Speaker 1: A Ferrari Formula One driver. That's all I drink for.
Speaker 1: In all of the difficult moments, I always remember myself
Speaker 1: how lucky I am to be in that position and
Speaker 1: leading off what I love most, which is driving. I
Speaker 1: love what I do, but I want to be the best.
Speaker 1: There's one man and.
Speaker 2: The Formula One that has gotten a lot of attention,
Speaker 2: the championship contender to Charles the Clerk. If your father
Speaker 2: was here now, and what do you think he'd say
Speaker 2: to you?
Speaker 1: As soon as he passed away? I asked myself, what
Speaker 1: would he wants me to do?
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Speaker 1: The number one health and wellness podcast.
Speaker 2: Jay Shetty Jay Shetty See Learnt. Hey everyone, welcome back
Speaker 2: to On Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world.
Speaker 2: Thanks to each and every one of you that come
Speaker 2: back every week to become happier, healthier, and more healed.
Speaker 2: I don't think there's anything more interesting in the world
Speaker 2: than human story. And what I love about this podcast
Speaker 2: is I get to dive into the minds of people
Speaker 2: that are often mysterious. We don't know so much about them.
Speaker 2: We may see them on the big screen, but here
Speaker 2: we're getting to learn about them behind the scenes. And
Speaker 2: today's guest is someone who I met just a few
Speaker 2: moments ago. I've been looking forward to this interview for
Speaker 2: a long long time. I'm so glad to finally have
Speaker 2: him in the studio, and in a few moments I've
Speaker 2: spent with him, I can already tell that we're gonna
Speaker 2: have a great conversation. Please welcome to On Purpose. Charles Leclerk.
Speaker 2: Charles Leclerk is one of the biggest names in global sport.
Speaker 2: Charles currently raised in Formula One, driving for the legendary
Speaker 2: Ferrari since twenty nineteen, the youngest driver in history to
Speaker 2: be signed up by the team, Charles features in the
Speaker 2: hit Netflix series Drive to Survive and is loved by
Speaker 2: fans and sports community alike for his positive mindset and determined,
Speaker 2: straightforward approach. Charles, thank you for being.
Speaker 1: Here, well, thank you for having me. It's a pleasure
Speaker 1: to finally meet you in person and to be here.
Speaker 2: When I was researching, as I do for all my guests,
Speaker 2: I can listen to interviews, I'll read articles. You haven't
Speaker 2: done a lot of interviews. You don't talk so much
Speaker 2: about things publicly. I was wondering why did you feel
Speaker 2: now was the right time and this was the right platform.
Speaker 1: You've got something special in all the different interviews you do.
Speaker 1: I think you get out the best out of the people,
Speaker 1: and it's something very special. Of course, we do lots
Speaker 1: of interviews, but they are mostly based on our racing career,
Speaker 1: of course, which I'm very happy to speak of and
Speaker 1: about all the time. But it's good also to get
Speaker 1: to know the person behind the steering wheel. In our case,
Speaker 1: we'll always have a helmet as well, so it's difficult
Speaker 1: to put a face on the name sometimes and I
Speaker 1: think it's a great way to maybe show a bit
Speaker 1: of myself.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, and I want to thank you for that.
Speaker 2: I want to thank you for trusting me. I don't
Speaker 2: want to say how grateful I am that you allowed
Speaker 2: us to have this conversation, because it's not always comfortable
Speaker 2: to take the helmet off and do this, and so
Speaker 2: I appreciate it. But let's dive straight in. I want
Speaker 2: to ask you what would you have been if you
Speaker 2: weren't a race guard driver?
Speaker 1: Oh, good question to start with. Probably an architect. I
Speaker 1: love design in general. I wouldn't have been good enough
Speaker 1: to be an artist, but definitely an architect. I love
Speaker 1: architecture in general. It's another passion of mine. So yeah,
Speaker 1: probably an architect.
Speaker 2: Nice. And do you think that some of that passion
Speaker 2: has helped with being a Formula one racer with the engineering,
Speaker 2: the understanding of the car, the design. Do you think
Speaker 2: that's transferred or not? Really?
Speaker 1: Not really, because obviously with my career I had to
Speaker 1: stop quite early school to put myself into and having
Speaker 1: the best chances. In order to succeed in that sport,
Speaker 1: you need to very early on taking crucial decisions and
Speaker 1: my parents were always very supportive of that, which obviously
Speaker 1: helped me as well. But so I didn't do the
Speaker 1: study to get to being an architect or close off
Speaker 1: being an architect. But it's always something that interested me.
Speaker 1: So no, it did not help my racing career, but
Speaker 1: it's definitely something that I would like to look at
Speaker 1: once my career is done to maybe, yeah, be able
Speaker 1: to do something.
Speaker 2: There, don't we do? So we don't need you. You've
Speaker 2: got many, many years ahead of you, so we'll put
Speaker 2: that out into the far far future. When you first
Speaker 2: had the experience of driving your first ever race, guy,
Speaker 2: as a young boy, I believe you're like four years.
Speaker 1: Old, yes, three and a half.
Speaker 2: Three and a half, walk us through what you remember.
Speaker 2: What was the first time you remember driving a car
Speaker 2: and you remember how you felt and what was that
Speaker 2: feeling like.
Speaker 1: Well, first of all, I started by total coincidence. I
Speaker 1: was a kid three and a half years old. I
Speaker 1: didn't want to go to school that day, and I
Speaker 1: said my father I was ill, and he believed me
Speaker 1: by coincidence. He had to go and see his best friend,
Speaker 1: which owned a couting truck. So I got in the
Speaker 1: car with him when there, and then I was seeing
Speaker 1: the carting going around the truck and I was asking
Speaker 1: can I try But obviously at three and a half
Speaker 1: years old, they are not really any carts made for
Speaker 1: a three and a half years old kids. But luckily
Speaker 1: for me, the owner, which was Jules Biankie's father, Philip Yanki,
Speaker 1: had a carting made for his son when he was
Speaker 1: three and a half. So there was everything ready and
Speaker 1: I tried for the first time there and I remember
Speaker 1: the first lab. They attached a rope to my carting
Speaker 1: and there was an adult driving in front of me,
Speaker 1: just to make sure that I will be able to turn, etc.
Speaker 1: And after the first lap, we took off the rope
Speaker 1: and I went on until there was no fuel left.
Speaker 1: So it was an amazing felling straight away. I enjoyed
Speaker 1: the feeling of being in control of accounting at such
Speaker 1: a young age was something very very amazing to experience,
Speaker 1: and I love the adrenaline that it gave me, So
Speaker 1: it was definitely a very special moment. I cannot remember
Speaker 1: it because I was too young, but at the same time,
Speaker 1: I've got images that my father had done of this day, which, yeah,
Speaker 1: gives you back a bit, the filling of the day.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's beautiful to be able to look back. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I was thinking, if you remember that from three and
Speaker 2: a half that's impressive. It's like I can't remember anything
Speaker 2: from when I was three and a half years old,
Speaker 2: but pictures do such a wonderful job of doing that
Speaker 2: walk us through the level of discipline and rigor and
Speaker 2: training that you've had to adopt. I feel like the
Speaker 2: Formula One season is like relentless. It's long, it's tiring,
Speaker 2: it's exhausting. When I look at the amount of races
Speaker 2: there are, when I've spoken to other drivers, it's just
Speaker 2: it's all encompassing, like your whole life is absorbed into this.
Speaker 2: Of course, how have you allowed yourself And we're getting
Speaker 2: to the end of the season right now as we're taping,
Speaker 2: how have you developed the stamina? Like what does it
Speaker 2: take to see yourself through to the end when it's
Speaker 2: so grueling and so demanding.
Speaker 1: It changes a lot in your career because you start
Speaker 1: in kuting, we're there. You are spending a lot of
Speaker 1: days on track, but it's always a truck that is
Speaker 1: very close to your house. So even though you travel
Speaker 1: or you spend a lot of time in the car
Speaker 1: to get to the track, you are racing all day.
Speaker 1: You come back at home evening it's still quite easy
Speaker 1: in a way because it's all very very close. Then
Speaker 1: you get to single seaters, Form four, Formula three, Formula two,
Speaker 1: where you've got to travel a bit more all around Europe.
Speaker 1: I'll say, but you've only got like twelve thirteen races
Speaker 1: to do in a year, so it's still not too much.
Speaker 1: It takes a lot of time, of course, but it's
Speaker 1: still not too much. And then you get to Formula
Speaker 1: one and it's twenty four races now all over the world.
