Road To Success with Benedict Fowler May 25, 2026

Rachel Brookes: I Didnt Expect It To Be This Brutal! The Max Interview Was Savage!

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Person

Sebastian Vettel

Sebastian Vettel is a famous Formula 1 race driver who won championships. Here, they’re talking about qualifying, when drivers try to get the best possible performance from their car.

Topic

qualifying

Qualifying is the part of an F1 weekend where drivers race to set their position for the main race. It’s when they try to squeeze out the best possible lap time from the car.

Term

A lap is one complete circuit around the track. In qualifying, a driver’s “lap” is the timed run that determines their position, so whether that lap reflects the car’s true potential is a big talking point.

Topic

love of statistics

They’re talking about using data to understand racing. The idea is that numbers can help explain what drivers do and why results happen.

Person

Michael Schumacher

Michael Schumacher was a legendary Formula 1 driver. In this story, his teammate realizes he’s not ready in time, which turns into a stressful moment right before qualifying.

Topic

Monaco Grand Prix

The Monaco Grand Prix is a famous Formula 1 race in Monaco. Because it’s run on city streets and is very tight, even small problems can really affect how a race weekend goes.

Brand

Mercedes garage

In F1, the garage is where the team works on the car and gets everything ready. “Mercedes garage” means the Mercedes team’s area.

Car

radical SL1

A Radical SL1 is a purpose-built race car. It’s designed to stick to the track using downforce, so it can feel much more stable and predictable than many road cars when you’re driving fast.

Term

downforce

Downforce is what makes a race car press down onto the road as it goes faster. That extra “squish” helps the tires grip the track so the car feels more controllable.

Term

oversteer

Oversteer is when the back of the car loses traction, so it swings around more than you intended. If you don’t correct it, it can lead to a spin.

Term

understeer

Understeer is when the front of the car can’t grip enough, so it doesn’t turn as sharply as you want. The car tends to push outward in the corner.

Term

Driving in the wet

Wet driving is harder because the tires don’t grip as well on a slippery surface. You usually have to slow down and be smoother with steering and braking.

Topic

Friday practice

Friday practice is the early track time during a race weekend. Drivers use it to learn the track and try things before the more important sessions later.

Topic

endurance records

Endurance records are about racing for a long time, not just going fast for a short lap. The goal is to keep the car running and keep driving consistently for hours (or longer).

Place

Monza

Monza is a world-famous race track in Italy. It’s known for being fast and for a dramatic banked section where cars can carry a lot of speed through the turns.

Term

banking

Banking is when a race track turn is tilted upward. That tilt helps cars go around the corner faster and more safely because it supports the car as it turns.

Topic

Formula One

Formula One is the highest level of professional race car driving. Teams race on tracks around the world, and the cars are very advanced and highly engineered.

Place

paddock

The paddock is the busy area at a race where teams set up the cars and work on them. It’s also a place where fans and crew can mingle and talk during the event.

Topic

changing the driver

It means the team switches who’s driving the car. That can be because the driver is having a rough time or because the team thinks another driver can do better.

Person

Sergio Perez

Sergio Pérez is a Formula 1 race driver. Here, he’s brought up because there was a situation where another driver (Max) was asked to give him the place.

Person

Max

“Max” refers to Max Verstappen, a top Formula 1 driver and multiple-time world champion. The segment discusses his reaction to a prior Monaco incident and how that affected a later on-track decision.

Person

George Russell

George Russell is another Formula 1 driver. The hosts mention that he and Max Verstappen had a tense moment during a race in Spain.

Place

Spain

Spain is the country where the race happened. The hosts are saying that Max and George Russell had contact during that Spanish race.

Term

contact

“Contact” just means the cars bump or touch each other on track. The segment is discussing whether that bump looked like it was on purpose or not.

Person

Nico Rosberg

Nico Rosberg is a former Formula 1 champion driver. Here, the host uses his opinion because he’s experienced in how F1 incidents can happen.

Term

deliberate

“Deliberate” here means the driver may have meant to do it, not that it happened by accident. They’re debating whether the move was intentional.

Place

Imola

Imola refers to the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari circuit in Imola, Italy, which hosts Formula One races. In this segment, it’s used as the context for a prior standout overtaking move that made the later incident feel more disappointing.

Person

Fernando Alonso

Fernando Alonso is a famous race driver in Formula 1. The host is saying Alonso often gives thoughtful answers with extra details you can learn from.

Brand

Ferrari

Ferrari is a major racing team in Formula 1. The host says Ferrari organized the event that kicked off their early access to F1 interviews.

Place

Italy

Italy is the country where the event happened. The host says they were flown there for a big, luxury trip connected to racing.

Topic

Vroom

Vroom is the name of an event in Italy that Ferrari put on. The host says it was part of how they first got access to interview major racing drivers.

Person

Massa

Massa is another well-known Formula 1 driver from Brazil. The host says they were set up to interview him along with Alonso.

Topic

MotoGP

MotoGP is the top level of motorcycle racing. The host is saying the event had a MotoGP day first, then an F1 day right after.

Brand

Red Bull

Red Bull is the racing team behind one of the top Formula 1 efforts. They choose drivers and put them in their race cars, and that’s why the speaker mentions them when talking about a driver’s progress.

Place

Nurburgring

The Nürburgring is a well-known race track in Germany. It’s famous because it’s very long and twisty, so it really tests how well a car handles and how strong its brakes and tires are.

Topic

F1

F1 is Formula 1, the highest level of open-wheel race car competition. Drivers race on tracks around the world, and the cars are very advanced and highly competitive.

Topic

interview pen

That “interview pen” is a spot at an F1 event where drivers go to talk to reporters after they finish on track. It’s set up so the media can get interviews right after the cars come in.

Place

Singapore

Singapore is where an F1 race is held on city streets. Because it’s a street track, it’s usually tight and slow compared to many other circuits.

Place

Suzuka

Suzuka is a famous race track in Japan used for Formula 1. It’s known for being fast and tricky, so mistakes can lead to big crashes.

Term

timing screen

A timing screen in an F1 paddock/garage area shows live session timing and status as cars enter and leave the circuit. When the transcript says it showed “pit, pit,” it’s referring to cars being in the pit/entry sequence and the team/media tracking who has returned.

Person

Jules

“Jules” is talking about Jules Bianchi, another Formula 1 driver. The host is saying that what happened to him was so shocking that it changed how fans experienced major crashes.

Person

Grosjean

Grosjean is a Formula 1 race driver. The host is talking about a famous, very scary crash he had at Monaco—and how shocking it was that he survived.

Place

Bahrain

Bahrain is where Formula 1 holds a race. The host is saying they were watching a big moment happen while in an office there.

