Will Norris-Verstappen friendship survive the test of F1? 2024 Austrian GP Review

[00:00:02] Before we begin, I wanted to give a huge shout out to the folks at Amazon Music for partnering with us on this episode of the Inside Line F1 Podcast. But more on this later right then let's get right into today's episode.

[00:00:27] Well then folks, we need to ask ourselves one big question. What is it like to see a time bomb ticking when all the hostilities that you see around finally come to life?

[00:00:45] When you know that everything that you see, all the niceness, all the smiles, all the pleasantries between two people are about to go down out of the window. It's time ladies and gentlemen, the gloves are off and yet another French friendship,

[00:00:59] friendship tell me about it, have been so exasperated by that battle that I'm fumbling up my words. But why shouldn't you? Because when you see a race like that being decided in a manner like that, you just have to fall short of words.

[00:01:14] Kunal, another friendship ruined by Formula One. Are we on that course now? It seems like it. Although I hope not because you know, boat drivers very good, very likable. Yes, Max is very likable as well. One second. You know, Landon already likable. Yeah, where and for which people?

[00:01:34] Well, I used to drive a racing car, right? You want to do everything that Max does as a racing car driver, as a sportsman. Apps. Okay, you got me there.

[00:01:48] Well, yeah, I would still say everything his ability to do whatever he can do in that car is incredible. But now suddenly we've got like, you know, fan bases who are listening in calling, Oh, dude, this guy is Max Pro or whatever.

[00:02:03] No, wait a minute. Just wait a minute. Since you asked me about friendship, Landon Norris has made it very clear. If he says something stupid, my respect for him is going to go.

[00:02:16] If he comes and tells me that what he did was wrong or why he did or whatever, then it still might be okay. So the story for Silverstone is not going to be whether they'll go wheel to wheel again because they will.

[00:02:30] But will they go wheel to wheel again as friends? Did they play paddle midweek or not? That's going to be the story to follow, especially for Drive to Survive and since we all love Drive to Survive.

[00:02:43] But it's true. Relationships change when you go wheel to wheel with each other. Peronian wheel nerve were not as bad until they went wheel to wheel. Same with Rosberg and Hamilton. Same with Senna and Frost. The moment you've collided with someone on track like this,

[00:02:59] you cannot emphasize on the way the relationship changes after that. And you could see it in Landon Norris' eyes. He looked genuinely disappointed in Max Verstappen in every single post-race interview that he's done. To the point where he's not even commenting on what Verstappen has done.

[00:03:16] He just says that I'm not the man to say anything. I think Max should. That speaks volumes. That really speaks volumes, Kunal. I know as media we tend to blow things up out of proportion sometimes. But this is it. This is the harsh reality of what it is.

[00:03:31] And Alex Jakes mentioned it so well on commentary. It was inevitable. At some point it had to happen, right? Or all the pleasantries, all the niceness, all the goodwill and all the paddle games. They had to go sour at some point. As fans, we are lucky.

[00:03:46] But between the two of them, man, this is a story to brew and a new rivalry for us to enjoy. And let's also explain why this was inevitable. To me, that's the more fun part, right? Because Landon Norris and Max Verstappen have finished one-two since.

[00:04:03] So their first one-two finish was in China, then in Miami, then in Imola, then in Canada, and then in Spain, right? And I think it was just once that Max Verstappen was in first and Landon Norris was, right?

[00:04:19] So it's about when was this equation finally going to blow up. And that blow-up was all dependent on Will Norris and McLaren actually deliver a fantastic race.

[00:04:30] You know, we all spoke of can they execute a race the way they need to to take the challenge to Max Verstappen? And they did that in Austria. And that wheel-to-wheel battle was hence inevitable, right?

[00:04:45] And in all of this, you know, there are two ways that we should discuss this. One is, of course, the sporting way was Max Verstappen wrong or did he actually do right? Was Landon Norris going overboard on a few laps because while the drivers were battling,

[00:05:02] their engineers were literally doing what you do, Somal, which is give real-time commentary so that the race director picks things up, you know? So there's a sporting aspect and then there's, of course, the emotional and the more human aspect of things.

[00:05:16] And that's what Andrea Stella, the team principal of McLaren has so eloquently said post-race. And he said a couple of things. He's like, Max went unchecked when he was going wheel-to-wheel against Lewis Hamilton in 2021

[00:05:31] and this is now a fallout of that very, very brave of him to actually say that. I mean, you know, Andrea Stella actually is a fantastic spokesperson. Okay. Then he also turned around and said that Red Bull and Max do not need to do this,

[00:05:49] that everyone has so much respect for Red Bull and Max, that why would they compromise their reputation in such a manner? Okay. Very, very interesting. So we've already taken the step into the whole emotional aspect. I think we should just go ahead and speak about that.

