Flights & the F1 Finale

This is, is off track.

Hello. And welcome to an off track with H and Rossi. Hello.

How you doing buddy? Do you, do you feel welcome?

I feel like, here's the problem. We've just been dealing

with some technical difficulties and while that's been going on, we just talked and caught up on everything.

So, yeah, I guess good chat. Not really much.

See you guys next week. Yeah. See you week. What's crazy

Is what that recap in Nashville, you guys were just going through. That was insane.

I, I can't believe that it wasn't recording the whole time. I can't

Believe how much I missed from Yeah.

Just watching the race. Well, anyway, uh, now

that we're done with that, how's everybody doing? Good.

Good. Um, good. No, well, it's not entirely true.

That's, I feel like he just, people just say that when you ask them.

At least I do. It's a very Canadian thing. I think

Most people Yeah, that's true.

That's a good point. Yeah. Alex definitely does not do that.

That's fair. If he's not doing well,

It just looks at you like, how dare you speak to me .

Yeah. Like, we're not asking that question. Okay.

Yeah, we're good. We're good. I'm just tired, Tim.

I'm tired. It's been a, it's been a, so, Alex,

do you remember when, do you remember when IndyCar ended?

Uh, not really. It was so long ago.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Nine to 10 years ago.

Right. So I know you didn't stop working then

because you go to the sim every other day in Charlotte, but like the racing going to the racetrack or in England.

Or in England, um, you've done a couple tests, but for the most part you've been home, uh, when not, you know, your responsibilities have been less.

I've, I just got home. I just got home.

I basically left Nashville and I, and I basically just got home and I'm now home for a while.

So, as this is a travel podcast, we should go over my flight stuff for the year.

'cause I know you love when I talk about my flight stuff.

So here is my passport from Flighty, um, 105 flights this year.

140,519 miles, which is 5.6 times around the world.

I spent 14 days and seven hours in an airplane.

This year. Two weeks of my life

were spent sitting in a tin can this year that is not account for the 28 hours lost to delays.

So that's just time in the plane.

That's not airports, that's just in the plane. So 28 hours.

Again, that's not from being in the airport.

That's being in the airport for hours.

I was not supposed to be in the airport over a day.

59 different airports, 16 different airlines. This was wild.

It's wild. Wild. Do you wanna, do you wanna metal or what?

I'm just, I'm just, I'm just talking. I'm just talking guys.

Longest flight.

14 hours and 48 minutes, which was amazingly the one coming home from this trip.

Trip. So I ended on the longest flight

Of the year.

Was it? Was it Abu Dhabi, Chicago on Etha?

It was Dubai to new to Newark.

Ah, On United.

Ah, why?

Here's what's, um, crazy to think about James. Hmm.

That's only five hours longer than my flight from London to Charlotte.

Yeah, dude. , this is, we were talking about this.

So Alex, you had to go to England for, what'd you say, of 20 hours feet on the ground. Mm-hmm . Um,

I just really wanted a nice, you know, British meal. That's what they're known for.

No such thing. Um, so yeah.

So explain , explain, explain to the listeners what you explained to me about your flight home.

Well, like, like you, when I asked the question, I was like, how long do you think it takes to get from London to Charlotte?

And you're like, oh, seven-ish hours.

Which is I think an, an an appropriate guess considering, you know, New York to London can be under six hours.

Chicago to, to London is very often six and a half.

Obviously going east you have some tailwinds, but, you know, jets can overcome a lot of that.

It's not like my little putt putt, right? .

So, coming back, yeah, you might lose 45 minutes or an hour or whatever, but, um, yeah, no, it was, it was a nine and a half hour flight and I didn't think that was possible until you think about the curvature of the earth.

And you know, when you fly over to the Atlantic, they go pretty far north.

Um, you know, E tops requires them to be in certain ranges on the event that there's an engine failure and, you know, single engine duration and that sort of thing.

And so they fly, they fly up towards the top of the globe also because it's a shorter distance I'm sure.

'cause the earth is thinner up there anyways.

When you come back down, it gets fatter. Hmm.

Um, so yeah, it would seem that, uh, flying from Iceland to Charlotte is about as long as it takes to get from New York to London, which is a crazy little thing to imagine, but It just, it's so, so that is what I explain.

You look at it, you look at the map and you're like, that that's not right.

Well, and just, just have knowledge of geography and you'd be like, that's not possible. That

Makes no sense.