Speaker 1: And in between the races you also got to do
Speaker 1: a lot of events, sponsorship events, for the preparation of
Speaker 1: the races. I'm going in the simulator in Maranello, so
Speaker 1: lots of things are adding up, which makes it a
Speaker 1: season that is extremely tiring, and especially when we get
Speaker 1: to the end of the season like it is now,
Speaker 1: it is more and more difficult. But then it's all
Speaker 1: about trying to plan the things better. I arrived the
Speaker 1: first year and Formula one, and to be honest, I
Speaker 1: was a mess. I arrived and I was doing the
Speaker 1: flight myself. I'll get to the track the day just
Speaker 1: before the practice will starts and I will be super tired,
Speaker 1: and especially the end of the season, then you don't
Speaker 1: manage to stay at you one hundred percent all the time.
Speaker 1: And then of course with experience, you learn now there
Speaker 1: are a whole team of people helping me and all
Speaker 1: of this because it's super important to be one hundred
Speaker 1: percent at the end of the season. And now, yeah,
Speaker 1: you plan the things better in order to keep a
Speaker 1: good quality of life. Training, diet, sleeping is super important.
Speaker 1: The different time zones all over the world is very
Speaker 1: difficult to manage as well. But now I am up
Speaker 1: to speed with that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love hearing that. I remember I've interviewed different
Speaker 2: athletes in different sports, and I remember speaking the one
Speaker 2: athlete who at the time was at the cusp of
Speaker 2: I think potentially going to one day become one of
Speaker 2: the one of the best. And I remember asking him
Speaker 2: like what his routine was and how he prepared, and
Speaker 2: he didn't have one, and it didn't get better, Like
Speaker 2: it didn't improve from there, And then you see that
Speaker 2: it's hard to sustain a career like that walk us
Speaker 2: through because I think people are fascinated, because I think
Speaker 2: anyone who's not a fan of F one or hasn't
Speaker 2: watched Drive to Survive as we were talking about earlier,
Speaker 2: or doesn't understand it, they don't recognize how physically demanding
Speaker 2: it is to sit in a car. I'll just give
Speaker 2: an example to everyone. I went go karting like two
Speaker 2: weeks ago, and I was nowhere near going as fast
Speaker 2: as you go, obviously in an electric gokar, and I
Speaker 2: came back with the ribs. Yeah, completely bruised. And that's
Speaker 2: just from like a little kids go cutting thing. It's
Speaker 2: so demanding in so many ways. Walk us through. First
Speaker 2: of all, walk us through your like, your diet, you sleep,
Speaker 2: What is that routine like for you personally, what do
Speaker 2: you eat, what do you need to build in terms
Speaker 2: of working out, et cetera. And then talk to me
Speaker 2: about what actually happens during a race to you, like
Speaker 2: what's going through your body and mind.
Speaker 1: The sleep for me is the number one priority. It
Speaker 1: is so incredibly important. Is where obviously you rest and
Speaker 1: recover all the energy in the body that you need,
Speaker 1: and it's something super important. So on that I'm super strict.
Speaker 1: I'm a good sleeper. I probably sleep around turn eleven
Speaker 1: hours a night. So wow, really really a long, long
Speaker 1: long time.
Speaker 2: Do you have any tricks for that or Are you
Speaker 2: just a good sleep.
Speaker 1: No, I'm a good sleeper. The only big problem I
Speaker 1: have is that I don't sleep in planes. For some reason.
Speaker 1: I struggle to sleep in planes, which I spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time, So I need to take the planes
Speaker 1: by day so I can stay awake and all of
Speaker 1: these kind of things. But again that is part of
Speaker 1: planning diets. Have got a dietitian in Milan that is
Speaker 1: following me and sending me all the diet requirements. I
Speaker 1: use to have something very repetitive, which then you get
Speaker 1: bored off. Now it's a lot more diverse, so it's
Speaker 1: very difficult to get into the details of what I say.
Speaker 1: But it's more carb ridrates, especially whence race day are coming.
Speaker 1: Our weight fluctuates a lot through throughout a week of
Speaker 1: racing because you get the Friday before train, before the
Speaker 1: practice driving practice, and you're quite heavy because there you
Speaker 1: ate a lot of car rydrates that takes the water.
Speaker 1: You drink a lot of water. You need to be
Speaker 1: well hydrated. But then we go through extreme hit inside
Speaker 1: the cockpit, so you lose so much water and in
Speaker 1: some races you can lose up to a few and
Speaker 1: a half four kilos of water, which is very difficult.
Speaker 1: Then in the one or two days after recover from that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is super important, the agrotation plan and and and
Speaker 1: the dietitian plan in order to be fully on it
Speaker 1: through throughout the weekend. And then physically, it is a
Speaker 1: very strange sport in a way because there are muscles
Speaker 1: that know the sports you really use, which especially the neck.
Speaker 1: By example, the neck is probably the hardest part to
Speaker 1: train properly because it's full of little muscles that you
Speaker 1: don't use, and that is very difficult to reproduce in
Speaker 1: a gym. So driving is basically the only training you
Speaker 1: can get for that, as much as you are trying
Speaker 1: with elastics to try and reproduce that, but it's very difficult.
Speaker 1: Whenever we get to the first day of practice in
Speaker 1: February after the winter break, you speak to all drivers
Speaker 1: and at the end of the first day they are
Speaker 1: all so tired, so tired, just because the neck is
Speaker 1: a very difficult one to use but to train. But
Speaker 1: then lots of cardio training it's super important. And another
Speaker 1: thing that is also difficult to train is the breathing
Speaker 1: techniques because with the g forces sometimes it's very difficult
Speaker 1: to breathe normally, so we do a lot of happnear
Speaker 1: in the corners, but this is something that you get
Speaker 1: used years after years driving a Formula One cars.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Wow, No, really great, really great breakdown there, because
Speaker 2: I think you never think about For most people, you
Speaker 2: never think about the neck. You're never thinking about obviously
Speaker 2: the breath. The losing of weight is incredible. You've talked
Speaker 2: about before that in your karting days, your mental health
Speaker 2: or you like your resilience. Your mindset was a lot weaker.
Speaker 2: How did you experience that? What did that look like
Speaker 2: back in the day? What do you mean by your
Speaker 2: mindset was weaker than.
Speaker 1: I was extremely harsh on myself, which I think now
Speaker 1: is a strength because I'm super honest with myself and
Speaker 1: I don't like to be nice to myself. Whenever I
Speaker 1: do a mistake, I'm very harsh and I'm very honest
Speaker 1: with myself. But at the same time, I think the
Speaker 1: reaction from that is extremely important. The way you react
Speaker 1: to mistakes you've done inside the car. This is where
Speaker 1: you manage to transform a mistake into something positive from
Speaker 1: learning from it. And when I was younger, I didn't
Speaker 1: have the right reaction, I would put myself so much
Speaker 1: down it will also hurt my self confidence. Now it's
Speaker 1: very different. I know that I got to a certain
Speaker 1: level because I worked hard. Of course, because there's also
Speaker 1: a part of talent that you have when you are young.
Speaker 1: It's super important to keep the self confidence super high
Speaker 1: in those difficult moments. Otherwise you can lose a little
Speaker 1: bit the way, the direction in which you need to work,
Speaker 1: and it can make things a bit more complicated. So
Speaker 1: that's where I was struggling when I was younger.
Speaker 2: Hey everyone, it's Jay here. My wife and I have
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Speaker 2: at Drinkjuni dot com and find Juni at a target
Speaker 2: near you. Yeah. I love that you brought that out
Speaker 2: because I feel like everyone can relate to that, Like
Speaker 2: whether you drive cars or you don't, everyone can relate
Speaker 2: to the idea that we can be harsh on ourselves,
Speaker 2: We can be heavy on ourselves. We can be self
Speaker 2: critical and judgmental. How do you or how did you
Speaker 2: learn to Like, let's say you've just done the first
Speaker 2: lap and you made a ton of mistakes, or you
Speaker 2: feel like you're behind. I can imagine that it's so
Speaker 2: easy for the next two laps to just be lost
Speaker 2: in criticizing yourself and the thought in your head just
Speaker 2: being should have taken that better, should have done this,
Speaker 2: should have done that. How did you grow to have
Speaker 2: a more positive relationship with that honesty and that self
Speaker 2: criticism as opposed to that thought repeating in your head?
Speaker 2: Has that happened before? Have you ever felt that where
Speaker 2: you're criticizing yourself during a race or there's no time
Speaker 2: for that?
Speaker 1: Actually no, I think I think adrenaline helps us in
Speaker 1: our sport to not think too much because you haven't
Speaker 1: got the time to think. You go from one corner
Speaker 1: to the other. If you're already thinking about your last corner,
Speaker 1: you're getting to do a mistake at the next corner.