[00:06:03] Yeah. But I agree with Stella. They don't need to do this. And the only way I can give a judgment on what Max did is by asking a question. If you start to move under braking, how does a Formula One driver pass ever?

[00:06:19] How does it do it around the track? That's not legal. Inside cutting the grass, that's not legal. Pushing someone off, that's not legal. So how do you pass? And I'm not saying open up the DRS and make it happen. Stop it if you're thinking about that.

[00:06:34] I mean, that's not a good idea. I mean, I think it's not a good idea to change this genuinely. That idea is horrendous. But realistically, if you have to go side by side with a driver, how do you pass if you start to move under braking?

[00:06:47] It's one simple question. And I think Max needs to learn the lesson by being behind once. Again, he's so good that he normally is never behind. But the day he is, I think that, I mean, he knows it very well. But that needs to change, right?

[00:07:02] So he's genuinely dangerous style of driving. And that doesn't take away anything from how brilliant a driver he is. Like, four-tents in qualifying, mind-blowing. A flawless race up until the point that Norris started to attack him. Brilliant so far in every race so far this year.

[00:07:17] And well-managing, well-managed on the tyre front, on the qualifying front, on the start front. Excellent everywhere, almost untouchable. But his one main, I wouldn't say weakness, but a slightly rough edge which makes him who he is, is this. And I just, I just feel a 10 second penalty

[00:07:36] isn't enough to paper over the cranks now. It's genuinely impossible to pass like that. And racing isn't meant to be impossible to pass. It's meant to be logically enough that you can pass. For all our touch fans, we're not taking sides.

[00:07:50] We know there's millions of you tuning in from the Netherlands. We're not taking sides. We're just sort of pointing out that, yes, Max Wischtapp and doing what he does is box office. Do we love it? We absolutely do. Do we love wheel-to-wheel racing where wheels are banging?

[00:08:08] We absolutely do. So everyone, show me one fan who dislikes it and that probably is not a fan, okay, a Formula One. But we're just saying how does one go wheel-to-wheel against Max if Max doesn't let them go wheel-to-wheel if that's literally the question, right?

[00:08:28] Because we want Norris to go wheel-to-wheel. We want a Hamilton. We want everyone. Max is saying I want people to go wheel-to-wheel with me. But this whole you yield a weak crash approach has to change at some point. And I know Max doesn't care about his legacy.

[00:08:44] All he cares about is winning. And that's what makes Max who he is. And some of you said, you know, Max actually was never behind. Well, you're right. In the sprint yesterday on Saturday, he was momentarily behind Norris. And that move into turn four was yet another

[00:09:01] you yield or we crash, but it was so maxy. It was so ballsy because he went down the inside of turn four, you know, locked up his front right, rotated the car. Perfectly as Max wished happened. Excellent. And yeah, I just wish it was a little more fair,

[00:09:18] little more, you know, sporting for the other driver. And trust me, my Twitter's gone completely berserk. I've had people calling me names, telling me I don't understand racing, all of that. I don't care, you know, people what they say on Twitter.

[00:09:34] I know that this is polarizing the fan bases again. Right. But this is not where motor racing should be. We want them to go wheel-to-wheel. And I'll also add another caveat here. Max moved under braking, which is allowed once.

[00:09:51] So he has to rule for everyone tuning in, figuring what the hell just happened. Let me check out another podcast to see if they explain it. By the way, that show we've not done the intro yet.

[00:10:01] We get there. It's such a good race that we'll probably need to do it in a bit. But we will maybe this is the best intro. Maybe this is the best intro because we are sort of giving neutral, but harsh neutral viewpoints.

[00:10:15] If that's where I'm going to put it. Formula on cars, just how many sharp edges do they have? They remind me of that Mad Max movie. One touch on the wheel and boom, you have two wheels that just get punctured. Careful with your words.

[00:10:29] Mad Max is probably not the right word for today. Okay. Just kidding. For those of you listening on the audio, you should tune into the video. Actually, that was a complete... I didn't know that, but anyway. We're not taking sides. But no, fair point, right?

[00:10:50] Because you just can't go racing. And to me, as sad as it sounds, this race once again proves why Formula 1 races are just not won by battling on track. They are won in three key moments.

[00:11:04] The start, the pit stop and the way you manage the stint between the pit stops. Everything else with this way of driving and with these sort of sharp cars and this sort of technology like DRS is utterly futile.

