Is F1 headed the wrong way with the new regs? | S04EP02

Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the Track Limits podcast. Today I have two faces who are familiar.

They are very familiar to not only you, but also to the podcast. We have Ernie Black who's

being such an incredibly helpful person to the Track Limits podcast. He's a member of the Track Limits

family, but also more importantly, he is an incredibly well-known writer, poet, in the F1

community. He goes by the F1 poet Ernie. Welcome back. Thank you, sir. And on the other hand,

his opponent for numcating, his opponent for today is an unbelievable journalist and tech journalist,

tech influencer, really, I would say, especially on Twitter. If you are on Twitter, definitely you

need to be following Craig Scarborough. Craig has actually been on the Track Limits podcast before.

We're definitely going to link his previous episode below, but Craig, welcome back to the podcast.

Thank you again for making the time. No, thank you for inviting me back.

Start of a great season. Start talking about it.

100%. So I mean, it's cool because when I initially wanted to do this episode, guys, we were

actually not even... We hadn't seen a car on track yet. I was thinking of doing it before

Bahrain testing. And then, you know, obviously a lot of things came up. I really began to appreciate

you guys being so flexible. And I think what's really cool is when I was thinking back at all the

questions that I wrote, I'm like, wait, we now have Bahrain testing done. We have the Australia race

done. We are now halfway at the time of this recording, halfway done, Shanghai, you know,

obviously the race isn't done, but qualifying is done. I'm kind of curious, like, give me a rating

on where you feel like the season, quote unquote, has been and your feeling of where it's going to

end up being. Because there's a lot of talk right now about F1 doesn't feel like F1 anymore.

The cars don't feel like they're actually moving as quickly as they were last year. Is this,

you know, a step backwards for F1 or are we actually moving forward? So maybe we'll start with

you, Craig, like, where would you rate the season so far and where do you think it's going to end up?

Well, I think from the car action, we've had already this year. So we've had the Melbourne

qualifying race and had a sprint. We've had another set of qualifying. So that's what at least two

sets of starts as well. For me, and I go, yeah, I'm not, I'm not a standard fan. I'm more

interested in the tech. I think it's been a fantastic season, not just because of the tech, but I

think we've seen some great track action. You can see that races are totally predictable. There's

a little bit of shuffling around. You have problems with people starting at the start as a race and

then energy management. Now, I accept that F1's got some problems, but you know, we've,

every set of rule changes, particularly big ones and we've had quite a lot of them over the past

couple of decades. They then shake things up. The cars do get slower. The cars do look different.

They act differently. I don't think what we've seen in the race in a half that we've had is

truly what this formula is going to be like as we go from balance to the season.

You know, these are teething problems, particularly at the starts and particularly with some of

the energy management with our two really tricky tracks as well. Anyone that, you know, everyone on

social media is going, I hate it. I'm never going to watch Formula One again. Give it a bit of time,

you know, like anything else, it just needs to mature a little bit. But I'm loving it. I think

the cars look fantastic on circuit. Yeah, Ernie, would you agree with that? I've got some opinions.

Listen, on the tech side, yes, for sure, there's all kinds of new stuff. I love seeing those little

tidbits of new bits on cars. The little halo winglet there on the Ferrari, the flip wing or whatever

the Macarena wing. I mean, it's still, it's still early days for that. Though we've seen them,

you know, bring it in and take it out and it's, they're still testing. But all of these things,

they're starting to bring back innovation. And if you guys remember, at least Craig and I will

remember back in the 70s and 80s, there's a lot of change. A lot of cars look different from each

other, not just it didn't look like a spec series. I think where we, we need to start being a little

bit more cautious here is around like the drivers themselves are not crazy about the cars. Max has

been very outspoken. Everyone's kind of struggling with, with energy deployment and understanding the

new power units and whatnot. From a seasoned fan perspective, I think that's great because we're

starting to see as, as Craig said, some action on track. We're starting to see people who you

wouldn't maybe normally see making strides, making strides because they're starting to understand

that better. The whole Mario Kart thing. So you just started to see some of the young drivers,

Kimi Antonelli getting pulled today. Well done, sir. But also the, the, the Netflix generation

offends might be looking at this saying, I don't know if this is good or bad. Some might be

interested. Some might say this is too complicated to follow. So there's going to be two sides

to the sport and the entertainment side, which may or may not suffer. I think it's doing well

right now because I mean, aside from knowing that Mercedes has a very good power plant and generally

speaking, they're probably going to come out on top most weekends. You really don't know where

everyone else is going to finish. Ferrari seems to be in the mix, but McLaren show today,

they're not that far off. And one or two upgrades as Andreas Ellis said, coming in Japan,

that could change things, right? So, hey, listen, early days, let's give it a few races, right? Even

22, 22, when we had the real change, we saw, you know, Alonzo shaking up the field and saying,

look at these back, you know. So let's give it some time. I'd like to see where we land in a few

more races. On the note, though, of Max, for example, calling, you know, the driving really tough

and he's been very verbal. I think there was an FIA meeting that happened, God leaked, which was,

you know, pretty sad to see. I think a lot of the drivers weren't happy with that either.

I am curious about just the philosophical debate here, right? Because the philosophical

debate wouldn't change by the time Japan comes or by the time even the end of the season happens,

which is, you know, people think of F1, they think of, okay, cars that are on the absolute

limit, drivers that are just thinking about driving the car. And to be fair, like, anybody who's

right now saying that, oh, these new regs are making them, you know, manage a computer and they're

like having to manage their battery, that was kind of the case for the previous years too,

but albeit it's a lot more now. It's a lot more prevalent now where I'm thinking twice about

even making an overtake because I'm like, what, what is my battery level going to be coming out of

that corner? Or what is my battery level going to be the next lap over? And I'm not going to be

able to defend the two cars behind me. Is that F1? Is that F1? I'm like, that's the philosophical

debate here. Is energy management and more of that philosophically aligned to what F1 should be?

