thank you very much, I will say to the team
Speaker 1: loves Pierre like they are like one happy family with Pierre.
Speaker 1: He loves the guys like everyone on the team, you know.
Speaker 1: So it's like it's gonna be pain well when he
Speaker 1: has to part with them. But hope, I think the
Speaker 1: hope why a lot of people is that he ends
Speaker 1: up somewhere better or where there's actually a career trajectory
Speaker 1: that isn't just in a holding pattern, you know, perpetually
Speaker 1: holding pattern, you know, perpetually perpetually holding pattern, perpetually perpetually.
Speaker 1: So who's the who's this other driver? Other driver? We've
Speaker 1: got Yuki Sonoda who two sophomore season. This guy is
Speaker 1: not a tall man. He is barely not a boy,
Speaker 1: and he is not tall. I don't want to sound
Speaker 1: like short was a derogatory term, because it's not. But
Speaker 1: he isn't tall even by F one standards. He is short.
Speaker 1: So just to recap here, most drivers are between five
Speaker 1: seven to five ten, usually five eight, five nine, maybe
Speaker 1: uh in the tallest drivers or there's a couple who
Speaker 1: are six ft six ft one, but they're very skinny
Speaker 1: and kind of lanky. Allah Estabato con or a George Russell.
Speaker 1: On the other end of the spectrum, I think the
Speaker 1: next shortest drivers like five six, and then you've got
Speaker 1: Yuki at five two, and he's so short to the
Speaker 1: point where they actually had to like re engineer the
Speaker 1: cars that his feet could could actually touch the pedals
Speaker 1: because they basically, yeah, I'm excited to hear about this
Speaker 1: guy because we haven't had a lot of non white
Speaker 1: European men who drive a race car. Yes, and it's
Speaker 1: been a little bit since they've had a Japanese driver
Speaker 1: in particular, and I will say that there's a huge
Speaker 1: Japanese fan base. For one, his assent to Formula one
Speaker 1: has been very quick, which means he's been pretty good.
Speaker 1: Ashley Khalita Again, so from I believe Japanese F four
Speaker 1: to Formula one, I think it just took him over
Speaker 1: three years. And when he arrived in twenty nine and
Speaker 1: started racing around Europe. He had no knowledge of the
Speaker 1: circuits which track information is everything. To the fact he's
Speaker 1: been doing so well in the minimal amount of experience
Speaker 1: quote unquote, he has comparatively to the other drivers on
Speaker 1: the field with him, he had has placed very impressively
Speaker 1: in my opinion, in addition to being a very talented
Speaker 1: member of the Red Bull Young Driver Program. Something else
Speaker 1: that's helpful is that at this point we've talked about
Speaker 1: Honda before, and now Honda is the l O l
Speaker 1: j K manufacturer and constructor of Formula One. They're in,
Speaker 1: they're out, They're they're supplying engines, they're they're actually in
Speaker 1: the sport. They're out again. So as of late they
Speaker 1: have been supplying engines to to Red Bull, and so
Speaker 1: Honda kind of says to Red Bull, hey, we're besties. Right,
Speaker 1: there's a Japanese driver and we're a Japanese company, and
Speaker 1: wouldn't it be great if you gave this seat to
Speaker 1: this nice man who is from Japan. Uh And there
Speaker 1: is there's always controversy whenever something like that happens, because
Speaker 1: always other drivers who people wanted to see an F
Speaker 1: one who did better than him, who then don't get
Speaker 1: a seat and uh but yeah, so basically it does help.
Speaker 1: You know, the stars aligned, so to speak, that Yuki
Speaker 1: happens to be coming up through Formula two and does
Speaker 1: well all at a time when a company like Honda
Speaker 1: has a little bit of poll right, and it's with
Speaker 1: the program that he's he's in, He's in Red Bull.
Speaker 1: So so Yuki rookie season, it was a little inconsistent.
Speaker 1: So his first race, his debut race and Formula one
Speaker 1: he gets p nine. You need a fantastic race, fantastic
Speaker 1: slow down, so he gets two points. It's very exciting.
Speaker 1: Everyone's like, that's great. Yeah, However, he just starts having
Speaker 1: a little bit of trouble. We have our first spina here.