Place

Silverstone

Silverstone is a famous Formula 1 race track in the UK. It hosts the British Grand Prix, and it’s known for being fast and exciting to drive.

Topic

Austin

Austin is where the US Formula 1 race is held in Texas. The track is modern and twisty, with sections that feel very different from each other.

Topic

British Grand Prix

The British Grand Prix is a major Formula 1 race traditionally held at Silverstone. It’s one of the sport’s historic events, so it often comes up when drivers talk about favorite tracks.

LIVE

The stuff I got sent was horrendous.

I got people telling me I should never be allowed to,

I should never be able to have children

because I'm a bad example.

I got the most horrific stuff you could imagine.

Please welcome, it's Sky Sports F1 reporter, Rachel Brooks.

Everyone takes the mickey out of me at work

because my notebook is enormous.

You're not the only person with a notebook in the paddock.

Mine is much bigger than Ted's.

Enough of that.

What's got you into the role that you're doing?

I've got two older brothers

and the only one who could hang out with him

was watching motorsport with them.

I raced a little bit just amateur stuff

and so I'd go round down to Brands or I'd go to Cadwell.

How many races was it when you started?

16 or 18 maybe.

And it's 24 now?

Yeah.

Is Fernando secretly your favourite driver?

Why do you say that? Everyone says that to me.

You only have two questions when you're there, right?

These rules come in in the last few years.

If something dramatic has happened,

I have to go in straight away with the first question.

So I said to Max, was it deliberate?

And his response was...

Do you want to then explain the hours, days, weeks

that then followed that?

Rachel, you're probably best known to me

for interviewing drivers either their best or their worst times.

Some having to prize the answers out of them.

But in your own words, who are you and what do you do?

I am a very, very, very lucky girl

who's been privileged enough to do

probably the best job in the world for the last 14, 15 years.

And I, every race weekend,

speak to one happy person and 19 miserable people

or 21 miserable people as it is this year.

That's how I would sum it up.

But there's so many other parts to your job

and role that go into doing what you do.

There's one off pieces to cameras as the whole journey

of how you've got there, which we're going to explore today.

And there's also dealing with those moments on human on human

of looking in someone's eyes and going,

they really don't want me to be here,

which is not an easy thing to do, which leads me on to

there's been 42 drivers debut since you started in Formula One.

Out of those 42 drivers,

who springs to mind now as the most challenging to look into the eyes of?

I would say Sebastian Vettel.

Yeah, so Seb and I always had a bit of a back and forth.

And I don't know why I never really got to the bottom of it.

I was in those days, I was standing next to Lee McKenzie in the pen,

who obviously is very good friends with Seb and they get on really well.

And always she I look up to her because I think she's phenomenal.

I learned so much from standing next to her over those years.

And I think she's probably one of the best interviewers we've had in the sport.

And she had a great relationship with Seb.

So I always wanted to have those kind of interviews,

but I never got them with Seb.

And I remember one particular race.

It was in India and it was at the end of qualifying.

And he came over and as often happens in qualifying,

you know, you you see a lap from a driver,

but you never know if they've got the best out of the car.

And quite often they'll tell you, no, I could have done this here.

I could have got an extra tent there.

So I said to Seb, something along the lines of, you know,

how was that? Did you get everything out of the car?

And he went, well, what do you think?

If you think I could have done better, you get in the car.

And I sort of went, oh, no, no, no, I'm not saying that.

I'm just, you know, sometimes he went, no, no, seriously,

if you think you could do better, you go and drive it.

And I was really taken aback.

And and I just sort of said, well, no, that's, you know, OK, great.

If you've got everything out of it anyway, the interview finished.

And he moved on to Lee and his first answer to her, he said,

no, I could have done better.

I could have got some more time here and there.

And I was just thinking a minute, but he also, as he went to Lee,

look back at me and said again, no, no, seriously,

if you think you could do better, you go and drive it.

And I was completely baffled by it because I was thinking

I've asked you a question I've asked on so many other weekends

and it's never been an issue.

And you've literally just said to Lee MacKenzie

that you could have got more out of the car.

And I never got to the bottom of why.

But at the end of the day, I always have to remember

they're human beings, too, and you have no idea what else is going on.

So he's just got out of the car and come and spoken to me.

All manner of things could be going on.

You don't know if there was a problem with the car

that he's been told not to talk about and he's having to cover up.

You just have no idea what's going on.

So that was one of the times where I thought I cannot take this personally.

I cannot take any of these interviews personally

because I don't know what's going on behind the scenes.

But it's one that sticks in my head as where on earth did that come from?

We're going to get into your love of statistics today

and also understanding people and their little mannerisms.

And before we hit record, you were showing me

different parts of your book and a specific part

that talked about how the drivers were getting in each other's heads

and how one little thing could lead to ruin in their race weekends.

You gave an example about the toilets.

Yeah. So when Nico Rosberg was teammates with Michael Schumacher,

it was the Monaco Grand Prix and it was just before qualifying.

And in Monaco, there are very few toilets for anybody

because it's not a racetrack normally.

So there was a toilet for the Mercedes garage and Michael Schumacher had gone in.

And Nico knew he had gone in.

So Nico goes up and Michael's in this way, wait.

And then he knocks on the door and he's sort of like, Michael, Michael, no answer.

So he's waiting and he's waiting.

And it's getting really close to the start of qualifying.

And Nico realizes Michael's not coming out

and he needs to pee before he gets in the car.

So he grabs an oil bucket and he pees in the oil bucket.

Then he goes and gets in his car.

And sure enough, like three minutes before qualifying is about to start,

Michael emerges, casual as he like gets in his car.

And Nico said it got in his head and his qualifying was ruined.

By the fact that this had got in his head before the start.

And he said he learned from that the kind of tricks

that drivers will do to get into their rivals' heads.

So do you think that you had got into Sebastian's head prior to that interview?

And that was something that he held against you specifically as an interviewer?

I don't think so.

I don't think we register as much in the driver's heads as fans like to think.

Well, a toilet does, but is that because it's competitor on competitor?

So do you not think that something at some point could be something

that actually has an impression on a race?

I mean, the drivers always say they don't read the media,

but they do or their friends and family do and they let them know what people are saying.

So it is possible, but I'd never, as far as I was aware,

said anything bad about Seb in the run up to that at all.

I know I'm sure you're going to get into it.

Max Verstappen and I have had our battles in the pen,

but I've always tried to speak to him afterwards and made sure everything was OK.

And I think we have a pretty good relationship now.

I'm not going to say he likes me particularly.

I like him. I think he's incredible.

I think we can get into that.

But I don't ever want a driver to think I have an agenda when I stand in front of them.

I hate that thought because I come to every race with a blank page in my head

unless there's issues left hanging over from previous race or.

But otherwise, I come with a blank page

and I treat every driver and every race as a new day.

