2 Soft Compounds
2 Soft Compounds is a weekly podcast focusing on Formula 1, hosted by radio broadcaster Rick Houghton and motorsport journalist and GrandPrix247 founder, Paul Velasco.
With a focus on unfiltered analysis, behind-the-scenes insights and expert commentary, the podcast offers fans an entertaining and informative take on the fastest sport in the world.
2 Soft Compounds
Canadian GP: Russell’s Redemption, Norris' Despair And Hamilton’s Frustration!
Canadian GP: Russell’s Redemption, Norris’ Despair And Hamilton’s Frustration!
This week on 2 Soft Compounds we span continents and emotions - from Robert Kubica’s fairy-tale return to the top at Le Mans, to George Russell’s precision-crafted win at the Canadian Grand Prix.
Rick and Paul discuss how Mercedes are back in business and if George Russell just delivered a career-defining drive? There's chat too about McLaren's weekend and rookie sensation Andrea Kimi Antonelli.
Plus there's Rick's favorite topic with Ferrari once again firing off a series of baffling strategic calls, which ultimately compromised Charles Leclerc’s race and fueled the rumors of team boss Fred Vasseur’s future being in doubt.
So as the grid prepares for Austria, the title fight is wide open - Mercedes resurgent, McLaren surging and Verstappen suddenly chasing! And we've got it covered, right here on 2 Soft Compounds.
Production Credits:
Presented by: Rick Houghton & Paul Velasco
Studio Engineer & Editor: Roy D'Monte
Executive Producer: Ian Carless
Produced by: W4 Podcast Studio & GrandPrix247
I don't make mistakes. I make prophecies that immediately turn out to be wrong. Anything can happen in Formula One, and it usually does.
Speaker 2:Hey, welcome to another edition of Two Soft Compounds, with me, rick, and Paul Velasco, the founder and editor-in-chief of Grand Prix247.com. It's been one hell of a motorsport weekend, the Canadian Grand Prix and the Formula One coming up, but first we definitely need to touch on the 24-hour race at Le Mans. It's always a spectacle and there was some decent racing. There was a couple of errors made by some of the drivers and teams over the weekend, but victory in the end for a privateer in the form of a Ferrari. Paul, you probably followed this more than I did over the weekend.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I followed the whole thing and I must say it was an intriguing race. Yeah, although the Cadillacs got it on pole, they were easily eaten up by the Porsche early on and then Ferrari just got going, got ahead, of steam and it's a hat trick for them. It's a hat, although it wasn't the works team, it was the privateer 599, so what was it? A 499? One of them anyway. The reality is is, uh, they're just unbeatable at le mans, three in a row.
Speaker 1:Yeah, robert made history, along with ufa ye and phil hansen. They did an amazing job. Uh, robert of course did probably most of the cockpit time, if I'm not mistaken, and also it was heard a few times on the radio when they were told to sort of favor the works Ferraris. He was quite irate about it and in the end they did the business. And really, robert of course had two stints in Formula One, the first time up until 2010, where he drove for Renault and he was bound, apparently then the year or the next, to join Fernando Alonso at Ferrari. But he got involved in a sort of minor rally after topping the times in Barcelona, I believe, or Jerez I think it was Barcelona in testing, but then he went on the rally and we know what happened. He basically a barrier barrier on the side of the road went through the car and basically cut his arm and, yeah, he really, really damaged his hand and he spent the rest of his life coming back.
Speaker 1:And this is the cherry on the cake the Le Mans 24-hour race winner, robert Kubica, which was historic in that he's the first Polish driver, but more so Ye, is the first Chinese driver to win overall Le Mans. So, yeah, it was a really really good Le Mans, but it was just painted yellow. Actually, although it was a Ferrari, it was the yellow Ferrari that won. You know, porsche tried really hard. They chased, they chased, they chased, but to no avail, and one of the other Ferraris finished in third. So, yeah, it was really I wouldn't say it was an epic race was very tense race.
Speaker 2:Many, many laps, I think might be the lap record established in this modern era and, it has to be said as well, paul, I think the most number of former formula one drivers taking part in le mans at the weekend. There was nine of them, including jensen button and some drivers you probably may have even forgotten the names of, but they were former F1 drivers and they were piloting those Le Mans cars actually I'm going to correct you there were 17 in hypercars.
