Live: BTCC legend Jason Plato as you've never heard him before #282
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Concept
BTCC
BTCC stands for the British Touring Car Championship, which is a popular car racing series in the UK. It features regular cars that have been modified for racing.
Car
Renault 5
The Renault 5 Turbo 3E is a new electric car that has a lot of power, making it very exciting to drive. It's based on an older model called the Renault 5, which was popular for its fun design.
Term
EV
An EV, or electric vehicle, is a car that uses electricity to run instead of gas. This makes them better for the environment and can save money on fuel.
Car
Porsche 911 Turbo S
The Porsche Taycan Turbo S is a fast electric car made by Porsche. It's known for being very powerful and fun to drive, even though it's electric.
Car
Porsche Taycan
Concept
Formula One
Formula One is a type of car racing that features very fast cars and takes place on special tracks. It's one of the most popular and prestigious racing competitions in the world.
Concept
Renault Spider Series
The Renault Spider Series was a racing competition where all cars were the same model, the Renault Spider. This type of racing focuses on the driver's abilities since everyone has the same car.
Concept
Formula Euro Renault
Formula Euro Renault was a type of car racing for young drivers using single-seat cars powered by Renault engines. It helped drivers gain experience and move up to more advanced racing categories.
Concept
Formula 3
Formula 3 is a type of racing series where drivers compete in small, fast cars. It's often where new drivers start their careers before moving to bigger racing leagues like Formula 1.
Car
Renault Sport
The Renault Sport Spider is a small, fast car made by Renault that was used in racing. It was very light and handled well, making it fun to drive.
Car
Ford Freestyle
The Ford Freestyle is a type of SUV that has a lot of room inside for families. It's comfortable to drive and good for everyday activities.
Car
Honda Passports
The Honda Passport is a roomy SUV that's great for families. It can handle rough roads and has a lot of space inside for passengers and their stuff.
Brand
Williams
Williams is a famous racing team from the UK that competes in Formula One and other racing events. They are known for their history of winning races.
Concept
super touring era
The super touring era was a time in racing when cars that looked like regular cars were modified to compete in races. These cars were often very fast and had a lot of support from big companies.
Company
TWR
TWR stands for Tom Walkinshaw Racing, a team that was involved in many types of car racing. They were known for making fast cars and competing at a high level.
Term
trick cars
Trick cars are cars that have been changed or improved to make them faster and better for racing. These changes help them perform better on the track.
Term
light cars
Light cars are vehicles that weigh less than usual. Being lighter helps them go faster and handle better when racing.
Concept
F1
F1 stands for Formula 1, which is a type of car racing where very fast cars compete in races around the world. It's known for having the latest technology and exciting races.
Term
tire wall
A tire wall is a barrier made of tires that helps keep race cars safe if they crash. It absorbs the impact and protects the driver from getting hurt.
Term
front-wheel drive
Front-wheel drive means that the front wheels of the car are the ones that get the power from the engine. This helps the car grip the road better, especially in bad weather.
Term
space-frame cars
Space-frame cars have a skeleton-like structure made of beams that hold everything together. This helps keep the car strong without adding too much weight, allowing for different shapes and better performance.
Term
normally aspirated engines
Normally aspirated engines take in air naturally without any help from a turbo or supercharger. This means they work by just using the air pressure around them, which can make them easier to understand and maintain.
Term
six-speed sequential box
A six-speed sequential box is a type of car transmission that lets you change gears quickly and easily, one at a time, without having to use a clutch pedal like in regular cars. It's often used in race cars to help them go faster.
Term
budget
A budget in racing is the amount of money a team has to spend on things like building and maintaining their cars and paying their staff. More money usually means better cars and more chances to win.
Brand
Nissan
Nissan is a Japanese car company that makes many different kinds of cars, including electric ones.
Brand
Volvo
Volvo is a car company from Sweden that is famous for making safe and reliable vehicles.
Concept
British Touring Car Championship
The British Touring Car Championship is a popular car racing series in the UK where regular cars are modified for racing. It features exciting races and has been around for many years.
Concept
Le Mans
Le Mans is a famous car race that lasts for 24 hours. It's known for having fast cars and is a big deal in the racing world.
Concept
Formula 1
Formula 1 is a top-level car racing series where teams compete in fast cars on different tracks. It's famous for its exciting races and advanced car technology.
Car
Chevrolet Corvettes
The Chevrolet Corvette is a fast and stylish sports car from America. It's famous for its speed and has been around for a long time, making it a popular choice for car enthusiasts.
Car
Plymouth Cricket
The Plymouth Cricket is a small car from the 1970s that's easy on the wallet. It's simple and practical, making it a good choice for people who need a reliable vehicle.
Car
Porsche 911
The Porsche 911 is a well-known sports car that looks really cool and drives fast. It's been around for many years and is loved by people who enjoy driving.
Car
Porsche 911 GT3 RS
The Porsche 911 GT3 RS is a super-fast sports car made for racing. It's lighter and more powerful than regular 911s, which makes it really exciting to drive on a racetrack.
Car
Porsche 911 Turbo
The Porsche 911 Turbo is a super-fast version of the regular 911 sports car. It has a special engine that helps it go even faster, and it's designed for people who really love to drive.
Car
Daihatsu Applause
The Daihatsu Applause is a small, affordable car that was made a long time ago. It's designed to be practical and easy to drive for people who want something simple.
LIVE
Welcome back to the podcast, everybody. This is episode 282. This one's a bit different. It's a live podcast recorded a couple of weeks back in London with BTCC legend Jason Plato. It's actually quite an important episode, I think this one. The first half, first two thirds of the chat, a fairly typical interview style with Jason talking about his career in race.
And then it sort of turns and it goes off in a slightly different direction, but an important direction. And Jason reveals what the last few years have been like for him. And he also talks about what's next for him. So a few days after we recorded this episode, Jason announced publicly that he is returning to the BTCC next year as a team owner. He's not going to be driving, but he will own.
He wasn't ready during the recording of this episode to announce that, so he eludes to it, but he doesn't say specifically what the news is. So we do now know that that's what it is. He's returning to the BTCC as a team owner, but not a driver. But it's around then that Jason talks about the challenges that he's had in his life over the past few years. He talks about his mental health. And that's the bit that's really important.
So I hope you enjoy this conversation. I hope you enjoy hearing his old racing stories, but listen all the way through. And I think it'll be quite moved by the sort of final third of this episode.
There is some choice language in this one. We've decided not to bleep it out so you have been warned. I'm really pleased with the way this interview went. And I'm so grateful to Jason for being so open and honest and forthcoming. So let's go on with it. Enjoy this episode. Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another TI live podcast evening. First of all, thank you so much for coming here. I know some of you live in town. I know a lot of you don't. It's massively appreciated.
Yeah, we're going to have a funny evening. Thank you as much to Renault for making this all possible. They opened this store this afternoon. I was at a press conference here at about three o'clock where we got all the details about what this is about.
They wheeled out this amazing thing and this exceptionally good thing. And we are grateful to everybody at Renault who has helped provide the venue, the cars, the food, the beer, the wine, the everything else.
So thank you for that. And we have a podcast to get on with and to record. So we have a guest who will be sitting there in a minute. He doesn't need any introducing from either of us, but Dan is going to do it anyway. I will.
Two BTCC championships, 97 BTCC race wins, 23 seasons in the BTCC and a long career on television. It can only be Jason Plato.
Radva Plaus, please.
Right, do not swear. I hope there's gin in there.
Funny enough there is. I can't drink. Well, I can have one of us a wine, but then it just I get the thing I'm just going to go a bit wonky.
Yeah, so I can drink. You go wonky on that. You're amongst friends. I know, I know. Well, Jason.
Hi everybody. Welcome to this, the in school of podcast, this live podcast. Thank you for being here. I just have you had a good chance to have a look at this car behind us.
And an old nemesis of mine, Ivan. Well, I think that might be a signature on the side there.
I know he's done some trouble. I think there's something I was going to put on it.
I know he's done a bit of money's in this. And you know, we will speech. We think about rivals and friends.
Yeah. And what rivals to turn into? But I'm okay with the van there. And he says absolutely extraordinary.
Yeah. This is mental for the. They're going to make it on the road. They are. They are for the benefit of the recording.
There is a Renault 5 turbo 3e in the room, which is this fully electric 550 odd horsepower lunatic of a thing.
And yes, they're going to make them for the road 135,000 pounds. They are going to build them for customers.
Renault has a long history of building nutty hatchbacks for the road. The five turbos, the groupie cars from the 1980s,
the Clio V6s of the 2000s. I think this is probably the maddest of the lot.
I can't wait to have a go. And maybe you can learn us your long term.
Of course, of course. But you've also been knocking about in that haven't you?
And I think that everybody who's subscribed to TI knows that I'm not just saying this because we are in Renault's company this evening.
That is the best car of its type that exists at the moment. If you want an affordable small EV hatchback, it's that.
It really is. Do you can car?
Well, I saw this at Munich Motor Show maybe four years ago.
Yeah.
We just started doing fifth gear recharge, which was...
Go on.
Nobody's listening.
I'm a petrolhead, okay, throwing through.
However, my opinion of electric cars changed after doing the recharge thing because guess what?
I slagged them off, but never really been in any of them.
And when you get in some of the cars, I mean, you know, the only one I liked until I sat in that was the Porsche Taycan Turbo S.
Yeah.
Obviously.
But they're all a bit kind of...
I think most of the electric cars in the market, they're like fridges. They're like white goods.
They're dull, they're uninspiring.
And I saw this four, four years ago and it had a denim roof.
And it looked knock out.
And it was a big concept car.
I can't distinguish that from what I saw.
Yeah.
It's a great big kit.
Honestly, you know, I know I've got a long history with Redneum and their great friends.
If it was shit, I'd say so because that's the way I am.
I loved it. I had it for two days.
And I've been on to the people at Redneum at the back of the room saying that I want one, a long term.
Obviously before that one.
I think if you're in the city, it's a great better kit.
It's fun. It's fun inside.
It does what it says.
It's cheap as chips really, if you compare it to the EV market as a whole.
I think it's great.
And you can pull birds in it.
And you will know us or no of us, or three of us, to know that we really are not just saying that.
Well, let's stick with Renault for a moment.
You mentioned it yourself.
You do have a long history with Renault.
To what extent do you owe your professional racing career to Renault?
I owe a lot to Renault, but I owe an awful amount to bless him.
He's not here. Tim Jackson.
He was the PR man when I started in Formula Redneum in the early 90s.
And we just clicked.
And all the way through my single-seat city career, when I ran out of money and my dream of Formula One went the other way.