Speaker 1: Yuki Sonoda never been to this track before. He starts
Speaker 1: spinning out a lot. He starts crashing quite a bit,
Speaker 1: and some of this is expected with rookies, you know
Speaker 1: what happens. I mean, it's impossible to go rookie season
Speaker 1: without spinning out a couple of times or just getting
Speaker 1: getting the feel for the car. You know, Formula one
Speaker 1: cars aren't even the same as Formula two, right, Like
Speaker 1: there's just such a big learning curve and make that
Speaker 1: jump up, so that's expected to a certain extent. But
Speaker 1: on top of everything else, yet he's kind of rude
Speaker 1: on the radio to his race engineer during races, and
Speaker 1: cursing a lot and and just being kind of rude.
Speaker 1: So Yuki is definitely not the main character, which is unfortunate,
Speaker 1: but I think but he's definitely I'm trying to think
Speaker 1: of like relevant side characters that have taken over TV
Speaker 1: shows and you're really like, wow, maybe they should be
Speaker 1: the main character. And I really think that's that's Yuki
Speaker 1: with the experience he has, and maybe he has had
Speaker 1: a lack of consistency in one. However, he's definitely shown
Speaker 1: plenty of moments where he can compete with the top dogs.
Speaker 1: Is he forgive my ignorance on this? Is he speaking
Speaker 1: English with his yes so that everyone has to speak
Speaker 1: English when it comes to race communications? Yet I think
Speaker 1: to keep everything standardized and yeah, you know, so they
Speaker 1: can hear what the hell is going on exactly. Um,
Speaker 1: And and on top of that that, yeah, he's talked
Speaker 1: about this. He really struggled, especially in the pandemic. You know,
Speaker 1: Japan had a lot of lockdowns and whatnot. Is very
Speaker 1: hard to get back home, he dealt with a lot
Speaker 1: of homesickness, and he's been away for a while from home,
Speaker 1: and at this point, you know, he's twenty years old,
Speaker 1: so he's been away from home for several years. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, he he There's also he does speak English,
Speaker 1: but there is somewhat of a language barrier. There's also
Speaker 1: gonna be you know, barriers in terms of customs and
Speaker 1: how different you know, the West does things versus the
Speaker 1: East that he has to deal with. On top of
Speaker 1: all this, he does have some issues with like discipline.
Speaker 1: There's actually like a scene in Drive to Survive season
Speaker 1: four when he makes his first appearance on the show,
Speaker 1: obviously it's his first season where basically he's complaining about
Speaker 1: having to just like run, like doing a normal training run,
Speaker 1: and that's kind of just generally with them. He's even
Speaker 1: joked about this how he's like, oh, I'd rather lie
Speaker 1: down and like eat a sandwich then go exercise, which
Speaker 1: you know, it kind of doesn't doesn't work for certain people,
Speaker 1: but I will send the flip side. Yuki is a
Speaker 1: very fun and wacky personality. He wears his heart on
Speaker 1: his sleeve and it's brutally honest with the press. Is
Speaker 1: that more sort of expectation from from helmet and did
Speaker 1: he uh with a helmet? I got we got this
Speaker 1: big this afternoon a BM, and I don't think it's
Speaker 1: gonna be fun conversation between us sometimes the teams like
Speaker 1: you can't you can't say that out out or or
Speaker 1: even a lot of his dynamic with Pierre. Pierre is
Speaker 1: almost like an older brother do Yuki, And half the
Speaker 1: time Uki will say something inappropriate, not problematic, just inappropriate
Speaker 1: or bizarre, you know, Pierce, like you can't do that,
Speaker 1: like you absolutely need to be quiet. They probably put
Speaker 1: him through endless media training and he's still going to
Speaker 1: say what he's gonna say, and never necessarily always a
Speaker 1: rude way, but just he'll just be really really upfront
Speaker 1: with you have a good report, Yeah, they have a
Speaker 1: very good report. I think it does help that Pierre
Speaker 1: is so well established on that team and he is
Speaker 1: the number one. But in the same sense, Yuki is
Speaker 1: a rookie, right and he just came on. So I
Speaker 1: think that there's not this feeling of resentment or whatnot
Speaker 1: from from that dynamic. Quick break and we'll be back.
Speaker 1: So that's that's alf a towery I would say for Pierre,
Speaker 1: you know, I think Pierre's kind of getting this. This
Speaker 1: reputation is like the comeback kid, right, like, really was
Speaker 1: down of the dumps, had a lot of personal and
Speaker 1: professional tragedy at the same time, and has not only
Speaker 1: risen above it, but totally slayed the game in the process.