Speaker 1:There were 19 Formula One drivers on the grid and of the 63 cars I think that started, I think 20 something were hypercars, and of those hypercars there were 19 Formula 17 Formula One drivers in those hypercars wow, so it just shows you that uh life continues a varying experience. I'm talking about who had maybe one race or two races or 50 races.
Speaker 2:You know you're talking a lot of guys and we mentioned robert kibitzer, of course, the victory at le mans, uh, the icing on the cake for him after a long motorsport career, and that's a great link to talk about circuit gilles villeneuve, the canadian formula one grand prix, because of course, his only win in formula one came at that very circuit and one of the worst crashes we've ever seen in formula one also came a circuit gilles villeneuve. So let's, uh, let's, pirouette into the canadian formula one grand prix. It was an amazing weekend for many reasons in fact. Obviously, mercedes came out on top, with George Russell winning the race, but we can go back to FP1.
Speaker 2:I said to my missus who do you think is going to be the first to bin it? And she mentioned a couple of drivers, including Lance Stroll, and it turned out to be Charles Leclerc who binned it, and it was almost unavoidable really. He kept who, uh, who binned it? And it was almost unavoidable, really. He, he kept his foot in, thinking he was going to be an easy save and in the end, he, he clipped the inside barrier and ruined his friday, the whole friday.
Speaker 1:he didn't run the whole of friday and I think that put him a bit on the back foot. But to be honest, he's such a good driver, he's such a talent that I saw him straight away in qualifying like really setting some amazing laps. So, yeah, yeah, I mean you know these guys at that level. Yes, you don't want to miss out a day, but they also plug in and play. You know that's the reality of it. But he was on the back foot the whole weekend because of that and his qualifying should have been a lot better. He even thought he had a car for pole position, which I don't know if he did, but he definitely had a car better than P7 or wherever he qualified. But the reality is this he did go up, he did make some progress and on race pace, the Ferrari's okay. But you know, it was a strange weekend. I mean, didn't you make like the whole pecking order sort of was shaken up a bit? What do you make of it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I thought we all expected the McLarens are going to be really strong. I know norris completely messed up his final quali run by making an error and really the story of his weekend was errors. Uh, which will mistake, mistake, mistake. Yeah, and we'll come on to that a little bit later on. I think mercedes were worried that on race day the temperature of the track had increased, so they had pretty good running on friday and Saturday. Obviously George Russell qualified on pole and I thought it was one of the best pole laps I've ever seen at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. He didn't make a single mistake. Every entry and exit was absolutely smooth, like the car was on rails, and it was so good to see that from George. He said himself it was the first time he'd qualified a Formula One car and got goosebumps because the lap was that good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, indeed it was a spectacular lap, but actually I made a bad prediction because I thought the race wouldn't be decided in turn one but it actually was, because in the end I think the first four finished the way they started. George was supreme. I actually predicted a race. That Jad Malik, the editor, said when he read my virtual gridwalk. He said man, you're reporting this like a WWE, but after Barcelona it was a bit of a WWE. I thought so it wasn't.
Speaker 1:Canada were really super well-behaved. That first lap was pretty decent. I mean, I think only who did we see? Albon Albon went all over the grass. I think only who did we see? Albon Albon went all over the grass, and yeah, but all in all I felt that, you know, the race actually wasn't much of a race. It was kind of like everyone was on the pace, even when there was the pit stop changes, and you thought, okay, this is going to be a bit different. But once everyone sort of stopped and everything, it was pretty much the same until the end.
Speaker 1:And in the end you had the McLarens coming on to Antonelli and that's where I think Antonelli bunching up Piastri and Norris, was key to that race because they both wanted to get past, but at the same time Norris was back on to Piastri and mate, I don't know what he was thinking. I mean he knows. I mean, let's be honest, know what he was thinking, I mean he knows. I mean, let's be honest, we've got the quotes from him. He said you know, rule number one, you don't crash against your teammate. You know he's been me a Cooper from the minute it happened. So that's not the issue. But what was he thinking at the time? I don't know. I really he nearly he could have cost McLaren dearly, but fortunately you know. It reminded me it's almost exactly the same place. Remember when Lewis and Jenson Button had a getting together.