I mean, I would have been quick enough, but would I have been disciplined enough?
I very much doubt it.
Trust me.
So actually, the right thing happened.
But, you know, Tim and all the people at Renault UK were always great supporters of mine.
And, you know, they tried really hard.
You know, I entered the one-make-see series, the Renault Spider Series in 96.
But before that, you'd done what they called Formula Euro Renault or something?
I did a championship in 1991.
I won the Formula Redneum European Championship, yeah.
And that was all the Formula 3?
Yeah.
Yeah, kind of, yeah.
Yeah, kind of.
So I was on my way.
But what they didn't realise was, you know, I talk a big game.
And I'm really good at telling lies about how much cash we had.
And we didn't have anything.
And eventually, he's found out and I was fired from a Formula 3 team,
because guess what?
The checks didn't arrive for me to them.
And, you know, that's the hard, cold reality of motorsport.
And it's getting worse, because the budgets are just going ridiculous.
You know, when I was looking at a Formula 3 budget in 1992,
it was quarter of a million quid, which was mental.
And that was the best seat.
And what would that be today?
1.2 million quid.
For a season of Formula 3.
Yeah, season 4.
To buy your way in.
Yeah, it's bonkers.
And, you know, the country is littered with very, very tasty.
I mean, you know, Kelvin Bird.
One of the best racing drivers I've ever sat behind and watched.
Yeah.
He's not doing anything now.
Such a shame.
But that's the hard, factuality of motorsport.
You know, it's...
I have to be careful, I say, because his lady's in the room.
But, you know, there's that great expression.
You're going to be pissed with the dick you've got.
And motor racing is very much like that.
Sorry to lower the tone, but I think you understand what I'm saying.
You know, a lot of it is about the kit.
A lot of it is about the team you're wearing.
Yeah.
And they're experienced in the engineers.
But that's not to say you can't...
You can't get through that and find a way.
But it's fairly, very difficult, very difficult.
So Renault did hand you a lifeline after your single-seater career.
Very much, yeah.
With the Renault Sport Spider Series.
Yeah.
1996.
You won it.
You won almost every race that season.
And that was enough to get you a test.
With Williams in the Laguna for the VTCC.
Yeah, I mean, I can remember when Team Jackson called me and said,
or, look, JP, you're fancy doing this to Renault Sport Spider.
One makes serious.
I went to Team Glutt Stop.
I'm a Formula 3 driver.
He said, well, you're not, because you've got no money.
So best have a look at this.
But I was at a crunch point in my career,
where that was...
That was the crossroads.
I either go down there,
take a huge risk and go backwards a few steps.
Where, if I won everyone would say, well, of course he should do.
But if I didn't win, then that was the end of it.
Yeah.
That was the end of my career.
So it was just a bust for me.
It was shit, shit, shit.
I remember Team saying, well, please look at it.
You know, we're going to put a big PR behind it.
And I was pushing and pushing away.
And he said, just so you know,
the winner of the series will get a test that Williams in their works.
BTCC Laguna.
And also, don't repeat this,
but Will Ho is out of contract at the end of the year.
And he won't be resigned.
Not because he's done anything wrong.
God bless him too.
And there was a hole.
And that's when I went, tell me more.
And it became a strategic thing.
And you didn't get the drive, did you?
No, I didn't get the drive back.
Well, I did in the end.
Yeah.
I wanted to hear that story.
I read your book,
and I'm not to be a racing driver.
And he's dead through that.
The story.
Don't copy me, because it'll go wrong.
Yeah.
But we'll come to that.
But the story of how you were turned down.
You did really well in the test,
but there were two other drivers.
But they didn't get, so I know they did that.
No.
So they turned down everybody.
Well, no, that's not, that's not strictly true.
I did a test as part of winning the Spider Series,
which was a bit of a PR thing itself.
Okay.
I had a real intention behind it to give you a drive
that the test went well.
There was a Renault's perspective.
Renault really wanted me to get in that seat,
but it was Frank's decision.
Yeah.
And on paper, I didn't fit in with their plans.
You know, I wasn't well known.
I certainly wasn't next F1 driver,
or in the case of Jean-Christophe Bourbouillon,
there, for an on-test driver.
I don't remember going down having a great meet meet
Frank, I met Patrick, and Loddy-Doddy-Doddy.
And I remember Frank saying, look,
there's nothing you could have done, actually.
You don't feel bad, but it really isn't a drive.
You haven't got the profile, all that sort of stuff.
And I remember leaving there.
Well, it's full of hell.
I just thought, this is shit.
You know, what more do I need to do?
And it's stewed on me for about a week and a half.
Plenty of booze.
And I just woke up one more and I thought, I'm not having this.
So I marched down there.
And because I've been there like 10 days before,
I mean, you never know.
So every time, you know, in that situation rises,
you put your best foot forward.
And you know, I made friends with security guards on the gate.
You know, I saw stuck the two secretaries on reception.
I just made an impact with everyone.
So when I've actually broke into the site,
when I went to go and doorstep at Frank.
And I literally did arrive there at 830, you know.
And it can only be described as a 90 day white Sierra
with not with knocky tapets.
If only it was my favorite color, which is hearing aid beige.
That's a great one.
That would have been it.
Or dog dick red.
That's another great one.
You know, I rocked up there.
And I wallsed in because I got through security.
I got to the front desk and the girls said,
Oh no, Jason, you had to do Frank.
Oh, yeah, I'm actually, yeah, yeah.
We'll just have a seat.
I thought, I mean, I mean.
And then the velociraptor, as we called it,
Nicola, which is Frank's PA march on the stairs.
I don't know.
Ten minutes later.
And I said, in back, back,
what are you doing?
You can't, I said, well, please, please, can I see Frank?
And she got, it didn't get heated.
But I knew I was welcome.
And she let one gem out.
Either she did it on purpose.
Or it was a mistake.
And she's waiting a time.
He's not in today.
And he's not until lunchtime.
And Frank had a, you know, everyone's familiar with Frank's,
his condition.
He had an apartment up on the third floor.
He's still there to this day.
So often he would be there overnight.
Anyway, he wasn't.
And she said, you wasted time.
And that gave me the opportunity to go, look,
I need to recoil here.
Because otherwise, I'll be arguing till 2030.
And I said, well, look, please, can you let Frank know
I've been and I'd like to speak to him.
Should you?
No problem.
So I then went and jumped to the car and drove.
It was always going to go out.
But then did another right turn and parked it under a tree,
where I could see the security gate and reception.
I thought I'd just stay here three hours.
I was there waiting and smoking and calling my dad.
And my dad said, well, I called a guy.
You might have come across a guy called Mike Knight
from Winfield Racing School.
No.
Wow.
Well, a lovely English guy.
The two brothers, Mike and Richard Knight,
ran what was called the Winfield L racing school in France.
And they had one dad won school at Paul Ricard
and what one at Manicore.
And up until that point, they had 27 Formula One drivers
go through their school.
And the great and the good.
And I went through through the school.
So Mike was a great supporter of my new Frank.
And Mike said, what are you doing?
I said, I don't know.
I don't know.
But I've got to see these three.
But then the specialist went down.
And I got the other side of it.
He said, mate, you just go for it.
So I was OK.
And then he's car arrived at security, not off.
I went chasing after him.
And that was the day that changed my life.
Yeah.
That is extraordinary.
And you got in front of Frank.
And presumably he admired the trutz part.
Well, I remember.
I've still got the suit now.
And it's a bit tight, if I'm honest.
But I can get into it.
And I had a briefcase.
A nice little brand briefcase.
And there was nothing in it.
I mean, nothing.
I thought I'd take it.
And I remember.
I remember.
What did you do?
And I remember running across the flower beds.
Because it kind of,
for those who haven't been to we,
where I was under the big oak tree,
there's security over there.
And then you come in.
And you drive past reception.
Reception over there.
Grass and ornaments and all sort of flower beds and stuff.
But from where I was studying,
it looked like Frank was going to was turning right
to go through a secret gate round the back.
So I just took after him like, like,
like Hussein Bolt across the flower beds.
Only for them to do it like a,
a U-turn and park on what,
what one of those little grass-cree areas.
So from my perspective,
it looked like grass.
So he was never going to park there.
And I can remember looking at Frank from say,
I know from here to maybe that back wall.
Little further.
And he's looking through the windscreen at me.
And I'm running over the flower beds.
Would he have known who you were?
Was he at the table?
Yeah, you know,
because I went for an interview within two weeks before.
Ten days before.
So he knew exactly who I was.
And of course, security would have known I was there.
So he knew, he knew also.
And he gave me this weird kind of look
as to say, what the fuck are you doing?
But then I'll know and I've been clotted by Frank
with my empty briefcase.
I mean,
he's slightly overly tight,
green Italian suit.
And I had to then go from a full blown sprint
to a casual walk
in probably six places.
And it probably looked to be cracked, to be honest.
So to make...
So much of what's going through a young,
young black's head at this point.
However, Hamish's doctor,
his nurse's aide,
was driving him.
I mean, I remember landing at the passenger door
like staring at him or Frank,
thinking, oh, fuck, they've got to get him out.
Yeah.
And that's no, you know, it's no mean feat.
And then Hamish opened the driver's side,
and they looked at me across the roof.
And he had just this look on his face,
which is friendly.
And I thought, are they?
It's all okay, they know.
Anyway, they've got Frank out,
the car, the potman is wheelchair.
And he hadn't said a word at this point.
He just looked at me.
He said, Jason, what, what, what are you doing?
I said to Frank, I just, please, can I five minutes?
He said, no, I'm busy.
And they started to wheel him off.
And I stood in front of him.
And this way it went on for maybe two minutes.
And I said, please, and I just begged him,
begged him, begged him in the end he gave in.
Wow.
And that then proceeded the most embarrassing moment of life
where I didn't know, but next to where the reception desk was.
So there's a secret lift,
where only Frank used, tiny little lift.
And Hamish then reversed him
towards the girls who kind of looked to me and said,
oh, you have to all step to him.
And Hamish then turned him around and started to reverse him
into the lift.
The lift was opened.
And I've kind of gone, there's no way I'm getting in there.
And he said, are you fucking coming or what?
Genuinely, excuse me for a minute.
But I'm now in the lift here looking at Frank.
Frank's knees are touching mine.
Frank's head's there.
And Hamish got this look on his face
where he's about to let rip.
He's just he can't contain himself.
That was awkward to say the least.
And then the little shit kept me out.
So his office for 40 minutes.
Right, right, too.
Yeah.
And Nick, the came out, scowled.
She said, do you want to see a coffee at the city?