Speaker 1: So you've got to mentally reset at every corner, and
Speaker 1: if you did a mistake, you need to reset for
Speaker 1: the next corner, which is in one second, so it's
Speaker 1: super quick. But I think adrenaline helps you. I think
Speaker 1: where I struggle MOI is when you finish a race
Speaker 1: on multiple laps and you are looking back at it
Speaker 1: and you're like, Okay, this this I shouldn't I shouldn't
Speaker 1: have done that mistake. I should have known that, I
Speaker 1: should have prepared for that, And then I was putting
Speaker 1: myself down and that had a much longer effect as well,
Speaker 1: because then for you need to wait for the next
Speaker 1: race in order to move on, and that's in one
Speaker 1: or two weeks time. And for one or two weeks
Speaker 1: you're like, Okay, I just can't wait to be back
Speaker 1: in the carting to show what I can do. But
Speaker 1: in those last two weeks you need to accept, obviously
Speaker 1: the view of others, which was also something that was
Speaker 1: hurting me back in the past, and it's just not
Speaker 1: good for learning from your mistakes.
Speaker 2: Are you excited for the next race to prove yourself.
Speaker 2: That's what it sounds like like. There's that feeling of
Speaker 2: adrenaline of like, Okay, I can't wait to be back
Speaker 2: on the track. Have you ever had a moment where
Speaker 2: you're like, I don't want to go back on the
Speaker 2: track because I'm scared. I'm fearing losing or failure or never.
Speaker 1: Never, because I love so much what I do, and
Speaker 1: in every tough times, I think I always like to
Speaker 1: remember myself when everything started, when I was three and
Speaker 1: a half. I don't remember that time, so around seven
Speaker 1: or eight years old, the way I looked up to
Speaker 1: Formula one, the way I dreamed of being in a
Speaker 1: position I am today, a Ferrari Formula One driver. That's
Speaker 1: all I drink for. I still want to win a
Speaker 1: world championship, which is another dream of mine, and I'm
Speaker 1: working for that. But in all of the difficult moments,
Speaker 1: I always remember myself how lucky I am to be
Speaker 1: in that position and living off what I love most,
Speaker 1: which is driving. So that remind me how much I
Speaker 1: love the sport that I'm doing, and how much I
Speaker 1: love what I do no matter the situation I'm in.
Speaker 2: That's a beautiful mindset to have, and how have you
Speaker 2: kept that gratitude? Like I'm listening to you right now
Speaker 2: and I just feel you sound so grateful and so
Speaker 2: happy to be here. It's not an egotistic arrogance, but
Speaker 2: it's a sense of like joy and excitement, like you
Speaker 2: still have that freshness with it even though you've done
Speaker 2: it for twenty years now. Yeah, Like, how have you
Speaker 2: kept that freshness? Like what is it that makes you
Speaker 2: fall back in love with it because you're so young,
Speaker 2: but at the same time you've done.
Speaker 1: It for so exactly. Yeah, it's been twenty three years
Speaker 1: that I'm in the sport now, so a very very
Speaker 1: long time. But I don't know just the adrenaline that
Speaker 1: it gives me being lucky enough to work with so
Speaker 1: many incredibly talented people, because all the engineers, all the mechanics,
Speaker 1: all the people around the team are people that have
Speaker 1: focused their own life in order to arrive to the
Speaker 1: position they are in now, and to be able to
Speaker 1: work with so many incredible people is a big chance.
Speaker 1: So whenever I work with them, it's always super interesting.
Speaker 1: You learn every day in this port because it's a
Speaker 1: very complex pot there's the driving part of course, but
Speaker 1: then there's all the technical parts of the cows, and yeah,
Speaker 1: just being able to stay with those people, speak with
Speaker 1: those super interesting people, and also do the driving, which
Speaker 1: is what I love the most, which is Yeah, whenever
Speaker 1: I put the helmets on, I've got a smile on
Speaker 1: my face because the adrenaline that I get when I
Speaker 1: get on the throatle getting out of the pits is
Speaker 1: something super special. So yeah, I love what I do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it sounds like you're so fearless on the track,
Speaker 2: and you built that mindset as time has gone on.
Speaker 2: What about off the track? Is there anything that scares you,
Speaker 2: any fears that exist. Does that fearlessness on the track
Speaker 2: help you off the track? Or is it just two
Speaker 2: different worlds in two different things.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, trust me, I'm scared of different things. Snakes
Speaker 1: I hate. I hate snakes. I tried Benja jumping and
Speaker 1: I couldn't jump.
Speaker 2: You didn't do it, No, But.
Speaker 1: It's weird because at the same time I did parachute
Speaker 1: skydiving and I loved it. But yeah, you know Benja jumping,
Speaker 1: I couldn't jump, so I was super scared at the
Speaker 1: same time, as you said, whenever I'm in a race car.
Speaker 1: There's not one percent of me that he's that he's scared,
Speaker 1: just because being in control helps a lot, I think,
Speaker 1: and you know, I'm never scared.
Speaker 2: There's naturally those external things that scare you as well.
Speaker 2: And I wonder you know you've been through when I
Speaker 2: was when I was looking back at your journey and listening,
Speaker 2: you've been through so much loss in your journey, and
Speaker 2: I think you to continue to show up in the
Speaker 2: way you are right now with love and gratitude, enjoy
Speaker 2: That takes even more courage than sitting in a car
Speaker 2: and driving at that speed, because it's almost sometimes like
Speaker 2: emotional emotional transformation is sometimes harder than physical and mind's
Speaker 2: mental transformation. Like walk us through the losses that you've
Speaker 2: endured and how you've been able to kind of channel
Speaker 2: that grief into growth.
Speaker 1: I think it's made me grow faster. I lost my
Speaker 1: father in twenty seventeen, so I was obviously very young,
Speaker 1: and at this time of your career or your life,
Speaker 1: you need that person that helps you grow as a
Speaker 1: man and also as a driver, because he was basically
Speaker 1: my best mentor. He was also a driver himself back
Speaker 1: in the day. So obviously he was helping me with
Speaker 1: all his experience throughout the years that he've learned into
Speaker 1: inter racing, and to lose him at that age made
Speaker 1: me an adult much much faster, because you get to
Speaker 1: manage your own things much earlier. Before that, I was
Speaker 1: just a kid. He will just bring me to the races.
Speaker 1: I will do what I love the most, which is driving.
Speaker 1: Then flights, organization planning. That was all on my father,
Speaker 1: and he was doing that perfectly, and he sacrificed a
Speaker 1: lot for me to get here. But then at one point,
Speaker 1: from one day to the other, there's not your father anymore,
Speaker 1: and you need to take all of these things in hands.
Speaker 1: I've got my younger brother. Also, my older brother was
Speaker 1: he's ten years older than me, so he was already
Speaker 1: an adult in a way. But my younger brother was
Speaker 1: three years younger than me. Had to take care of
Speaker 1: my mother as well. So all of these things it's
Speaker 1: not something that comes natural when you are seventeen or
Speaker 1: eighteen years old. It took some time to get used
Speaker 1: to it, but I think we all got much closer
Speaker 1: in the family after that. It was a difficult moment
Speaker 1: as well, to lose my father because I think I
Speaker 1: was in the age of around fourteen to nineteen where
Speaker 1: you're always clashing a little bit with your parents. After that,
Speaker 1: I think it got puts us all together much much
Speaker 1: closer than before.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what was what was it like racing that year? Like,
Speaker 2: you know, having to show up again now where you
Speaker 2: don't have your mentor and you don't have the person
Speaker 2: who believes in you and loves you in Trincy, Like
Speaker 2: what was that like? Because I think that that is
Speaker 2: that's so brave and it requires a inner strength. Like
Speaker 2: what was that for you? What was it like?
Speaker 1: I don't know. It was on the on the Tuesday
Speaker 1: of Baku, I had a Formula two race. I was
Speaker 1: in Formala two, not yet in Formula one, and he
Speaker 1: passed away, I think on the on the Tuesday, and
Speaker 1: I had the flight on the Wednesday to get to
Speaker 1: the race. As soon as he passed away, I asked
Speaker 1: myself what would he want me to do? And I
Speaker 1: had no doubts. I mean, there was only one answer.
Speaker 1: He was leaving for racing. He loved so much racing,
Speaker 1: and he loved seeing me racing, and especially when I won,
Speaker 1: So I knew I had to go there. And do
Speaker 1: absolutely everything to try and win the race, and that
Speaker 1: gave me an extra motivation as well to make him
Speaker 1: proud from there. So it was super important for me
Speaker 1: to do that.
Speaker 2: What was his reaction when you won and what was
Speaker 2: his reaction when you didn't win.
Speaker 1: I think the honesty to myself always came from my father.
Speaker 1: He was always super honest with myself. With me, he
Speaker 1: was obviously harsh whenever things weren't going the way he
Speaker 1: wanted or whenever he thought that there was a mistake
Speaker 1: that was to be made at that time of my career,
Speaker 1: but at the same time incredibly happy whenever I won.
Speaker 1: You could really see how much it meant to him.
Speaker 1: So he was coming to every racist, absolutely every racist.