But again, as we were pointing out Yes, you, you do it when you think about it and the curvature of the earth and all that stuff, and you sort of fly these arc patterns, uh, you don't fly straight lines when you are looking at it at a two.

Anybody. Well, 'cause Earth is

Not Flat.

Anybody, anybody that thinks the earth is flat is just ignoring all facts. All facts.

Favorite. My favorite part

of the conspiracy theory that the earth is flat.

Well, there's a few favorite parts.

One, um, why, like, who would benefit?

Like Big Globe is just trying to keep selling things just to classrooms. .

Yep. And then two, like, just the, the, the leaps

of which you'd have to like, ignore fundamental principles.

Be like, okay, well then if we're not on a ball that's rotating, why do we have Gravity?

Or like, why did the Stars move in one way and the planets move a different way And Yeah.

You can't prove gravity. It's all, we're in a simulation.

All right. This is just like a big Fortnite map. Nope.

You don't know why it is though.

It's not because the Earth's round could just be that something's down on us from above some invisible force.

Yeah. I didn't,

You know what?

I didn't consider it that way. You heard

it here first James.

He believes he Earth is flat.

Let's not get, let's not get involved in Big Globe. Right.

You know, it's a big . Big guy's

Not Big Globe anymore.

Attention. Right.

Well also, you know, people are sensitive these days, so it might piss people off. Um, you know

What?

I'm all right. Pissing people off.

If they think the earth is flat. Let's,

You know what, you know what pisses me off.

Please. So are you ever on Instagram

and you're going through like, I've seen It, You Yeah, I know you've been on one or twice. ,

Insta. What? And you're going through like your, uh,

Reels.

Notifications, notifications, notifications. Right.

And then it says, and and, and, and like a lot of Instagram is all about, you know, if you go to your, your search page or, or whatever like your It's the algorithm page.

The algorithm. Right. It's tune into you

and it's trying to get to click on stuff.

Right. And it knows it's pretty good. Right?

I mean, Tim's A high All boobies.

Mine is now all babies. So there you go.

Yeah. Um, mine's a lot of watches and race cars.

That's kind of, that's kind of what mine looks like right now.

The point that the three of us are in life. That all makes

sense, .

That is, yeah. That's pretty accurate.

So the, what throws me off is when you're going through your notifications every once in a while it goes so and so posted a thread you might like, Oh, I, that does piss me off.

And that just, I'm like, this, you don't know me at all.

'cause I have never once clicked on a threat.

I, I hate the idea of threat.

I don't even know what thread is. They, they

Own it.

I know they own it. That's why. Okay.

But it's, but like you don't get me if you are suggesting that there's anything on thread that I am interested in, 'cause I'm just not So just give up. Just just quit.

That's really old man right there.

'cause you just called it Thread.

What is it? Is it Threads? Yeah.

Oh, whatever. This was just, this was brought

to my attention because Cutter put something in Our can't prove are talking are on Talk Tick.

It's just really really annoying. Um, yeah,

It makes perfect sense.

Guys, make of me for sharing tiktoks on the group chat.

Oh, that's ridiculous. Oh, it's, it's s hand.

It's insulting to us that you think we have TikTok to watch them .

I know that you both have a profile so that you can watch them.

It's not, it's not that we can't have a profile so that nobody takes the handle that is associated with all my other social Media channels. Alright. So you

Can watch it when I send it.

Point refuse. Refuse. No refuse. Kelly

Actually gets mad at me because apparently you can see if someone watches your tiktoks if you text it to Them. Yeah. Lets you know.

Yeah. And so like, I've never done it.

So she's gotten to the point where she will take the time to screen record a TikTok and send it to me before You can just download it too. You can do that.

I actually respect that. She wants you

to watch it so badly.

She's gonna go through that process and send it to you.

Yeah. 'cause she knows you're not gonna watch a TikTok.

In fairness, I do think that your wife is the person who sends me the second most amount of actually maybe the most amount of tiktoks. Even more than Tim.

Yeah. And they're usually sends Yeah. She's allowed to.

She's whatever.

Um, okay, listen, let's stop talking about that.

Uh, you, you started this episode off talking about what you have been doing since the IndyCar season ended.

Mm. Obviously a huge amount of travel. Welcome home.

Thank you. Thank goodness that, thank you.

At least you get a couple weeks, I would imagine in Indiana.

Mm-hmm . Um, let's get right into it.