I said to kitchen's that way.
I kid you not.
Because I lost the doorstep and beaten the gatekeeper.
And she wasn't, she wasn't very nice.
She was frosty.
And then I went and I sat down and said, look,
you've got five minutes, what do you want?
And I'm just begging you.
Did you have a plan at this point?
No, no, I'm picture.
No, no, no, no.
I'm trying complete freestyle.
And I mean, I was dying for a wee,
but I didn't want to leave the seat in case I missed my slot.
And I started to think, what am I going to say?
And then you just, you can't.
You can't rehearse that.
You just got to give it max.
And I did, and I gave it max.
And I even banged on the test.
I said, please don't give it to some failed F1 driver.
That's milking the gravy train the way down.
Give it to some young lad.
He wants it.
And he literally said, look, thanks a lot.
And I could see he had just this look of warmth through his face.
And Frank, as we know, Frank was a racer.
He loved all that sort of stuff.
Anyway, two weeks later, I get, well, in fact, less than two weeks.
Just over a week later, I get a call from Frank saying, Jason,
we've got to test it.
Snatterton next week.
And we'd like you to attend.
It's between you and Christophe.
Christophe, Leon, and Gianni Morbide, dolly.
We all get the same equipment fastest man.
We'll get the job.
That was you.
That was me.
Good on you.
You just wouldn't give up.
That's the point, isn't it?
You just wouldn't give up.
But if Frank had not given you that time, not given you that test,
what would have become of Jason Plater?
Well, it would have been a fighter pilot or a sex star.
I think it's fair to say the country would have been safe.
But I don't know.
I would have been selling things or...
Not racing cars for a living problem.
No, no.
Because I was at the end of my tether.
I just had enough.
I just thought this is stupid this game.
What more do I have to do to get an opportunity?
It's like any...
Life's unfair at times.
It's a very...
It's a shit experience being a young racing driver.
It really is because 99.99% of people don't get the chance to do it.
I mentioned Calvin Burb.
There's lots of other people in the industry.
It's almost like it's a drug.
I think it's fair to say we're all slightly on the spectrum.
Otherwise, we wouldn't be doing it.
Or otherwise, we would give in and go this too hard.
But a lot of the really talented lads keep going until they're mid-30s
and keep pushing and pushing and pushing and then realize,
what am I going to do now?
So you were 28 when you got that drive?
Yeah.
So clearly the F1...
Actually, there's a bit of a story about that.
I was actually 30, but the team thought I was 29.
And they knew because we went testing what one day after I got the drive.
They're like private jets.
The first private jet I'd be being in, I'm like, this is mint.
But you had to hand the passports to your passports team at manager.
And he clocked it.
He waited until it was my 30th birthday.
So I was 29, but he thought I was 28.
And he took a double-page spread out in all the sports.
And he found a picture of me looking a bit perplexed.
And he said, oh, this man's got a problem.
He can't remember his birthday. Happy 30th.
Rumble.
Yeah, yeah.
But that led to your debut in the BTCC.
And three seasons with Renault and Williams in the BTCC,
one of a bunch of races.
Was that the best era?
That's super touring era.
Huge teams, Williams, TWR, others, big budgets, big sponsors, big salaries.
Or without a deck?
Yeah.
The best cars?
Trick cars.
The cars were trick.
The cars were light.
They were nimble.
They were very high techy.
Williams, we even developed some stuff for the F1 team.
We did it with fiddle brakes.
I won't bore you, but it's mind warping.
And we developed this.
They said, well, can we use this?
And then it was banned immediately, because word got got out.
It was great.
There was enough budget there where they could do things properly.
And it weren't screaming and saving.
And the cars were brilliant to drive.
There were hard to drive.
There was lots of grip.
The tires were phenomenal.
There was a tire wall going on between two manufacturers.
I was going to ask, because you've come out of a history of single-seaters.
I was built racing cars.
And going into front-wheel drive cars based on production chassis.
Obviously, by that stage, the F1 dream was gone.
But you still enjoyed, despite that history,
you still enjoyed driving these production-based front-drive cars.
I did, but even though they were production-based,
they thought there's no resemblance to the shell of the race car.
I can speak candidly about it now.
They're all a bit bent, to be honest.
The roof was slightly cut down.
We're talking millimeters out of the A,
or not out of the A, but out of the B and the C.C.
It's just to put the rear wing two-mille up in the air.
That was the level of detail.
But there were space-frame cars.
And the shell didn't really form any structural part of the car.
It didn't form any rigidity, really.
It was just something you had to carve around with it.
It was a thing we carted around to make it look like a road car.
It's almost a silhouette formula.
Exactly, yeah, it was.
And the engines, you know,
back in those days were normally aspirated engines,
two-litre hours were tuned by Sademo in France.
Really good operation, but we were pushing them to the edge.
And, you know, the regulation said eight and a half thousand revs no more.
So of course, our engines were everything was tuned to eight and a half thousand revs.
If I did eight, seven and a down change,
it's fucked.
Came over.
Yeah.
It was broken.
And then it's like I'm called up in front of the big boys,
and given a right-rot-rollicking.
200 revs over.
It's very easy to do.
This is six-speed sequential box.
Eight, eight, eight, eight, five, seventy.
You've damaged it,
and it won't be as good for the rest of the race.
But everything was fragile.
You know, the tires were really peaky.
You know, wheel bearings were just to get the end of the race.
You know, everything was right on the edge.
And that made it great fun and interesting,
and very challenging for the driver.
Now they're a bit, they're like tanks now.
I know why, because the budgets back then, you know,
that my final year at Williams in 99, the budget was,
this is excluding tires,
because they were paid for direct-by-runner.
Excluding engines, because that was picked up directly by Renault.
The budget was 15 million quid.
And that's 15 million quid in 1999.
Yeah, it was a lot of money.
It's a consequently the series just imploded.
Of course.
It wasn't sustainable, wasn't it?
No.
That rule set.
No, and also, you know, the industry went through a big turning point where,
you know, Renault, Nissan,
joint forces, Ford, joint forces with Volvo.
So they were never allowed to compete against each other.
So, all of a sudden you've got half as many manufacturers,
and it just got ridiculous.
And they're worn by one way, we can't afford this.
And it was great when everyone was like 89 manufacturers.
It was fantastic, but yeah, it did get, you know,
it had to come to an end.
It's a shame, because it was amazing for me.
So in 2001 then, you won your first BTC.
Did you say, did you mention about my debut in the Renault?
Did you mention that?
I was going to come to that, but if now's an opportune time.
Where are you going to say that,
and my debut, I've got the pole position three times in a row,
the world's, well, my teammate,
the world's finest to drive in the world.
It's in here.
The pole position.
You did?
Yeah, David, where were you?
Was it Donington Park?
Hey, was it Donington Park?
It was, yes.
And did you all, were you also going to make mention that?
And my third pole, I'm now what,
what do you run the pilot thing today?
King Dick.
And I saw it on the grid.
You saw it on the grid?
Oh, yeah, it was so awesome, yeah.
But that is extraordinary.
And do you know, I will come back to that,
because I want to ask you a specific question about that.
But you won your first championship,
actually, with Voxel in 2001.
And I believe you were fired from that drive the same day.
Yes.
How does that happen?
It's called politics.
Did the, I want to hear that story.
Oh, it's called me being a asshole.
Yeah.
Or a mixture of both.
It was politics.
It was politics.
And do you, on reflection,
does the politics add some enjoyable drama and fun to motorsport
or would you rather be away with it altogether?
One of the reasons why I wanted to retire
was I just had had had enough in politics.
So it didn't go away over all those years
that you were doing it?
No, because I understand the value of it.
I understand to be involved.
And, you know, there's 10 races, 10 events a year,
which go from April to mid-October.
So we got a lot of spare time, but guess what?
It's, it's in my mind running around.
The moment I go to sleep and the moment I wake up,
it's their 24 hours of every single day.
And it needs to be like that.
Otherwise, you miss tricks.
And so it's never ending.
And the problem is when you get,
when you get a bit older and you've been around the industry
and the game so much,
and you really truly understand it,
I just can't be asked to brown nose anymore and play the game.
I just like, oh, it's ridiculous.
So I was actually making it harder for myself
by not being slippery and, you know, I just couldn't be on it.
But did you understand in 2001 where you went?
Here you go, guys.
Here's the championship.
And they went, thanks Jason.
See ya.
Well, I knew it was coming because I'd broken,
I'd broken the rule in my first year with Voxal.
Which was?
Well, which was,
I, they had a contract with the Van Mullenmuller
on a multiple year contract.
And I said to them, look,
I don't mind being a number two to a Van in year one,
but that means if we're right at the end of the Czech championship
and he's slightly ahead,
when it becomes mathematically not impossible,
because that's ridiculous,
but when it becomes mathematically unlikely,
I'm going to beat him.
Of course, I'll support him.
And that was on,
that those were the contractual terms I signed.
And year two would be all bets are off.
I was leading the championship going into the Thruxton
and they made me pull over for a fact.
Ah.
And I did it.
And you did?
I did it, because guess what?
I'm being paid to be there.
I'm an employee.
But I didn't do it very nicely.
Yeah.
And I was like,
did you do it quite visibly?
It was extremely visibly.
Yeah.
I was about eight seconds in the lead,
like kicking everyone's ass,
and last lap I came out of the chicane,
put me in the cateron
and literally slowed the crawl and started waving.
And then took our bathroom again.
And that went down like a lead balloon,
because voxel didn't were unaware of that.
There were underway that that was going on behind the scenes.
And it makes them look silly, doesn't it?
Well, voxel were furious at the teams.
So then I've then put myself,
I'm now in a limb.
And it was all to do with the contractual clauses
which Yvonne had in his contract,
which said that if his teammate did beat him,
there will be a financial penalty.
Oh, we're not talking about a 20-30 grand.
We're talking big numbers.
And in my, in the 2001 series,
there was all sorts of bad stuff going on.
Lawyers were at races.
I mean, it was just ridiculous.
Best man more, obviously.
Clearly.
So you were...
Here we go.
I told you we'd come back to it.
You were fast right away in a go-kart
up against some future F1 World Championships.
World Champions.
Yeah, in fact.
Fast right away in single-seaters.
Fast right away in touring cars, as you say.
Pole, pole, pole, from your debut,
which is remarkable.
Now, I'm sure you're proud and grateful
for the career that you did have.
I'm sure we've all been hugely entertained
by the British Touring Car Championship.
But did your talent actually deserve the world stage?
Arguably, yes.
But...
Well, definitely, yes.
But I'd go back to what I said slightly facetiously
that they didn't know earlier.