Speaker 1: Pierre I like very very much. I love anybody who
Speaker 1: gets pushed aside for some other new young hot shot
Speaker 1: and he has to kind of get some grit, he
Speaker 1: has some adversity in his past, true adversity death, and
Speaker 1: then and then we've got Yuki. You know, I'm a
Speaker 1: little bit afraid that Formula one sees Yuki as this
Speaker 1: odd Asian entity that we don't know what to do with.
Speaker 1: And even some of the videos it was kind of like,
Speaker 1: look at him trying to do the funny thing, and
Speaker 1: some of that might just be because he's so young
Speaker 1: and they don't know what to do with, you know,
Speaker 1: like it almost seems like gimmicky, a little alienating, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: So my hope is that Yuki kind of keeps his
Speaker 1: head down and doesn't doesn't let that ship bother him,
Speaker 1: and then just wins on the racetrack. I'm not. I don't.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen enough to say that about from the one,
Speaker 1: but it just feels like maybe they don't really know
Speaker 1: how to embrace who he is yet. It's easy to
Speaker 1: see the cute face as an American and Western we
Speaker 1: see Japanese and we kind of like don't really know
Speaker 1: what it means, and it's like, what is this thing
Speaker 1: over here? But at the end of the day, it's like,
Speaker 1: if he's a bad motherfucker in the race car, that's awesome.
Speaker 1: I mean, like I says, racing has been a little consistent.
Speaker 1: Somebodays he's brilliant. Other days, Yeah, he's crashing into a
Speaker 1: wall multiple times on the weekend. But I think he
Speaker 1: does bring a very different personality and kind of a
Speaker 1: different different style about him. And he is, Yeah, he's
Speaker 1: so young, like he was twenty when he came in, right,
Speaker 1: he can barely legally drink in the US. So and
Speaker 1: when you're a rookie and they say jump, you just
Speaker 1: have to say how high? Especially in your team when
Speaker 1: your teammate is pere ghastly who had just come off
Speaker 1: a win, the first win on the team's history in
Speaker 1: this like incredibly, you know, epic fashion, Like that's your teammate.
Speaker 1: You gotta kind of roll with it a little bit
Speaker 1: and and play into the fact that you know he's
Speaker 1: the guy. How are you feeling about Alpha TWI, How
Speaker 1: do you feel like? I like Alfa a lot. I
Speaker 1: like the colors, I like the the logo. Their car
Speaker 1: looks fast. You know. My least favorite part of Alpha
Speaker 1: Torre is that they're part of Red Bull. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: you told me this was a separate team, I'd be like,
Speaker 1: I think I'm all in on this team. It's like,
Speaker 1: I love my friend Paul. He's funny, he has a
Speaker 1: good sense of adventure. He always makes me laugh. His wife,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. It's like it's like Alpha Tarry.
Speaker 1: I just wish it would become its own thing. I
Speaker 1: feel like if Alpha Towery started winning, winning, winning, Red
Speaker 1: Bull would like secretly change up their wrench box so
Speaker 1: it has the wrong tools or something. That's just like,
Speaker 1: that's just how I feel about it. I wouldn't put
Speaker 1: that above Christian Horner or Helmet Marko to do themselves.
Speaker 1: I mean, if Yuki Sonoda is making half a million
Speaker 1: a year and Max is making twenty five million, that
Speaker 1: means in the organization, Max is seen as fifty times
Speaker 1: the worth of Yuki. That's a huge difference. Yes, if
Speaker 1: I was Yuki, I would crash my car into Max.
Speaker 1: He's Yuki has done that with most of the growth,
Speaker 1: but a little bit of a rookie season. I like
Speaker 1: Alpha Tori, I like Alfa Tori. And and where where
Speaker 1: do they act in your overall Where are they? I
Speaker 1: would say they're top three from me? Is that interesting?