It must be, though, as you said,

the drivers say they don't look at the media and look at what happens.

And you say that you're not too bothered about what they say

or how they answer and learn not to deal with it.

But growing up as someone extremely passionate about motorsport

in a family will get into that was extremely passionate about motorsports.

Have you had those moments where you're like, oh, I really liked you growing up.

I got you. You just made me feel rubbish then.

Like, have you kind of had that with any of the people in the pen?

No, I don't think so. No, I really don't think so.

I am. The one thing I did was when I got my race license

and I did a race weekend in a radical SL1.

I wanted to do it one to feel what it is like to drive a car with proper downforce on a track.

I've been in road cars on tracks, but that's horrendous.

I mean, I hate it. They roll around all over the place.

You'd never feel 100% safe, especially as a passenger.

So I did that and I learned a lot, not just about feeling

understeer, oversteer, you know, all the different nuances.

Driving in the wet, crashing in Friday practice.

Great, 100 miles an hour.

I learned so much from it.

But the one thing, the biggest thing I took away from it was at the end of my first race,

I did two races in my first race, I'd overtaken somebody.

I was so proud of myself.

And then I spun on the last corner and he took the place back.

And I got out of the car and this young boy came up to me and he said,

can I interview you for my website?

I had steam coming out of my ears at this point.

And I looked at his little face and I just went, yes.

And I was like, oh, my God, this is how it feels.

This is how those drivers feel when they have to walk in and talk to me.

Because the last thing I wanted to do was do an interview at that point with anybody,

especially not a really cute little kid who just wanted to put something on his website.

You know, I was like, OK, I get it. I get it now.

And I think that was a really good thing for me to do.

I've clearly in researching you understood the context of your earliest years

to understand that A, why you wanted to be in that race car

and B, why you have got to Formula One.

But what to you were like the fundamental things

that not only got you to Formula One growing up,

but also got you into the role that you're doing?

I mean, I love people and body language and studying people.

I've always been really inquisitive.

Like if I read a story online, I'll look at the background of it.

I don't just believe a headline or a believer story.

I'm always wanting to know more.

So I think that's probably where the journalistic side came from.

But in terms of motorsport, my dad did endurance records.

So when I was a kid, you know, this picture's on the wall at home of him

on the banking at Monza in black and white.

But they did seven days and nights around that banking.

There are no barriers at the top of that banking.

I mean, it was incredible.

So I've always seen that,

but I never really knew the story properly until I was older.

And then I've got two older brothers and when you're the youngest younger sister,

got an older sister as well.

But to me, the boys were cool.

Like my brothers were cool.

I was like, I want to hang out with them.

They're cool.

And the only one I could hang out with them was watching motorsport with them.

So then that's how I got into it,

because we'd sit and watch Formula One on a Sunday afternoon and stuff.

And then they raced a little bit, just amateur stuff.

And so I'd go around down to brands or I'd go to Cadwell or I'd go to,

you know, these circuits and and watch them race or watch one of them to both of them race.

And so I got into that and I was in the paddock environment.

And the paddock at those sorts of races is so nice and so friendly.

Everyone knows each other.

Everyone chats, shares picnic lunches, all that sort of stuff.

And just really enjoyed the environment.

Really, really loved it.

The type of racing that your dad did in endurance comes with a lot of like records.

Well, yeah, he didn't race endurance.

I should put that straight.

He was he had they basically got records, world records for endurance running.

I guess you call it. I don't know.

They did like 33 days, nights, four days, nights, five days, nights, 67

But there you're already reeling off numbers and what they did

and how many times they went round and all the rest of it.

Do you think that kind of love of statistics and what went on

came from hearing what they had to do, what they had to endure?

Maybe. I mean, everyone takes the mickey out of me at work

because my notebook is enormous and I have all the stats in it.

I've got every qualifying and race result for the last.

Well, since I started in 2012 in my big, fat notebook, which I take everywhere.

You're not the only person with a notebook in the in the paddock then.

No, this is true.

Mine is much bigger than Ted's and probably not as much

incredible information as Ted's, but it is it is still there.

Natalie Pinkham on the pit stop podcast actually described you

as you would have also made a fabulous detective.

Did you say that that is you?

No, because I'm not like that with the people around me.

I'm not like that with the people around me.

I think it's just sport. It's just stats.

It's just the history of sport and things.

I like I was saying before, when I see a headline, I will look into the story.

I won't just believe what I see.

I want to find out the facts and data.

But if someone says, you know, oh, you know, such and such,

you know, in a meeting, whatever, I'll go and look it up and find out

where it's come from and what the origin is. Or if somebody I remember,

there was a photo of Toto and Max online recently

suggesting Max was going to Mercedes and it was put into our group,

Sky F1 group.

And I immediately went on to the Internet, found the original photo,

found the original Max photo, the original Toto photo,

and it was Toto and Paul DeReste getting off a private jet.

And then I put those in the group and straight away everyone's like

Detective Brooks again.

But so I enjoy that sort of thing.

But no, not in my personal life.

What's fascinating is I've interviewed a lot of the Sky F1 team

and it's really, really made me aware of a presenter isn't someone that's in a box.

Like you were all so different.

You're so different to how you view what you do,

like how much of a job slash how much of a life that it is,

how you do your job, like how you present.

There are so many different types of presenters.

When did you realise that was something that you wanted to do?

I never wanted to be a presenter.

So when I was little, I wanted to be a radio presenter.

And I used to listen to this guy on a station called Radio Mercury

and his name was Timbo Lloyd.

I can still sing you the jingle now.

T for terrific, I for incredible, M for magnificent, B for brilliant.

Oh, oh, oh, Timbo.

Anyway, I listened to that when I was tiny.

And I thought I want to be a radio presenter.

And so I did that.

And then up until 2005, I was on a radio station in Southampton

and then Talk Sport were looking for people to present during the ad breaks on camera.

And a friend of mine was doing it and she said, you should come up and do it.

So I went and did it and we were in this tiny little broom cupboard.

I mean, it was literally broom cupboard.

I mean, it's smaller than this van, like half the size of this van.

And we literally just had to fill in the ad breaks and we had no script.

We had no producer.

We had people in the gallery who were in the radio gallery,

but just it flicked to a camera.

I don't even know how it worked, but and they were in our ears.

But we were all really young at this point.

And so they were saying the most random stuff while I was live.

So, you know, they would be saying stuff in your ear while you were reading out.

So you'd go and get all the latest sports headlines

and then you'd read them on camera or whatever, Radlib.

But they would say the most random stuff in your ear.

Like there's a spider on your shoulder and stuff like this.

While you're reading these sports headlines to try and throw you off.

And it was the best training you could ever have, because at that point,

I was like, keep going, going.

You can look when they get to the break or when they go back to the studio.