I think you go again. There's not no yes, no answer to that, is there? I think lots of people

early mentioned the car that drive to survive people. Do they care? No, as long as they see shiny

cars and good looking drivers and all the other kind of stuff that goes around it, some of us

older purists will say, you know, maybe it's not Formula One because the drivers aren't flat out

all the time, but then equally, some of us can remember whenever was Formula One about

going fine and sound. You know, in the 70s, you were managing, you know, is it safe to overtake?

Am I going to go crashing into a wall and burn it up all the flames? You know, I've got to manage

that gearbox in the turbo where you were managing the engine, you were managing your fuel consumption,

you know, tire management. There's always something and this is just something new the drivers

are managing and I can accept that it's too much at this stage. But, you know, Mercedes aren't

having to do too much management. Lots of other teams are. Ferrari are able to get really great

starts. Other things can't. You can see that some of this is possible and it will improve.

And, you know, the world is a different place to 10, 20, 13 years ago. And I think energy management,

just, you know, might have been tires or fuel in the past will just become the new normal.

But I don't think it will be as dramatic as we're seeing at the moment.

And when you see these cars going through the corners, they haven't got the aerodynamic grip.

They haven't got the tires. They've got a whole heap of torque coming out of the corners.

And I think Hamilton is looking spectacular at moment because he's struggling. But that's great.

I mean, for how many years have we seen cars just easy flat through all of these corners?

It hasn't been going through the year. I mean, we've got Japan coming up.

You know, it's 130R. All these other corners are going to be easy flat.

Other drivers are going to have to put some effort in. And long as energy management isn't the

thing that's stopping them going really fast through these corners, then I think we've got quite

an eye shape up with thousands of horsepower and maybe a little grip.

I'm going to, yeah, I'm going to say, again, I've got my opinions on this.

I'd love to see less of a 5050 split on the power to be completely honest when we're talking about

philosophical F1. I really miss the sounds of yesterday or like I get the turbo era.

We've had a turbo era before, but aligned with Craig with respect to managing,

like we always had someone managing something. Nikki Lauda was great at it.

Alan Prost was the professor. He was great at managing his car.

You had your flat outs, like Erton said, I don't know. I don't know necessarily

that he ever wanted to really manage things, but we also had an era where we had traction control

and refueling. And there was less to manage there, maybe more on the side of the tires,

especially with the tire war back then. So we've had that. Is it F1 today? I think it is.

I think you're always going to have those management conundrums like, do I push,

do I save, do I have to worry about what's happening in the next corner? That's always been there.

The question is, are we just used to something and now we're being asked to get used to something

else? That's been the case. Every time there's been a formal change, we've had to get used to

something else. So again, a little bit of patience, I think is required, but philosophically, yes,

this is still a F1. We all have our preferences, of course.

Yeah. And I mean, you guys brought up a great point there around management law. It's been a

thing. I am all secure. And if you have to zoom out even more than, and I'm not trying to get

you guys in trouble, I swear, but I am very curious. Do you guys then think the FIA is handling

the direction of the sport well? Because Ernie, you brought it up, right? Like the 50,

the 50 50 split is not ideal. Again, I made a video recently saying it's ironic that they're

focusing more on the cars on track when the emissions don't even come a majority of times from

the car on track. It's like less than 1% emission that comes from the cars actually. It's all the

logistics. It's all logistics. It's right. But it's also the fact that you're partnered with,

I mean, obviously, the Saudi Arabian race is not going to happen. And Bahrain's not going to

happen. But like, you can't say, I want to make the sport more sustainable and then go and,

you know, create these multi-billion dollar deals with countries that are clearly not on the same

page as you, right? So I don't know if there's some underlying level of hypocrisy that like people

just need to constantly call out because it is a bit frustrating that it's compromising the sport

that we love on track, you know, and it's all being done behind closed doors. So I'm more curious,

do you think the FI is handling the direction and the sport properly? And what are like maybe the

one or two things you wish the FI would change on? Quick pause before we get back into this episode

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All right, now let's get back to the episode. My opinion is that I think this whole

thing has been handled really badly, all the way through. We're not talking about the FA,

we're talking about everyone in F1, so you've got the manufacturer as you have the teams,

you have the FIA and the Liberty F1 management. We went into this rules set and the aim was to

try and make more efficient cars, and I've got absolutely no issue with that. Some people seem

to be really caught up on this 50-50 split, and well, you know, if you get around a lap with,

you know, just 50% of your combustion horsepower, and you've got a, you know, 50% potentially wasted.

Why not use that wasted energy? I mean, the world has changed a lot as it, you know, I sort of said,

you know, we, you know, think different about safely. We think differently about diversity. We

don't have good girls anymore. You know, the sport's changing because the world's changing,

and I don't think you can just have race cars going around burning fuel just for the sake of it,

even if it's a sustainable fuel. I mean, it just, you know, it just doesn't seem to make sense anymore,

and it's, you know, the sport has some responsibility to what's happening around the rest of the world,

and you know, you can argue, and there's some situations where it's difficult. I think what's gone wrong

is two things. One of all, they had a direction for the sport with these regulations where they

wanted the cars to be more efficient. So there was always going to be active air. I mean, there

was always going to be an increased hybrid element and sustainable fuel element. But what went,

then went wrong is it went through the series of committees with the manufacturers, with the teams,

with everyone that's got their own vested interests and the things that they want themselves to have,

but other rivals not to had. And we've ended up, you know, as I say, and I don't know how well,

it's translate with you guys, but a camel is a horse designed by a committee, and we've kind of

ended up with a camel. We should have had a car that had some form of pervade recovery, whether

that was the MGUH or something more like a Porsche running wet, which was just an exhaust

group in general, it's something quite different. The front MGU, you know, you've got most of the

braking done by the front brakes, and that is all just sent out of the car as hot end.