Let's do it. So Abu Dhabi, we have been talking at length,

uh, again because IndyCar's been over, um, for about as long as color televisions have been out .

And so this is essentially a podcast about F1 now.

And so we have been following very closely with much interest.

Um, the championship fight that came down to the final race.

Mm-hmm . Three guys going for all the glory

for the first time since 2014.

Was it 2000? Who? The, the team?

No, three people in contention. Oh.

20, um, 10 was the last time. There was three. So 15 years.

And I thought it was anti-climatic.

I thought it was, it was, um, that's not true.

Let me rephrase that. I thought the buildup

to the weekend was incredible.

I thought qualifying was incredible.

I thought the pre-race was incredible. Great job, James.

Thank you. Uh, a big F1 TV fan now, by the way. Thank you.

Um, I appreciate that. When YouTube TV

and Disney had their little spat and ESPN was no longer available.

I had to resort to F1 TV and I didn't switch away from it for the last five races.

So we got 'em. You, you, you converted me.

The buildup was amazing. I was

so exci like I had butterflies in my stomach as the lights were going on and then off.

'cause I was so excited about what was gonna happen over the next 58 laps or whatever it is.

And then it was kind of just, oh, .

It's so funny, man.

It's so funny because we'll get, we'll get into it more, but we, we, you know, the every night that week, right?

We'd sit around the dinner table with our group of Ed F1 TV and once we got through and like you're just talk, you're just talking about everything.

You're just trying to come up with every scenario, right?

You're just trying to see what the world's gonna do. Right?

What if, yeah. What if?

And so after qualifying and Max is on Poll and Lando iss second, Oscar's third, so, you know, top three in the championship qualify top three in the race.

It's very NASCAR of them Scripted so perfectly.

Right. and then,

and then like Q Netflix conspiracy theorists.

Right? And then Julian Palmer, my good friend

and commentator on F1 TV was absolutely convinced.

Absolutely convinced. He was like, oh my God.

The level of howery that we are gonna see in the race tomorrow is gonna be Epic.

Abu Dhabi's kind of not known as the best race ever.

It's never usually like a cracking race. Right.

Which is really weird because It's weird.

I don't understand why it races so poorly.

I completely agree. I I've

had this discussion with other people.

Yeah. On paper it should.

It's got two massive straits with DRS zones into big break zone.

Like it should be a good race.

And it just seldom is, it is now broken a record for 11 consecutive races where the pole sitter has won.

So it was tied with Barcelona infamous for being a boring race.

Mm. And being a, being a Saturday weekend, right.

The race is Saturday and it's now beat the record for consecutive races won from Pulp.

But Julian's like, no, no, no, no, no.

Max is just gonna back the, he's gonna drive so slow.

He goes, remember 2021 when Checko had Lewis behind him and was trying to give Max a buffer?

He would Dr he was driving around three and a half, four seconds off the pace and keeping Lewis Hamilton behind him.

He was like, Checko is good.

Imagine Max as good as Max is how slow he can drive and keep cars behind him to get the midfield guys to mix in and undercut and try to just get involved because they just, they had to get Lando off the podium for Max to win the championship.

And, and, and he was just like, it is gonna be complete Tom foolery complete Skullduggery.

It is gonna be like a dirty fight.

It's gonna be elbows out, it's gonna be great.

And I was like, Julian, because that's what we all think is gonna happen.

Whoever comes out of, however they come outta turn one is how they will finish the race.

And I was nearly right. There was a pass halfway

through Lap one and that was how they finished the race.

But there there was so much, I so much expectation that it was gonna be this like complete cluster and a strategic nightmare and all these things.

And it was none of those things. It was none of them.

I I will say that I think there was an interesting, um, interview with, uh, Andrea Stella Sunday before the race.

And someone asked him like, you know, how did you sleep last night?

And he was like, well, I wasn't sleeping at all until I realized what the solution to the race is.

And then I slept great.

And I think what what made it a boring race and McLaren nailed it, was starting Oscar on the hard tire.

Yeah. Because that negated really any of the bull

that Max could do because Max, it wasn't just about Lando getting off the podium, like Max still had to win, right?

Right. And so with Oscar

and the pace that he had on the hard tire, being able to go along and all of this sort of thing, it never really afforded Max the opportunity to back anyone up.

And if he were to, you know, let's say after all of the stops were done, he would've been giving up a 22nd buffer lead, which is just insane.