Speaker 2:Yeah, in that 2011 race which went on for 19 hours 19 hours Well, you remember it was rain, delayed. And then, yeah, well, not quite 19 hours, but it was a lot of hours. You know I was exaggerating.
Speaker 1:Well, they'd say 90, but 19 sounds plausible.
Speaker 2:It felt like 19 hours at the time, but it was an amazing race and it's plausible. It felt like 19 hours at the time, but it was an amazing race and, yeah, that happened fairly close to the start, didn't it? Exactly the same thing.
Speaker 1:I mean, lewis went for a gap. That didn't happen. I think Jenson was a bit naughty and did jink a little bit, but really it was exactly the same accidents and there really was no gap. Where was he going? I mean, when the guys were watching it in the cool-down room, the top three, the consensus was well, there was just no gap there. And I don't understand how he goes racing these days. I mean, I thought he was cleaning up his head, but his head is not good. I mean, he fumbled twice in qualifying.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, look, we're seeing the emergence of Oscar Piastri as the potential champion. He's got a really, really good gap now. He's got 22 points on Landa and he's got 43 on Verstappen. So you know, the kid looks like he's heading there. If he can just keep on keeping on, basically he's going to be doing super well and, of course, max being Max just was superb. You know, if you've got to do the benchmark, we'll talk about him later. You look at Tsunoda. It was pretty much McLaren's dominance went and it just levelled the playing field. But not good for Ferrari, not good for Lewis either.
Speaker 2:I think oh, no, not at all.
Speaker 1:What's going on there with your man Lewis? Normally you get really irate. What happened this time?
Speaker 2:come, you're a Lewis watcher, watcher well, you know, after the spanish grand prix, uh, rachel brooks from sky sports f1 interviewed him in the paddock and he gave sort of two word answers and he was very down and in fact so much so that he made a beeline for rachel when they got to canada and apologized. He said I was really sorry. You know, I was so down after Spain and obviously similar things happened again in Canada. Now we now know that the reason he was in no man's land during the race was because he hit a poor groundhog and that damaged the floor of the Ferrari. But once again he just didn't look as though he was ever going to make much of an impact in the race. His qualifying pace seemed good at times, but that car just seems really inconsistent. And I'm talking about lap to lap. You know one decent lap and then one which is, you know, three hundredths of a second down on the previous one. The consistency is not there with Ferrari this season.
Speaker 2:And then we talk about the Ferrari strategy and the mistakes that were made, once again with Charles Leclerc I was looking at an analysis of it today. So basically, you'll have heard, during the race Ferrari came on the radio with Charles and said we're going for. We think plan B and Charles said I think plan C. And that was the conversation. It later emerges that plan C was keeping him out long on the hard tire which he started on and doing a one-stop race.
Speaker 2:Without any more consultation with Charles, who's driving the car and can feel the tyres underneath him, they brought him in for a pit stop and turned it into a two-stopper, which immediately alerted McLaren to the fact that they needed to bring Norris in, because that was the person he was chasing. At the time Charles was questioning it. The radio uh, once again Ferrari, I've got the strategy wrong. At the end of the race, charles Leclerc was was quite pragmatic. He said well, you know, in the end it didn't really make any difference, but I've looked at some analysis today and it actually did make some difference. It put him five seconds in the disadvantage to the cars he was chasing ahead of him. So, once again Ferrari, another questionable decision and not listening to the driver. I mean, they've got the telemetry and the data on the pit wall, paul, but you've got to speak to the driver about how he's feeling, how those tyres are coping on every apex, haven't you Look?
Speaker 1:Ferrari entered the weekend with a huge blow. Okay, two of the biggest newspapers in Italy took on Vacher for the first time. Not only Vacher, the whole team. It badly ran Bum, bum, bum. It was a proper, proper roasting. It was a coordinated roasting by the two most respected journalists in motor racing and their editorial team, carrera de la Sero and Carrera de la Sport. They basically roasted the team. They roasted the team. It was unacceptable.