And the teams were scared of that because of an Audi, but then, well, you know, in Mercedes,

ran a former ET, they know about front regeneration. There's lots that went wrong with these

regulations, and I think we've ended up with regulations that are trying to please too many people

with way too many complicated ways of explaining, describing things. And I think,

if I've been quite bad at communicating that all the way through these regulations,

everyone's got misconceptions about what's happening going on. So I think we've just kind of wound

up in a situation where, you know, nobody's happy because everyone wanted their own way, you know,

such as life. I think we need to go back to the form of a one that's maybe a little bit more

dictatorial, where someone, you know, is kind of saying, well, this is the way it's going to be.

There's always a degree of flexibility in it, but I just think we've kind of ended up with a

rule set that kind of lost the stomach of what it was aiming for.

Almost forgot the question. Is the FAA handling things? I think, listen, I think there's always

going to be room for improvement. With any governing body, there's going to be challenges,

you're not going to make everyone happy. Definitely, there could have been things handled differently.

I agree this rule set is maybe even confusing to the people within the sport, let alone the fans.

I keep thinking of, you know, yesterday year where I think we all complained about the FAA at

some point as well. This is nothing new. I know where we're talking about the FAA. I keep

thinking about Charlie Whiting who actually passed away several years ago today and how different

things were even in his day. Miss him at the tracks, obviously, the way he handled drivers and

what not. I think some of the communications, as Craig said, have been less than ideal,

both with the drivers and with the public. Yeah, to answer your question, I think that the FAA

could have done better. I think that's always kind of been the case, but specifically the last

few years, I think we've seen kind of a decline in that. I kind of agree with Craig to a degree

with respect to the tutorial ship, if that isn't even a word. If they were to come out with a

rule set and they look, this is it. That rule set needs to be really, really good. Whether you like

them or not, it's fair and it's, and I don't necessarily feel that that's the case right now.

Case in point, start procedures and the compression ratio. Take a stand. What are we doing? You

set out the rules at the beginning. Ferrari brought them, hey, we have this concern. Everybody

else didn't really account for it. They have now they're going to try to change the rules to

a piece of everybody else. I'm kind of in a disagreement there. The compression ratio with Mercedes,

is it a thing? How are we testing this? If we're going to take a stand on this, make your call

before the season starts so everybody knows what's allowed and what's not. Because right now,

there's still like, what is it, Japan? They're talking about making a ruling on it.

I'm sorry. That's like, that's a long ways off. We're already many races in the championship.

I'm not saying could be decided by then, but I think there should be definitely things that are

maybe in consideration for everyone else done differently from the FIA perspective.

I guess on the positive note too though, they are, I think maybe a couple of years ago,

we would have said guys like, some of the older drivers need to step aside. Let's get some fresh

young talent in. It does feel like F1 now has a pretty healthy crop of drivers. If you look now at

even like George Russell and LeClair and Norris, you wouldn't even call them young drivers anymore,

which is like how young F1 has become, right? They're kind of in the middle of the pack now.

And now you got guys like, you know, Kimi Antonelli and Isaac Hadjar and Oli Bareman,

Arvid Linbad, Gabriel Bordeaux, Franco Calipinto, all of these guys that have come in now.

So I'm actually curious like, who do you guys have your bet on, right? I think this year, you know,

likely there's going to be a driver from Mercedes or Ferrari that'll put, you know,

the winning touch to the driver's championship. But if you had to pick a young kid,

and maybe it's Kimi Antonelli because he's driving on Mercedes, but outside of that,

just purely just on talent. Who are you putting your money on out of the young

young? Yeah, putting our money on to do what though, like to win, to win, to win, to win.

Not, not the championship. Are you talking about races or because to be dominant, to be dominant

in races, to be the best of the younger generation coming up, because I mean again, like we could

also argue who, by the way, is the best of the current generation, like the middle pack,

right? People might say Charles, people might say Lando, people might even just say George,

but like, that was the next question. I'm more curious like the younger crop.

All right, the young ones. Who do you guys like? Craig, Craig, who you putting your money on?

I mean, if anyone to ask about to judge drivers, I'm possibly the worst person ever. I mean,

I can't even name them or recognize half of them. I mean, I think Limblad really showed

a good hand in the first races, but that is an unusual for new drivers arriving into F1. How often

have we seen drivers make those first few races, particularly if they've made a mid-season entry

in like, wow, but then they kind of go, you know, jump off the cliff as suddenly it all gets

on top of them before they're climbing back up. And I think we saw that sort of very much last year

with, you know, sort of people like Ben with Antonelli. So, you know, we could, we could judge

Limblad too early. I mean, I think Hadjar, there's something about him as much as whenever I watch

him, I feel very frustrated that he's not achieved in what I'd like him to. It's just something

about him that just makes me feel that he could not have blossomed into a fantastic race driver.

I could equally believe he could go the other way because I'm not seeing the evidence.

I think Berneman as well. I mean, I think Ferrari, nothing him on board, and he's kind of gone

through that slump and come back out. I mean, his performance in Melbourne, I thought throughout

the weekend was fantastic. Ferrari could be looking for another driver in the next few years.

So, you know, I think Ben and could be, and yeah, I hate to say because I'm British and

these British, and it really isn't the thing to do with that. I think it's another one of those

people that we need to kind of keep an eye on. Antonelli, I'm interested in mine's about at the moment.