[00:11:16] A terrible statement, I know, but somewhere down the line, we need to change this. But in my head, right? I just need to now tell you this piece of information which baffles me even more

[00:11:28] and is something that we already know, but it just gives you a good idea of what sort of a driver Max is. The moment that really sort of annoyed me, even though I have the most respect for Max and what he does,

[00:11:41] which you can listen to in all the other episodes and find out, we've been praising him so much because he has been excellent. But he didn't let go of Lando Norris and pushed him into the grass even when he knew he had a puncture.

[00:11:55] Seven-time world champion or not, greatest human being on Earth or not, this in a racing manner is terrible. Let him go. You have a puncture. Don't force him into the grass. That just makes him who he is. That's the kind of driver he is.

[00:12:11] But to me, if you are handing out penalties, that should be penalty number two for sure. That was terrible. This is where I was going to say you should do the introduction, but I'm going to just say one thing before you go to the introduction, 12 minutes in.

[00:12:28] I actually loved that part of Max Wish Tappan. The first part was when he actually got hit at the entry of the corner, then Max turned in a particular way where he would get hit. Max knew that's it. That's the end of it.

[00:12:41] I'm sure these drivers know they can just feel the hit when it happens. The mid-corner was when he turned again in a way that they had. To me, that's awareness and I love Max Wish Tappan for that. He's like, screw it. My race is gone.

[00:12:56] I'm just going to use all my awareness I can to screw the other driver's race because you screwed mine and you're going racing. Then when he actually acted in that whole puncture manner that you explained,

[00:13:07] I loved that. I said, wow, that kind of ruthlessness is sort of what I really love about Max Wish Tappan. I'm not saying this for the Dutch basis. I'm not saying that's the right thing or wrong. Isn't that the kind of stuff that gets you called stuff

[00:13:24] which starts with an A and ends with a Hone? That would, right? In any other sport if you do that. Well, we should just ask Max why he moved left on under braking closer to the entry of turn three.

[00:13:37] That's where it is. This is where Samuel Aurora, you can now cue the introduction. So folks, this is not a Max Wish Tappan hit podcast. We still very much love him. Should we turn on him now?

[00:13:48] We absolutely shouldn't. We just need to call out things that are there as well. And before I tell you who we are, a quick word. It's not that he's not matured because had this been 2018, had he been clipped by another driver, had he had the same incident

[00:14:04] when he was in his early years in Formula One, he would have stormed to the media and would have annoyed the life out of everyone. He would have complained like a kid. But you know the first thing he said when he went to the media,

[00:14:15] he said, I'll check the footage and I'll see if I've done something wrong. And the only thing he was annoyed about was not the crash, but the mistakes by Red Bull that led to the crash, which we should also discuss in the other part of this podcast.

[00:14:27] This just simply means he's evolving. He's maturing. We don't hate him. Just need to call out some things the way they are. And that's what we are on the Inside Line F1 podcast. We try to be as unbiased as we can until there's some chatter

[00:14:40] about Jensen Button, Fernando Lonzo or Carlos Sainzi is my favorite. But again, we are the top 1.5% of all listening podcasts on Spotify. And we've also been awarded India's best sports podcast across all sports that is. So that's us. My name is Somal Arora.

[00:14:56] I am the voice of the MotoGP Indian Grand Prix, the Indian Racing League, the Indian Supercross Racing Championship and so many others as well. And you will also be listening to Kunal Shah, the former marketing head of the Four Cyndia Formula One team.

[00:15:12] Currently an FIA accredited Formula One journalist working with the ViyaPlay Network. Who, if you don't know, are the people who show you the live footage of her Stappan and Norris racing in such an entertaining manner. He is the one who's producing the post and pre-shows for that.

[00:15:28] So that's who we are. And we're also missing F1 stats guru, our in-house stats legend who's a part of the WTF One talent pool and is one of the most followed stats pages on the Internet. Who's stats, by the way, have been picked up by

[00:15:42] CroftyOttoSport.com, MoroSport.com, you name it, and his stats are there. Get well soon, man. But coming back to the whole point, what do we talk about first? Do we talk about the race winner 15 minutes into the race? Or do we still have something to say on?

[00:16:00] I think we still... Let's put it this way. Everyone listening in is more curious about what actually happened. Who gives the most biased, unbiased, neutral, aggressive views on which Stappan versus Norris. Everyone wants that. That's the blockbuster part. Yes, George Russell won his second race win,

[00:16:20] but he won a race where he was 15 seconds behind the crashing pair. Okay. So anyway, we'll get to you, George. 15 seconds later. 15 minutes may be given how much we love exacting these things because we of course try and apply a layer of what you see, I see,

[00:16:38] and all the neutrality that we try and bring into what we do, some of it. But in the whole wish-tap and Norris thing, another very interesting thing, the headlines, like you pointed out just before that introduction,

[00:16:49] by the way, thank you, was Max Wish-tap and wanted to point out the mistakes that Red Bull made in the race. So every time there was a question about what happened with Norris, he actually said, yeah, but we shouldn't have gotten into that situation.