Speaker 1:And they used the back-to-back comparisons with the Le Mans project to the point that you know, they've won Le Mans twice in a row, they're world champions, blah, blah, blah. And they say this team can't get it together. So there's already talk that the guy who's running, I think, coletta, who's running the Amato Coletta, who's running the hypercar team, they're talking about him already coming and replacing Vassar, which is absolutely you know that's so disruptive. So, yeah, I mean, you know, ferrari's Ferrari mate, they first got to get their car to go and then, when they're getting their car to go, trying to get their car to go, the team principles under fire. So yeah, it's a shit show that, uh, that's what you sign up for. You know, fred can't say oh, I didn't know this was coming. Uh, ferrari's like this if you win for them, you can walk on water. If you don't, you, you know, walk the line.
Speaker 1:And I think fred felt the heat, although I don't think he was directly, directly slammed, according to the Italian media, but just his whole operational methods were revealed in a book by the media man who left the team, and the book suggests that there's potential for divisions within the team. And yeah, so I'm not surprised that it's turning into this situation, which immediately prompted stories that Charlotte Clark might be looking around. So yeah, that's the scenario at Ferrari. So when you're carrying all that baggage and you're up against teams like Red Bull and Max and Mercedes even, and McLaren, of course, if you're not bringing your A-plus game, yeah, you can bring your A-plus game, but if you've got a big, fat bag on your back, you can't go to war like that.
Speaker 2:So yeah, yeah, I thought it was something really interesting. A video I saw of a young lady we're hoping to actually get on the podcast in the next few weeks. She's a former Ferrari employee and she said something which which kind of blindsided me. She said the whole philosophy of ferrari is for them to win the driver's championship.
Speaker 1:They're not interested in the constructors no one gives a shit about the construction I was like, wow, okay, I didn't realize that.
Speaker 2:I thought like a mark, a mark like ferrari would want the constructors. But no, it's all about all about the glamour and the fact that they put big names in their seat.
Speaker 2:You know they take former world champions like Alonso and Hamilton and Vettel and they put them there because they want to raise them on that Ferrari pedestal. I found that was fairly unique and there's been some articles I've read online today actually talking about the whole Ferrari philosophy, saying if factory, for instance, was in the UK, like most Formula 1 factories are, they wouldn't be having these issues. If the pit crew or the people on the pit wall were staffed with other nationalities, they wouldn't be having these issues. And that's not me sounding racist, that's me saying the Italian way doesn't seem to work.
Speaker 1:Might, might, might, might, might, mate, mate, mate, mate. If Liverpool played in blue, they'd be called Everton. Come on, bro, really seriously, you know Ferrari, ferrari. I mean, imagine if they did it all perfectly They'd be shit. No one would want it. They'd be like Mercedes were, when no one liked Mercedes, when they just won everything.
Speaker 1:The beauty of Ferrari is that they go racing the way they go racing. So, yeah, I mean, you know it's. I know, when you've got your man, lewis hamilton, in there, it's hard to watch, but you were warned, guys. I mean, yes, the honeymoon was beautiful, but the honeymoon there's never been a ferrari world champion honeymoon. That hasn't been amazing. Alonzo is amazing. Sebastian was learned german, learned italian, you know. So, end of the day, yeah, everyone has a great romance with ferrari, but it always ends up in divorce. I'm not seeing this. I'm not saying that about lewis right now. I'm just saying that for the first time, I'm hearing rumblings of charlotte clack, maybe on the radar of other teams, and for that to be happening, charles must be giving some kind of mating signals out there.
Speaker 2:Let's have a conversation about Antonelli. He had a fairly disastrous triple header but this weekend he bounced back big time and I thought his overtaking move into turn two was genius. And that was on lap one, which put him into third place. He got past piastri, who's a wise old fox, and I you know piastri I don't think was expecting it, but antonelli sort of got, went for it and made it work really cleanly. And then I was really impressed with, with the mature head on young shoulders, when he was fighting off the mclarens in the latter stage of the race. Piastri was gaining on him, norris was gaining on Piastri. They were going to be a threat and Antonelli didn't put a foot wrong. Not a single lock-up. The car looked as though it was on rails. He's 18 years of age. He's one of the youngest podium sitters ever in Formula 1. I just thought it was a really impressive weekend.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know the kid is just on another level. Happy to say that proved me wrong that he's really really up for it. And honestly, as much as the impressive that first turn was, that first sector basically was super impressive To me. The way he held off Piastri right at the end. There was crucial to the race and it basically brought Norris into the, into the equation and they took each other out. So basically, well, they compromised each other and that's how Antonelli he didn't look like he was going to hang on to that third but he did and it was by design or not yeah the McLarens really were hampered by him and by then.