And it was amazing training and I really enjoyed it.

And then I went to Sky Sports and I'd emailed Andy Cairns or written to Andy Cairns,

who was the boss of Sky Sports News at the time for five years before I got an interview with him.

So I was, I started in, God, I don't know what year it was I started,

but I started writing to him saying, hi, I want to work for you one day.

This is what I'm doing now.

And he was like, great, keep it up, keep you posted.

So I kept doing that.

And then eventually I got a reply saying, come in for a chat.

And so I asked around about him and I was told that he is an absolute

stickler for you knowing your stuff.

So I'd said I like cricket because I'd started going to watch Hampshire a lot.

I lived in Southampton and I'd gone to a lot of Hampshire cricket games.

I thought, oh, he's going to ask me about cricket, isn't he?

So the night before I stayed with my friend in Twickenham and I said,

oh, I need you to tell me everything, test me on everything in cricket at the moment.

And I said, not England, that's too easy.

I think he's going to test me on county cricketers.

So you've got division one and division two.

So I said, I said, test me on division one, division two.

And she did.

And the next day I went in and he asked me questions about county cricketers,

batting averages, bowling averages, team captains, stuff that you would,

you know, you would know if you worked in it, but you wouldn't otherwise.

And I got every single one right.

And so he said to me in the end, he said, if you quit your job, I'll give you a job.

I think it was like the second interview I had where this happened.

And I said, OK, and I went back to talk sport and quit the next day.

Why are you so obsessed with getting to Sky?

I guess, I mean, this is 2006.

This is 20 years ago.

So they were the only people really if you wanted to work in sport.

If you if you weren't at the BBC, it was only Sky.

There wasn't any other competition really.

But to message someone for five years is fairly obsessive.

Yeah, he called me a terrier.

He was like, you're like a little terrier yapping at my heels.

I said, but that's because I've got a passion and I want to do it.

I think a lot of people write and email me and say, oh, I want to work in sport

and I want to do this or I want to do your job.

I'm like, but you don't just walk into my job.

As I say, always say, go to your nearest racetrack,

get to know all the people in the junior series, make the contacts now.

You could meet someone today who is a Formula One driver in the future.

I mean, my brother was racing and Billy Munger went up to my brother

and spoke to him because Billy knew that we live nearby.

And he went and spoke to my brother.

My brother remembers speaking to Billy Munger when he was very small

and just started driving and carting and stuff.

And my brother was racing.

So you never know who you're going to meet.

If you go to these tracks, get experience, write up the race weekend,

put it online, do video logs, do all these things.

And then you have a backlog or back catalogue, I should say,

to send to someone like Sky, somebody, you know, whoever's doing the broadcast.

But it's it's I mean, I was very lucky in the way I fell into it,

but that doesn't happen now.

But you were it sounds like an F1 obsessive.

Like you also loved watching it actually leaked through because we'll get into it.

I think fans are very acute now in terms of the team and the narrators

and the presenters to seeing who knows F1 and who doesn't.

And the guys that seem to know it, I mean, you know, it's such a degree

that even the guys that have kind of joined since the drive to survive era,

it makes them look like they've got this massive piece of the library missing

at the minute. And I think that's why, like, there's been 42 drivers debut

since you started and F1, yet there's not that much change

on that core team of Sky F1 presenters.

Like, do you have any fear now there's so much more interest in the sport of like,

oh, I've got to keep my seat.

I've got to keep the stats up.

I've got to keep performing to the level that I need to.

Like the pressure cooker is a formula one.

I maybe in the past, I don't anymore.

I because I have had 14 and a half amazing years doing my job.

And when you look around in other sports, that just doesn't happen.

And so I know how lucky I've been.

And if it all ended tomorrow, I'd be perfectly OK with that.

Because I've learned so much from it.

I've got other passions in life now, excuse me.

The writing for one thing.

I always wanted to write a book ever since I was little.

And I've always wanted to write fiction.

And it was me trying to sell a fiction book

that led to the publisher asking me to write this, the nonfiction.

So that's ignited that I want to do more of that.

I've got so many other things I want to do that actually doesn't.

I mean, I've been incredibly lucky and whoever gets my shoes next

just gets the best job in the world.

So I'm not as long as they're as passionate about the sport as I am,

as long as they're as committed to it, to the role as I've been.

No, no, no issues whatsoever.

A few years ago, I went through a massive change with my health

and managed to lose a lot of weight.

And Hello Fresh were a fundamental part in that journey.

Eating much healthier foods, but critical to me,

the correct portion sizes ultimately enabled me to lose over four stone.

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What have you given up, like really given up that you knew you'd have to let go of

to stay in your role for 14 or so years?

I think we all give up an awful lot in terms of you miss birthdays, you miss weddings,

you miss really big moments in other people's lives.

And when you start working in F1, it's all consuming.

And I remember those first three or four years where I couldn't wait for the next race.

Everything was about when am I next to a race, when am I next to a race?

And then after sort of the first three or four years, you get this switch where you go,

actually, it's the in between races that's important.

The race is just my job.

It's the in between I need to work on.

And then you get to the point where you're like, right, I need to prioritise more

what's going on at home.

I think for the first 12, 13 years, I didn't ask for a race off.

I was rested for races because nobody did the full calendar.

But I never said, can I not go to that race because I've got this going on.

I think it took me about 12 years to ask for a race off.

And that was for an operation.

How many races was it when you started?

Sixteen or 18, maybe.

And it's 24 now.

Yeah. So the most I've done in a season, I think is either 19 or 20.

You're in a season plus testing.

I think most people with just like a general view of it would think, OK,

you fly to race, fly, fly home afterwards.

That's not the case, is it?

A lot of them you're going to the race.

And even if there's a two week gap, you're going to the next place that there's

a race a lot of the time.

No, it depends.

If if so, for example, Australia, China, I went a couple of days early

because I had a friend to see in Australia and then we went straight

to China from Australia.

So that was two and a half, nearly three weeks I was away.

Came back every week at home, then you go to Japan, come back.

Obviously, we had the break because of the races in the Middle East being cancelled.

But we usually so if it's a long haul race, I'll usually fly on the Tuesday

or European even I fly on the Tuesday because we want to do some filming

on the Wednesday. So Montreal, I'm speaking to Pierre and Isaac on Wednesday

and doing some filming with them.

So I go Tuesday and then I don't fly home till Monday.

Get home Tuesday morning.

But that's just because of flights.

So we don't tend to, unless it's a back to back, we don't tend to stay up.

Something that made me realise just how obsessed you are was statistic.

This doesn't sound good.

Was hearing you speak about planning your suitcases.

Oh, God, yeah.

So what you take two pieces of luggage, which comes to 66 kilos, right?

Not every time, not every trip.