I'm not a goat, the gym sort of bloke.
I'm, you know, I'm maverick.
I say what I like.
And back in, back in my day.
You know, all the drivers which were getting there,
there weren't me.
They were homogenized.
Not saying they're not brilliant drivers.
But they were just not real.
And it was all bullshit.
And it was all saying the right things
to befriend this bloke, to befriend that.
That's just not me.
So, would I have been disciplined
and roughly got the gym every day,
without a doubt?
No way.
Would that have been peed in my performance?
Without a doubt, yes, it would have done.
And, you know, if you think to back to...
Okay, let's go back to Susanna.
He moved the game on considerably
with personal health and diet and all the rest of it.
And commitment.
And then Schumacher came along and moved it on again.
And, you know, Schumacher, Michael,
was a contemporary of mine in karting.
And literally on his day,
and he didn't have many in karting.
But when he had his purple patch,
we'd best go up.
And it was only a little bit.
It was like two tenths of lap.
But he couldn't find it.
He just had something.
Yeah.
Wow.
And he truly was extraordinary.
And as he went through his career,
he managed to find the location of that purple patch.
And he could pull it out more often.
Yeah.
He just found his thing.
And he was extraordinary.
Would I have been as good as him?
No.
Because I didn't...
I wasn't disciplined enough to go there in the gym.
And, you know, eat quinoa and mung beans.
I mean, fuck off.
Did you ever...
When I was sort of looking through your career highlights
and there have been no shortage of them,
I was surprised to see that you've no history of sports car racing.
You know, you've never been to Le Mans.
Yeah.
Did you ever...
And you did 23 years in the BTC.
Did you ever think about changing tech
and going off even occasionally,
going off and just doing something completely differently?
And do you not now look at that and think,
maybe you still have plans to do Le Mans?
I don't know.
There are some races out there,
which I'd really love to have done.
But...
With that shout out.
With that, it's out.
Yeah.
One of the problems,
especially speaking about Le Mans,
you know, I desperately wanted to do that.
But pre-qualifying back in those days,
got in the way of BTC.
I was the...
You know, the big fish...
You know, a big fish in a small pond,
earning more than anyone else.
And I was quite enjoying that lifestyle,
very much.
Yeah.
And I'd built a career in the marketing world
around my motor racing in BTC.
And, you know, I did some racing in the world...
In the World Tour of Car Championship.
You know, Andy Prey has a very fine...
I mean, incredibly good racing driver.
Yeah.
No one knows who he is.
Yeah.
And that...
That's where the brass is.
And...
I'm motivated by nice things.
You know, I like to live in big houses.
And I like a hot tub.
And all that sort of shit.
And guess what?
Andy hasn't got those.
Or didn't have back those.
And I was in such a good place,
where I'd, you know, develop this character of mine.
This persona has been, you know,
dick dastardly of motorsports.
What's it, a persona?
It was a persona, yeah.
Was it an act?
A certain element of it.
It was, yes.
It was a...
It was an...
It was an expected of you.
It was an embed basement.
I mean, I'm a bit naughty.
You know, I'm a bit maverick.
And I want it to be honest.
I want it to be genuine.
Because that's how I want to live my life.
And I realize that actually there's more mileage in this.
Which means a longer career.
Because, you know, don't get me wrong.
We'd all...
All of us...
would do it for nothing.
Because we love it.
But the main reason...
That is the motivation.
So you're not one of the...
Because there are some drivers, I know,
who are actually that interested in cars.
What they want is to win.
And the car is merely the inverter commas vehicle.
Yes.
Which allows them to do that.
But you genuinely clearly always have just loved cars.
Oh, absolutely, yeah.
Yeah.
So, you know...
I mean, we would do it for nothing.
Because we love it, you know.
And I mention about being slightly autistic.
And I know I am.
Because I've done the tests and stuff.
It's the most important thing in your life.
And it's a passion.
And it's something which...
I mean, you know,
you bet Ben Ainsley or that amazing woman
who sailed the South Pacific on her own.
Alan MacArthur.
I mean, for goodness sake, that woman's offer.
Off her rocker, is she not?
But she's not.
She just loves that.
So it seems alien to us.
Yeah.
But the problem is once you then get into this commercial world,
that most of what I turned it into for me,
don't let go of that.
And if it's going well, you keep going.
So that ultimately hindered me doing other things like them all.
But to answer that question, I'd love to do it.
I'd love to do it more.
When I grow up,
would you say that, actually, as you say,
being on that spectrum, being slightly autistic
has actually helped you in your career?
Without that.
Nearly everybody I know in my world.
And we're talking about, you know,
everyone designers, aerodynamicists, engineers, technicians,
other drivers, business people,
golf people, chefs.
Everyone I've met, that is really successful in their world.
They're all on the spectrum.
Not one isn't.
And I honestly believe,
and there's also a lot of people who are on the spectrum,
which have got too much spectrum,
and it hinders their daily life.
Because they can't look people in the eye or one eye.
And I know a great deal about this,
because my daughter, my eldest daughter is on the spectrum
with lots of different acronyms
that have been labeled at her.
And she's just on the right side of,
on the edge of being,
ooh, that could be too much.
But all of those who have been incredibly successful
and are considered to be legendary in their field,
whether it be a businessman or a golfer or whatever,
they're all off the rockers.
Because it gives them focus
and it gives them a special power to get up.
That's single mining.
That's the gap.
I mean, can the clock have all the other stuff?
I mean, okay, let's throw something about it.
Loop littler.
Incredible talent.
I mean, do you think he's new record typical?
How can he be?
He throws darts.
He throws arrows at a dartboard for 20 hours a day.
Oh, look, okay, maybe that's bullshit.
15 hours a day.
Seven days a week.
And he's done it for 15 years of his life.
He's not, he's off his rocker.
But guess what?
That's what gives him.
Yeah.
That's what it takes.
Because that's what it takes to be really good at what you do.
Same with anyone who plays the music instrument.
You know, the best and they're often quite clunky people.
And honestly, I think it's a gift.
You know, how many people do we know which are
that are number blind or word blind?
So many gifted people.
So many successful people.
Jackie Stewart.
Famous.
There we go.
And it is a gift.
It just means that these people, my brother is one,
that they look at the world in a different way.
Different way, yeah.
It is a gift.
And it needs to be recognized as something.
I'll never forget.
I mean, I'm an only child.
You might know.
You might be.
You might be obviously not.
I don't know.
But I can't remember.
My mum was a British.
We used to love jigsaw puzzles when I was a kid.
And we had a way of doing it.
And that was she'd sort them all out.
We had middle for diddles.
And then we do the eight pieces.
And you get four little corners.
They go to the side.
And you build the edge first.
And then off it would go.
And you put colors over there.
And another color there.
Well, I started doing jigsaw puzzles before we knew about my
linear.
Well, she was about four, five years old.
And she was having none of that.
She's no, no, I don't want to do it that way.
I'm like, I know.
But that's an expert of this.
Yeah.
And she said, well, no, I'm not doing that way.
And literally, I remember that sat watching.
She'd literally go.
And it was like she was a witch.
It was witchcraft.
And it's because she sees the world in a very different
place than what we see the world.
Even things like it might take her a week to recognize
something she's seen and to articulate that.
So for instance, I know we have some friends come around
and say on a Sunday, the following Friday she goes,
oh, do you remember shoes?
Do you remember rob shoes?
I go, what are you about?
And it would be literally tangent.
I go, no, she went with the buckles,
right on the edge of the buckle.
She would notice some detail.
But it took five, six days for it to go through the process.
Yeah.
And literally, I remember a few years ago.
She's a bit mental.
But it's just the way she sees things.
And actually, we could all learn a lot from the,
you know, in the weird world of F1,
you'll know this.
In fact, you will learn too.
In Williams, they have a whole department where they try
and employ autistic non-neurotypical thinking people
in the aerodynamics department to just think outside the box.
Absolutely.
It's very clever.
And guess what?
They're the geniuses.
Yeah.
Because they're not constrained with the way the world is.
Processes and the way they...
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
They're the ones who can come at it from a completely different
direction that would never even occurred.
Absolutely, yes, too.
But in fact, if you, if you're in Europe,
when you came out of the idea, they'd march out the building.
You know what I mean?
One thing you were never really during your BTCC days
was a championship driver, right?
And what I mean by that is,
it was not your focus.
Alan Prost would, you know, the professor.
He knew exactly what he had to do to win that championship.
And he just had to finish fit in that race.
And he would do that.
So that's interesting, because Prost was a big inspiration for me.
Really?
But I didn't...
But I'm not wide like the he is.
Yeah, it's a different approach, isn't it?
And you can see it in your career stats.
Two championships.
Exceptional.
But there are guys out there with more.
Yeah.
But 97, maybe 98, race wins.
97.
90.
We'll call it 97.
Far more than anybody else.
Yeah.
And I think this is because you view the job of a racing driver
to win races.
Absolutely.
I'm not there to come to a second and there to win.
And that's it.
I can be honest about this.
With a bit of bad luck.
Get rid of that.
I would have had eight chat championships.
You had our set up for seconds.
You finished second or third in the championship 11 times.
And often by just a few points.
Can I make my kill a stat?
How much...
Can you remember how many BTCC races you did?
Not a clue.
I think it's about 650.
What I do know is that in any given BTCC race you did,
there was a one in three chance you'd end up on the podium.
Including all the ones you retired from,
all the ones that were in shit cars.
You finished on the podium in more than the third of the BTCC races
you ever did.
Which I think is extraordinary.
Please do that.
Above average.
Yeah, Joe.
I'm proud of that.
I'm proud that every year we went to...
First of all, Jordan McGregor.
Every year we went to the final races of the year.
I was in with a shout.
Yeah.
And I argued I could turn around myself.
Which of course all drivers couldn't go well.
Had this not happened.
Had that not happened.
But generally, you know, if I was second and there was a sniff of a gap
I'd have a go.
And it...
Often it didn't work.
And that would be bang, you know.
DNF.
Broken car.
Whatever.
Just the way I'm wired up.
I'm there to win.
And...
I can't...
Where's Colin Turkin?
There's a good parlor mine.
He drives very differently.
He drives very differently.
Very skilled, very natural, beautiful driver.
But he's quite happy with the third place.
He's happy with the fourth.
I think he's off his rocker.
What do you mean?
Like fourth is third loser.
Seconds, first loser.
But if you're on a car which isn't capable of winning.
And if you get that car as far up the grid.
Yeah.
As it's ever like you to go.
Is there not a certain pleasure in that?
Or are you still pissed off that you didn't win?