You're not gonna do that because then if you don't win, you're gonna look like a real big idiot.

Right. So it never presented itself

because McLaren, you know, split strategies, which they're not super known to do, and, um, called it perfectly.

And, and as much as I was disappointed with the results of the championship, because as it's been documented on this podcast, and I think James, you agree, it's been really cool to become a Max fan over the past, you know, year, but really the past eight races and, and watch the fight that, that him and the whole organization had to try and claw it back.

But ultimately there were so many factors, especially coming down to the final race that were out Orlando's control that he should have had this thing locked up well before Abu Dhabi in the first place.

Right. So the bright guy won the championship. Yes.

Um, that's not to say that the best guy won the championship, but the, the guy in the championship.

And it was really cool to see a first time world champion and someone that obviously has an immense amount of talent, um, and had to deal with a lot of criticism, um, throughout the past couple of years, but especially the past five months and came out the other side of it looking like, uh, a hero.

So that was, that was cool to see.

As much as it would've been awesome for Max to complete the comeback, it wasn't meant to be.

So there you go. That's my opinion on it.

It was not. And there's, there's so many things

to unpacking the whole thing, but o off the top, I just, I I want to say it again 'cause I know we've, we've talked about it here before.

'cause it became really clear to me around, I think it was around Austin, well, at least Austin's the first time I remember talking about it, it was actually on another podcast.

It's on the F1 Nation podcast.

But Lando had this, had this sort of, you know, there, there was this, there was this moment where everything sort of shifted for him and he kinda started performing better and whatever.

And everybody was giving him criticism like you you mentioned for being like too hard on himself publicly, right?

Like too honest in the pen with mistakes and things like that.

Not being mentally strong enough, making these mistakes and qualifying whatever, whatever.

And I remember like always thinking, no, it, it looks to me like land's taking ownership of this stuff before anybody can call him out for it.

It's that it goes back to that whole mentality, right?

Of like, if you make fun of something about yourself before anybody else, can you take that power away from them to like use it against you.

And that's what he was doing.

If he made a mistake, he was like the only driver in the world to put his hand up and be like, nah, I messed that up.

Even things that, and we talked about this, things that you didn't even see him do, you didn't even know there was a mistake there.

He would come out and say, Hey, I made this mistake.

And what it does is it eliminates anybody being able to use that as ammo against you.

Now you could try to use that approach as ammo against him, but ultimately what he figured out was to get the best out of himself, he had to be this completely honest, open person.

He talked about his struggles with mental health, with depression and all these things which are not things that are traditionally seen as traits of a champion.

They're seen as weaknesses.

And Lando didn't do it that way, even when the championship battle was getting tense, not only just with his teammate, but as Max started making that comeback, Lando always had a smile on his face.

Lando was always, you know, able to shake hands with the guy across the garage and with Max, who we know he is, got a good friendship with that never wavered.

And he kind of did things and this is what he said afterwards, right?

As I get to the apex of the discussion, Sully, he did it his way, he did it the Lando way and it, it's, you know, we've, we've seen this template of a champion that we think you have to be, which is this cold-blooded killer and emotionless and whatever.

And it's just not true.

And he proved it and I think it actually does a lot for young athletes, right?

Because the guy that was vulnerable, the guy that came out and opened up about his struggles was still able to get it done right?

Nice guys, don't finish last nice guys can win world championships if you work hard at it.

You work hard on yourself, you figure out what you need, you can get it done.

And I think that's huge.

I think if Lando had been a title favorite coming in, kind of had this criticism about being open about his struggles and whatever, and then bottled it and doesn't win the championship, I think it sets back this whole discussion of men.

And there's a lot of other athletes in the last two, three years that have been more open about this stuff.

Obviously Simone Biles was one of the big ones that made a big push of, you know, being open about struggling with stuff.

But I think the fact that he talked about it and then backed it up is great.

And it proves to young athletes that like, it's okay to feel that way.

It's okay to talk about it and you work through it and figure out what you need.

So I give him a ton of credit in that respect.

The other thing that I think is really cool is Max had this interview, I think in Qatar and he's always kind of had this blase approach to the championship, right?

Because he was never supposed to be in it realistically.

And he said, he was like, yeah, whatever happens happens.

Like if I win it, cool.

If I don't, it's not gonna change my life.

And that's the kind of thing that a driver says in that situation, right?

But like, you really kind of believe it.