Explain to the women this name, how you plan your outfits and the men

because the men have to plan their outfits.

Do I mean, Ted's outfit planning is 10 pairs of shorts and 10.

Yeah, I'm talking more Jaxson, but some noise.

Simons is 10 of this jumper, two pairs of jeans and a lot of stain remover.

Yours was insane how how many different things you actually had to plan for.

It makes me realise just what goes into actually doing it,

the things you have to think about.

That's what I like to try and give the audience is what is it you actually

have to think about when doing all this stuff?

So the first thing I think about is I'll write down Wednesday, Thursday,

Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

So Wednesday could be a shoot away from the track.

What is that shoot?

Because it could be getting in a car doing hot laps like it was in Australia

with Oscar and I was like, well, I can't wear a skirt or a dress

because I'm getting into a car.

I'm going to have to wear a jumpsuit or something with trousers.

Then it's a case of, well, what's the weather like?

It's going to be really hot.

So, you know, thin material, jumpsuit, whatever.

Then you think about Thursday, I'm at the track, but I could be doing interviews.

Am I doing a sit-down?

So in China, I was doing a sit-down with Gabby Bortoletto on the Thursday.

So I was like, right, I need an outfit for that.

But that's not necessarily what I'm going to wear all day

because it's going to get creased by the time I get to the interview.

So you'll have an outfit to wear just during the day on Thursday,

could be shorts and a T-shirt or whatever, and then you'll change for the interview.

And then Friday, I will have an outfit to wear in commentary.

But if I'm presenting, it might not be the same outfit

because commentary box can sometimes be quite chilly because of the air-con.

But then if you're in the paddock, it could be really hot.

So I'm like, do I want to wear the same thing in commentary box as I do presenting FB2?

Then you have Saturday, which is qualifying.

So everyone dresses a bit smarter on Saturday.

And then Sunday race day everyone has a race day outfit.

But then you have to look at the weather.

And if you're in somewhere like Montreal, it could say it's going to be sunny

and there could be a downpour.

So you need a wet weather option for everything as well.

You need shoes that go with everything.

You need trainers in the paddock.

Trainers in the pit lane rather.

So if there's any pit lane hits, you have to wear trainers or closed toad, no heel shoes.

But if you're in the paddock and you're wearing a dress, you might want to wear heels

just to look nice because I don't always like wearing trainers with dresses.

And this is all that goes in to every one of those pieces that you see you present

when they're doing a hot lap and a car when you're doing an interview with the driver.

But you told me earlier, where I kind of connect with you from,

like I think it's fair to say people would tend to connect him immediately with the notebook.

That's not what all he does.

He's been upside down in planes with George Russell.

It's not all you do, but you have that immediate connection.

And with me, it's you in the paddock.

You only have two questions when you're there, right?

That I didn't even twig if you know what I mean.

Yeah. So this rules come in in the last few years.

Originally it was a lot looser and actually put them probably less

broadcasters in the pen maybe when I started as well.

But the drivers now have so many more demands on their time from their own team, social media,

all sorts of stuff that we only get two questions now after qualifying and after the race.

It is two questions maximum to each driver.

So even if they say something incredible in the second answer,

unless you're really fancy pushing your luck that day, you can't go back in on it.

And then after sprint, it's one question.

After the sprint, it's literally just one question.

So I do get people sometimes sort of making comments and I'm just like,

I literally get two questions.

So I mean, it really depends where you want to go.

But if something dramatic has happened, I don't have the opportunity to go,

hi, look, you know, great race, whatever, and soften them up before I go in.

I have to go in straight away with the first question

with what we need to talk about because I then need to respond to their answer and follow up.

Of the current grid, the guys that are standing there now,

who has changed the most in their answering back to you?

Wow, that is a great question.

Positively or negatively as well?

I mean, they all come in very fresh faced and very keen, enthusiastic and open.

But their answers do change.

I can't think of anybody.

Lewis?

No, because Lewis has always worn his heart on his sleeve in my eyes.

So I don't feel he has his challenging days.

And you know they are because he can't hide it.

He doesn't hide his emotions.

So when he said to me in Hungary last year, change the driver,

I'm a fan as well.

And I hate hearing that.

I don't want to push him anymore because I'm the person at home watching who feels

just as uncomfortable, but this seven-time world champion is feeling that bad in the car

right now that he's just changing the driver.

Yet when he has a good day, he's still open and chatty and you know,

chats away for ages about a good day.

So I wouldn't say he's changed.

I think for me, he's been pretty consistent over the years

and the way he shows his emotions and in his answers.

I think that the answers get tempered a lot.

I mean, the press team now, if you ever watch it, as soon as the driver gets out of a car,

there is a press officer by their side and they're talking to them on that short walk to the pen.

They're always chatting in their ears.

So if anything controversial has happened, they'll be giving them guidance on it.

Like, don't talk about that.

Just say you'll talk after the race.

You haven't seen the footage yet or whatever it is they're saying in their ears.

You get that rare occasion where the driver hasn't seen their press officer yet.

So we had this in Brazil with Sergio Perez and I don't remember the race with Max

where Max was asked to give the place to Perez and Max said no,

because he didn't like what happened in Monaco.

He thought Perez had crashed deliberately in Monaco.

And I saw Sergio Perez walking towards the pen and he didn't have his press officer with him

and he walked into the pen.

He came straight up to me and Alice, who was his press officer then said,

no, no, no, we need to go and Sergio goes, no, I want to talk now.

And so he spoke to me, gave me his answer and then he left the pen.

He didn't speak to anybody else and then he left the pen.

Then he went and spoke to the team and then he came back and did the rest of his interviews.

And that's really rare, but he obviously had something he wanted to say.

So have they become more robotic and is that a big frustration to you?

I wouldn't say robotic, but I would say they are more controlled in their answers.

They're more contained.

I don't know if it's just because they're wiser as well to the impact of what they say.

I think social media has had a massive impact on that in terms of

they know that quote in the past, say when it was on the BBC or just us at the start,

that might be covered on our websites or on a sports program.

But now that comment goes all around the world in seconds.

So I think they're more aware as well of what they say and the implications of it.

So I think that's come into it as well as the team trying to control more of the narrative.

Do you ever get it where you've heard an answer from a driver and you just think it's any old

answer yet you open the phone up and go, oh my God.

So many times. I can't even think of one specific right now.

But yeah, that happens an awful lot, an awful lot.

Some drivers get more hate than others.

And you've experienced, which we'll get onto,

like backlash of asking a question a certain way or that fan base getting on top of you, etc.

Is there anyone that you think gets almost unfairly pressed upon as a driver?

And you kind of look at them and interview them and think like,

I wish life would cut you a break a little bit.

It's really hard because I think in the past it felt like fans were fans of the sport.

Yes, they would have a favorite driver,

but it didn't mean they needed to hate anyone else.