There's a little bit of pleasure.
But I'm still pissed off that I didn't win, yeah.
And, you know, that's probably to do with my upbringing
and karting the way my dad is and the way we went karting.
That winning is everything, you know.
I don't subscribe to this.
This view that, you know, it's about taking part.
Oh, fuck off.
It's not.
It's about winning.
It doesn't matter what you're doing.
If you're playing tennis or titty wings or cars.
It's a competition.
I might be wrong.
But that's how it, that's how it feels to me.
That's how you view it.
Yeah.
I mean, you see this sort of cheer for me too.
Yeah.
That's from Bathurst.
That was a good circuit, isn't it?
Oh, who's that good?
It's just me and Mark Skath at the hotel on the Saturday night.
Playing the game, you walk with two bottles
and you try and get one further up the road in the other.
On the bottle.
But A was as wild as, you know, it's about winning.
And that's just everything.
You probably need that, you need to have that drive.
Certainly, it's where 97 BTCZ races really do.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Can we talk rivalries?
You've had a few.
You mentioned Evam Muller.
Yeah.
Was Alan Menu, was that a rivalry or a...
Do you know it was a rivalry?
Yeah.
I mean, I have a normal suspect fellow.
And he taught me a talk.
You know, I was taught by the best, because when I joined in 1997,
he really was sublime.
And not just, you know, when he was in the car,
the way the way he interacted with his engineers,
or the way he read the data, and not all that.
Just the way he operated outside the car.
Guy was tricky.
And he would, you know, and him and his wife, his wife,
and Caroline, they'd just play it really.
They'd play a really tricky game.
And you need to be right on your game to understand it.
And that was my first, you know, my first exposure to that.
And I learnt a lot from that, actually.
I'll be forever grateful.
But he was sublime.
I mean, really a genius.
A genius in the car.
And the real rivalry, though, was Mr. Matt Neal.
Well, Evam was a pretty big rivalry.
I mean, Evam is an incredibly talented human being in the racing car.
But as a human being, he's an absolute asshole.
Okay.
And if Matt Neal walked in through that door now,
he's not going to be a big hug with me.
Ironically, I don't know if any of you saw the interview,
which me and Matt did with my great mate, Jot Johnny Smith,
on his late break show.
Honest to God, I set that up with Jot Johnny.
And my motivation to set that was to put in all the strokes
that we release, because it's my patch.
It's pictures of me around my cars there.
And there was still a bit of animal.
And I'm also there.
And bless him.
Jot Johnny put that to bed, actually.
And they spent all day together.
And we told ourselves a few truths.
Oh, you know what?
I was a bit of a shit then.
I shouldn't have done that.
Any festive to a few things.
And actually, you know, the last three, no one will know this.
But you know, the last three and a half, four years of my life
have been a bit shit to be honest.
And basically, I don't like any racing drivers.
I'm not there to be friendly.
I'm there to win.
And there are a few exceptions, like James Thompson
and Fabizio Giovanni.
I'm very, very good pals with them.
But most of them, I'm just not interested.
And I'll go out my way to push them away.
But actually, when Matt found out what was going in my personal life,
he generally reached out, like genuinely did.
And we were actually, you know, we're good pals now.
So sorry, I didn't just spell that, man.
But he's still a tall streak of piss.
Obviously.
But we were actually good mates.
And you know what?
I'm pleased with that.
Because, you know, we shared a bit together.
But it brought something to the BTC for all those years, didn't it?
That rivalry bit a needle between you.
It was good fun for all of us watching.
And we did rather up a bit.
Of course.
But generally, it was true.
We didn't like each other.
We didn't like each other.
And yeah, there was lots of high jinks.
I remember we were raised at Montello Park
and Stephen and his dad, which actually was a root of all eve.
Actually, Steve was a great, he would wind up Matt.
And they were complaining about something.
And we were taking the mic about something.
I technically, we'd found a loophole.
And they were kicking off.
But they had no evidence.
And I, I love a bit of a practical joke.
I shot off to mother care in Belfast in Dublin on the Saturday night.
I bought a pram and loaded toys.
And then I was there first thing in the morning.
And I just put it before the garage doors open, pit lane side,
put the pram over and put the toys out.
And just wait out there with all, with my photographers.
And they also had the garage doors out of the cell.
The toys out of the pram are they?
Steve went orbital.
No sense of humour.
No.
And that was just what?
There was nearly every weekend there was something going on beyond the scenes.
That was, you know, a bit kind of rubbing the nose in.
I mean, do you remember when Matt Neil had a fire at Silveston?
And he mumbled about the Silveston as the penultimate race.
He had a little pop off at the marshals publicly in the press.
That he wasn't fast enough.
One marshall fell over.
He was a bit overweight, but without them, we don't go racing.
Yeah.
And he had a right pop of them.
So me and my business partner went, ooh, there's an opportunity to turn the screw.
So we, with my association with Tesco,
we organised the proper pack lunch at Brannesites, the following races.
Hell, the big, big huddle down at the bottom of Paddock Hill,
when he got them all, he gave them all a 15-quid voucher.
And we got them all to shout at the top of the voices,
what our soul, so Matt Neil's were.
That was the level of...
...anx, which was going on.
So it's good fun.
It was a bit naughty at times.
Yeah.
But the funny thing was...
Gow loved it.
Of course.
And Gow, who runs a series.
But guess what?
I TV loved it more than Gow did.
A night TV...
You know, that famous where...
You know, I had a hell of money wanting to punch me.
And I was egging him on.
Warned me.
Because I knew that'd be it, he'd be out.
And we got called into the bus with Alan.
And we both got fine 10 grand,
for bringing the sport and to distribute.
And as we left it, the ITV people said, oh, that's great.
Can we do it again?
What?
Are you going to pay my fines?
So yeah.
But so there was a bit of revving up.
But by and large, it was...
Problem is there was me and Matt,
by and large, knocking lumps out each other every race weekend.
And we were always on the TV.
It was of course the focus was with us.
But honestly,
the driving further down the back of the good...
Mate, it was in a different league.
So dirty, so non-professional.
What we were up to,
was just a bit of a professional foul every now and just a rub and a tickle.
But because it was on the TV all the time,
we got labelled us being fruit cakes.
Did you buy that?
Wait, you don't, I know.
Right, you buy that.
But it's true, it generally is true.
So your...
Yours was a long career in the BTCC as we know.
You started at 28 towards it 29.
And you raced on in the BTCC until your mid-50s.
I just wonder,
what changes in that time in you as a driver?
Where do you improve?
Are there any...
Is there any decline?
That's Basel expedition.
Oh, that's been bummed I'm not answering that.
She's heard on the great run after I've done some stuff.
You'll be in trouble.
What changes, you say?
You know, the passion of being in the car,
that's unwavered.
You've done enough time in beautiful cars and race cars.
You've raced.
But on the green flag lap when you've got a chance to just clear your mind
and everyone clears the grid and you've got one up to get everything all sorted out.
It's a beautiful moment.
And you just...
You almost teleport yourself into a different place.
And your heart rate slows down, you get a system,
and you just get totally tuned in to what you're doing.
That never leaves you.
And that's lush, really, truly lush.
Arguably, definitely.
You know, your reactions are slowed down a little bit.
You might get overthinkative about it.
You know, when you get a young kid who picks up a golf club,
he just swings it naturally.
It's ugly, but guess what?
You wax the ball.
And then you get some 50-year-old bloke who's been playing golf all his life
and he thinks about it just.
And you just lose that.
I think you just lose that innocence rhythm,
which you found, which works.
And then you overthink it
and then you have a few results which aren't as weight
and you start pushing a bit harder.
And you just lose that lovely ride in the wave
and you end up, you smash into a wave.
And you ever think it.
And I think to a certain degree, if we look at Lewis Hamilton now,
I think that's probably what's happening to him in the mode.
He just certainly drives a racing car faster than anyone.
But he's just...
He's not going with the waves.
And I think you naturally would do that if you were a big young guy.
So are you one of those drivers
who wants to stop?
Once they stop, stay stopped.
Or are you one of those drivers?
I can remember, Jackie Stewart just found the idea of racing after you retired
because it would never be at that level again.
Completely anathema to him.
Because why would you? Why would you take those risks
when you'd already achieved everything?
And then there are other drivers that we could easily know
who just raced on and on and on.
Anything they could get into because they just love racing cars.
Yeah, well, I think I am like that, actually.
I am like Jackie.
She's been in a right pain and she's...
Should we share the issues to Steve?
Hello.
Hello.
Hello, this is an important information thing.
I'm blocked to more from doing that.
But apparently I haven't.
Sorry about those.
That's all right.
Stuart, I think I'm in the Jackie Stewart thing.
I've not...
After retiring from BTCC, which is my choice,
I've done a few of the historic races.
There's some lovely cars with some great powers.
I was going to ask you about that.
The responses.
And racing it, good wood, in that big block Corvette's testing
or even my great power mic.
It frightens the living day that exactly.
Really?
Is that more fun than a front drive too?
Yeah, BTCC.
It's a different mindset.
BTCC is a job.
It's very data driven.
There's no emotion, there's no fun.
Because we block that out with...
It's interesting, it's not fun.
Well, it's not fun because I don't know how it's to be fun.
I'm there to do a job.
And my relationship with my engineers and the team
is very different to what it will be if I was racing
and say, good, good wood.
Because they're having a giggle.
So you'd still do a good wood?
Oh, without a doubt.
And I love it.
I love it.
I guess the living day that's happening.
Yeah, good.
It should.
Yeah, and it should.
Yeah.
But competitively, I mean, I've got myself
in a potential sticky situation in the MSA actually.
Because I'm not applied for race sciences for two years.
I think they'll let you have one.
I think they might do it.
Well, I hope so otherwise.
Otherwise, I know where they live.
They've moved.
And you know what?
Like I said, I won't go into it much.
But you know, I've had three really shitty years, you know,
mentally, you know, with lots of stuff that's happened.
I just wasn't in the right frame.
I might have had some offers to go and race it.
A good wood in some Larry cars.
I just thought, yeah, well, I'm not feeling it.
And the last thing you want to do is get in a hairy ass.
If you're in the right frame, I might do it.
I'm not totally in tune with what's going on.
Yeah.
Because stuff can go wrong very quickly there.
And, you know, mortality, even though I've never thought about it at all.
I lost my cousin in a tour and car.
Keep Keith at all.
So, you know, death and destruction has always been around.
I've never thought about it ever.
Ever.
I do think about it now because I am.
Because I want to make the right choices.
And I don't want to, I don't want to not enjoy it.
I believe myself at risk.