[00:17:02] We made a mistake, right? Whereas Norris's headlines were all about the friendship. Okay. And to me, whether there's a friendship or not, that's the main question because definitely there is no world championship for Norris in 2024. Come what may, Max is going to just seal it.

[00:17:21] You know, it's all about again which races he's going to do it. Is he going to get not your while he does it, et cetera, et cetera, because that's going to be the key part. But yeah, I don't care about the friendship,

[00:17:34] but it's always good to see these trends like you said at the start. You know, the minute you go wheel-to-wheel, especially in this harsher manner, it affects your off-track relationships. And if we go back to Spain where Max Wish-tap and won again,

[00:17:52] you remember there was one thing he said, which was we need to add performance to the car because we cannot rely on a perfect execution of a race weekend, every race weekend. And guess what? For the first time in many, many races,

[00:18:09] we saw Red Bull make two mistakes in the race today. First was of course that six second pit stop that they had, which certainly cut down a seven-eighth second lead to two seconds and that got Landon or Swiss in charging distance.

[00:18:24] And then of course this whole debate of whether they should have just gone longer in the second stint and so on, which you know, in time Red Bull will just know what was what. Yeah, but you see the way Max has matured now, he's evolved, he's a machine.

[00:18:40] He's not focusing on any of these things. He's just focused on efficiency, optimization, which is why Red Bull are where they are. So at the end of it all, it's just mind blowing that he's still able to do what he does.

[00:18:53] And with that, we should talk a little bit more about the driver of our weekend overall. Formula one, well, the official driver of the day was Landon Norris. We had more than just one race this weekend.

[00:19:06] I really, I mean, I'm sort of torn apart between Russell and Piastri. I want to talk about Piastri before we go to Russell because that's a different story altogether. And Piastri has a big helping hand in Russell's story, but you have something to say.

[00:19:19] Yeah, we are still not done talking of Norris and... Oh, we are not. ...and wish to happen. Oh, go ahead. There'll be more. No, I'll tell you one point. We need to commend McLaren again for having a car which works around Austria, which is a great thing.

[00:19:35] Last year in Austria is when they got their big upgrades and they suddenly metamorphized into the team that they are now. This year, they were again the fastest car through the weekend. They should have won. They could have won. It's again down to that. But...

[00:19:51] Sorry, a point on that before you just say that. They should have, but Max was tapping and qualifying. Oh my God, what a lap. How did he do that? How did he... That's the Max wish to happen in magic.

[00:20:04] So I would choose Max as my driver of the weekend. Doesn't matter what he did with Norris. It was one small blip. However, you see it over a weekend of fantastic performance, especially now that they're under pressure. I mean, P1 to P19 in Q1 of qualifying was 0.598 seconds.

[00:20:27] Joe Guan knew who was 20th was actually 2 tenths off whoever was P19. I think it was Logan Sargent. Of course. And I was just like, dude, when everyone else is within half a tenth, why are you at 2 tenths? You just messed up the whole number. Okay.

[00:20:42] And then guess what? In Q3, Max wish to happen pulls four tenths on P2. So we've gone from the narrowest gap ever in the history of qualifying, especially since this format was adopted, right? Seven tenths, narrowest gap between P1 to P20 to the longest

[00:21:03] or the largest or the widest gap all season between P1 and P2 in Q3. So that's what Max wish to happen did with that lap. And after he put that lap, I said, there's no way he's losing that race, but I was so wrong.

[00:21:17] But I'll tell you the point that I was trying to make. If you remember the last couple of races, we questioned again, should McLaren have just followed what Red Bull was doing and chase them? Right.

[00:21:30] We actually use that as an example to say you don't chase Red Bull for just 10% of the race. You chase them for 100% of the race. So they actually did that. Every lap, every pit stop this race,

[00:21:45] they put it exactly at the same time on the same lap as Max wish to happen. Just to be like, if we know we're quicker than him, let's just put on the same tires or whatever, get onto the same strategy and chase him down. Right.

[00:21:59] For once, I actually wondered if McLaren and Norris' strategy to pit on the same lap was to try and force Red Bull into an unsafe release because it happened the first time. And when it happened the second time, they actually held Max wish to happen back.

[00:22:14] So first I thought maybe they've just held Max back to be a little cautious. But of course it turned out that I think his left rear wheel not just took longer or whatever. But yeah, so hats off and full marks to McLaren for chasing Red Bull

[00:22:28] for all 60 laps of the race. Good point. And that does save you time because if you hold the driver back slightly as well, gives you a 10th there, a second there here and there, which you would die for in normal racing circumstances.