Whereas now it feels like drivers really polarise an audience.

So you have the Max Verstappen fans who love him and the people who hate him.

But I find that hate really unnecessary.

You don't have to...

In smaller, I think.

Do you?

I mean, last year, for example, at the end of the year,

I loved the way people were cheering on for Max as the underdog.

People who said, I never thought I'd be cheering for Max Verstappen in a race.

That was fascinating for me to see that happening.

Because the thing with Max is, he's so honest,

I've never had an issue with Max.

I have so much respect for him.

If you read in the book, you'll see the way, oh, this is what people get wrong.

So you wouldn't call it an issue?

No, not in a million years.

Do you want to just clarify what it is that we're talking about?

So in Spain last year, Max had contact with George Russell.

And they'd had a coming together on the straight or something Max was upset about.

It was a frustrating race for him.

And there was contact with George.

Nico Rosberg was on our programme that weekend.

He'd implied he thought it was deliberate.

This is what our pundits were saying.

And Nico, as a Formula One driver and a world champion, said it looked deliberate.

So I'm in the pen and there is no one better than a Formula One world champion

to tell me what could have happened in that moment.

I'm not making a summary myself here.

I'm literally relaying what our world champion on the team thinks.

So I said to Max, was it deliberate?

And his response was, does it matter?

And I said to him, well, I think it does.

Because in that moment, I'm a fan watching at home.

And the reason I said that was because in Imola, just before,

he had pulled off that incredible move at the start of the race.

He had our commentators and our pundits open mouthed at how fantastic

his move was at the start of the race.

And that is what Max does and Max can do.

So to me, when he did what he did with George, it took some of the shine off.

Which is what I said to him.

And I hate that because he's incredible.

And he has those little moments that give people cause to criticise him.

And I'm just like, it really frustrated me as a fan that that had happened.

And so, and then he said, you know, does it matter?

And I said, yeah, I think to the fans watching into the kids.

Now he took that as me saying he's a role model and he shouldn't do it.

And which he's completely entitled to take it that way.

But I genuinely was coming at that from a fan's point of view.

In that it's so hard.

Like, I want people to see how good you are.

And you make it difficult when you do stuff like that.

That's where I was coming from.

What would you have said if it was someone that pulled that move

that hadn't had the record of skill that Max has?

I still would have asked him if it was deliberate.

I actually think I would have said it does matter to people watching.

But I wouldn't have referenced an Immola move.

But I would have asked the same thing.

Do you think you'd have been more inclined to say what the hell were you doing?

No, because that assumes that I have knowledge of what it's like to drive a race car.

You see what I'm saying.

So if I say, what the hell were you doing?

They can say, well, how would you know you've never been in a race car?

So I have to ask an open question.

Was it deliberate?

Because I'm not making assumptions there because I've not raced a Formula 1 car.

From your perspective,

do you want to then explain the hours, days, weeks that then followed that in your life

when you opened your phone and what that happened, what blew up, what that was like for you?

The interesting part of that was I got a lot of messages from people

in broadcasting, in sports broadcasting, saying, well done for asking the question.

Because nobody else in that pen that day asked him that question.

And even my colleagues said they wouldn't have asked that question

because they'd have been too scared to ask it.

So colleagues who'd do that pen admitted they wouldn't have asked it.

I didn't feel particularly brave.

I just came out of an inquisitive nature.

Did you mean to do that?

But then the fans, the social media side of it was horrendous.

I got people telling me I should never be allowed to,

I should never be able to have children because I'm a bad example.

I got the most horrific stuff you could imagine.

And this is from a lot of these profiles with dads, with kids, with daughters,

and things like that, where you just look at it and think,

take a step back.

It's a race.

It's a Formula One race.

It's sport.

But the stuff I got sent was horrendous, utterly horrendous.

So I just closed my comments.

That's what I was going to say.

I clearly had an effect because you disabled all your comments and all platforms.

Now to someone that is so, what's the word, cutthroat in your questioning

and clearly strong and brave, was that like a time that maybe broke you

behind the scenes a little bit?

No.

I mean, does it make you think about those questions in the future?

Yes.

But does it stop you asking them?

No, because it's my job.

And I have a responsibility to put those questions to people.

There was an incident in Austria with Max and Lando,

where they had their battle on track.

And Lando, similarly to the Checo incident,

walked straight into the pen, straight up to me and wanted to talk.

So I asked him and he, I'm going to paraphrase it.

I don't remember the exact words he used,

but he basically said,

this will damage our friendship if he doesn't apologize.

So I then have a duty to put that to Max.

Now, some people messaged me and said, oh, you're stirring up trouble.

And I said, but if I didn't ask Max that,

and just the Lando quote was out there,

Max would have a right to say,

you didn't give me the opportunity to respond to that.

That's not fair.

So you have to give the other person the opportunity to respond.

And that's what I did.

And Max said what he said, and that's it, done and dusted.

The problem is it's a no-win, isn't it?

If you change yourself to appease the person that mentioned you that,

you'd have somebody else that was annoyed at the fact

that you weren't the way that you're going to be anyway.

And the way I look at it is,

if I get half abuse and half compliments,

I'm probably doing the right job.

So when Lewis and Nico in 2016,

that's the first experience I really had of the fans' anger

when they crashed in Spain.

Half the comments I got were that I was too hard on Nico, too easy on Lewis.

And the other half were too hard on Lewis and too easy on Nico.

And I looked at it and thought, well,

if both sides think I was fair and unfair,

then I'll probably hit it about right in the middle somewhere.

Is it difficult when you've got so many opinions,

and also you obviously internally all know as a group

who supports or leans towards their driver?

Yeah.

Of course you don't.

Yeah.

When you're all out, Ted's gone to bed,

and everyone else is sat there in a bar discussing what's happened.

How did you know Ted's gone to bed?

Discussing what's happened at the race.

Is it very difficult because the paddock's so small

and there's so many people from different teams?

You almost have to be like,

who's listening, the press officer,

when you give a personal opinion

of how you think a driver behave.

Say, and I'm not saying you do,

say you went back and were at that bar and were like,

I'm convinced he deliberately hit him.

But he hasn't said, but that was desperately deliberate.

Have you ever had word spread so quickly around the paddock

that something that you said away from it has kind of got back in?

Do you have to be careful?

No, I'm...

Usually pretty careful about what I say.

But also, I don't tend...

I'm so conscious of not having an opinion,

a strong opinion in terms of, I haven't raced,

I haven't been in a car.

I will listen to Martin Randall,

I'll listen to Nika Rosberg,

I'll listen to Johnny and Damon,

we had them on the team.

Listen to Jamie Chadwick.

They've been racers.

They know what it's like.

And I really don't ever want to be...

I can see what it's like from a human point of view.