Speaker 1: On the podiums? Yeah, Ferrari's still up there. I like Alpha. Um,
Speaker 1: well it's Williams. Of course we haven't even talked. Was
Speaker 1: gonna say, and we talked about Williams? No, no, no,
Speaker 1: we haven't. But um yeah, I don't know. For some reason,
Speaker 1: they're connecting with me. Yeah, watch the rubbing of the pants. Sorry,
Speaker 1: who's this other person's voice that I only occasionally here,
Speaker 1: not as often as YOHI. But yeah, so that's our
Speaker 1: sound engineer, Rob. I know you were supposed to be
Speaker 1: the only non F one person coming into the sport. Hilariously,
Speaker 1: Rob was just you know, assigned to deal with us
Speaker 1: in the studio technical. Yeah, but he has become a
Speaker 1: massive F one fan over the course of this recording. Definitely, definitely, Rob.
Speaker 1: You've had You've had some disagreements with some of Michael's opinions,
Speaker 1: his driver opinions. Oh god, what is it? What is
Speaker 1: this my Twitter page? All of a sudden, I like Estevan?
Speaker 1: Who Why do you like est? I think he hasn't
Speaker 1: had his time yet, and I think there's an opportunity
Speaker 1: for him to have his time, and I think it'd
Speaker 1: be cool to see. I strongly disagree with Rob, and
Speaker 1: I think there's a reason that he works in the
Speaker 1: audio booth and not sitting where I'm wait, So, who
Speaker 1: do you not like? Rob? Checko? Really? How I've said
Speaker 1: this before, but we connect with people for certain reasons.
Speaker 1: And the thing that I love about Checko is he's
Speaker 1: a father of three. Now, there is nothing more selfless
Speaker 1: and humiliating than being a parent, you know, like you're
Speaker 1: just constantly faced with your mortality and how unimportant your
Speaker 1: personal life is. All of that is the opposite of
Speaker 1: what it takes to be a Formula one driver. So
Speaker 1: I just find that dichotomy so fascinating. That he probably
Speaker 1: goes home and is the fifth most important person in
Speaker 1: his house and then he goes to the race track,
Speaker 1: and well, even though he's behind Max, he has to
Speaker 1: act and behave and have the ego of I am
Speaker 1: the best driver around this course. I find that fascinating.
Speaker 1: I have no idea who this guy is in real life.
Speaker 1: He could be a total prick. I don't know. And
Speaker 1: there there's more. Dad's on the in the race track, right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk about a very exciting one next episode. Anyways, Rob,
Speaker 1: turn your microphone off from now on. Okay, loud and clear.
Speaker 1: Uh So, next time we're going on to the third
Speaker 1: team in the midfield with an a name Aston Martin,
Speaker 1: which I'm sure you will have thoughts and opinions just
Speaker 1: by you know, the association with the name Aston Martin.
Speaker 1: Aston Martin is one of my favorite teams to talk
Speaker 1: about in the sense that at the beginning of the
Speaker 1: season we talked about how F one is a billionaire's playground.
Speaker 1: I would specify that that playground is mostly Aston Martin drama.
Speaker 1: We're going to get into a lot of weight, yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of billionaires who have done a lot of
Speaker 1: not great things. We've got a terrifying looking owner of
Speaker 1: the team. We're going to really dive into this term
Speaker 1: of page Driver that we've kind of thrown around. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean everything that I've heard about Aston Martin on
Speaker 1: the surface is ripe for some strong opinions. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: you've ever wanted to eat the rich, you want to
Speaker 1: eat Aston Martin. So so it's gonna be a great, fun,
Speaker 1: very rich time to be had. Alright, anything else you
Speaker 1: high before we I think we can wrap all right?
Speaker 1: Thank you? Jumping in a lot. It's been a week, okay,
Speaker 1: m hm, this has been Choosing Sides F one, a
Speaker 1: production from Sports Illustrated Studios and I Heart Radio. The
Speaker 1: show was hosted by Michael Costa and Lily Hermit. This
Speaker 1: episode was produced by Lily Herman and our senior producer
Speaker 1: Johai Mattel, who is also the sound designer at the
Speaker 1: Cutting Room Studios. We recorded with engineer Robert O'Leary, mastering
Speaker 1: by Sella Weiss Bloom. Max Miller is the executive producer
Speaker 1: and Brandon Getchas is head of Audio at SI Studios.
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. Sean ty Toone is our executive producer.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
Speaker 1: Don't forget to rate and subscribe, and tell your friends
Speaker 1: to choose a side that was kind of crazy. I like,
Speaker 1: got it, I got enough. I'm I might start a
Speaker 1: podcast tomorrow