Why are you too much about it? So Craig is putting his money on everybody, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think Antonelli maybe is coming a little bit

too early into a big team, and now he's kind of got to perform. But I think some drivers need

a bit more time to mature because he is so young. So that's where I have my doubts. And we've seen

great drivers riding at one that we were going to think we're going to do great things, and then,

you know, somehow just didn't. I get that vibe from his performances over last year.

Ernie, what about you?

Yeah, you know, as Craig was speaking, I keep thinking of all of these drivers, and like, how do

you not like all of them? Because, you know, listen, I love Kimmy. I think he's in a really good

car this year, which is obviously going to make him my pick for who's going to do better of all

of the rest of the rookies or the young generation. Absolutely love Hydr. I think he's just,

he's an incredible talent. Again, I'm going to hold back on Lindblad just because one race,

let's give him some time to see where he really is. Yeah, Bearman's another one, right? So if I

had to pick like my top three, those would be my top three, Kimmy just by the fact that he's in,

you know, like a class leading car right now, he's got to be up there. You know, performance

today was great. You might argue, well, you know, George wasn't at his best for Q3 because of the

issues that he had. So he could have ended up second, but he didn't end up on pole. And to be fair,

second in Australia, he's not going to do, he's not necessarily going to do bad in China.

Yeah, as he too young, probably, but I think this is, he's going to cut his teeth in a really good

car this year. Last year's show promise, obviously, it's always going to be second to George,

because he's just so comfortable in a team, he's been there for a while. But Kimmy'd be my,

Kimmy'd be my number one right now for the young drivers with HedgeR and Bearman coming up close.

And then, you know, one more driver question, then Craig, I promise we'll go back to engineering,

we'll go back to the car. But I am curious, you know, again, Max were stepping undisputed,

best driver probably of his generation. I think you have to say he's the best driver of his

generation. I'm curious though, you put somebody in that RB23, you know, or you put somebody in

the McLaren of last year, you know, obviously Landon Norse one was at the cleanest victory,

was at the most, you know, dominant victory over all the other drivers. No, I'm curious that

behind Max Verstappen, who you guys are like, okay, you know what, you gave, if you gave this

driver like a Charles the George or Orlando or an Oscar, Max's car from 2023, they would win

almost every race as well. Is there a driver like that or is Max just like in an entirely

different league of his own, even now? I mean, it's interesting. I think we've seen so few drivers

actually kind of demonstrate their ability to really manage, you know, a race at potential

championship. You know, for me, the person that I think has got the greatest ability next to Max

is probably Charlotte Claire, you know, and again, I'm as with Oliver, I'll say I always kind of

had caveat. You know, I think he has matured now, he had lots of incidents when he was, you know,

going for pole and winning a race and, you know, he kind of seemed to throw the car off the track

just when he didn't need to. I think he goes every time that you could need to do it. I just think

he's, he's at that point where if he doesn't get the car soon, yeah, it'll be past him.

So yeah, let's see, you know, I think if we could see him in a fantastic car, I think the Ferrari

is particularly good this year. Let's see if he can, you know, perform the way that, you know,

his trajectory is suggested. And beyond that, I think, you know, a lot of the other drivers,

you could easily kind of pop them in then, but I don't think any didn't kind of send to some kind

of generational talent. I hate to keep agreeing with Craig because that's kind of boring.

I'm going to say, I'm going to say, Max has that killer instinct that I don't think that I've seen

in others in that, in that same generation. I would agree to Charles is up there. I'd also put

PS3 in that from what we've saw last year. Mental 42, he's very calm. Max is just, if I were to

put anybody else in that car, a lot of the drivers that we, I mean, you put a Lonzo in that car,

he's going to win. So you can make a lot of arguments around who, you know, do you put, I think it's,

it's just a different thing. For me, it's more like,

Max starts at the back of the grid and ends up on the podium or he ends up winning a race or he

ends up in the top 10. In any car you put him in, and almost in any series, because if I recall,

he didn't do too bad when he stepped out of form of a one as Hans. I think he's just, he is

a completely different force from from others. And I would, I would say that he's, he's just,

that guy, he's, he's, he's just, he is the best right now of his, of his era.

And then I'm curious then on the cars itself, then the, the Macarena, you mentioned it, Ernie.

So Craig, I'm actually curious, when you saw that, were you like, am I, am I, like, are you serious?

Like, were you happy? Were you like, what the hell is this? Can you, Craig, we're doing back flips?

Yeah. Can you explain to like any person watching why this was like such a cool addition,

and why it was even meant like, what is the, what is the benefit of the Macarena, other than it

looking pretty cool on, on the camera? Well, first of all, my biggest beef with the whole

thing is they're called at the Macarena wing. I find myself walking around the Hanno's Sky.

I mean, I, you know, following Sestan, I've wake up in the morning and we get first

to the UK.

Is that because, yeah, the DIS rules or the equivalent of what you could do with the wing,

rear wing fats under the previous regulations would probably throw down and you can do things

that just weren't possible before. So, um, yeah, to simplify it. So, you know, when you open a

rear wing and active aerodes going to straight line mode or SLM as we, we love to call things by

their acronyms. Um, you know, there's various things you're after. You're trying to reduce drag

and it's the rear wing that creates all the drag on the car on the straight.

So, opening in a DRS style really reduces drag massively. There's not much drag left in that

rear wing. Um, but then you've also got to think about as we've spoken about so many times over

the DRS era is, you know, what happens when you close the RS, you know, drive a leave in it too late,

and then, you know, just going off at the next corner. So, you're, you're trying to find ways of

making the, the shedding of the downforce in order to reduce drag, making that a bit more predictable,

and how clean have got their own solution, which I think is fantastic. And I'm sure we'll have

lots of other teams will appear with something like that. The Macarena wing, I'm saying, I can't

believe I'm saying it, I'm saying it, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm rotating rear wing.