I can say the way he was so defensive,

that tells me he knows he was wrong.

I'd look at it from that point of view.

So Max's response made me in the pen that day,

and then look, his apology the next day on the Monday,

he said, he did wrong.

So from a human point of view,

I can tell from the body language and the response

that he felt he did the wrong thing

and he was angry with himself.

But I could never assume as a racer,

he did that deliberately to hit another driver.

That makes sense.

Who's the most challenging team principal you've ever interviewed?

Who's a wily old fox?

They're all pretty wily old foxes.

You don't get to be a team principal without being...

Excuse me.

Who's been the most difficult?

Have you got an idea in mind of that question?

Maybe Flavio.

We don't get to speak to Flavio very often, to be honest.

When he was?

Yeah, I didn't speak to him when he was Rano Boss,

and we don't really get to speak to him very much now.

They're all pretty good.

They're all friendly.

You sometimes have to put in your topics beforehand

to certain team principals,

so they get an idea.

But a lot of the time that's due to language

as opposed to actually wanting to prepare answers.

It's due to just language barriers,

they're not being 100% confident with their English

and just wanting a heads up.

But they're all pretty good.

I mean, Christian, you would have to listen to his answers

because sometimes he'd plant stuff in there

about other teams that you'd have to go,

oh, hang on a minute, what are you saying?

Are you saying that you think their car might be doing

something it shouldn't be?

Or, you know, you'd always have to listen

very carefully to his answers

because he would drop stuff in there.

He's like Fernando Alonso.

When you interview Fernando Alonso,

he drops stuff in his answers that he wants you to pick up.

Is Fernando secretly your favorite driver?

Why do you say that? Everyone says that to me.

It's really funny.

Um, no, he's not.

I have a lot of respect for him.

He's the first driver I met.

So when we started, when we got the rights to this sport,

there was an event in Italy called Vroom

that Ferrari put on that was insane.

I mean, if you want to look at Formula One

as a sport full of money,

we got flown to this ski resort in Italy,

this five star ski resort,

stayed in this amazing hotel.

And my job was, and I was on my own,

I didn't know anyone in F1.

And they basically said, right,

you'll get to interview the two drivers

who are Alonso and Massa at the time.

But we've also got the MotoGP riders here.

So there's a day for the MotoGP

and then the next day is the Formula One.

So I went to the MotoGP day,

looked at how it was all set up,

you go to a press conference,

you then go skiing up at the mountain

and you will meet for lunch.

You meet your cameraman on the mountain

to do your piece to camera.

This is influencers before influencers are around,

getting the special treatment.

Oh, this is amazing treatment.

Yeah, we don't get this anymore.

And then you ski down

and then you'll meet your editor

and you'll put your piece together

and you'll send it back.

So that was the first day.

So the second day,

and you have a dinner on the mountain as well, by the way.

So you get a cable car up to this dinner

and then you can ski down by torture light.

I mean, it was insane.

So the second day was the F1 day.

So I did the interview for LePay

and I did an interview with,

I think it was Stephanie Domenicale

at the time as it was boss.

Anyway, I then went up the mountain

to find my cameraman

and did this piece to camera with a cameraman.

But it was quite a tricky slope.

This restaurant was at the top of

and that I had to meet him at.

And then obviously on the way down fell

and rolled all the way down the mountain, basically.

With this SIM card,

this SD card in my backpack,

hoping it survived to the bottom,

took it to the editor,

put this piece together anyway.

And then the last night,

there was this massive party.

And I'd been so good all week

because I was so nervous of putting a foot wrong,

but at the party on the last night,

I had one gin and tonic

and then tripped and fell

in front of Johnny Noble from motorsport

or the race.

His wife looked after me for the rest of the evening.

Anyway, but that night was the first night

I met Fernando Alondo at this party.

And everyone was dancing

and having drinks and things.

And it was just, it was hilarious.

He's the first driver I met in Formula One.

But it was just a completely sort of

open atmosphere in terms of everyone

was talking to each other.

There was no, they're the drivers

and they're the journalists.

Everyone was just human beings

having a night out at the end of the week.

And so he's the first driver I ever met.

So to me, you know, I'm like,

you're the first person I spoke to.

You're the first person.

You were really nice to me that weekend

or that week or whenever it was.

But no, he's, I just think he's,

he's fascinating in terms of

he went away from the sport,

he's come back to it.

And at his age, he's still doing what he's doing.

That's amazing.

Just gives her an hour's of messy lives, doesn't it?

It does, but also I think it sends a message to Lewis

that he can do it for a few more years as well.

Because if you can keep the training up,

keep up the intensity of what you do,

you can still get in a car and do good things.

I just think it's a shame for him

that the Aston's so far behind right now.

Do you get that anymore throughout the season

at any point where you will just have

the kind of relaxed time to see how the drivers take?

Or is it just completely?

No, it's changed so, so much.

I mean, we don't even get on the same flights

as drivers anymore hardly.

In the past, you know, you could be sat next to a driver

on the way from one race to the next,

but now there are so many private jets involved

and other ways of travel that you don't often see

drivers on your flights anymore either.

Does that make your job more difficult?

You're not getting to know the person

behind the eyes that are staring at you?

Yes and no, because I think sometimes you can get too close

and you think your friends...

I won't ask you that because like Lando,

when he was kind of a lot before being a world champion,

when he was maybe a bit more of a happy chappy?

No, I mean, people think...

I wouldn't call any of the drivers one of my friends.

I would never go that far because I just don't think you should be...

You can have a relationship with people where you chat or, you know,

you can have a working relationship with them.

But your fears get into the point that if you hypothetically did...

You'd influence your question.

And I don't ever want that, so no.

Yeah, I don't think I would call any of them my friend.

There are ones, you know, Danny Kvyat when he was in the sport,

Johnny and I, I would say we were friends with him

because we would see him outside of races when he was with Kelly.

We met him in London, we went out for lunch one day, the four of us,

you know, those sort of things.

Yes, but he was also leaving the sport around then as well.

So, yeah, I maybe would see him, would have seen him as a friend,

but no, not anymore.

It's very different.

What's it like interviewing Lance Stroll?

Challenging.

I mean, it's...

I try and understand where he's coming from because

for a lot of the drivers, they are aware of the image they have to put out there.

And they are aware of the fact that

brand sponsorship deals depend on how they appear and come across,

whereas Lance has grown up very differently.

And so for him, for the team, I did his,

this is probably not something I should boast about,

but I did his media training when he started.

So when he was at Williams, before he came into the sport,

I spent a day and afternoon with him at Williams with a cameraman.

And we sat him down and I interviewed him and then we watched it back and I said,

look, you're doing this, let's do it again.

But this time, have a think about it and think about this and don't move your hand so much.

And I spent that time with him.