Speaker 1:So the fantastic podium. And, if you think about it, there's only two other guys who've been younger on the podium, and that's Max Verstappen. And fuck Our friend Lawrence, Lawrence's son.
Speaker 2:What's his name? What's his name? Oh that way, lance Stroll, lance.
Speaker 1:Stroll. Oh my God Mate, watching that guy drive honestly, watching Lance Stroll drive hurts my eyeballs. Have you ever had eyeball pain?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, I have Okay. Did you happen to catch the driver's press conference on Thursday, which featured Lance Stroll?
Speaker 1:Oh man, Of course I did, I reported all about it.
Speaker 2:Oh my God have you ever seen a more petulant-looking teenage brat?
Speaker 1:He's not teenage mate.
Speaker 2:He's 27. I know, but that's how he looked. He was slouched on the couch like he looked so, though he couldn't be bothered. He wanted to be out with his mates. He didn't want to be in a racing uniform.
Speaker 1:He hasn't got mates, he didn't want to be out with his mates. A guy like that have mates. I'm sorry, no, seriously, no, the. Every time the camera comes on him I think, okay, what's this kid gonna do now? Is he gonna, is he gonna, bin it? Is he gonna do something stupid? And he did crash yeah, he did crash.
Speaker 1:You know, I mean, and the whole wrist thing, you know the whole wrist thing, that and and he comes up with this pussy excuse. It's my medical privacy to not tell us what's wrong with his wrist. Seriously, you know, he's his own worst enemy and I don't know who's PRing the kid, but they're doing a horrible job. They really need someone at his side to actually say hey, dude, you're being a dick.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Say this, say that See that stupid smile. You got on that stupid smirk. You got like you can't be arsed and you're sitting here in the press conference disrespectfully. Show some respect, mate. Show some character, show some something. Don't be just a bloody well entitled. Anyway, why did we bring up Stroll?
Speaker 2:Because he was one of the youngest on the podium. But again.
Speaker 1:Just to reiterate it he got destroyed by Alonso. Again, it's 22-0, mate in qualifying.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about the other side of the garage, then. And Fernando Alonso finished the race in Canada in seventh place. He looked really quite strong all weekend In a couple of the free practice sessions he was topping the timesheets for a number of laps there. He said afterwards that he thinks that they've discovered something on the car which wasn't working from the start of the season. They've discovered the problem, they've fixed it and it's given him a bit of an extra edge. Obviously, they've done the same to Lance Stroll's car, but he brought it home in 17th and Alonso brought it home in 7th. That was the point.
Speaker 1:That was the point.
Speaker 2:He was the last of the cars running. Yeah, okay, carry on. So when you see the performance Alonso's putting in and he now seems impressed conferences, and when he's talking in the paddock after the race, he seems to have a bit of a glint in his eye, he seems to have a spring in his step. He feels as though they've they've turned a corner this season and maybe he's going to be able to challenge for regular points, which is great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, good on him. And you know, fernando is Fernando. You give him half a sniff of a good car and he's going to do miracles with it. And, like I said, you know his teammates now are Alonso P7. So there you go. And also another veteran about time. He's doing some stuff. In fact, the next three guys, all of them about time. They did something. It was Nico Hulkenberg in P8, esteban Ocon in P9, and Carlos Sainz P10., those three guys are really you know, they normally underperform in my opinion, but Nico's had a couple of good runs. Esteban good comeback with the horse and Carlos Sainz disappointing really. Sturgeon good comeback with the Haas, and Carlos Sainz disappointing really. He was bulked in qualifying in.