I also got two girls, you know.
Yeah.
So here's a question for you.
My honest daughter, she's not long-term 17.
Do I teach her to drive a car?
Or do I stay well away?
Okay.
So you teach her to drive a car?
Or to drive a car?
And then a driving instructor teaches her how to pass a test.
So that's the options?
Oh, well.
That's what I did.
I taught my children how to drive cars.
And then instructors told them how to pass tests.
And they're not the same thing.
No.
But I want to do it the other way.
Because remember, this is my tricky eldest daughters.
We'll turn around and say,
it ain't made me time in your opinion, dad.
Don't know the wheel like that's why in your opinion.
Yeah.
So I've just decided it's the best thing to do.
Let the driving instructor, once you get the test,
then I'll take it up to Silicin or wherever.
And I'll teach her how to drive a car.
But even then, I'll get a bottle of vodka in that.
What, what, what do you know?
I said, well, actually probably not much now.
So you've, you've, you've had a tricky few years.
But I feel you're coming out of that now.
Yeah.
So what's next and why?
See now, I've got,
there's a really massive announcement coming up on Sunday morning live on the box.
It could be that I'm being living in a life of a transvestite for all of your years.
That's unlikely.
How can I say that these days?
You can't talk like that.
We'll find out.
We'll find out.
So anyway, I've decided I'm not going to say anything tonight,
because you know what?
This social media thing is a bloody nightmare.
And I don't know many people.
I know hardly anything.
I think I'm not a trustee.
Because what I'm about to say on Sunday is pretty groundbreaking stuff.
JP's back.
But he won't be in a car.
I think we'll leave it at that.
You can't give us,
can you, you can't give us a hint of it?
Or what has brought you to make this decision?
And yeah, yeah, I can.
I mean, you know, I, you know,
it's quite a topical subject at that moment.
And probably dear to all of us, actually,
with the people we know in our lives and stuff.
You know, us blocs are pretty shit at speaking about stuff.
And us blocs who have lived a life of being involved in motorsport,
where, you know, from a very early age,
I pushed a motion into the campus, the enemy.
And it generally is, you know,
motorizing the way I think in the skies is all up here.
It's a thought.
It's cognitive.
It's data.
It's yes, no, maybe.
It's bad.
Yes, no, black or white.
Do I do that?
Do I jump down the inside?
Yes, no.
It's like that.
And any emotion I allow into that,
that thought process generally fucks it right up.
So ever since I was 12, 13 years old,
you know, kind of schooled by my dad and stuff.
Emotions, you know, me.
And when you used to deal with that,
and you become really very adept
and actually pretty skilled at just cutting out the emotion,
even though in things that when cars on fire,
it's like, okay.
You think you're indestructible?
And I, you know, I'll openly admit it.
I didn't fully appreciate the impact it would make to me,
my mental health, you know, retiring from sport.
And then when you throw in that, you know,
back in, back at that point,
we would just come out of COVID.
Fifth year was a bit wonky.
There wasn't enough money flying around.
Product, the broadcast went,
we're not going to fuck on that anymore.
And that was in almost the same sort of month.
And then you throw in that I've taken a bit of a wild ride
with some mental investments.
And I think it's fair to say that I think the only way to say it is
is to properly tip some.
And then, you know, break down the marriage
and all that comes in one go and all of a sudden I found myself
in a situation where I wasn't ready
and I wasn't able to fully cope with what I was presented with.
And I literally went off the rails, you know,
nearly all ended.
Really grim.
And I'm not ashamed to say that.
But the good news is,
you know, three years of hard battling.
You know, if I said to you,
I mean, you probably won't believe it,
because no one would ever think that of me.
You know, I took every mirror down in the house,
seven months.
Didn't leave the house for six months.
It was properly fucked up.
So my biggest, my biggest,
the biggest thing I'm proud about is coming back from,
you know, down there.
Well, it wasn't that lot, lot longer.
I had two private planes.
They're in shit loads of money.
And an amazing wife.
Living the life of Riley.
From the vast majority of my career.
And then all of a sudden it goes,
tits up.
It's pretty hard to come back from that.
And guess what?
We're back.
And now when we tell you what's happening on Sunday.
You must be more proud of that than anything we've done in your life.
Anything else?
Anything else?
I'm so grateful and pleased that you have spoken honestly
and openly this evening.
We all appreciate it.
Sure.
I'm glad also that this will go out and be listened to by many more people
than in this room this evening.
Lots of people will be listening,
having struggles in their own life.
Right.
We've all got one.
What do you say to them?
What do they need to be doing?
Well, you know, the most important thing is,
she's just got, you know, she's got to think,
well, the most important thing I learned.
And it took me a while to learn it.
She was actually going to speak to a few people.
Yeah.
And I'm very guarded.
I saw everything myself.
And guess what?
I have done.
But there's a couple of things that crop up in a life where you can't.
You can't fix it yourself.
You need a bit of help and guns.
You know, I got a bit of therapy and stuff and that helped.
But it helped.
You know, I got into the habit of just the phone would ring and I just let you go.
Not interested.
Not interested.
Do you want to speak to anyone?
Didn't want to explain it again.
So I just shut myself down.
I think if you ever find yourself doing that,
you've got to reach out and go and get some help from some people.
And you know what?
It can happen to the people you most,
you least think it could do.
You know, everyone thinks I'm a hard-knows absolute asshole in this game.
I'm not.
I'm not.
I'm a regular bloke.
It's just good at what he does and done time it certain way.
And we all have our weaknesses.
But I would say that's probably the most important lesson is to speak to people.
And also never fucking give in.
Yeah.
It'll make a big difference to a lot of people here and you talk like this.
Well, I hope so.
I hope so.
Yeah.
You know, we've lost, you know,
he's a very trouble man.
Ricky Hatton this week.
He lost football as an all sorts.
So you think they have a dead, delicate life.
But, you know, there's inner demons.
And, you know, like I said at the top of this conversation,
men, we shit it.
Talk about it.
But particularly if you are someone who is as you are and have been
all your career completely driven to the exclusion of everything else.
Absolutely.
And you block the door out.
Yeah.
And then suddenly it all goes away.
And then everything else piles in on top of you.
Yeah.
I mean, that must.
Well, it's clearly was for you.
Yeah.
The overwhelming.
Hence, right?
And he went transition.
Right.
Before we get in any trouble here.
Or no.
So we are going to do a little, a little Q&A.
So please get your questions ready.
There will be a roving mic somewhere.
I'm sure some.
There we go over.
Over by the door.
Final one from me though.
Jason.
Magic wand here.
You can't see it.
It's magic.
I can wave this and give you one more BTCC race championship.
So you have three like Matt Neal.
Oh.
That was a low blow.
Or.
How many races do you want?
Can't remember.
Perfect.
Perfect.
Yeah.
I don't know.
I'm a new one.
Or do seven, doesn't it?
Or would you take three more race wins to get to 100?
Very much.
It's straightforward for you, isn't it?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
That's very good.
I don't.
You know, the weirdest thing is, you know.
I mean.
I don't know.
You know the stats.
I don't know.
I don't know how many trophies I've got from BTCC.
I've got hardly any at home.
I'm not interested.
It's just bits of plastic or tin or they're all shit.
Because it's in there.
It's the memory.
It's the doing it.
And the weirdest thing is, as soon as the race is over.
And, you know, let's say you win and you cross the line.
And, you know, there's the, you know, the Marshall, you know,
whoever it is, waves to check a clienty.
You hear on the radio.
Buff.
Within 20 meters.
All I'm thinking about is, PR.
Get the hands off.
Get logos on view.
Think about some things which happen in the race, which would be humorous
or engaging.
How can I, how can I, how can I, how can I mention something
that's happened within the team, which would break the sponsors?
It's just the process.
So, actually, there's, the enjoyment is actually in the moment.
It's not after the moment.
It's like the podium thing.
It's actually embarrassing sometimes.
It's not in the mood.
I just want to crack on.
And go and see the engineers and say, right,
let's have a look at the data.
Let's scrub the tires.
Let's work it all out.
So, that's weird.
Don't you think?
Don't you think?
It is.
I'm not, I'm not interested in the relation of all.
Where everyone's gone.
But now we've learned.
I've moved on.
About you.
Yeah.
Where it comes from.
Yeah.
It does make sense.
Last question from me.
It's been fantastic.
We haven't even talked about your career as a tele-percent.
And I think we do with road cars trying to have a particular passion
if yours.
Was, was that, you know, you talked about BTC, you know,
it wasn't fun because it was your job.
Yeah.
Was that the same with television?
I enjoyed it.
Yeah.
Lovely.
But it's not like having a fun round of golf with your racing at the revival.
Or racing at the revival.
It's like the difference between having a fun round of golf with your mates
versus playing a pro.
Yeah.
It's a different thing.
If you're having a fun round of golf with your mates,
you still want to win, don't you?
Of course I do.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And if no one makes the ladies tea, I don't mean that in a bad way.
If we don't make the ladies tea, we will thought, you know,
the rules are pants down.
You have to play the rest of the hole.
No.
And that's strictly enforced.
Good.
No, no, no, no.
I'm trying to put each other off.
And I've walked many a golf hole with me.
We just drive around your ankles.
And now we all know.
If Jason Plato invites you to play golf,
it's a, it's a hard game.
Yeah.
Unless you're very, very good indeed.
It's a lot of fun.
Okay.
Let's crack on with the Q&A then.
If anyone wants to get a started, hand in the air.
And the microphone will find its way to you.
There's one here.
And there's one there.
Should we go here first?
Because it's on the way.
Jason, thank you very much for being.
This is where we are recording it.
Yeah.
Thank you very much for being so natural and telling us about your life.
And what's happened to you since you gave up racing?
Just what I have one question.
Are there any particular cars which you sat in and race,
which you just remember now as just being wonderful cars
that just you knew were great to and really enjoyed?
Yeah, there are a few.
I mean, every car has got its day.
And every car has got certain circuits where it comes alive and works on.
But there are a few cars which just out of the box are.
They're just.
Could one of them be a Renault, please?
What was the first, you know, I was very fortunate to join the best team in the business
with the best team I could ever have.
And the 97 Laguna was just remarkable.
I mean, it was just.
It was like, you know, you're best pair of comfy shoes.
Or your favourite golf club.
It just fits.
And it was intuitive.
And it was just sublime.
And the 98 and the 99 car weren't as good as they then started to push the boundaries.
And they just fell outside of the little, you know, the little sweet spot.
You know, and if I told you that, you know, those cars are so sensitive
we raised the rear ride height one millimeter.
It fucks it up.