Speaker 1: But I will say he was a bit of a
Speaker 1: different father on races, because the father tends to be
Speaker 1: always with the kids on races and always be there
Speaker 1: and pushing them, and he was always doing a step
Speaker 1: back on that, trying to let me grow in my
Speaker 1: own environments with my engineers, me with my mechanics and
Speaker 1: get there at the end of the weekend and then
Speaker 1: have the discussion at the end of the weekend. Okay,
Speaker 1: I saw that this you shall have done better, But
Speaker 1: this was amazing and he was always super supportive and
Speaker 1: also in difficult moments. I think that's all you need
Speaker 1: sometimes the good person, a person that is obviously close
Speaker 1: to you, that only wants good from you for you,
Speaker 1: and that tells you supportive words. And I knew that
Speaker 1: this was a huge help that then I lost when
Speaker 1: I lost my father. Obviously there was still my mom,
Speaker 1: but my mom doesn't have the technical knowledge that my
Speaker 1: father had on racing. But it's super important to have
Speaker 1: close people that then also along your career, whatever level
Speaker 1: you at, can tell you the right things at the
Speaker 1: right moment for you. And yeah, this was super important
Speaker 1: to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he sounds like an amazing man. It sounds like
Speaker 2: such a wonderful, wonderful mentor to have in life. And
Speaker 2: is there any words of advice that he said to
Speaker 2: you or something you shared with you that you feel
Speaker 2: you always kind of carry with you, whether it's on
Speaker 2: race there or in life. Is there something that he
Speaker 2: left you that you feel you always turn towards to.
Speaker 1: Always stay humble and grateful. I think these are the
Speaker 1: two words that he always said, because even when I
Speaker 1: was six or seven years old, I've had years where
Speaker 1: years that were extremely good for me at that age
Speaker 1: where I used to maybe doing twenty four races and
Speaker 1: I would win eighteen or the twenty four races, and
Speaker 1: at that age you get carried away like I'm the
Speaker 1: best and this is yeah, this is for me. I'll
Speaker 1: get to formal one. And he was always there. Child,
Speaker 1: you're only six years old. Formula one is a very
Speaker 1: long way, so you need to keep working, stay stay humble.
Speaker 1: It was always always in a funny way that I
Speaker 1: was doing that. I've never been arrogant in a way
Speaker 1: because I think it's a trait of our family. We
Speaker 1: are all like this. But yeah, I think these are
Speaker 1: the two words that I always keep and remind me
Speaker 1: of it, and especially the great full part.
Speaker 2: Yeah, how do you stay humble when, like you said,
Speaker 2: you're racing the dream, you're driving Ferrari, like you know,
Speaker 2: life's great, Like things are awesome opportunities everywhere, like how
Speaker 2: And I can feel it from you by the way,
Speaker 2: I believe it, and anyone who's listening or watching, I'm
Speaker 2: sure you can feel it. I can sense it just
Speaker 2: from sitting with you, that it's true. How have you?
Speaker 2: How have you remained that way, and how do you
Speaker 2: train yourself to remain that way? Obviously comes naturally in
Speaker 2: your family, which is beautiful, but is there a practice
Speaker 2: of tempering with your ego in a way that's helped you?
Speaker 1: Not really, not really don't know the I mean to
Speaker 1: be humble. I think, yeah, I've never really worked for that.
Speaker 1: It's just worse that my father told me. And I
Speaker 1: always remind myself because as I said, sometimes you can
Speaker 1: have four really really good races and you feel like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I found the rhythm, and he's very easy in those
Speaker 1: very very good moments to maybe work a little bit
Speaker 1: less than in a very difficult moments. And this is
Speaker 1: maybe where sometimes I remind myself, Charles, Yes, you are
Speaker 1: in a very good moment of your career, but that
Speaker 1: you still need to work as hard as in a
Speaker 1: very difficult moments, because all the people that are now
Speaker 1: struggling are going to work and going to catch up
Speaker 1: at one point. So you need to keep working as
Speaker 1: hard as possible. Where I have to do a bit no,
Speaker 1: not a bit more work, but where I have to
Speaker 1: think a bit more. It's in the difficult moest to
Speaker 1: be still grateful to be in the position that I am,
Speaker 1: because when you leave the moment and that you struggle
Speaker 1: with a race or two three races in a row,
Speaker 1: lots of critics are coming to you. Obviously, it's a
Speaker 1: sport that is quite It's getting bigger and bigger, especially
Speaker 1: in the US now, it's getting huge. In Europe It's
Speaker 1: always been huge, But there's a lot of pressure when
Speaker 1: you are for arry driver as well, even more so
Speaker 1: because it means a lot to people all around the world,
Speaker 1: and you need to manage those pressures in the difficult moments,
Speaker 1: and it might be difficult also to manage the opinion
Speaker 1: of others in those very difficult moments, and it might
Speaker 1: hurt you personally as well. That's where I always try
Speaker 1: and work on remembering how grateful I am and how
Speaker 1: lucky I am to be in that position.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. Was there a criticism or that kind of
Speaker 2: feedback that hurt you the most where you're like, oh,
Speaker 2: that was hard to deal with, that was difficult? What
Speaker 2: would that be if there was one?
Speaker 1: The critics that hurts me the most are the ones
Speaker 1: that doesn't define me as a person. I think in
Speaker 1: the world we are living now with social media everybody
Speaker 1: can give their opinion super easily, and also people that
Speaker 1: don't know you personally. Yeah, remember like two or three
Speaker 1: years ago someone who said, look how arrogant is And
Speaker 1: these are critics that really hurts me because I know
Speaker 1: I'm not like this and it's difficult to accept them
Speaker 1: when you are not when you are not really like that,
Speaker 1: and I remember that hurting me personally. Then you always
Speaker 1: get critics on your driving or if you do a
Speaker 1: mistake in a race or whatsoever. But this is part
Speaker 1: of the sport. This used to hurt me back, especially
Speaker 1: the first year in Formula one, because you get from
Speaker 1: a formula to driver, whether there are no media, nobody
Speaker 1: talks about you, you do a mistake and only my
Speaker 1: memo my dad will say, okay, Charles, you did a mistake.
Speaker 1: That it's not good. Where you get to Formula one
Speaker 1: and then you're in the spotlight of absolutely everything you
Speaker 1: do a mistake and hundreds or thousands of people are
Speaker 1: speaking about it on social media, which it takes a
Speaker 1: bit of time to get used to. I remember the
Speaker 1: first year in Formula one. I I got into from
Speaker 1: when I was watching absolutely everything that people will say
Speaker 1: about me because it was it was new for me,
Speaker 1: and then you get to learn to just make sure
Speaker 1: that you only value what people you love most think
Speaker 1: about about me, and that is only what matters to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's and that's how to do. Like you said,
Speaker 2: like you go from being in Formula two when no
Speaker 2: one's talking about you to Formula one where everyone's talking
Speaker 2: about you. And I think people in the world have
Speaker 2: that experience as well. That we're now living at a
Speaker 2: time where everyone can comment, everyone can share, everyone can
Speaker 2: say something. I know I struggle to deal with it
Speaker 2: as well. Like I find it really difficult, and I
Speaker 2: love what you said that it's always when it's about
Speaker 2: your character that it hurts more. If someone says, like, oh,
Speaker 2: you didn't get that technical thing right whatever. I can
Speaker 2: live with that, but it's really hard when it's about
Speaker 2: you as a human, yeah, in your truth, when you're like, no, no,
Speaker 2: I'm not like that. Like I wish I've said this before.
Speaker 2: I wish that I if everyone who felt that way
Speaker 2: about me, I wish I could meet them personally exactly
Speaker 2: and hold their hands and just talk to them for
Speaker 2: a second, yeah, and say, look, this is who I
Speaker 2: truly am. I am and I'm so sorry that somehow
Speaker 2: you felt that I was that way, and whatever it was,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry that it made you feel that way. But
Speaker 2: I promise you this is who I truly am.
Speaker 1: But you can't exactly that exactly that. No, no, you can't.
Speaker 1: Too many people. I always try also to use the
Speaker 1: social media in order to reflect my true self. Then
Speaker 1: if someone doesn't like my true self, and then it's
Speaker 1: like this, I won't be liked by everybody else in
Speaker 1: the way, by everybody in the world. This is normal.
Speaker 1: So I just need to be my true self. But
Speaker 1: as you said, it's just difficult when someone understand a
Speaker 1: trait of your personality wrong and then criticize it, and
Speaker 1: you're like, that's that's not me, and I wish I
Speaker 1: could prove you, but it's it's like life.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. You were saying earlier that you know fear
Speaker 2: and what you're scared of, and I've read before that
Speaker 2: you've said that you're scared of when your brother's is driving,
Speaker 2: that that is something that you get scared about. So
Speaker 2: you're not scared when you're driving and you're in control,
Speaker 2: when you're not in control, Walk me through what goes
Speaker 2: through your mind, like, is that what is that fear?
Speaker 2: What's that experience?