[00:22:44] But this is where we have to bring in a question from one of our followers on social media. It's one from Uttara that we need to address. And she says, as she says rather, Norris was training with Stappenbauer on six seconds before the pit stops,

[00:22:57] bringing him in for new tires before Max would have potentially put him in between Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. Was there a strategic reason for not attempting an undercut on Max at this point? Considering the potential time gain from fresher tires,

[00:23:11] would this have been a viable option for the team to consider? And you sort of answered that question in a way, haven't you Kunal? Because when we spoke about this in the Spanish GP review, the whole point was can McLaren annoy Red Bull for the whole race?

[00:23:24] They need to pressure him all the way throughout. And eventually, there was no incentive to go for an undercut in the first, I mean in the second stint because as you rightly mentioned, he would have been between Russell and Hamilton, which is counterproductive.

[00:23:37] Why do you want to put your driver in dirty air? And in the first stint, it was just the case of McLaren, at least what it looks like from the outside, trying to stick around with Max and trying to be on the same strategy

[00:23:47] so that they can avoid what happened in Spain, which was eventually going off strategy and the Stappen gaining advantage through having more fresher. Well, interesting scenario now. And McLaren are opting to pressure Red Bull racing so much and so consistently. But she's also asked another question and says,

[00:24:05] which I think we should touch upon very, very briefly before we talk about all the other stuff. No, no, I think you need to bring out your C3 insight as well, because ladies and gentlemen, Somil has actually been digging a lot more into the data

[00:24:22] to figure out what he should actually say he's figured out. Now, totally forgot about that. But no, it's interesting. We mentioned this in the preview. Miami, what compound of tire got Landon Norris the win? And I'm not saying the tire he finished the race on,

[00:24:39] the tire on which his stint made him go above all the others. It was the C3. Count a year back, Austrian GB 2023, on what tire compound did Landon Norris do so well that he ended up beating Fernando, Lonzo and Lois Hamilton

[00:24:56] cars that were significantly faster than the McLaren before that race. It was the C3 hard compound tire. In the preview, we told you, watch out for McLaren on that C3 tire compound, the hard compound tires this time out.

[00:25:10] And believe it or not, Landon was actually closing up to Max when he was on that hard. Eventually, of course, it took a terrible pit stop from Red Bull Racing to get McLaren back in the mix. And by that point, they were all on the mediums.

[00:25:23] But still, it counts. It's an interesting trend. C3 is something that has been working for them so much. It didn't work out in one occasion, which is what we dug up together, Montreal, where again, the conditions were probably not quite right

[00:25:37] and there was a wet track sort of switch around and so it was ideal to be on the softer compound tires. But generally, it seems like an interesting trend that McLaren are doing quite well with that C3 tire compound. So follow it along. Keep checking.

[00:25:51] If it's the C3, check the performance between Red Bull and McLaren and see if there are any marginal gains because it just so can happen that a certain cars philosophy can suit a certain tire compound, like Mercedes performed better under cooler conditions and something of that sort.

[00:26:07] Hard to explain exactly why we're not the best people. We should probably ring up James Allison and the likes to tell more about why that is, but it's an interesting phenomenon that is appearing. It is. So this is where we can actually,

[00:26:21] 26 minutes into the podcast, talk about George Russell. We want to. He picked up. No, we should. We should. Yeah, I think he of course picked up the pieces that were left, literally the debris and the points and the win by Norris and wish to happen.

[00:26:40] And he picked up a smile on Dotto's face. Actually, not a smile, a smug on Dotto's face. Did you see that short canal? Yeah, but I think George Russell is not going to get his race win bonus from Toto Wolf for that.

[00:26:55] Expletive laden radio message when Mercedes's chief motivation officer, Toto Wolf came out of the radio saying, George, we can win this whatever. And he's motivation officer. Man, how do you come up with this stuff? That's some things that I'm good at, which is CRAP instead of CAR.

[00:27:16] But anyway, that's a daddy joke there. But no, I think he was, he was in the mix 15 seconds off, but he was in the mix. But that's what you do. He actually said this yesterday. I hope Lando and Max have their own battle and they go so

[00:27:30] off that I just jump into the lead and that's what happened. Did he write? Yeah, he actually said that post qualifying. So that's it. But think of it this way. Now this is the progress Mercedes has made since their front wing introduction that happened in Monaco, right?

[00:27:47] Because there were two other times when Red Bull dropped the ball in the races this season in Australia and in Monaco and guess who picked up the pieces? Ferrari, one each for signs and Leclerc. Okay. But now it's no longer Ferrari that's there to pick up the pieces.