Yeah, that's trying to do very much the same as the Alpine wing. So, when it flips upwards,

effectively, the rear wing flaps are now facing upside down and back to front. So, you know,

the sharp end is pointing into the air flow. Now, when it's doing that, it's changing the

flow field behind the car, and again, I've seen some CFD, but I've not entirely understood or seen

enough images to kind of understand, but it does things for the air flow behind the car that

makes that last little bit of drag reduction. But then it flips back down to recover the downforce

as you get into the corner. It's just some really unusual things. So, there is a kind of an airbrake

effect moment. There is a moment when you're looking downforce, and then there's a moment when

that downforce reconnects. I mean, you can't see there's enough of an advantage. Anything that wing

is doing to kind of account for the strange things in behavior as it rotates backwards, and indeed,

as it rotates, you know, as you enter the straight with that. But there's at one point when you

get onto the main straight, you operate straight line mode, and that wing actually will slow the car

down momentarily. I think the momentarily, but it's like, I can't juggle in my head what the

justification for it is. But you have to guess that it's, you know, increased drag reduction,

and something that makes the driver's feel a bit more comfortable coming back now on straight

line mode into corner mode. But it seems well, why not do what Alping did? That's much, much

easy. Not far from school, admittedly. But yeah, it's one of those conundrums that I think we

will learn more about and see with other teams copy it off a Ferrari drop it, because, you know,

normally those massive strengths in China, they haven't run it in the sprint today. And I don't

think they ran anything quite fine either as I remember. So yeah, it's just one of those odd things.

I don't think it's as important as kind of as we've given it the attention. I think it's less

attention rather than both. Yeah, we've heard, we've heard a lot of bullshit numbers. Oh, it could

be worth half a second. I was going to ask you, I was going to ask you, Craig, because you mentioned

something. I call it the parachute effect. And that is that when it's actually flipping, it is,

it's increased a lot, but there's a lot more resistance there. The only thing I can think of

in terms of potential improvement or advantage is if it creates any lift, that saves the rear

tires. Because if you use it often enough during a lap, is it possible that there might be some sort

of lift effect where it manages the rear tires a little bit so that they're less, they're not as

maybe they don't green as much or I'm trying to figure out why would they do this other than

having people talk about it, which I'm sure they didn't. That's not a reason for it, but

they did get people talking. Got a lot of people thinking about it. There must have been

something somewhere where they thought, you know, maybe in the tunnel, they might be seeing

something in the wind tunnel, they might be seeing something, some data that's beneficial.

I just don't get, I don't get the whole, because at two points, you're going to get that that

effect where it's literally, you know, perpendicular to the ground and that's not going to help.

There's got to be, there's got to be something else that we're not seeing that they are. Look,

if it works, great. It's something to talk about. If it gives them an advantage, all the better,

what I'm hoping for is I don't want to see someone else running away with a championship

this year. I want to see a fight. Like last year, literally going down to the last race and you

you didn't know if Max was actually going to be able to do it. Yeah. Right. So, so I like the idea

of people coming up with clever ideas, you know, getting back to that innovative F1 of yesterday

and trying something new. Look, if it doesn't pan out, well, they tried it, you've got to try.

Yeah. Absolutely. You're right. There is an outbreak effect when the wind comes up before it goes

up and over where it's, you know, why would you do that? Terror dynamics suicide, if you could

even say it such a thing. I think, as you say, there's a lot of rubbish has been spoken about

this wing in terms of what it's doing, what's helping. I think one of the misconceptions

even though the wing is almost upside down, I don't think it's actually creating lift.

I think there was still some downforce from it. And a lot of people were kind of making the

deductible. Well, if it's Creighton lift, it's not Creighton drag. Well,

whether it's Creighton downforce or lift, it's Creighton drag because just like aircraft,

plain aircraft, wings, Creighton drag. So the lift is a bit of a, you know,

it's a blind alley, although we don't actually know. I don't think it's necessarily having

some effect along the streets. There might be something subtle going on there,

but I think it's more to do with, you know, the general airflow behind the car. I don't think

it's about trying to lift the back of the car higher because as soon as the reduced downforce,

the back of the car jumps up anyway. And that could potentially help, you know,

um, saw the diffuser. Well, there's a lot to be gained from there. So again, there's,

there's lots of things people are kind of kind of deduced from it without kind of put in any,

we're not that I'm an aerodermist in any true sense of the word, but, um, I think some people

are kind of conflating effects, but, you know, you don't have to exist there. And yeah,

as we were saying, um, I think we are going to get innovation this year. I think everyone's kind

of gone into these personal races in terms of like, like, let's just get through these races.

Um, and, you know, unfortunately now, potentially we have a gap in the seas and maybe we might

use some some of the innovations brought out, um, earlier, albeit probably it's not that much earlier

because of the, uh, I think we're going to see a lot more of the fact that everyone else is

running in effect to be a D.R.S. rear wing. No one's doing anything particularly clever with

the front wing in straight line mode and, you know, everything else aerodynamically,

mechanically and how you energy wise. I think this season's going to change constantly.

We're seeing Mercedes dominate. We can use that word. This stage, you see, and everyone else

is kind of, you know, depending on the session, you know, problems, things working well for them,

you know, coming and going behind them. I think they'll come a point where Mercedes

covered advantage is eroded by other people improving their energy management or something else

on the car aerodynamics, tire management, um, weight reduction potentially. So I think we're

going to have a season that's going to cycle, um, probably more so than last year, which was a kind

of a season split in three between Piaftrey, Norris, and then, you know, the staffman's cars working

for them. I think we're going to see maybe half a dozen or more, um, cycles of dominance or,

greater success by teams based on, you know, the circuit where they are in their development cycle,

you know, good and bad fortune. So I don't think that we're looking at the championship,

it's going to get one super early. Um, you know, there's always the opportunity to

Mercedes to, you know, continue to domic dominate. But I think some of this

early season of advantage for them could be eroded. Well, yeah, just watching space do

a lot more fun stuff to come both in the racing and the tech.