Speaker 1: Because as much as I'm not scared for me at all,
Speaker 1: I'm still completely aware that it is such an incredibly
Speaker 1: dangerous sport. As much as there's been so much safety
Speaker 1: improvements over the years, it is and we'll always be
Speaker 1: a dangerous sport because we go at crazy spids and
Speaker 1: anything can happen. Whenever I'm in control and I'm racing,
Speaker 1: not one part of me thinks about the potential risk
Speaker 1: I'm occurring doing that. However, when I see someone I
Speaker 1: love a lot doing exactly the same thing, then you
Speaker 1: see the things very differently. Of Course, I'm always looking
Speaker 1: at the performance, but for me, what is the most
Speaker 1: important thing of all his security, him making it safe
Speaker 1: to the end of the race, and then whatever else
Speaker 1: comes secondary. It's not as enjoyable to watch racing when
Speaker 1: my brother is racing, because it's just super scary and
Speaker 1: I get super super stressed.
Speaker 2: What's the fastest you've ever been? And when you've watched
Speaker 2: your brother, what's the fastest he's ever been? Where you've
Speaker 2: been worried or was there a race where you felt
Speaker 2: like that was the one?
Speaker 1: Every every race, every races is a torture.
Speaker 2: So do you even watch?
Speaker 1: No, I do you do?
Speaker 2: You still watch? These are the performance and you want
Speaker 2: to help him out.
Speaker 1: But it's difficult because also we are on the same
Speaker 1: race weekends, and most of the times I've got meetings
Speaker 1: preparing my race at the same time of his race,
Speaker 1: and so I need to look at the race but
Speaker 1: at the same time be focused on my meeting. And
Speaker 1: this is the hardest task ever. But fastest speed probably
Speaker 1: three hundred and seventy kph, which is around two thirty
Speaker 1: miles per hour. I think something like this. I don't
Speaker 1: think that is the impressive part of Formula one. The
Speaker 1: straight line speed is fast, but you don't really fill
Speaker 1: it in a car like like a Formula one car,
Speaker 1: it's mostly the breaking the speed in the corners is
Speaker 1: something crazy and very difficult to put into words and
Speaker 1: to make it understand in a way.
Speaker 2: No, I know. I only know how hard it is
Speaker 2: just from playing the video game. Yeah, like that, that's already.
Speaker 2: You try playing F one video games like it is
Speaker 2: one of the hardest things.
Speaker 1: Do you play on the controller? Do you have a simulation?
Speaker 2: I'm the controller. I haven't got the will and you
Speaker 2: need to get. Yeah, yeah, even that, you just recognize
Speaker 2: just how challenging it is. Like it's when when you're training,
Speaker 2: did you ever have you seen Obviously I'm sure you've seen,
Speaker 2: But when you're training, I'm sure there's accidents. I'm sure
Speaker 2: you see things that are that are painful to watch,
Speaker 2: either with yourself or with others you love. Like, how
Speaker 2: is that like when you're training, Because obviously in F
Speaker 2: one that made it safe for everything, but training is
Speaker 2: like training, right, it's not the same standards.
Speaker 1: Well, first of all, it's a very different sport to others,
Speaker 1: football or whatever other sports in the world. You can
Speaker 1: train as much as you want. In form one, you can't.
Speaker 1: I only have three days in the Formula one car
Speaker 1: over the year, and then it's the first race. That
Speaker 1: is the only practice I get. It's three days in
Speaker 1: the new car. You need to understand what's the behavior
Speaker 1: of the car, not long at all, that is nothing,
Speaker 1: that is nothing, and then all the rest is done virtually.
Speaker 1: So you race. You practice on simulators without the controller
Speaker 1: with the will this time, but you practice on simulators
Speaker 1: in order to get ready for the real thing. And
Speaker 1: then you've got three days in order to get to
Speaker 1: get up to speed, to understand tons of informations from
Speaker 1: the car that is mostly on the engineers to do that,
Speaker 1: and then you need to be ready at the first
Speaker 1: qualifying session a week later. This is very, very, very difficult. Then,
Speaker 1: as you were saying, we all know it's a dangerous sport.
Speaker 1: I've unfortunately lost my sporting godfather in twenty and fourteen,
Speaker 1: Geux Bianchi, who was an incredible driver and he had
Speaker 1: a fatal crash in Japan and lost his life there.
Speaker 1: And also another friend Antoine in twenty nineteen in Belgium.
Speaker 1: And these are very very difficult moments because then you
Speaker 1: are racing on this exact same track, you are going
Speaker 1: through the exact same corner where a person that you
Speaker 1: were close with lost his life. And this is the
Speaker 1: two moments in my entire career where you have a
Speaker 1: bit of negative thoughts going into that corner and you
Speaker 1: need to battle a bit through them in order to
Speaker 1: think about something else and get on with it. As
Speaker 1: much as it's difficult, because a part of me was
Speaker 1: like I cannot get on with it, like nothing happened.
Speaker 1: But at the same time you've got to do that
Speaker 1: at least as soon as you get inside the car,
Speaker 1: and so you get out of the car. You need
Speaker 1: to do that. You need to focus fully on driving,
Speaker 1: otherwise you are never able to extract the maximum out
Speaker 1: of the car.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that balance between acceptance. We often think like it's
Speaker 2: acceptance or action, and actually you're saying it's both together.
Speaker 2: There's an acceptance of the truth of what happened, and
Speaker 2: then at the same time you have to drive. And
Speaker 2: it's not either raw. It's not like Okay, I'm going
Speaker 2: to get over this and then we're going to drive,
Speaker 2: because that could take forever. Yeah, And you can't just
Speaker 2: drive and ignore it because it will come up. And
Speaker 2: I remember, I mean I remember. One of my favorite
Speaker 2: movies is Rush with Nicki Louder and James Hunt. Like
Speaker 2: that's probably one of my favorite movies. And it's you
Speaker 2: see so much of the world of like the ego,
Speaker 2: the fame, the success, the focus, the amount of effort,
Speaker 2: the competition, like you see the dangerous side of it.
Speaker 2: Like it's so well done. The movie. I've always been
Speaker 2: a fan. I wonder whether you're a fan of that
Speaker 2: movie or whether you're like, it's not like that at all.
Speaker 1: No, I love it. I love it. I mean, I
Speaker 1: think it's a really good representation of what the sport
Speaker 1: was back then.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes, not now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it was amazing to see how it was
Speaker 1: back then and how it is now and how much
Speaker 1: everything has changed. And I also think that as much
Speaker 1: as today when I say that, I'm getting into the
Speaker 1: car and there's not one part of me that think
Speaker 1: about the danger, I really believe that thirty forty years
Speaker 1: ago that was completely different for the drivers back then,
Speaker 1: and they probably I think it was the driver that
Speaker 1: was willing to get the closest to death that was
Speaker 1: the fastest because they were so brave. The cows. I've
Speaker 1: driven old cows now and there was no safety like
Speaker 1: the where they had the legs is just something like
Speaker 1: this off metal and if you take it, if you
Speaker 1: take if you take a world, that's that's it. And
Speaker 1: obviously I'm sure they had that in mind somewhere, which
Speaker 1: now everything is so much safer that you don't you
Speaker 1: don't think about it anymore. So I think the sport
Speaker 1: has evolved like crazy since then. But it's a great movie.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, no, And I love hearing that, like it's
Speaker 2: so interesting. Obviously we know it's changed. But to hear
Speaker 2: about how much the cars have changed, how much safer
Speaker 2: they are, like the level of risk that a driver
Speaker 2: was taking back then is is insane. It's unfathomable to
Speaker 2: even recognize, like you're saying, it's interesting for some of
Speaker 2: the outside to even look at that. What was your
Speaker 2: favorite car that you've gone back and driven. Is there
Speaker 2: like a favorite error or like a favorite year that
Speaker 2: you've seen or exposed to and why why is it special?
Speaker 1: I've actually driven the Niki lauda car that was very
Speaker 1: very special. Unfortunately, I had a problem on the car
Speaker 1: while driving on the brakes, which was pretty scary. But
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed driving that car. But it was completely different.
Speaker 1: I think also in terms of driving it was super different.
Speaker 1: You had the gearbox, you had the shifters, so you
Speaker 1: had to press the clutch every time you will pass
Speaker 1: the gears like in a normal car today, but now
Speaker 1: in a Formula one car, everything is electronic, so you
Speaker 1: pass the gears, you only press a button. You don't
Speaker 1: have to press the clutch, you don't have to press anything,
Speaker 1: and your brain can focus on many, many other things.
Speaker 1: We've got hundred thousands of things going on the stingle
Speaker 1: that we need to touch while driving. But you haven't
Speaker 1: got to think about the gears anymore. Back then, I
Speaker 1: think the gears were was a super important part of driving.
Speaker 1: But I really enjoyed driving this, this Louder Old cars.
Speaker 1: This was very special.