Like after the race, he wins the race, loses the championship first gotta go up and give Lando a hug, laughing with him in the cool down room.

He's not sitting there thinking back to being taken out by Kimie, Antonelli and Austria.

He's not going back and thinking about his boneheaded move in Spain that cost him enough points that he would've won the championship.

I really don't think it bothered him at all.

And that's a man talk about being in a good place as an athlete, right?

Like being content with the success you've had that you came that close worked that hard.

One of the greatest comebacks in sports history was right there.

And he doesn't pull it off.

And he is like, yeah, cool, all good. I'm happy Philando.

He, he got a championship. That's great.

So, so this just goes to prove what has become increasingly apparent over the past couple of years is that Max views Formula One as a hobby.

He views it as, as something that, you know, he enjoys doing it obviously, you know, he makes a living and it's going to support his family and his, his daughter and his stepdaughter for Generations , Right?

But he views it as an opportunity to go to work with his friends.

You know, obviously his, his relationship with his engineer is incredibly close.

Um, his relationship with that entire organization is incredibly close and it should be considering he was the, he was the Red Bull protege.

He was the, the kid that they took a chance on and he's has rewarded them immensely for that.

And so he is Red Bull F1 in, in a lot of ways.

And so he just, he loves going and, and demanding the best out of the people he works with and holding himself to that level of excellence.

And so I think, I think for the fact that he went out there, he put it on pole with two laps that were good enough for Pole, by the way.

Mm-hmm . He dominated the race.

He, he showed that he's the best driver in Formula One and potentially the best driver in F1 history with what he did this year.

And, you know, he talked about going into Qatar, how, you know, he, his prep for the weekend was he had to deal with some of his stuff with g his GT three team.

He had to deal with some stuff that was going on with his sim racing team.

And that really consumed his three or four days leading up to Qatar.

He got his guitar kind of put down his, his laptop and his cell phone and went and played a race car F1 driver for three days, got a win, wasn't supposed to win, was like cool, I guess we'll, you know, try this again Abu Dhabi.

And sure enough, he did everything that he could.

The team did everything that he could.

And you could hear that in the radio messages, right?

Mm-hmm . Like, there, there, there was such a level

of respect going both ways.

And it was like you gave everything you could, you should be proud of yourself and vice versa.

You know, the team never quit.

The team never gave up, the team never just, we've won four of these.

We'll phone it in twenty, twenty six different, different regulations, Honda's leaving.

Anyways, they, they showed the heart and the belief to the very last lap.

And I think that that is why he is fine with it because ultimately Lando is his buddy.

Um, and and the truth is he does have four of those at home and it's the same.

So is a fifth gonna change his life? It sure isn't.

It's, it's just, it's so funny because like on one hand you think of Max as that stone cold killer. Well, he

Is Template, right?

And he is like between the, the, the green flag and the checkered flag, that is what he is.

But it, it, to me, it is so amazing who he's become, what he's grown into with all the success that he's had.

As soon as the checkered flag falls, he can just go back to being that like good human being where, like, like you say, I mean you nailed it.

The radio message to the team after the checkered flag was incredible, man.

He didn't give himself even the cool down lap to feel bad for himself, to feel sorry for himself, to be disappointed, to be upset, to be angry.

He was so proud that they were even in that conversation, even in that fight at all to come back all this stuff through all the turmoil of the years, switching team principles, switching teammates, all this stuff.

And his message was, dude so impressed.

Like I said, I think I said in the post race show, I didn't think I could be more impressed with Max Tappin as a driver.

He did it, but he always does. And it's the same,

but he's just, he's leveled up outside of the car in a way that I didn't see coming.

And it's, it's amazing.

No, if, if he continues to Grace F1 with his presence, he will rewrite every, every record.

And it really doesn't matter clearly if Red Bull has the best car or not, as long as the car is good enough.

Mm-hmm. Right. He will,

he will win more world championships.

I think he will beat Lewis' record and he will not that he cares.

He's, he's gone a record saying many times he doesn't give a <inaudible>, but if he continues to stay 'cause he's having fun.

And that's, that's the big thing for him.

He says, as long as I'm, if these new cars suck to drive, like I'm out.

And it was also interesting, you know, there, I think it was in the cool down room and he was talking to Oscar and it was funny 'cause both of them were like, thank God this era of car is done , dude, every one of them.