At the early season advantage, would you sum it down to the power unit, Craig,

is it mainly on the power unit that other teams need to primarily catch up on? Or is there,

is there another side here that people aren't seeing that other other teams need to catch up on?

I would say that the majority of their, um, performance is down to energy management.

Now it's not the same as power. I watched the, uh, the, uh, one CD broadcast today and says,

oh, just look at the power of the Mercedes going by them. Probably a power like power.

Yeah, when you, whatever you pick, you've got, they're probably not that different.

But if you've got more energy, and this is something that people need to learn,

there's different street power and energy, it can get more energy,

then you get more lap time, you're able to overtake better. And a lot of other people are really

struggling and you know, the powering will quite vocal about they weren't given enough data

before the start of the season for them to completely understand how to deploy that power unit.

And whether that's through or not, there's lots of politics and all of this.

So I think mainly Mercedes advantage is, is energy management, which, you know,

fundamental is P you, but it's about what the team do with it.

But they've got a good car. Don't get me wrong. Um, if you look at the telemetry,

most of their performance is on, you know, the straight to parts.

Ferrari's got a far better car in the corners.

I think Red Bull scene to, you know, we're not quite sure where they stand.

I think certainly McLaren are behind on energy management, but they've got a good car.

So once everyone starts to understand this, you know, this is why I'm kind of,

don't want any knee jerk reactions in the regulations, you know, to suit anybody that things will,

you know, get changed. And so we saw this, you know, in the early years of Formula E,

and I hate to bring that into this conversation because many people hate it.

But there was a point earlier in Formula E where one team, I know just kind of that,

that epiphany, that light-fold moment, and they worked out energy management.

I'm at the next neuroses. I think we can get situations like this.

We'll figure the regulations. And yeah, we're kind of watching space.

So we brought up Formula E. So we might as well talk briefly because I also did go to a

Formula E race at the start of the year. I went to Mexico and had a great time interview to

a bunch of people there. And one of the questions I asked Jeff Dodds, who's their CEO and president,

I said, well, and this is by the way, before we even saw the regulations in action with an F1.

But I asked him, like, do you feel like there is a possibility that F1 starts to encroach on FE,

right? Because if the cars are going to become, quote unquote, more sustainable and they are going

to run more in battery than even fuel. Again, I don't know if it would surprise me. If four years

or five years down the road, we saw a 60-40 split, right? I don't know. Maybe we will. Maybe we wouldn't.

Right? Like, what's to say that the FIA will just stop at 50-50?

Does that make FE redundant? Like, does it make it kind of like we're watching kind of Formula E

and then formally? It's interesting. Both of them are kind of on different trajectories at the

moment. Formula One, I don't think really knows where it's going. We had all the talk about going

back to V10 to V8's much-produced hybrid performance, you know, sustainable fuel. Is that

a future of Formula One? Should the formula even have, you know, let's just say, you know,

how unit manufacturer you've got this budget, this dyno time, go and make how unit the

consumes excellent energy, depending on the energy source. Yeah, if it's electric, if it's

actual, if it's diesel hydrogen, you know, nuclear reactor, yeah, who knows what? I've used to go

that way. Formula E is also going through a bit of a change. It's kind of, it's set out to be

electric, but kind of based on, you know, urban racing, street racing. They've found that they

can get more and more performance out of electric. And the Gen 4 car, the 4.5 and the Gen 5 car,

they're going to be incredible in terms of the horsepower, the acceleration, and they're

getting the chassis now to match it, and kind of bridge-stone groove 5 going back to, you know,

yesterday year and F1 in the 2000s. So, you know, and that means that they're going to be

outgrown in street circuits, you know, where are they going to cross over? So, I think the F1

needs to, you know, set out what all these different categories that we can include WEC

with hypercars and with GT cars and WRC rally cars and, you know, everything that, what's the

strategy for all of these is a big thing, because it will get confusing. I think Formula E

could potentially continue to be relevant if it stays to which original speed starts,

but if it starts going into major circuits, which it looks like it will start to go towards,

then, you know, where's the different extension with F1? Whereas, you know, kind of the thing that,

I think F1 will always be the most popular category. We get about motorsport, Formula 1, you know,

gets viewing figures that hundreds of sports would love to have, you know,

there's very few sports that got that viewership. That would sustain viewership, you know,

we know it's only up, and there's the whole drive to survive aspect, but Formula 1 has always

drawn big numbers, you know, since Bernie took over and got that sorted out, and I think that

continues because people, you know, quite habitual in their watching habits, you would find

very few people despite what they're saying. So, should be you will go, I'm going to go up

watch WRC exclusively now. The numbers suggest people don't do that. So, it's interesting,

and, you know, I think to see the media trying to portray this kind of, you know,

eye top between the two categories, they can come to quite happily. People talk about them on,

yeah, they, it's 100 years, whatever it must be now.

These can kind of exist, they can be quite similar in areas, they can be different in areas.

I just don't know what Formula 1 I'm going to do with the power unit going forwards. I mean,

I don't have great beach for that, they go into more hybrid, as long as, you know, the combustion

engine is effectively giving you that initial burst of energy. Anything you can recover after that

is it's free now, isn't it? So, why shouldn't you use it?

Ernie, there's a lot to unpack there, but, are you watching Formula E, Ernie?