Speaker 2: It's amazing. I can imagine the amount of attention this takes. Like,
Speaker 2: like we said, you're on the road for a long time,
Speaker 2: You're doing so many races a year, You've got so
Speaker 2: many things happening in front of you while you're on
Speaker 2: the race, it's natural to experience burnout, Like it's natural
Speaker 2: to become exhausted. Do you find that you're what do
Speaker 2: you do as recovery? Like you were saying, like and
Speaker 2: you just came from the Brazil race, Like just now,
Speaker 2: like what a couple of.
Speaker 1: Days years ago?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, two days ago? Like what did you have
Speaker 2: to do in those two days to just feel normal again?
Speaker 2: If normal is even a reality.
Speaker 1: I love music. I play piano and.
Speaker 2: I've seen videos of it. You're pretty good, yeah.
Speaker 1: Kind of, but good enough to enjoy it and to
Speaker 1: disconnect from everything. And for me, piano and music in
Speaker 1: general is an an amazing way of disconnecting myself from
Speaker 1: the pressure of Formula one, from Formula one as a whole.
Speaker 1: You don't sing the I don't know no no better better,
Speaker 1: I don't think just just playing the piano. But yeah,
Speaker 1: playing the piano is definitely one of the thing I
Speaker 1: love most. Disconnect and rechargement batteries.
Speaker 2: And has that been a part of your life for
Speaker 2: a long long time through the whole journey?
Speaker 1: Actually not at all. I started during COVID lots of
Speaker 1: time at home. I had a simulator, so I was
Speaker 1: driving a lot virtually every day, but yeah, with twitters actually,
Speaker 1: But after two weeks, two weeks and a half, doing
Speaker 1: that all day was getting quite tiring. So I bought
Speaker 1: a piano. I started then, and I loved it.
Speaker 2: Wow. Yeah, And what is it that? Like? How do
Speaker 2: you how have you to have you simply taught yourself
Speaker 2: to play? Like? Is that how it's worked?
Speaker 1: Yes? I always when we were younger, my younger brother
Speaker 1: used to have a piano, so I sometimes was playing
Speaker 1: on it, but not I never took like courses or whatsoever.
Speaker 1: And I thought COVID was a great time to try
Speaker 1: and learn it a bit more, pushing a bit more
Speaker 1: and trying to understand a bit more how everything works.
Speaker 1: So I took some lessons like five or six, but
Speaker 1: very quickly I realized that I wasn't done for lessons,
Speaker 1: So I just told myself the piano and tried to
Speaker 1: came up with melodies and musics that I enjoyed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: sometimes I thought I will be on the piano since
Speaker 1: an hour, and I will look the time and it
Speaker 1: will be four or five hours past. I just really
Speaker 1: really liked it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's nice to hear that you've had And I
Speaker 2: guess COVID was a surprising time where people had a
Speaker 2: bit more time or to take up hobbies and try
Speaker 2: new things. But I've always found that especially Formula one,
Speaker 2: like it's so grueling, there's so much attension required, there's
Speaker 2: so much focus required. How has your and we were
Speaker 2: just talking about it when you came in today, Like
Speaker 2: you don't have that much time for a personal life.
Speaker 2: You've got the events in between, You've got like, how
Speaker 2: have you made sense of that? What does your personal
Speaker 2: life look like when you do have time? How much
Speaker 2: time do you get a year? Right, let's start there.
Speaker 2: How much time do you get a year where you've
Speaker 2: actually got time for your family, your friends and yourself.
Speaker 1: I will say maybe forty days, forty days, yeah, like
Speaker 1: thirty forty days a yeah. We've got two weeks, two
Speaker 1: weeks and a half in August and then two weeks
Speaker 1: two weeks and a half in December, so for Christmas
Speaker 1: and everything. But then also with Formula one, the good
Speaker 1: thing is that we travel all over the world, but
Speaker 1: years after years you also go to always the same places,
Speaker 1: which then you meet new people in this city, and
Speaker 1: then you've got group of friends a little bit everywhere
Speaker 1: around the world, which is also super nice. So whenever
Speaker 1: I go to Brazil, here in Los Angeles, Miami, I've
Speaker 1: got my group of friends there. So it's always great
Speaker 1: to come back to a race. Obviously you want to
Speaker 1: drive as much as possible and being the car again
Speaker 1: as soon as possible, but at the same time you've
Speaker 1: got your friends there, so it's not like my private
Speaker 1: life is suffering a lot from it. My mom also
Speaker 1: now can follow me on races. I think it's more
Speaker 1: when I was a kid there, it was a bit
Speaker 1: more difficult in a way that you are. Sometimes you
Speaker 1: are leaving school for two or three weeks for different races,
Speaker 1: and there you don't spend as much time with your
Speaker 1: home friends. I used to not speak Italian and English
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, So you get to the
Speaker 1: cuting tracks and you cannot really speak with anybody. So
Speaker 1: that is a bit more the difficult parts. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, I was so incredibly happy to go
Speaker 1: to the racetrack to drive kouting that was making it
Speaker 1: all up for it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, are there any other athletes or any other sports
Speaker 2: or even musicians maybe even because of or architects, engineers
Speaker 2: that you've kind of like looked to and been inspired
Speaker 2: by and I pulled from. Have you studied people that
Speaker 2: you find fascinating? All that kind of become your guidance
Speaker 2: and mentors, even if you don't know them personally, or
Speaker 2: is it or is it very much a personal love
Speaker 2: and a personal inspiration thing.
Speaker 1: I really try to be the best version of myself.
Speaker 1: Having said that, there was one driver that for me
Speaker 1: was the best of all time was Earton Senna. I've
Speaker 1: never had the chance because I'm too young to have
Speaker 1: witnessed him in real life, but obviously through movies some
Speaker 1: books I could learn more about his person and what
Speaker 1: he's done. In Formula one and he's always been a
Speaker 1: person that I've admired, and he was also the idol
Speaker 1: of my father, so I think that played a part
Speaker 1: into it as well.
Speaker 2: What was it specifically about the way he raised from
Speaker 2: what you've seen in footage and books, What was it
Speaker 2: about him?
Speaker 1: Just the precision that he had at that time. It
Speaker 1: was also in the time where we were mentioning before,
Speaker 1: in a much more dangerous time of Formula one. Sadly
Speaker 1: he lost his life on the track, but he was
Speaker 1: so precise and he was extremely special in Monaco. He
Speaker 1: was special everywhere, but in Monaco even more so. And
Speaker 1: being in Monaco watching the videos of his on board
Speaker 1: camera of his qualifying laps around Monaco was is just crazy.
Speaker 2: Have any similar has ever done this where you could
Speaker 2: race alongside legendary races? Does that exist?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: Have you like if you wanted to race him? Maybe?
Speaker 1: Maybe like games, but not like proper like simulators. No, No,
Speaker 1: our simulator is crazy. It's in a room that is
Speaker 1: maybe there's five or six times bigger than this one,
Speaker 1: and it's like a huge simulator moving everywhere to try
Speaker 1: and reproduce the g forces. So now they are really pushed.
Speaker 1: But you're only racing on your own, so you cannot
Speaker 1: reproduce a race or whatsoever. You're just doing laps on
Speaker 1: your own.
Speaker 2: That similartor where is that station?
Speaker 1: Like where do you go in Marinello?
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, and that's that similar you're in all year around.
Speaker 2: The three days are in the real car.
Speaker 1: Yes, so you do three days in the real car
Speaker 1: and then everything else is on the simulator.
Speaker 2: Walk us through what that simulator feels like, like what
Speaker 2: you described it briefly there, but like walk us through
Speaker 2: like how what does it give you and what does
Speaker 2: it not give you?
Speaker 1: So what it gives you extremely well is that the
Speaker 1: engineers have managed to reproduce extremely close to the real
Speaker 1: car the feeling that you get in the real car.
Speaker 1: The thing that it doesn't give you and will I
Speaker 1: think never ever give you is obviously the adrenaline first,
Speaker 1: because you know you're on a simulator, you crash, you
Speaker 1: press a restart better, then you go again, which in
Speaker 1: reality is a bit more difficult. And also the g
Speaker 1: forces because we've got a huge platform which reproduces the
Speaker 1: G forces, but you're only going from right to left
Speaker 1: and then it stops in a formul one car when
Speaker 1: you turn right, then the g forces are always there
Speaker 1: until you stop turning right, which, yeah, makes a big
Speaker 1: difference because to be precise on a platform that is
Speaker 1: quite stable is one thing. To be precise in a
Speaker 1: formul one car with all the vibrations, with all the
Speaker 1: g forces that your body goes through is a complete other.
Speaker 1: So it makes things a bit more complet.
Speaker 2: It's fascinating to even think that you have to do
Speaker 2: something for work that you don't actually get to do,
Speaker 2: and it's phenomenal how smart and astute and intense you
Speaker 2: have to be in order to make it all come together.