The set up's gone.
That's how sensitive they are.
You know, like a quarter turn on the platform.
Should just send the corner weights out.
Maybe about three kilos.
Oh, it's different car.
And this one you could just.
Just dial it in and it was just lush.
What was the worst car you ever raised?
I mean, I can remember you won't remember this, but I can remember you and I
both tested ass cars for the first time on the same day.
Oh, I feel billions.
I scared they're leaving dial out.
It's just a vile thing.
And they had to think about a panhard rod.
I mean, what the fuck is that?
It's something of the rear suspension.
I mean, what is it?
And they're nuts like that.
I mean, that's not a racing car, is it?
But there's an art to it.
Yeah, I never mastered it.
And I, you know, because I went over, I tell you a human story.
When I got sucked after winning the first race championship,
I went over to try and do Nat Naskar.
Because I'd read all the stats.
I knew a few people over there.
And I thought, well, these guys are in 30 million told us a year.
That sounds like they made a bit of me, that's us.
And what's more, there's some bloke who are getting on.
And they wear brooks.
We'll have them.
So yeah, I went over there.
And I was being managed at the time by Julian Jacobi,
who was sent as Matt manager.
Anyway, Julian didn't come.
He sent his dry own man.
And we introduced a guy called Fred Wagonals,
who owned action performance.
And he had all the, he made all the, all the, the, the,
the trinkets, the merchandise to the drivers of toy cars.
And anyway, he was showing us around on each.
Imagine it and over us four corners.
And we were at Charlotte.
Each corner of the big drivers would have an arctic.
We should open up.
And all their merchandise in it.
It would go and be refilled twice a day.
And that's, that's, that's eight arctics fall going per day.
You could buy a gun with Dale or not.
See, isn't she?
At the track down the bar.
I mean, amazing.
So Fred's telling me that, how much is, you know,
these guys are earning.
And I never forget, we're walking across from the,
what, one of the outside days was wanting to,
the way American pallets are.
It's a little bit odd.
It's like a big square bit in the meat middle,
or a fat fence round.
Where some places, some states you go to,
it says, please leave your guns at the heart.
I mean, discuss.
What the hell.
And some circuits, that, that, that's not there.
That means people are carrying the gun from them.
Anyway, as we were walking towards this Dale was coming over
in his big black good wrench suit with his big,
right-round shade.
And he was having a chat with Fred Wagenhoes.
And I was introduced to Dale.
And he said, yeah, yeah, yeah, I've seen you,
you've raised them a little, big penny cars in, in England.
I said, yeah, yeah.
He said, well, you're in a big case.
I said, well, yeah, I am.
But I want, I want to come and race, you know,
NASCAR, and he pours.
And no word of a lie.
He kind of lent forward.
He pulled those guns.
He said, boy.
He said, nissen, no place for puppies.
He's wearing big darks piece.
And I literally thought, this is the funniest bloodline.
So I'm bent over double-gigging.
And I look, it wasn't messing around.
He's been serious.
At least he would.
He walked off.
Wow.
I can't remember.
I can't remember.
Got that story.
So the NASCAR was the ugliest car I've ever driven in my life.
I wouldn't know it was a NASCAR.
It was a NASCAR.
That was horrible.
But at VH Supercar, that was a proper thing,
where you had to be right in your game.
I never get me in a van and drove,
where we drove for the HRT,
which isn't hallman replacement, though,
but it's a, it's a holding race into the works team.
And we did our first test at Phillip Island,
Mark Skafen, Craig Lannes, jumped in our car,
and just made sure it was OK.
And then the van went out first.
And I remember watching what's the timescrew.
He's miles off.
Yeah.
And he came and said, OK.
What is my turn, Hank?
I said, OK, it's not so good.
OK, what's the time?
And he was six seconds off.
And he went, stop possible.
He said, well, I know I'm at the back of him.
I think he's fine with his.
And I jumped in.
I was six off.
Yeah.
And I took myself off the loo
and had a car.
I had a wild word with him.
I was chatting in the mirror.
Yeah.
And we got there in the end,
but that's a great car to drive.
The Chevrolet I drove when I won the British Championship,
that was a really, really big kit with RML,
who are arguably the finest race car constructors
at Intuitar and cars,
probably in the world, actually.
Ooh.
What have I said?
That's all right.
Oh, dear.
I'm not saying anything.
I think that's OK.
Before we get any more trouble, hands up then.
There must be some more questions in there.
There was one.
There was a gentleman over there right on the front road
at the far end.
I'm not saying anything.
Can I just say I've run out of gin and tonics
and I've got a driver coming.
No.
Very well, fine.
I think someone's on the case.
There might be a beer.
Oh, no, I'm joking.
I'm pretty hydrated to be honest.
I don't have a driver coming, sadly.
I am the driver.
Ah, well, you see, you should have had a chat with Reggie.
Yeah.
Next time.
Well, actually, if the truth has been out,
they sent some bloke in a fricking minibus.
I was pumped up over that.
So I've summoned my driver
and to drive my car and he's on his way down.
So your driver, we sent him off early
and he's currently doing a few tours
with a taxi thing on the top.
Next question.
Please.
Thank you, Jason.
It's been really an enjoyable evening.
I want you to, if you can cast your mind back
into the race you've done before,
was there a race where you came maybe second or third?
And what, what, what year?
Any year.
That you thought you could have won
if you'd have done something different
or the car had been set up differently?
Always.
Is there one particularly thing?
I shouldn't have done that.
Oh, yeah.
Maybe gone to the gap that you shouldn't have done that.
There's quite a few of that, actually.
Yeah, there was a famous one up there.
Set to turn away.
I took it to the left of the door open in 90s in 2009
and say I pulled a, you know,
a financial press 2008.
I just signed a new three-year deal with say it.
They pulled up in, stopped everything.
Left us all high and dry.
We shan't end up in a court case.
But we won't go into that.
And RML, me and Ray Matt Malak
and a couple of guys there just put this crazy deal together
to get together on a race-by-race basis.
Running in the...
I think there's a car which they put on the top gear test track.
It was the Chevrolet, the setting.
Yeah.
Was that on the top gear test track?
Yeah, it was.
But in racing, guys.
Boy, it was a weapon.
He was a proper thing.
And that was 2009.
I don't know if you've seen on YouTube.
That way I got waxed up the rubber paddock
and I'm completely crossed.
So I was crossed the road.
And through sheer skill and great looks,
I managed to save it.
And...
And that year,
Junior Watt,
because it was a race-by-race basis,
I juice was pushing a bit too hard.
And I remember I jumped down inside the collar in it.
And I kind of knew he was going to close the door
because he's a bit like that.
How's that fucking?
See what happens?
And you guess what?
I came up with it.
It could have gone the other way.
And had it done, I would have won the championship.
There's lots of those.
Lots of those, yeah.
Right.
Lots of gone the other way.
That's it.
Where you have a go.
Who's next?
Hi, Jason.
Thank you.
You kind of just touched on it,
but excuse my ignorance,
but you're in the race where you have the car
way over 90 degrees to the corner.
And somehow
I kept on going, pulled it back.
I can't say it.
It's skill and good looks.
That was going to be my question.
You were recollections of
if you have any of that particular moment.
Well, do you know what?
Honestly,
what saved me there was the amount of hooning around
we all do is journalists.
Particularly on 5th gear with that mentalist,
which is Tiffany Dell.
Because that's what we did for fun.
And we got paid for it.
And you become really good.
And very relaxed when the shit is the fan.
And you end up going backwards
in front of the drive car.
It's not a problem.
Because if you get on it,
if you get on the tap.
It's just fun.
You'll sort it out.
And by and large,
we tend to drive on the TV.
You know,
the upper end of the market
with powerful engines and stuff.
And you can get yourself out of all sorts of trouble.
And honestly, it's down to TV, probably.
Which is a bit straight,
but you just become just right going backwards,
which is a bit straight.
But you never become relaxed sat in a car with Tiff.
You never.
I think there's another question down at the front.
I punched him at rocking him inside the lawn TV.
I was armoured nervous papastasia,
which is perverse, but I am.
And he was just acting, acting just like,
stop it, Tiff.
No, you know,
we're doing 140 miles an hour and he's weaving around.
I'm not enjoying this.
I said, if you don't stop it, I'm going to eat you.
And you're like,
I'm acting straight in the jaw.
And he kept on going.
Sorry, he's a question.
How old do you think Tiff is?
Oh, he begins with a seven, doesn't it?
Oh, you bastard.
Sorry.
Because most people say six.
He begins with a six.
He's like 76 years old, isn't he?
No, he's not that old.
He's about 72, I think.
Seven.
But he's never eaten.
He eats a cook breakfast every morning.
He doesn't go to the gym.
He doesn't clean his teeth.
Oh, he's not one of his teeth.
He doesn't.
No, well, I don't know who's he up.
He does nothing.
And yet, he's up, isn't he?
He's still sharp as well.
Yeah, I mean, he goes sideways every day, isn't he?
But he does really.
He's the best TV driver, kind of like.
Yeah, but this is a bloke who's on the podium at Le Mans.
Yeah.
Like, all the people who we think of as being really, really good driver journalist,
people like Tony Drone, people like Mark Hales,
they actually start as racing drivers.
Yes.
And I think that's what you need to do.
Yeah.
And they're people like you, who start as racing drivers,
and then went over to the media side.
Yeah.
Because no one's ever done it the other way.
Oh, I don't think you can.
No, I think the levels do.
I mean, exactly correct.
Bless him.
Ham and stride in the way I'm to him.
And this is actually quite an important thing actually.
The BBC.
Well, another BBC is just a whole industry.
They've got to realise that.
You know, if you want a golfer, pro golfer, you don't get pro golfer.
And if you want to, you want to hoon round on ropes,
you don't get a blow that he knows that hoon round on ropes.
Well, you don't do it.
You don't put a lunatic cricket player in those situations.
Guess what?
They have no imagination for when it's about to go wrong.
Exactly.
You can foresee it.
You can foresee it, which one of the reasons I'm in such a terrible passenger.
I've seen miles away.
And they can't.
And they get revved on.
And guess what happens?
You've got a great car showing a great brand in top gear.
Dead.
Dead in the water because they're just not employing the right people.
Do you think that any of that's on him because he was an adult
and should have either asked the question
or should have known what he's letting himself in?
Or do you think it was entirely on the BBC
because he should never have been put in that situation in the first place?
Please turn on the BBC.
I really do, because it's fun, isn't it?
And if you drive in, I don't know, to CV or whatever it may be.
And you get away with it three or four times.
You're going to get away with it four times.