Speaker 1:Q1, which set him back. But honestly, he should have enough experience to have a. Please put a banker in or something I don't know. These guys shouldn't. Guys at that level should not be, especially if their teammates are not eliminated in Q1. Sainz should not be eliminated in Q1. But look, he came back and he got a P10, so good on him, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was the qualifying issue with Sainz and Hadja, and Hadja had been told by his team that Sainz was on a cool-down lap when in fact he was on a push lap. But Hadja didn't move in the way he normally would have done and that was a team error in terms of racing bulls. But, yeah, I think nico hulkenberg by the way, you mentioned him I think he's driving a brilliant season this year. I mean, like you say, he's been lackluster in the past many, many times. He occasionally pops up with a decent result once a season, but he seems to be stringing a load of them together at the moment, which is good to see yeah, I know.
Speaker 1:I mean, you know I'm not a big Nico Hülkenberg fan. I think he's a great guy, delightful driver, all that kind of stuff, but I don't think he's an elite driver. I mean, he'd been too long in the sport for me to consider him as an elite, but at least you know. Look, he's got a job next year with Audi, which will be a super interesting project. So yeah let's see.
Speaker 1:I mean, you know it's pull his finger out his ass and start matching nico again, but other than that it was good to see franco colopinto, although out of the point, he did beat gasly gasly, was involved in the wars the whole weekend. He didn't have a good weekend, but there was a flash of colopinto there that, uh, was interesting, but honestly I still don't know what the buzz is about, kid no, I would totally agree with you.
Speaker 2:I I think I think flavio started to think that way as well now at the moment, by the way, he's made a couple of comments has he, has he?
Speaker 2:yeah? Well, he basically said you know we're going to give the kid a chance. And now he's saying now he's starting to talk about how long he's going to get that chance for. So maybe he's quantifying it a little bit. Uh, we haven't mentioned alex albon.
Speaker 2:It was a nightmare weekend for Williams Alex Albon. There was one point where he came on the radio during the race and it sounded as though he was in tears. I mean he was like why? Why, you guys don't listen to me. He sounded as though he was crying. James Foles was asked about it during the race, during Sky Sports F1 coverage, and he said unfortunately it hasn't panned out for Alex. It's just the way the other cars um around him were behaving with their strategies. And if alex had actually understood what they were trying to do which he said they it would be explained to him after the race then then he wouldn't be as down he said. But you know he's having a torrid time and then, of course, he ends up with a dnf. Looks like another mercedes power unit failure. Aston mara have had had it in Monaco, williams had it in Canada. So it's unusual to see those sort of reliability issues with the Mercedes power unit. But still, it was a horrible weekend for Alex Albon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, indeed, and also Yuki Tsunoda. He finished 12th but way, way out of his depth compared to Max, and I don't know what they're going to do. Yusuke Hajo didn't have a great weekend but he's been good up until now. But I think you know that Canadian track people think is just point and squirt, but it's not really Like. I describe it as two drag strips with squiggles in the middle.
Speaker 2:It's not.
Speaker 1:I was trying to say this last week no, you weren't, you were saying it was like Spa. No, you weren't, you were saying, it was like Spa and.
Speaker 2:I was like oh, fucking Spa. I didn't say it was like Spa. I said it hasn't got many fast corners and those squiggles you talk about they're not fast corners.
Speaker 1:No, exactly, but they're still squiggles that have to be taken perfectly.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly, yeah, yeah. Did you see Danica Patrick, by the way, on the Sky coverage? Did you see Danica Patrick, former IndyCar driver? She's a pundit occasionally on the Sky Sports F1 coverage and she often comes up with things that make no sense whatsoever. And she was stood next to Martin Brundle and she said this was before qualifying. She said let's face it. She said the Montreal circuit is very easy to drive. It's a very standard racetrack. And Martin Brundle didn't say anything, but he looked directly down the barrel of the lens of the camera as if to say are you kidding? And then Nico Hulken not Nico Hulken, Nico Rosberg, who was in the commentary box, said I'm going to have to disagree with Danica there. This is one of the hardest circuits on the calendar to drive because you have to get every aspect right how much you're on the curb when you hit the apex.