[00:28:08] Carlos signs was third at best. Okay. Despite being ahead of George through a good start, but he then got overtaken and so on. So Ferrari has dropped back in that battle for the top three. They're at best, the fourth fastest team now. Okay.

[00:28:24] And then who else has Red Bull hired and sort of extended a contract till end of 2025 to pick up the pieces? Chaco Perez, right? Yeah. And Chaco Perez has now been six consecutive races that he's gone without a podium finish. Can you imagine? Why are you expecting one?

[00:28:49] You're the only one who's tracking that number. You know, right? That's what makes us so good that again we're not up, but that's why we are so meticulous. We just keep on taking into things that nobody takes into. Here we are.

[00:29:02] And we have a lot of Mexican fans who of course are wondering when that spell is going to break. But yeah, I mean in all fairness, Chaco actually had damage from the opening lap. He's posted a big picture of that damage or a picture

[00:29:16] of that big damage on his Instagram just to say, hey guys, I actually was off, which I can understand he was struggling. But yeah, there we go. He's picked it up. It was in Lewis Hamilton. It was George Russell, his second race win.

[00:29:29] I don't believe it changes anything in the constructors championship because Mercedes is now on 196 points. McLaren is on 268 points and Ferrari is on 291 points. So if anything that this result will do is what we'll find out maybe 10 races down the line when

[00:29:48] Mercedes end up overtaking Ferrari despite being 100 points off because Mercedes's points all from the race weekend saw well was 45 points. Lovely. Which is beautiful. That's a big hole. That's a big meaty bite into Ferrari. Yeah, first and fourth. Yeah, absolutely. So Mercedes did I would say very well.

[00:30:12] Tata Wolf that smug came out extremely well. And it of course George Russell is now has won at the Red Bull ring in GP3 in Formula 2 and in Formula 1. Not bad. Yeah, not bad. Not bad. But you know this is the reason why following an

[00:30:32] entire race is so important because whenever we see something like this happening when the leaders take themselves out it's always the best of the rest who emerges throughout the entire race. Raise your hands up. And again, it's not a cultural forceful thing that you

[00:30:50] have to track every driver, every single lap. Sometimes it's just nice to but raise your hands if you were genuinely following what was happening to George Russell. Not many people including myself can say that. It's only at the halfway mark where I was just

[00:31:06] checking and thinking okay who's the best of the rest now and are these guys are doing so well. And one of the big reasons why George Russell eventually came to that position where he did come to a big part of it comes down to the man

[00:31:18] who was second at Oscar Piazzari not gotten that time penalty. I can't imagine Russell, okay he has had better stats, yes, but I can't imagine Russell having a sustained advantage over that McLaren over the course of that race and eventually being in that

[00:31:34] position where he gets to pick up the scraps. Big hand thanks to Oscar Piazzari, he finished second but the big story here is he beat Lewis Hamilton fair and square. Decisive pass at the start, got that position back and his strategy wasn't anything fantastic.

[00:31:53] It wasn't anything that can blow you apart. It's just a normal well-driven race assisted by the fact that his team mate got into a few muddles by the fact that Ferrari just were completely off the pace consistently around a 10th, 10th and a half slower than the

[00:32:07] Mercedes and the McLaren's and also by the fact that Piazzari was nowhere to be seen and Perez as always unfortunately was at the back. That's all it takes, one good level headed weekend and you can maximize things and operational efficiency is something

[00:32:25] that we've been tagging along with Red Bull for so long. Mercedes have nailed it once again. Yeah they did and you know very interesting question that George Russell was asked post-trace seeing Mercedes was 15, 16 seconds off whatever when the crash happened. Should they really

[00:32:42] celebrate this win which technically isn't a win and George actually gave a very interesting answer saying you have to celebrate a high moment when it comes in Formula 1 because you never know when it's going to come again. Okay and the same thing Carlos Sainz said even though

[00:32:57] I don't know what I'm going to do next year I'm going to celebrate this podium and then for all those wanting to know what George Russell is going to do to celebrate he said even if my celebrations are 50% or what Lendon or is his

[00:33:08] celebrations are my celebrations are going to be a lot of fun so that's where he left it at but talking of Oscar Piatri we want to analyze the celebrations no I think because it was very lukewarm like when he was on the radio

[00:33:25] when someone wins from such a position you expect them to go ballistic like whoa yes whoa he's like hi everybody good one nice one boys come on George it's a race win it's not a podium again just my qualms with him a race

[00:33:43] win could have been for Oscar Piatri that track limits was so strange Somal and Oscar Piatri actually said two things he's like you've gone and put solutions at turns nine and ten you invested money to bring solutions to actually take track limits out of the