It's hilarious how much they all hate those things. Like,

It's so funny though, because, Which is because considering they're like breaking track records and they're the fastest they've ever been, but they're all like, they are heaps of <inaudible> to drive.

This is why they're so torn.

Like everyone says, like, we're gonna miss what it does in the high speed corners, but we're not gonna miss the size, the weight, the purposing, the, the ride quality.

'cause you gotta be so stiff and all this stuff.

They all love like a couple corners of the whole year.

Mm-hmm . It's like, oh, that's, we're gonna miss that.

We're gonna miss turn one at Suzuka with this thing, you know, we're gonna miss pong, we're gonna miss, you know, certain corners.

But yeah, I think fundamentally everyone's happy to see the back of it.

Yeah. Until the 26 car shows up and we'll see.

Maybe it's just so much less fun to drive.

They're like, I'd rather have a broken back and, uh, and get back to Porpoising, but have a good car.

Yeah. So anyway, congrats to Lando. Um,

Congrats to McLaren. I mean,

Congrats McLaren Huge what it was three years ago that they were like DFL in Bahrain and like Break setting on fire couldn't finish, runs Really bad, really bad.

And like last year it was a huge turnaround and a huge step.

And this year to be constructors and drivers champions.

I mean that's, that's pretty incredible.

So hats off to, to old Zach And you can't, and you can't, um, talk about that without talking about Oscar as well.

You know, his, his season was incredible man, 30 year in the series, when you look at the jump that he made, seven wins, six polls, led the championship for 15 races and did, did an incredible job.

Like no major mistakes outside of Baku.

You know, had that drop a little bit of a drop in form at that certain run of tracks kind of through the Americas, right?

Which the team says is 'cause they were low grip and the car required something specific and low grip that Lando just was better at than he was.

And it all comes with time.

I mean, look at the jump that Lando has made from year three in the championship to now I think he's in his seventh season or whatever.

Yeah. So, you know, Oscar's potential is unbelievably high.

And um, and I thought he handled everything very well, given the circumstance.

It's tough to lead the championship for that long and not come away with it.

Nobody's ever led the championship for that long and not won it.

And the season is longer now than it's ever been.

So that maybe not a completely fair comparison.

Um, Lando also, this is an interesting one, which I didn't realize.

Lando was the fourth longest career before winning their first world championship.

Hmm. Like fourth longest number of races.

I think Rossberg was number one button was up there. Hmm.

And then I forget who the third one was.

Well it must have been Vel, right?

Because he had so many years at Toroso first.

No dude, he was only there for like a year and a half.

Was he all year one in the went and Monza and then got promoted?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right. Yeah. Um huh. Well,

Whatever it was someone else. I mean, but that's

Also, that's also just indicative of Formula One being you're only as good as the car you're in. So like, for sure

I, yeah.

And, and just the fact that he stuck with McLaren when Red Bull came calling at one point because he saw the, you know, the potential in the team and he just, he deserves it, man.

There's just, there's no two ways about it.

He deserves it a hundred percent. He's gonna be a great

champion, you know, in terms of for the sport.

'cause again, max rightly so and understandably, he doesn't really care and he's not gonna go above and beyond.

He is not gonna do all the extracurriculars, whatever.

But like Lambos fan base is, is rabid and passionate in the right demo.

He's gonna be willing to go on the cover of GQ and you know, kind of help.

He's just gonna represent the sport, I think in a good way to a good demo and help grow it. Yeah,

Yeah.

You know, it really needs some growth and it really needs, it needs some, some momentum behind it.

You know, it's, it's sad to see it struggling like it is, you know.

So thank God, you know, Orlando's gonna go on the cover of GQ because, and my concerns there , I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say, that was a little sarcastic.

Do you think he could go on the cover of gq?

Like for IndyCar? .

We just need him to have one interview where he says he'd love to try IndyCar one day.

Let's, uh, let's close out, let's close out Abu Dhabi and F1 with, um, some big news that came out today, uh, being Tuesday.

Um, helmet Marco, who has been a stalwart of Red Bull racing and the Red Bull Driver Development program.

And really everything Red Bull racing related since they started, um, racing and not just making energy drinks, uh, was released one year early from his contract.

Um, and not entirely surprised.

Um, you know, Helme has his, his way of doing things and he's, he's, he's very much states things as he sees them with very little filter.

Um, which is part of the reason why I think he had such a huge eye for success and talent in, in young drivers is because there was no bull.