Speaker 1:it's threading, it's threading. It's threading the thread through a needle every corner. You know what I mean, but it's not in when you were talking classic tracks. Yes, it's the old school track, absolutely, but it's not a flowing track, it's a point and square track. But, as as you said, everything has to be perfect and that's why that George Russell lap, as again you said, was absolutely. You know it's like scraping the wood. It's how Monaco should be, as I said in the previous podcast. You know it would be so cool if Monaco could be this quick. But anyway, we were talking about Yuki. Is there anything else that you can think of?
Speaker 2:I'll tell you what I was going to say. You know, if you were Hadja and Christian Horner came to you and said listen, you've had a really good year so far apart from that embarrassment in Australia but you've been really good. You've produced some results, you've scored some points. We want you to step up to the senior team. I think Hadja's already has already said you know what. I'm not ready, but if you were his agent, you'd be like no thank you very much.
Speaker 1:I mean, it's the massive curse, isn't it that second seat? Well, I mean, you know, is it a curse or is it just simply guys can't drive the car that that max puts together there? I think it's the. It's the latter, because you know, curse means you've got to go religious, so let's not go there. I think, uh, yeah, I don't know. I mean, I would say, go for it. You seize the moment, honestly. You seize the moment. It's there's. You might never ever get that chance again. This is Formula 1. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2:yeah, very true so I would.
Speaker 1:If I was him, I'd go for it. Is he ready? You only know. Look, he's already in Formula 1. He seems ready with that v-car. So yeah, why not? I would. I would thrust him straight in there straight after the break, the summer break, I'll stick him in that car, why not? I mean yuki's not gonna get there. I'm sorry yuki's not gonna get there. It's like you can forget about it, but listen before we do go. We got. We talked about flavio, did we?
Speaker 2:no, but anyway. No, we didn't. But I seen on grand prix 247.com you've got luca domio leaving reno and briatore saying that it changes nothing in his eyes yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:you know, luca di meo came in and pretty much like ser Sergio Marchionne did with Ferrari, like wunderkinds of business and whatever, and they came to Formula One and they thought they knew what they were doing and Marchionne, before Luca, was nearly. He destroyed Ferrari and he's thinking that he said, ah, two, three years, we get winning with this. But it didn't happen. Then he sadly he died. Unrelated though, Luca Di Meo took over Renault and took over Renault. I mean, it's been a revolving door of staff.
Speaker 1:He really did not know what he was doing. In regards to the Formula One team, there was a lot of very, very strange hires going on and no stability whatsoever. So no surprise. Well, Renault, as we know it, Formula One team, the glorious French Formula One team and the engine builder is no more. It's finished. From next year on, Briatore's got a Mercedes bolted onto the back of the thing. It's Alpine by name only I'm still gravitating to. You'll see that Briatore will eventually own this team one way or the other. So let's see. It's interesting to see what's going on. And yeah, good luck to Luca. I think he's gone to some other. He's out of the car industry, he's gone to some fashion thing or whatever. But there you go, Another guy who comes in and thinks he knows what he's doing and destroys a legacy.
Speaker 2:Well, listen, we've got another week off, paul. Two weeks between now and Austria, which is always an interesting race, always a sea of orange of Max Verstappen fans who come across the border to watch that event, looking forward to it immensely.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, no, no no. You got it wrong, mate. That orange is McLaren fans. Sorry bro, no, it's not, it's McLaren fans.
Speaker 2:No, it's.
Speaker 1:Banks fans. It used to be last year, but this year it's McLaren fans.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, if that's the way you want to go, okay, I can live with that. Listen. Thanks very much. Tell your friends, tell your colleagues, tell your family about the Two Soft Compounds podcast with me and Paul, and for all the latest news and gossip in the world of Formula One, log on to GrandPrix247.com. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time. Cheers, guys. Two Soft Compounds was presented by myself, rick Hutton, alongside Paul Valesco. The studio engineer and editor was Roy DeMonte, the executive producer was Ian Carlos, and this podcast is a co-production between Grand Prix 24-7 and W4 podcast studio Dubai. Don't forget, if you want to join in the conversation, leave a comment on our Instagram page at Two Soft Compounds. We love getting comments, questions, and we'll give a shout out to some of the best ones on the podcast in the next few weeks. You can also email us at twosoftcompounds at gmailcom, and if you haven't done so already, please do click that follow or subscribe button. See you next time.