I was, I'm not now. Nothing to do with Formula E in particular. I just, I find myself more

interested in, in, in WEC and, and F1, early days of Formula 1, sorry, Formula E, you know,

we had a publication out myself in a gentleman by the name of Trent Price, which Scarbs knows

well as well. We had put out a publication called E Racing Mag, and it was essentially endurance

and electric racing. There were a lot of things in the early days of Formula E that turned a lot

of people off, and, and it's come a long way, right? There's no more swapping batteries in mid-race

and having to stop, and various other things. I just, I'm just not a fan of the sound. Love,

I love racing. I love all types of racing, so it's not that I wouldn't watch it. I just,

I don't follow it. But having said that, I will, I'm going to disagree with Craig in terms of

like my own preferences for Formula 1. I would love to see the end of battery in Formula 1. I would

love for them to go full combustion engine. It's added weight that we don't need. There is still a,

yes, yes, there is. Craig, the later you can make those cars the better, I would rather have them.

So why would you go back to V10s, which would be longer and heavier and have more race fuel?

I didn't say I would go back to V10s you did, but I would. The entertainment value in terms of

the sound, but the weight difference, because it's made up for the reduction in race fuel, and

you know, that little tiny V6 engine weighs more than the Senna's V12, you know, that that's

non-sensical. So yeah, there's, there's a lot to unpack by just saying, getting rid of the hybrid

and saying, wait, that's, that, that, that, that's not true. Well, see, that's why we have Craig on

these to call out my, I don't know, I just, I guess, more of a traditionalist in that respect.

But listen, I think there's room for Formula E, there's obviously generations, younger generations,

or people that are watching it, which is great. I don't know that they'll ever get the same

viewership, as Craig mentioned, as Formula One. I think just, there's, there's just a lot of one

history. If you start going back and watching old races and, and just seeing the pedigree from

some of the teams that have been here for, like, you look at Williams and Ferrari and McLaren,

they've been around for so long, right? Like, we've lost a lot of great names,

a sad to see, sober gone, but I mean, there've been so many in the past that have left us.

I'm glad that Williams is still Williams, even though Sir Frank Williams is no longer with us

and they've moved on. But there's a lot of history there, and I think that's important from,

when you look at a sport, from a holistic perspective, where have we come from, where are we now?

There's been a lot of changing Formula One. It's incredible to see how far they've come from when

they used to race with no helmets and just goggles and leather helmets, you know, like, we've come

a long way, right? Even from the death of Senna, the change in safety, the halo, so many different

things. It is, Formula One changes our everyday life in ways that we don't know, like anti-lock breaks,

traction control. There's a lot of technologies that have come out of Formula One that we find in

our road cars today, and I don't know that necessarily that would have happened if it wasn't for

Formula One. Yeah, that's totally fair. Final few questions here, so I'm going to give one to Ernie,

one to Craig, one to both of you. Ernie for you, Andreas Stella from McLaren came out, he was very

angry that Mercedes gave him a power unit and didn't give him the how-to guide, basically.

I'm paraphrasing here, basically, but he did call it out saying, look, they have an advantage, but,

you know, we're a little bit unhappy that the engine came with with very limited help from Mercedes.

Does Mercedes as a company that supplies engines to other teams, do they have a duty to maybe go

a little bit more over and beyond on helping the other teams understand what they've built?

I guess you would have to understand what help they've given them so far.

Is it sufficient? Is it insufficient? Does it meet a minimum requirement? I think there's a

sense of responsibility when someone buys PU from you that you kind of show them a certain amount,

right? But it's still a sport and it's still competitive. You're buying this. When you take

something home, you generally have one page of instructions, right? It could be from IKEA, how to

abandon. There may not even be words on it, it may just be pictures. It's up to you. You've decided

you're going to purchase from them. If they've given you the bare minimum and that's what they're

giving every team and it's fair across the board, then that's what it is. So sorry Andrea,

like that's what you get. Is it how much of a responsibility is it on Mercedes side to give

them and how much is that? We don't know. We don't know what was given. So I can't really answer that

without pissing a lot of people off, right? It might not be fair for Mercedes. They've done their

job. They've given them the same power unit that they have. Now go figure it out, guys.

Yeah, Mercedes came out and said they gave the same level of instruction to everyone, but they

also, I mean, a lot of commentators also added this on. They gave the same level of instruction

that they gave last year when McLaren had a very, very dominant car. Oh, maybe, maybe, you know,

maybe they they aren't at fault, but that became a little bit of a topic early on. I'm sure that

there was a lot of pressure on total from everybody to say your customer has beaten

new hands down with the same power unit. Like, yeah, we could say we could say a lot of different

things, tire management, chassis, various other things. Overall package, McLaren had it last

year and they had two really good drivers that made use of it. So I'm not blaming Mercedes

for, you know, anything right now. If they're if it's true that they've given everyone the same,

um, that's what it is, man. And then Craig, on on your side, Total Wolf now wants to bid for Alpine,

it looks like and he's trying to put together a package. I think it's 26% of Alpine. He'll be

competing with other bids, including a bid from Christian Horner. I'm curious if you think it's a

good idea to have for lack of a better word, the sort of like cannibalism with an F1, like,

you know, Red Bull has a junior team and then, you know, you you might have a Mercedes owner now

own another team as well. Is that a good thing for the sport or should we just say like each team

you have one owner and they can have a vested interest in another team? Yeah, I mean, I think

sort of fundamentally every team should be independent. You know, I know they're the kind of the

Red Bull conundrum that they have two teams. They I think we're happy to say that they work

relatively independently of each other in terms of it being an operation and a racing entity.

I don't like the idea of, you know, one person having invested interest in multiple teams. I think

so-toe used to have shares and Williams eventually, I think, they're disposed of those. I think him

buying into Alpine, for me, feels like the wrong thing for F1. On the flip side of that, I think,

you know, the endstone operationers, you know, you have to call it because it's changed names.