He didn't mm-hmm . Listen to the bull.

He didn't care about anything other than what his mind and gut was telling him.

Um, so it is probably one of his greatest strengths.

But anyways, he won't be a part of, of Red Bull F1 going forward.

So pretty big, pretty big shake up there over the past six months, isn't it?

Big shift. Big shift. Yeah. Yeah.

He's been there since the beginning and you know, he's the guy that found Vel.

He's the guy that convinced them to put Tappin into an F1 car at 17 years old.

You know, he's the one that rolled some dice in a big way.

You can look at it the other way too.

I mean, I think ISI read today in one of the articles, like he helped bring 21 different drivers into Formula One, including the likes of Tappin, Vel, whatever.

But you can look at it the other way. Of those 21,

there's probably 10 that you forget.

Were even in Formula One because Antonio Luzi, Scotts Christian Clean, you know, Christian Clean.

Yeah. Like Robert Thorn boss, you know, like good guys.

But they, that, that program was a little hectic at times.

And also actually let's, let's, let's not close out the Formula One stuff yet because keep on the Red Bull theme.

They finally announced their driver lineup for their two teams next year.

So Ec Cajar got the promotion to Race to Red Bull, which I think was pretty, pretty, that What it is. It's eac.

Yeah. Yeah. So it's, I get like,

that's how he says it.

Right. Well, but he also, he's, he's also like,

but I get that, like for English speakers it's is, it's Isaac, so he doesn't really carry either way, but I don't know, I heard him say it in interview, so I was like, nah, it doesn't, it doesn't sound weird, you know, like if you try to say, I'll put it this way, if I'm gonna say Char La Claire and not Charles la Clarke, I, I can say ISAC instead of Isaac.

But yeah, so Haja gets the promotion sort of, uh, understandably.

And then, yeah, Lynn Blad was again expected to be promoted to the Racing Bulls car from F two, which he was.

And they have opted to keep Liam Lawson and let Yuki, well not let him go, I guess reposition him, repurpose him to a, uh, reserve driver role for Red Bull.

Interesting. I know we've discussed

RIP Eza .

Dude, you have to wonder, you have to wonder what's gonna happen. Is it really

A wonder at this point?

No. You, you lean on, if you're him, you lean on the fact

that there's a new regulation coming, even though the pre 2022 cars, the pre-ground effects cars, he did the same thing to all his teammates.

So like, if he does it again, this came up, right, this conversation was happening over the weekend.

We, we basically did the math.

And if you go through all of his teammates since Ricardo, the average deficit in qualifying is like right at half a second.

And it's, it doesn't alban who's, you know, that's insane.

A team leader at Williams Gly who's got a long-term deal and a team leader at Alpine, like Checo who everybody thought was <inaudible> and is now like, oh my God, he actually was the best of the bunch and is now lead team leader at a brand new startup organization.

Like it's Max is just that good guys.

And it's going to be very interesting to see because all the chatter about these new regs and uh, extra work the drivers are gonna have to do in thinking about things like energy management and the drivers that have extra bandwidth to, to deal with that Max's advantage is gonna grow.

Mm, it's gonna grow with next year's car.

Whether his car's gonna be any good or not is irrelevant in terms of the inter team battle or intra team battle with, uh, with Jar.

So yeah, I mean it's gonna be an interesting, interesting program. Um, I mean

His car, his car might not be good, but at least he's gonna have some American ponies behind that thing. ,

I mean the engine's built in England by Red Bull Technologies, but Ford's gonna Slap a badge on it.

Blue, blue badge bro. Blue. It is gonna have a, it's

Kind of a badge on it.

Mm. It's gonna have that eco boost. It's gonna be ripping.

Wait, aren't you a Chevy guy? What do you ?

That's true. I'm a big Chevy guy. But

You know, there's a GM product that's gonna be on the grid.

Well, not engine wise, I guess not Next year. That's

True.

That's true. So wait, do we think

that Yuki should be looking at IndyCar?

I mean, does he want to enjoy his life again?

No, not yet. 'cause he keeps saying

that he's not done an F1, so no, he'll do the one year of a reserve driver role. Here's

The thing.

Yuki, Yuki wouldn't like IndyCar at least immediately 'cause he couldn't wear his pants that he likes to wear. 'cause people would, I mean,

You could wear his pants, make a lot Of fun of him.

Nah, it's, you know, it's, it's called fashion. Look it up Alex.