But the problem is he's got no experience of it going wrong.
You've had some bangs in cars.
I've had loads of bangs.
And you know when it feels wrong.
You know.
And it was the last shoot at the day.
It was all just one more time.
Just one more time.
And you know, I won't...
I mean, it's religion.
Come the end of the day when everyone's tired.
I'll say, right, that's it.
Over.
I'm going home.
Oh, no, we still got...
I said, no, no.
You miss your chance.
Because that's when the...
That's when shit goes wrong when people get hurt.
Yeah.
And camera man, they're tired.
You know, it's...
I don't want to dramatize it.
You know, we're driving around in Ferrari's and stuff.
And you get hurt yourself.
And you've got to know what you do it.
It's not a game.
It's not a game.
And unfortunately, you know, like Hammond,
I'm good mates with Hammond.
What did you get in that car for?
That bloody rocket thing.
I would have never even gone into the same field as it.
Let him drive it.
I mean, it's just mental.
But...
But I think there is a certain pressure.
Yeah, of course there is pressure.
Of course there is.
Okay, we understand.
No, no, of course you don't have to do it.
But that's all there is for it.
It's a shame.
It's a shame.
Yeah.
Please.
So the next question.
So the question.
Jason, so you're a car guy as well as a racing driver.
You're very much in it.
So using Dan's Magic Wand, was it?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah, okay, yeah, thanks.
So any track anywhere in the world with any car.
Could it be one of your racing cars or one of the amazing cars?
What's it going to be?
It's a great question.
Does it have to be something he's already driven?
That's easy.
Yeah.
I mean, if I'm really honest,
the Renault Laguna, the 97 Renault Laguna,
when we went to Bathurst and race that round there,
oh man, it was unbelievable.
Do you know he's got that record right now?
Do you?
Yeah.
And I can remember going running a road car
with Didier de Bay was our team at Mangia.
And Alan Jones, because he drove the second car.
And I can remember just looking out the window.
I was in the back looking out the window and saying,
you are joking.
What the fuck is that?
And it's insane.
That's amazing.
It's a beautiful piece of road.
And that car just really worked well there.
VX Supercar ran there.
It's great.
I'd like to drive, although I'm not,
I've got the bottle to do it.
I'd like to drive a 911 7-round port,
not round them all.
But that scares the living guy outside of me.
Because they're built out of Dexian,
really.
You know, they're not very strong.
It feels like a road car.
A road car.
Yeah.
Doesn't have to be on the track.
Joe, I'm a great driver.
Not a Caparo T1, I imagine.
Oh, sorry?
A Caparo T1?
Oh, no.
No, not that one.
No, no.
Oh, that was awful.
I'm a big fan of 911 drive.
I've had lots of them.
I love them a bit.
It's a best car in the world, I believe.
I was lucky enough to do a track test on the last series of 5th gear,
which wasn't the electric thing.
And I tested the new GT3 RS against a Porsche Corridor Cupcar on Slicks,
at Anglesey.
Wow.
It was unbelievable how close it was.
I mean, literally frightening.
Right.
Well, by this.
A couple of seconds.
It was 2.7 seconds alert.
And I wasn't hanging around on Slicks.
But I could change, you know, driving front or drive cars,
you get to understand what a diff can really do.
I could change the diff going down a fast straight as it happened.
I could change the diff and open up the, what they call the,
the coast ramps.
So the diff free wheels on the over, and if you like.
Oh, I walked straight in the corner.
Yeah.
And literally, but then turn it up.
If you click six, six clicks, turn it up,
and it would respond immediately.
Then I get those attractions.
But different.
I mean, it was unbelievably good.
Yeah.
And I think you literally go, part of your money, take him.
It's a further case.
It's amazing.
And that's the noise.
Was the Capara the most, the only time you ever got hurt in a car?
Yeah, it was actually.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, you know, amazing how many races you've done in all of them.
You will have done over a thousand races.
I've no doubt at all.
Yeah.
I guess so, yeah.
And that's the only time.
I mean, it might have been hurt a few times.
It would take a while.
I do know what, you know, touch some wood people.
I was lucky.
You know, I've had some close shades,
but I've never really truly hurt myself.
Apart from when that, that Capara jumped into flames,
which was horrific.
Did that cost your championship?
For that, don't you?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, you know, Traff, the doctor of a BGCC,
when you can still see the marks there.
He wouldn't let me race.
And I begged him, pleaded me, so I mean,
you can't race like that.
You know, my tendons were hanging out with my hands.
But I sold it off.
But it was horrific.
But even then, that's interesting.
I was in such pain.
But when the lights went out and the race started,
the pain just disappeared.
Yeah, of course.
Yeah.
And when the checkered flag came out,
it was like the switch.
Ah.
Yeah.
It's all a PSC.
Well, listen, we need to wrap this one up.
Do we?
Any more questions?
I don't appear to have my second drink
as the night I've been making a formal drink.
Let's take these two questions.
Thank you.
We'll wrap this one up.
Thank you.
Does anyone like Mickey Flanagan?
Absolutely.
Hold on, sister.
So you're jumping back.
Look lively.
I'll listen to a podcast to understand,
because I didn't understand, sorry.
Did you understand the reference?
Mickey Flanagan is a comedian.
Ah, no, I don't know.
Sorry.
Ah, yes.
No, it was just to mention a video that I saw a long time ago
from you and Tiff in a 9-11 turbo capability.
Oh, yeah.
Do you have any?
Yeah, so it's just to touch base on what you said earlier.
Do you have any more details about the story
because I really like that video
and makes me get good every time.
Well, that was a pickup shot,
because we'd broken to, or say, we.
Tiff had broken the out.
I'd say he broke it.
It broke when he was in the car.
So that was the shot, the shoot abandoned that day.
We've not got the conclusion.
So the three, four days later,
we had to go back up to Brunton Thorpe.
It was to do like, you know, two, three hours
to finish the shoot, shoot off.
I was late by an hour.
Tiff was not happy.
And he set about to really get under my skin.
And he did.
And we drove like an absolute man possessed.
And when you're in a cabaret,
you do an 170 mile an hour.
And you've got that droning lunatic next year.
And he's in charge of the pedals
and the bit in the middle, which the steering wheel,
and he's grinning like this.
It's not a good place to be.
I literally didn't like it.
So that wasn't acting.
That wasn't acting.
No, no.
Every time I was going,
I generally felt like I was about to die.
Because the Cheshire cap wasn't looking like he was going.
So that was hilarious.
But yeah.
He says.
Well, thank you for that.
He just didn't kill that.
Well, let's say the last question
just behind to bring things to a class.
So thank you very much for really enjoyable evening
and that's some really interesting insights.
I just want to know, as someone who's got a fairly
limited driving talent,
do you think different forms of motorsport suit
a different set of talents?
Some drivers more adapted to touring cars
versus single-seaters?
Or the best drivers be able to adapt to anything?
So if you put Max Verstappen in a touring car,
would he be the fastest?
If he was on?
If you put Max Verstappen in a touring car,
would he be the quickest or would...
He wouldn't be the quickest.
He'd be right up there, yeah.
I mean, the best in touring cars
would show how it's done.
But he...
You'd often get Formula One driver coming into touring cars.
And often they don't...
And they often...
Yeah.
I think, yes, there are drivers who suit disciplines.
But I do think world's best of the world's best.
And it doesn't matter really what you throw out of them.
They'll toss it out.
I mean, Sebastian Logan, a touring car.
It's Sebastian Logan in a rally car with sublime.
There's a highly autistic man.
Really?
Oh, well that doubt, yeah.
But in a good sense.
Yeah.
But he'd learn how to drive a touring car.
It became really, very good.
You know, I think you could put shoemaker in a touring car.
I think you could put Jensen.
You could put Louis.
You could put any of those.
It'd take a while because they're quirky bits of kids.
But it's only...
At the end of the day, it's a blob of mat metal.
Four bits of rubber held on springs.
It moves around.
And you just understand how that weight can screw you up.
Or you can use it.
And that's really the art of driving a racing car.
Or driving any car, a road car.
It's not the pedal on the right.
It's not the pedal on the left.
It's the one in the middle.
That's what makes you quick.
Because that has the biggest influence over the weight distribution of a car.
You know, if you get in a Ferrari,
the first Ferrari ever, and you hit the fourth pedal in the first gear,
you'll get a surge.
But hit the brake pedal as hard as you can underarm.
Now you go to the windscreen.
So the brake pedal has the most effect on the pitch and the diagonal change of a car.
And you watch what you can hold that weight where you want it to be.
You know what I mean?
Whereas with acceleration, it decays away, obviously.
But the brake is where it's at.
The best guys are the best of the brakes.
That's the skill.
That's the skill.
I'm sitting in it.
I think it's as simple as that.
You know, if you imagine, you know, you get...
You know, when you're occasionally driving automatic car,
and you don't tuck your other leg away,
and you hit with your left leg, you hit the brake pedal,
and you nearly go to the windscreen.
We've all done everything.
Well, that's someone who doesn't like to use a brake pedal.
But when you really know how to use the brake pedal,
that's when the magic happens.
That's what it is.
Anyone can push the throttle down.
That's my opinion. That's why I think.
Well, listen, thanks for those questions.
Thank you all for being here.
To Renault for making this evening possible.
Thank you.
And finally to Jason, it's been really good fun.
Really enjoyable listening to you talk.
The story is your honesty, your openness.
So thank you.
And everyone, please, a round of applause for Jason Pleison.
Thank you.
Thank you.
About this episode
Jason Plato, the BTCC legend, shares candid stories from his racing career in a live podcast. The conversation covers his early days in motorsport, the challenges of transitioning from driver to team owner, and his struggles with mental health. Plato reflects on his iconic races, rivalries, and the evolution of touring cars. He emphasizes the importance of mental well-being and the need for open conversations among men. With humor and honesty, he reveals his journey, including the highs and lows of his career and personal life, culminating in an exciting announcement about his future in the BTCC.
Original notes
Dan Prosser and Andrew Frankel are joined by double BTCC champion Jason Plato for a live podcast in partnership with Renault. Jason discusses his early racing career, his record-breaking 23-year stint in the British Touring Car Championship and much more. He also opens up about how difficult the past few years have been for him and the mental health challenges he has battled since retiring from racing.
Use coupon code pod20 at checkout to get 20% off an annual subscription to The Intercooler's online car magazine for the first year! Listen to this podcast ad-free, and enjoy a subscriber-only midweek podcast too. With a 30-day free trial, you can try it risk-free – https://www.the-intercooler.com/subscribe/
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The Intercooler
Dan Prosser and Andrew Frankel
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