Speaker 2: I wanted to ask you. I was thinking about this before,
Speaker 2: and I'm bringing it back because I wanted to ask
Speaker 2: you if your father was here now and he was
Speaker 2: getting to watch you now, Like, what do you think
Speaker 2: he'd say to you? Like, how do you think he'd
Speaker 2: respond to the journey that you're on.
Speaker 1: I think he will be extremely proud, because he passed
Speaker 1: away a year before I got into Formula one. It
Speaker 1: was very difficult because I unfortunately did not I hadn't
Speaker 1: signed my Formula one contract, which was the ultimate goal
Speaker 1: for our family. I mean, Formula one is really where
Speaker 1: you want to get. Once you start a racing career,
Speaker 1: that's where you want to be one day. But I
Speaker 1: had lied to him two days before he passed away,
Speaker 1: and I told him, listen, I signed my contract. The
Speaker 1: year was going well. I was quite confident that this
Speaker 1: will happen, but I also knew it was a matter
Speaker 1: of days before he would pass away. And I remember
Speaker 1: that that night that I said it to my mum,
Speaker 1: and my mum was pretty angry with me, telling me
Speaker 1: you shouldn't lie to your father, and that stayed in
Speaker 1: me four months, and luckily I signed my contract a
Speaker 1: month later he wasn't here anymore. And then I found
Speaker 1: much more peace within myself because I told myself, okay,
Speaker 1: I didn't lie my father and I told him the truth.
Speaker 1: I anticipated things, but everything is okay. And that was
Speaker 1: a really good moment because, as I said, Formula one
Speaker 1: is really the goal for every driver, and it was
Speaker 1: difficult to accept that he will go away without knowing
Speaker 1: what was the rest. But I think he would be
Speaker 1: really proud as much as on track at the moment.
Speaker 1: This year, not going too much into the specific, but
Speaker 1: it's not the best year ever. We are struggling a
Speaker 1: little bit with our car performance, but yeah, I'm still
Speaker 1: driving for hour an informal one, so he would be happy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's beautiful. Yeah you shared that with Krishana. Ronaldo
Speaker 2: has a similar story with his father, like his father
Speaker 2: never really got to see him. Yeah, become Chrishiana Ronaldo
Speaker 2: and the idea of like, how how hard it is
Speaker 2: when like, you know, you have a father who believes
Speaker 2: in you and loves you and wants you to become
Speaker 2: phenomenal and I don't. I can't. I can't remember the
Speaker 2: exact year they lost his father, But his father never
Speaker 2: got to see him reach the heights that he did.
Speaker 2: But of course it's beautiful to hear that. I'm so
Speaker 2: glad you could share it with him. That's such a
Speaker 2: special I'm so glad you got to tell. And I'm
Speaker 2: so glad it came true me too.
Speaker 1: I think I would have leaved so badly with with
Speaker 1: a lie like this for the rest of my life.
Speaker 1: So I'm I'm happy I did everything for it to happen.
Speaker 1: It's happened, and and he also sacrificed a lot for me.
Speaker 1: I never like to say that I sacrificed anything in
Speaker 1: my life because I didn't. I just did everything that
Speaker 1: I wanted to do, which was racing as much as Yes,
Speaker 1: I wasn't a lot of time at home when I
Speaker 1: was a kid, but I was spending my time on track,
Speaker 1: which was what I love doing the most. He, on
Speaker 1: the other hand, sacrificed a lot because modest sport is
Speaker 1: unfortunately a very expensive sport. He had to do saving
Speaker 1: for me to be able to do what I love most,
Speaker 1: which was driving, and I was aware of that, and
Speaker 1: also the fact that obviously my mom. He couldn't see
Speaker 1: my mom that much because he was always with me
Speaker 1: on races. So I think he made many more sacrifices
Speaker 1: than I did, because for me, it was always pure pleasure.
Speaker 2: Is driving a lonely sport. I imagine that everyone's quite competitive,
Speaker 2: Like I can't imagine drivers being friends and hanging out afterwards,
Speaker 2: because I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, actually, you tell me, Actually, I've got a
Speaker 1: really good friend on the grid, Pierre Ghastly. We grew
Speaker 1: up together. We started in kouting. We did our first
Speaker 1: race together in two thousand and five, so yeah, like
Speaker 1: seven eight years old. We did the French Championship together
Speaker 1: and we became super good friends. Our family are super
Speaker 1: close as well, so we used to get going on
Speaker 1: holidays together and then we found ourselves in Formula one
Speaker 1: now so but trust me, as soon as I close
Speaker 1: adviser and I'm with a helmet, he's nobody anymore. And
Speaker 1: that's the same for him and we know that. But
Speaker 1: whenever we are outside the cow, we have a really
Speaker 1: really strong friendship. So you can have friends, but it's
Speaker 1: very difficult to create friendships if you didn't know that
Speaker 1: person before getting into Formula one. Because it's such a
Speaker 1: competitive world. Everybody wants to have the upper hand. Everybody
Speaker 1: wants to do everything in his own benefits because at
Speaker 1: the end, we want to win. We want to be
Speaker 1: the best on track, so there's a lot of respect,
Speaker 1: but we are not giving anything away to the others.
Speaker 1: And as much as I'm with friend with Pierre, I'm
Speaker 1: not giving him any advices or whatsoever. I just want
Speaker 1: to beat him as much as I want to beat
Speaker 1: everybody else on track. But lonely sport, I don't think
Speaker 1: it is because I at the end, it's a it's
Speaker 1: a team sport. The only thing is that the team
Speaker 1: is a bit in the is working a bit in
Speaker 1: the shadow because when you watch Formula one, you see
Speaker 1: mostly the driver driving the car, but behind that the
Speaker 1: mechanics are making sure that they mount everything perfectly. The
Speaker 1: engineers are working in trying to optimize the car in
Speaker 1: the best possible way. Then there's a lot of strategy
Speaker 1: during the race, so there are there are many, many,
Speaker 1: many people in the background speaking and connected to me
Speaker 1: through the radio. So I need to speak with the
Speaker 1: guys on in the pits while I'm driving, and it's
Speaker 1: a big part of racing.
Speaker 2: What are your dreams and visions of you know, wanting
Speaker 2: to be one of the best and winning a world championship?
Speaker 2: What would that mean to you? Like? How important is that?
Speaker 2: What does that mean to you? What would it feel like? Like?
Speaker 2: What fuels you and drives you to go in that
Speaker 2: direction just to.
Speaker 1: Be the number one? Just the felling of the victory obviously,
Speaker 1: I mean I want few races in Formula one and
Speaker 1: the feeling that you get once you get that win
Speaker 1: is incredible because you know you've done the best on track,
Speaker 1: but it depends on so many other people doing the
Speaker 1: right thing. Is that whenever you do it, it's such
Speaker 1: an incredible joy, not only for you but for more
Speaker 1: than one five hundred people that are back at the
Speaker 1: factory in Manilo working for the Formula one program. So
Speaker 1: it's crazy. There are so many people involved, and whenever
Speaker 1: you achieve that as a team, it's such an incredible feeling. Yeah, victory,
Speaker 1: the taste of victory is what motivates me. Every morning.
Speaker 1: I wake up and I think about that every day.
Speaker 1: That is a bit more difficult to wake up and
Speaker 1: go in training. I think about winning a World championship
Speaker 1: one day and the feeling that it gives me. And so, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is what motivates me.
Speaker 2: Let's manifest it right now, like you did with what
Speaker 2: you said to your father. Like, let's fast forward and
Speaker 2: it's manifested the World championships here. What would you say
Speaker 2: to that self from here? What would you say to
Speaker 2: your future self?
Speaker 1: Well, on first, that is a pretty easy, easy one
Speaker 1: to remember all your career. Yeah, yeah, your journey, and
Speaker 1: to remember every single difficult moments where you thought you
Speaker 1: wouldn't make it, these difficult moments that I went through
Speaker 1: my career. Sometimes you tend to think I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: make it to form one, I'm not gonna make it
Speaker 1: to become a world champion. So yeah, if I become
Speaker 1: world champion, I will tell that to myself. To think
Speaker 1: about every single moment where I thought this wouldn't be possible.
Speaker 1: And this is also something that I tell myself today
Speaker 1: to the younger person I was sometimes thinking I will
Speaker 1: never make it to form one the only twenty drivers
Speaker 1: in the world. Why me? And yeah, to remember those
Speaker 1: moments and tell yourself that it's possible. With hard work,
Speaker 1: with motivation, it's possible to do anything.
Speaker 2: Charles, Well, you're definitely winning the race of life for sure.
Speaker 2: I can tell it's wonderful to engage with you and
Speaker 2: connect with you and just we're definitely manifesting it right now.
Speaker 2: Want to see it happen and you know can't wait
Speaker 2: for it because you deserve it. I can tell, thank you.