[00:34:00] equation and then suddenly at turn six you're like wow no but not turn six that's not the track where we can put you know gravel on or whatever even though there was gravel and then he was tracked via a helicopter shot which no other car was tracked using

[00:34:18] and the resolution was so bad that there was a lot of shadow and then of course McLaren protested but this is again when McLaren needs to pick up the pay as McLaren protested they sent the retter to the clock on the

[00:34:31] course instead of the store so that was like they did not state which part of the regulation they were addressing so that was another there was another there was a third strike as well so the protest was deemed inadmissible oh boy okay because

[00:34:47] it wasn't within the template and the format of what the FIA and the teams ever agreed a protest format should be yes I'm not making this up I'm not making this up either way so Oscar Piatri feeling like this win could have

[00:35:01] been a genuine feeling I would say so that yeah could have would have should have we can leave it at that but wait Ferrari definitely couldn't feel that this win would have been there Carlos Sainz was very candid saying this I was going to finish

[00:35:17] P5 it's just because of two cars that of me I got under the podium so that was fine but the focus for me wasn't on Carlos Sainz's race the focus for me was on Charles Leclerc so of course he had that lap damage and then

[00:35:31] Brian Bossey is new engineer who of course is backed by the strategy and every other engineering team that feeds into Charles's race right so he's the he's the main contact to Charles but that doesn't mean he does the strategy okay necessarily so at the

[00:35:48] beginning of the race they actually said we predict that we had the pace to finish in the points okay and then mid-race they actually said well we change our prediction we don't think you can get the points poor Charles okay but of course Charles

[00:36:06] of course gave some context he said I was a back marker and as a back marker I was losing just so much time behind letting people you know lap me that I was just not able to focus on my race and that's probably what happened to

[00:36:22] Leclerc and interestingly some of them so there were seven out of ten teams that scored points which means Saubo Williams and Aston Martin didn't score points right but to me this was one of those races where a back marker was actually overlapping themselves very very

[00:36:40] frequently I saw that with land stroll and I'm like wait a minute where on another day the land stroll overtake a Mercedes because Mercedes is running high up right I was just puzzled till I realized it was a back marker max which happened at one point was more

[00:36:56] worried about the houses were coming to on that so very interesting when you come to a short circuit like suddenly the back markers on fresher tires are just going go faster than you yeah barely any corners right so that that

[00:37:09] also helps out so much but I like the fact that you brought out house here we need to touch upon that it's a serious talking point basically what we need to do now is to honor the American this of house and only race

[00:37:24] at speedways because it's very clear the lower the number of corners the higher the house is finished because that means less opportunities for Kevin Magnuson to be a bully and take everyone out like a p6 in p8 is incredible no I said that because in the middle

[00:37:40] of that race firstly he passed Nico Hulkenberg because Hulkenberg had a bit of a bad stop so he fell back into Magnuson's hands and eventually you need to understand that if your teammates on a different strategy let him go Magnuson being Magnuson fair enough

[00:37:55] he said okay I'm gonna pass but the radio message after that was the weird one where harsh just subtly reminded him Kevin Nico's on a different strategy I think we should probably let him go he said do I have to conserve or does Nico also have to

[00:38:09] conserve again love that spirit about him he's like the engineer what did he say canal he said both of them yeah so they said you know he said f that that's what Magnuson's reply was management yeah yeah yeah okay because

[00:38:26] the message was that both of them have to conserve and then when Nico was told the same thing you need to bring in the tires and these tires will go to the end whatever the typical time management messages they get and he also are

[00:38:38] saying yeah well we got to do that together and I just love Kevin Magnuson's absolute Nordic approach straight face to the point just say that is Nico was knowing him you know he's a nice guy like sort of goes around

[00:38:50] the portion says oh but we both have to do it but in all fairness Haas's best result in Austria since 2022 when they again finished sixth and eighth okay sixth was Schumacher 8 was Magnuson so eighth place is Magnuson come what may the sixth place is

[00:39:08] what just changed between their German driver but I would say great result on merit I mean they finished ahead of Checo Perez and since we mentioned radio message of Magnuson Magnuson was pissed post-race because there was some multi-function message that he was given which

[00:39:30] he couldn't figure or he couldn't put in and then he was you know expressing it to his race engineer and then his race engineer said my bad but I think Ferrari gave us the wrong setting they said that so but either way Haas is now 10 points ahead

[00:39:46] of Alpine in P7 in the constructors championship and Nico Hulkenberg actually said post-race we're doing things differently we are doing things more efficiently this season and I'm glad it's actually all showing for Haas it is it is and genuinely I think they manage their race very well

[00:40:04] to be at that scenario where you're holding off Sergio Perez even though he has damaged yes but you are on harder tires that are 12 laps older fair play Hulkenberg man that is a good drive that that's the kind of stuff that gets you a factory contract again.