Could you imagine? Okay, so let's,

let's just be honest, all right.

There's one seat left in IndyCar.

Mm-hmm um, we all know who that is. Honda Power team.

Can you imagine, can you imagine he shows up and his attire to Dale Coin racing, uh, to the shop. I'd chuckle

If he walks into the track with a, with a Sonny's barbecue bag and his parachute pants.

Listen, um, I would love it because I think he is potentially the funniest guy on, he's a personality and he's obviously very good despite anything that has happened to him in the past six months being Max's teammate because he was destroying everyone that it was his teammate when he was at, uh, racing Bulls.

So, um, I think it'd be very cool.

But I agree with you that I don't think he's quite ready for that switch yet.

He's quite young.

Um, and it would not surprise me if he ends up back in a Formula One car at some point.

So that's my opinion. But it's cool to think about.

Well, yeah, I mean, based on all the other guys that Max has destroyed, they all ended up still having good careers after that.

So. 'cause they're not that bad.

They're not as bad as you think.

They're not as bad as you think Kaz man, it's wild, isn't it?

One guy just systematically dismantling everybody that sit beside him.

It's wild. I've never seen anything like it.

I never seen anything like it. I dunno,

is that what Paolo's doing right now?

I mean, if he keeps doing it, then yeah. Yeah.

I mean, is he dismantling Dixon? Yeah.

Four championships in the last five years to got zero.

It's not, it's not a great look.

Hey. Yeah, but I still don't,

I don't feel like anybody's sitting there laying like, eh, we should get rid of this Scott kid. He's no good anymore.

No, for sure. Because the, because the difference is is

like in IndyCar, the cars are all good.

So Scott Dixon, who is still a good driver, is still winning races and competing in top three in the championship, right?

Think, I think we do. But like when Red Bulls car's not

great, max just out drives it and everyone else is struggling in the, in the teens.

Yeah. Yes. So it's not the same.

Yeah. Agreed. Agreed.

Wild times guys. Well that's F1 done for guess what?

Uh, like less than 90 days before <inaudible> back on track, Dude.

It's fi it's 56 days I think to the first test from the end of Abu Dhabi.

And like they were, they're testing right now, like they're doing the young driver test and like the 2026 test today or yesterday, whatever day we're recording. Um, well

They better watch out because Indie lights is testing at the Miami track. So

That's, how's that?

I didn't realize it was like a track the rest of the year.

Neither did I. And also to What end

Also, why was that not provided as an option to IndyCar?

A hundred percent. Where's the

preseason 'cause test for IndyCar Phoenix. Oh

Yeah, that makes sense.

No, but like I would like that to be an option for, you know, it's hard to find road courses to test that in the winter.

Mm-hmm . In America. Mm-hmm .

Coda is very unreasonable from a price standpoint. Mm-hmm .

Mm-hmm . Um, we've all talked about our pros

and cons with Sebring.

Mm-hmm . Um, so a real road course

in Miami would be interesting. Mm-hmm .

Mm-hmm . But I, it's funny that like

that's a road course quality track for us. .

Right? Probably better than most.

I mean, definitely better than some.

What are you, what are you doing? You absolute doorknob.

Um, alright, so what, uh, what does your weekend look like, Alejandro? Well

Obviously I'm heading to Charlotte.

Mm-hmm . She's moved there. ,

I'm, I'm amazed you don't have like, at least a two bedroom condo uptown. Yeah.

Yeah. Um, and then it uh,

is our good friend Connor Daley.

And uh, I don't know if you've heard of him, James Hinchcliffe joint birthday party. Um, which,

Which Tim is not coming to Tim.

It was un invited to. I was

Invited.

I just said you're not coming. I

didn't say you weren't invited. I

Know.

Well, no, Alex said I wasn't invited.

Oh. And so that, that's gonna be my weekend.

I love that. I love that. I'm looking forward to it.

We have quite a little night planned, few different stops.

I'm excited. Um, should be fun man. Should be fun.

'cause Connor's birthday is the 15th. 16th. 15th.

Well, good. Um, that's, that's good.

That is, that is a big part of the weekend.

Uh, the rest of my week and weekend is done packing because, um, we're moving, which we'll talk about next week 'cause we're outta time.

And, uh, then we'll cover Nashville and she'll be good.

And Lord knows we have nothing to talk about next week.

So, but we'll still have more F1 stuff to talk about before we have any more stuff to talk about. ,

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