Speaker 2: The grace with which you carry yourself and the humility
Speaker 2: and the gratitude is really beautiful. And I think that
Speaker 2: those are the kind of winners we need in the
Speaker 2: world as well. I think the world is starving for
Speaker 2: winners that have great character and have great morals and
Speaker 2: you know, have their values in the right place. Like
Speaker 2: I look at that. I always think that if the
Speaker 2: most successful and the most talented and most impactful people
Speaker 2: in the world are walking in that graceful way, then
Speaker 2: that's going to impact so many younger generations and so
Speaker 2: many others. Do you how often do you get to
Speaker 2: work with younger drivers and people are up and coming,
Speaker 2: and like, do you enjoy that? Do you?
Speaker 1: I love it? I love it. I had actually an
Speaker 1: incredible experience. I went to a cuting race. I think
Speaker 1: it was a few months ago, like three four months ago.
Speaker 1: It had been a long time. I didn't go into
Speaker 1: a kating race watching kids. I have my younger cousin
Speaker 1: actually that is starting cutting that I went to see
Speaker 1: him and I got there and I mean I didn't
Speaker 1: have any expectations. I arrived to the track and all
Speaker 1: the kids were around me and looking with the eyes
Speaker 1: full of joy and admiration. And that made me come
Speaker 1: back a little bit when I was a kid and
Speaker 1: a formal one driver will get to the track and
Speaker 1: you will see him like God. And to see that
Speaker 1: in kids' eyes was something super super special. Because at
Speaker 1: the end, I live my own life, but sometimes I
Speaker 1: don't really realize that I am now a formal one
Speaker 1: for ari driver, which is something very special and something
Speaker 1: I've always dreamt off, as I've been saying many many times.
Speaker 1: But for me, I'm still me. For my mom, I'm
Speaker 1: still her son. So I'm staying with people that it's
Speaker 1: normal to be around me. But then once I get
Speaker 1: to the kids and to the cuting races that don't
Speaker 1: see Formula one drivers every day, you can understand how
Speaker 1: special it is. And the smallest gesture and this I
Speaker 1: remember from being a kid, the smallest gesture that the
Speaker 1: Formula One driver will have towards me, it will change
Speaker 1: my life for months, I'll think about that. I met
Speaker 1: Michael Schumaker when I was seven or six years old,
Speaker 1: and I remember that day still as it was yesterday.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I really spend time with the kids and
Speaker 1: trying to make them the happiest possible, and it was
Speaker 1: amazing to see the impacts that it had for them
Speaker 1: and how happy they left from just meeting me. For me,
Speaker 1: it's nothing I spent an hour with them, but for them,
Speaker 1: I'm sure it meant a lot and that was very
Speaker 1: special to see that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's beautiful. Do you believe that the life you're
Speaker 2: living is that it's been created from your mind or
Speaker 2: a vision or training, like how do you think about
Speaker 2: how what has had and is it hard work? Is
Speaker 2: it effort? Is it attitude? Is it all of those things?
Speaker 2: Is it something bigger than you? Is there a higher power?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: What is it for you? How do you describe the
Speaker 2: journey so far?
Speaker 1: I think clear vision is what helped me since a
Speaker 1: very very young age, because even though I started that
Speaker 1: three and a half, maybe from three and a half
Speaker 1: to five it was only for fun, but already from five,
Speaker 1: every time I was getting to the track, Yes I
Speaker 1: love what I do, but I want to be the best.
Speaker 1: This was super important for me to get away of
Speaker 1: the track the evening and to have learned something new
Speaker 1: and to have done a step in terms of driving
Speaker 1: and understanding of the cutting and all of these kind
Speaker 1: of things. And this I've always kept it. I was
Speaker 1: very clear in setting my goals, realistic goals, and in
Speaker 1: where I want it to be, not in ten fifteen
Speaker 1: years time, because this was way too far, but in
Speaker 1: one or two more teme which were small steps, but
Speaker 1: small steps, always in the right direction. And I think
Speaker 1: that definitely helped me in achieving small goals after small
Speaker 1: goals to get to the bigger goal. Which was obviously
Speaker 1: to become a Formula one driver, and even more so
Speaker 1: with Ferrari. But it's with the different small steps that
Speaker 1: I've and the different targets that I've fixed myself throughout
Speaker 1: my career.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Charles. We end every episode of On Purpose with
Speaker 2: a final five. So these final five questions have to
Speaker 2: be answered in one word or one sentence. Okay, all right,
Speaker 2: so tight. So these are your fast five. Drive fast.
Speaker 2: So now now you've got to talk fast. You don't
Speaker 2: have to answer them fast, they're just shorter answers. Question
Speaker 2: number one, Charles, what is the best advice you've ever
Speaker 2: heard or received?
Speaker 1: I'll use the one of my father, Stay humble, be grateful,
Speaker 1: and work hard. That is one sentence.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's perfect. Yeah, that's perfect. That's perfect. All right.
Speaker 2: Second question, where is the worst advice you've ever heard
Speaker 2: or received your journey?
Speaker 1: Don't do this mistake. I think you've got to do
Speaker 1: mistakes in order to learn from them and to become
Speaker 1: the person that you are then twenty years after otherwise
Speaker 1: you yeah, so yeah. I think every mistakes, as I
Speaker 1: said earlier, I think I always tend to think that
Speaker 1: it's a positive thing because you grow from them absolutely.
Speaker 2: Question number three, how do you prepare on a big
Speaker 2: day for a race on the day and how do
Speaker 2: you end the day after the race?
Speaker 1: Cold baths I started and I end it that way. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's I love it. It's great for the body, especially
Speaker 1: for our sport. Inside the cockpit, we are going through
Speaker 1: extremely high temperatures, so to put the body as low
Speaker 1: as possible before the race is super important. And then
Speaker 1: I do the call bath again for recovery after that,
Speaker 1: and that also wakes me up if I'm a bit
Speaker 1: tired in the morning. So yes, cold baths nice.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I've seen you do cry therapy as well, exactly.
Speaker 2: I love that video. Yeah, yeah, I do a lot
Speaker 2: of infrared saunas and coal plunges and okay, oh yes, yeah,
Speaker 2: it's fantastic. Question number four, what is something you've learned
Speaker 2: about yourself through your Formula one journey? Something you've learned
Speaker 2: about yourself personally that.
Speaker 1: I'm much stronger than what I initially thought. You get
Speaker 1: into Formula one and I was still a kid. So
Speaker 1: you get into a team with one thousand, five hundred people,
Speaker 1: with media, with a lot of pressure, and straight away
Speaker 1: you ask a bit yourself sometimes, Am I ready for this?
Speaker 1: I used to do cuting on my own with my
Speaker 1: father as a mechanic, and now I'm in formal one
Speaker 1: with one thy five hundred people working in order to
Speaker 1: make the best car for me, lots of media attention,
Speaker 1: lots of pressure. Am I ready for this? I am
Speaker 1: so so yeah, Maybe that I am stronger than what
Speaker 1: I initially thought.
Speaker 2: I love that fifth and final question. We asked this
Speaker 2: to every guest. If you could create one law or
Speaker 2: rule in the world that ever had to follow, what
Speaker 2: would it be.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a very simple one, but I think
Speaker 1: be nice and respectful to everybody. I think is extremely
Speaker 1: important and sometimes the world lacks that. This is something
Speaker 1: that always remind myself in a way it comes natural,
Speaker 1: but I think it's super important to just be nice,
Speaker 1: genuine with people around you, whoever this person is. And
Speaker 1: if everybody in the world would be like that, I
Speaker 1: think the world will be a much better place.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Charles, is there anything I haven't asked you that
Speaker 2: you wanted to share today that's on your heart, that's
Speaker 2: in your mind that you're like everybody wanted to talk
Speaker 2: about this, and maybe we haven't touched on it. I
Speaker 2: want to give you the flow to share anything.
Speaker 1: I think it's been a really good talk. So no,
Speaker 1: I think you've touched You've touched everything.
Speaker 2: Okay, good, Yeah. No, I wanted to give you the
Speaker 2: opportunity because I'm so grateful that we got to have
Speaker 2: this time. And definitely the words I'm going to remember
Speaker 2: you buy is grateful and humble. Those words. I love
Speaker 2: that that's how your family raised you. I love that
Speaker 2: theme coming out in our conversation today. I felt I
Speaker 2: could feel your genuine you still have a childlike love
Speaker 2: for what you do there, and I think that that
Speaker 2: is so rare. It can you know, we all get tired, jaded, stressed, whatever,
Speaker 2: and that's natural. But it's amazing that you've held onto
Speaker 2: that and I think it's credit to your beautiful parents
Speaker 2: and family.
Speaker 1: Then thank you, thank you so much, so thank you man,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. Thank you.
Speaker 2: If you love this episode, you will love my interview
Speaker 2: with Kobe Bryant on how to be strategic and obsessive
Speaker 2: to find your purpose.
Speaker 1: Our children have become less imaginative about how to problem solve,
Speaker 1: and parents and coaches have become more directive and trying
Speaker 1: to tell them how to behave versus teaching them how
Speaker 1: to behave.