Only stuffings are backwards and forwards. Yeah, I would love to see, you know, that operation

invested in in a way that and, you know, loved and cherished and directed by management in a way

that just nothing happened for so long. You know, you've got Flavio there, which is, you know,

he's kind of pulling strings. I don't think that's the same as what I'm kind of asking for.

I, you know, I think endstone has got every opportunity to produce a fantastic race car,

you know, the skills, the facilities, the experience that they still have. There's still a lot of

people there that, you know, have been there for the long haul. Sadly, some of them have, you know,

sort of moved away now. I think, yeah, I think absolutely. That's a team that needs to be brought.

I mean, I'd much rather be, you know, just people, seeing people that want to put money into it,

or ideally, you know, a manufacturer or a big name. I've been constrained to myself.

I'm in Paris at moments or a Veneton coding shop. We don't get them much in the UK. And it's like,

now there's the name that we want to come back. I don't know, I don't know what state

in business is a bit of the lovely to see, you know, a lot of the former ones seem to got quite

jaded and dull over these sort of recent years and they all feel a bit very much like they're

the same sort of corporate entities to each other. It'd be great if someone kind of just sort of

got the operation again, like like Veneton absolutely did back in the, well, what was that?

It's a bit heated, wasn't it, when they first came on board? So, yeah, so I mean, I think, yes,

let's get that endstone team with the right management, the right money,

we're going to get them racing again. Or be it, they did look pretty, pretty tasty today in

inspiration quality. Damn. Well, just to end things off, guys, we're going to give one

bold prediction. I will give mine at the very end based on how bold you guys go. If you guys

go very bold, I will go very, very bold. But Ernie, we'll start with you. Your bold prediction,

one bold prediction, it could be about a driver, it could be about a team, it could be about anything,

but give me a bold prediction for the 2026 season. Number eight for Lewis.

What's the Ferrari fan all with the Ferrari fan? You're not going to get bolder than that.

Go on, Craig. Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm about to say you've got the wrong team shirt, but I think,

think you did it clearly. No, I disagree. I happen to love this team shirt. I forget, I forget

drivers. I think for me, bold prediction, I think something's going to happen at Williams

this year. I'm not every excuse to kind of do well for this year, and I think there'll be

some kind of fallout if it's not drivers quitting or, you know, been principles being sacked or

something that someone being brought in. I just feel Williams are on the cast of some big

internal failure because they can't carry on the way they were doing, bearing in mind, the

compromises they've made in recent years to reach this season. So that's my bold prediction.

Let's see, I hope it doesn't. There's, you know, we all want, you know, all these old names,

it's been talking about, you know, the Renault scene. We want them, you know, to do well,

but I just feel that, you know, they're kind of between a rock and a hard place now.

Yep. My bold prediction, Arvid Lindbad, is going to end up on the podium once this year.

So I, I feel like that actually might not have that bold. Come on.

What? Okay. That's not that bold. That could, that could totally happen.

He was running in the last in the sprint race. I'd like to put that out. He did get, he did get

malt. Not as much as Hadjar by Kimmy, but that being said, yeah, maybe, maybe that. And then I

will say, if Lewis won an eighth, I would honestly be pretty happy because at this point,

I'd also love to just see him retire. If I have to be frank, like, I, I, I love, I love Lewis,

but I also feel like he is just in the sport right now for the eighth championship. He just wants

that one more. And then I think he's done. And you can clearly see that he has like other

interests. He wants to do other things. Like, I think it'd be great if he was able to just win

his eighth and then move on. And candidly, that might even move Ollie Bareman up to Ferrari.

And it might make another room in Hasfer for a younger driver that's sitting on the sidelines.

Or science goes back to Ferrari because of the fallout at Williams. I've just combined

everybody's world predictions. Yep. Yep. Maybe, maybe, I do feel like I agree with Craig,

though, that management will likely be the first to go in Williams before any of the drivers do.

Because I don't know. I think Carlos is a great asset for them. And they, they're paying him

pretty decently well, too. So I don't, I don't know if that'll happen. Plus,

does Carlos trust Ferrari again? Who knows? I don't know if you get a call from Ferrari,

you're probably going to Ferrari. But are you in the back of your mind thinking, what do they

drop me in a year or two? I don't know. Hey, if they don't win to our earlier point, what is

it? What is the likelihood of Leclerc thing? I don't know. Maybe this is weird, but I can't

imagine him in anything except a red. I can't see him in like red bull. I definitely can't see

him fit in the culture there. Maybe I could have seen him in Mercedes, but I feel like they're

so locked up now, right? They're locked up for the next 10 years. Pretty much with their roster.

Yeah. So I just don't know. McLaren. Yeah. So where does he go? Yeah, McLaren.

But then what happens? Yeah. But then who do you give up, Ernie? Or Craig?

The swap for PS3. Oh, I think I keep PS3 personally. Yeah. Yeah. I think it'd be interesting

to see that the chemistry at McLaren this year, especially if they can come back into

a lot of performance like we've seen over recent years. I don't think they're going to dominate

half the season, I don't think, but yeah, if it is PS3 that gets a feel for the car and the energy

management and Norris doesn't all vice versa, you know, we saw last year that they were pretty close

to kind of some catastrophe internally. Yeah. And you know, again, you know, I don't think that

was would be my bottom show for the exit. We can all say it coming. It's another potential

only McLaren get, you know, some some degree of performance.

I love it. I could talk to you guys all day. I appreciate you all coming on. Thank you for

listening. If you're watching this, drop a comment. Give us your bull prediction for this year.

Hope you enjoyed our thoughts. Our three spectacles. I just noticed the consistency.

Oh, and we'll see you guys in the next episode. Thank you guys for coming on. Appreciate it.

Thanks guys. Thanks guys.