[00:40:22] Indeed what a life saver that Audi contract and if they hit gold with that Audi package which Christian Dana literally the German formula one expert who was on our podcast couple of weeks ago said that Audi is a long way to actually making any inroads

[00:40:42] into formula one if they have to but another team that needs to make inroads is Aston Martin clearly completely off Fernando Alonso even more off he went into joke one you of all the people I mean I would never imagine joke one you and Fernando Alonso

[00:40:58] sharing the same piece of tarmac beyond the opening lap because Fernando is just Fernando miles ahead as he should be but Fernando Alonso stood out two times in the race weekend or maybe child three times first is he got a front row view of the Alpine battle

[00:41:16] between Estobano and Pierre Gasly and what did he say wow and then wow was his chosen race message on the radio for several other instances he also said wow when he was informed that he had a time penalty and this is

[00:41:34] very short trivia for you which I knew you were going to pass because I could ask you something like what happened in 1965 on race 6 lap 7 and you would remember so my trivia is actually like baby trivia for you but how many world champions on the grid in 2024 Alonso

[00:41:54] Verstappen and Hamilton that's all how many world champions got a time penalty in the 2024 Austrian Grand Prix Verstappen Hamilton and Fernando Alonso can you imagine and Hamilton picked it up for crossing the white line at pit exit that's a scary moment Fernando Alonso for take

[00:42:18] the white line on the pit exit really? no no he seemed like he was in control the pit entry wasn't it like oh the pit entry sorry yeah but seems like he's done it a long long time Fernando Alonso for taking joke on you

[00:42:32] bumping into M-turn 3 and Max Verstappen for doing what he did in Lando notice which we spent more than 40% of this episode talking about but yeah so Fernando Alonso's wow messages were absolutely gold standard for me and now Aston Martin Somal has gone 2 races without scoring points

[00:42:54] and they've not scored points in 3 out of the last 4 races so Canada was the only last races scored points whatever whatever and then Racing Bowls is 28 points away from Aston Martin hmm but you know the Hamilton pit entry thing I still don't know how Oscar Piazza

[00:43:14] even spot exactly when he went to the radio and he sort of called him out and I'm like dude how on earth did you see that exactly how did he do that like I don't get it the eyes on that guy is something else you know

[00:43:30] I really want to touch upon him as well because firstly that was unnatural but then secondly he's showing a great sense of decisiveness which I didn't quite see and which we all didn't quite see with one Alex Albon at this very stage of his career

[00:43:48] I know he was racing up against far more tougher drivers like Lewis Hamilton who didn't quite give him the room but with Oscar Piazzari the way he's pulling off moves with certainty same track same place Albon a few years ago Piazzari now

[00:44:04] you see a little bit of difference you see I mean you just get a belief that this guy will make it to the end when Sergio Perez pushed him out at the first lap and Oscar went wide he recovered it incredibly then

[00:44:16] to come back and hang it on the outside of Sergio Perez once more at that same corner and to make it work man you're talking about Ozzy Gritt this guy has got it all again in the sprint as well that move on Lando Norris

[00:44:30] decisive he had one shot he took that one shot this guy is going places I mean I just can't wait to see what happens when the luck favours him when he's just able to get those last couple of 10s in the time management

[00:44:44] facing the race all around and then for all we know it could be a wonderful wonderful three way battle at the top and it could happen next week because Silverstone is meant to be McLaren's best circuit of all of them so I think we're in

[00:44:58] for a good race next time out you shouldn't high speed extremely lots of drivers love the race circuit just because it's an absolute driver's circuit the homo formula one the mecca of motorsport the history the legacy that the circuit itself stands for I'm excited to see what

[00:45:16] happens at Silverstone like we asked you know the world championship is not going anywhere else but Max wish tapens way going by the looks of it the main question is does the friendship between Norris and wish tapen actually remain as is or will there be another crack

[00:45:34] at it at Silverstone will it will it stand the test of formula one let's let's look out for that yeah we will answer rather we should discuss those questions in more depth when we come for our British GP preview very very shortly so stay tuned

[00:45:50] on the inside line everyone podcast subscribe to us followers and all of your all of all of our social media channels and we'd love to take any of your questions for the preview as well that's been all from myself somal aurora and also

[00:46:04] from canal Shah thank you for listening folks we will see you in a couple of days for the British GP thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the inside line F1 podcast before we ended I just wanted to say a huge

[00:46:36] thank you to Amazon music once again for partnering with us on this episode of the podcast