So his first year in the sport, I thought he was great.

But then he changed and he knows and the team know that he doesn't really need to say anything

because their income and their sponsorship doesn't depend on him

being chatty and stuff on camera.

So I think that's changed over the years, definitely.

To ignite the person that loves to be fascinated by the people behind the eyes?

Yes.

Do you think Lance really wants to be in Formula One?

I do, I actually do.

He loves racing.

He is, you don't do what he did in the other formulas coming through

if you don't love racing.

He loves racing.

I just think he doesn't like everything else that goes with it.

And also, you have to think about it.

Will he ever be given credit for his driving or his racing?

Or will he always be there because of his dad's money?

That's what I find fascinating, but I find this fascinating because

if you just look at father and son duos in different places,

so take Britain's Got Talent, the acts that break Simon Cowell down to being more of a human over

the years has been when a father and son have come on and performed together.

And to me, in some respects, watching what Lawrence and Lance have tried to do for 10, 15 years,

they've worked their way through all the series.

Lawrence has gone to work and built businesses to afford to be able to back this dream.

This clearly got this dream as a family of becoming F1 world champions.

They will find a way to poach Adrian Newey.

They will find a way to do everything.

And when you package it like that, of like, Jesus,

they are on a mission like a father and son to be F1 world champions.

That's really admirable.

That's quite cool.

If you were going to go with your dad and go, screw it, we're going to be that.

So I always find it fascinating how far from that image the rest of the world looking in is.

And I just wonder whether that's because of how Lance presents himself in front of camera

and actually behind how he presents himself in front of the camera sometimes.

He really does have that fire to be an F1 world champion

or if he's just being dragged along by Lawrence.

No, I think he does.

I think if you watch the piece Ted did with him and he went skiing with him in Canada,

you see the real Lance.

And also, yeah.

And also Lawrence Stroll did a podcast with Tom Clarkson

that you really get Lawrence's passion coming across.

And that doesn't come across in other interviews.

But that interview, I listened to it and I saw a different side of Lawrence

and I imagine that's what Lance has as well.

And it just doesn't, they don't talk about it.

They haven't talked about it anywhere else.

And that's what I would, I would love to sit down with Lawrence and Lance

and get that out of them.

Because I did the Aston Martin launch after having listened to that podcast.

And the first time I did the launch with him, he was given a script

and he read it off an autocue and everybody criticised him.

And so I spoke to him the next year and said,

I said to the team, I said,

can I get five minutes with Lawrence?

Because I just want to explain, you know, how we want to approach it this year.

You're directly asking us an Aston Martin.

And so I sat down with Lawrence and I said about that podcast

and it was brilliant.

You were so passionate and it all came across.

Let's do that this year.

And so instead of a script, I just asked him questions

and tried to get that passion out of him again

so that people can actually see what this is about.

Because I feel both of them suffer for the fact

that there is so much money involved and that they've bought a team

and they've bought Adrian and things.

But that passion is there in both of them.

It absolutely is, you know, they want to be world champions.

They want to succeed just like everybody else in that paddock does.

And it's just a shame I feel for them that that doesn't come across.

And I also, yeah, I also feel for Lance

because I actually think when you look at him doing interviews,

he's going to be criticised no matter what.

And he probably feels like that.

So why give people ammunition?

I remember when he lashed out in the garage at one of his people.

Yeah, that was bad.

But he knows because he hit that breaking point,

just like you said, the steam coming out of your ears.

The reason I picked to them was I could have asked about any driver in there.

Like, I think Liam Lawson's come over a bit of a love, hate, love with so many fans.

And Red Bull kind of does that to their second drivers.

They go on this emotional rollercoaster of where they are.

But I do specifically find those two really fascinating Lawrence and Lance

because I would love to hear the vision, the grand vision,

that just is the passion for like what they what it is that they want to achieve together,

said without any press or media training or anything.

Because I think it'd be fascinating to see

how the fans' opinion of them may then differ.

But it's a very challenging thing to do, get time to be able to do that kind of thing.

Like for me as a podcaster to get an hour with people that are used to getting five minutes

here and there is really challenging.

You mentioned that you were the one that asked for that interview with Lawrence.

Prior to that in this interview, you've been saying, oh, I was given five minutes.

I was told to do this or be there.

And I'm in the pad at doing this.

How much of like the pieces that you do?

You know, when you said like Ted going skiing with Lance,

how much of that is your ideas come into life?

And like, how do you make that happen?

If you're enjoying the chat with Ben and I right now,

please consider subscribing.

And if you do that, you may want to click on the link by my book F1 Racing Drive.

Thanks.

So with so many of us on the team now, it's a lot less than it used to be.

But for example, Sergio Perez in Mexico,

when we went to his house with his family and sat down with his wife

and his only one child, Ben, that was me.

I worked on that for nine months.

So I went to his manager first of all and said, look,

really want the fans to know the real Sergio.

Similar vein to Lance, really.

I don't think people know the real Sergio.

This is when he was at Force India.

And I said, I'd love to get him at home and do some filming.

And I spoke to his manager.

I spoke to his wife, agent,

spoke to the team, press officers, and spoke to Sergio.

And explained that what I wanted to get out of it wasn't clickbait.

It wasn't editorial headlines.

It was get to know Sergio better, know the real Sergio.

And over the course of nine months, we got it arranged.

It was nine months from first conversation to transmission, I should say.

So it went out before the Mexico Grand Prix, I think.

But we'd been working on it since the end of the previous season.

So, and we went during the summer break in the August to Puerto Vallarta in Mexico.

And we went into his apartment and we filmed in his apartment with his wife and son.

Then we went to the gym he uses and filmed him training.

Then he took us to his favorite restaurant for lunch.

And his mum was there.

We had lunch with his mum and his trainer as well.

And we had a lovely lunch.

Then he took us to his favorite ice cream shop.

And then we walked down to the beach and we sat and had conversations.

So we had various interviews during the day.

But we had this whole day with him and he really opened up and he was fantastic.

And we got two really lovely pieces out of it.

I mean, it's so annoying that one day gets condensed into two five-minute pieces

for a race weekend, but that's what happens.

And I really enjoyed it and I love doing that sort of thing.

So I did the same with Pierre Gasly and Milan.

And we went to his apartment and then he took us out.

We didn't get as much time with Pierre.

It's really hard these days.

That was the most recent one I've done.

And that was the time is just you get a few hours now.

I mean, to get that day with him in Mexico was insane.

The full day from nine till six or whatever was insane.

But now you get a few hours if you're doing that home piece.

So what's the piece that's in your notes on your phone or in your head

that you've not been able to put together for maybe a long time?

Max. Max at home.

And I've asked and asked.

And at one point, Red Bull was saying,

look, we'd love to do it.

We'd love people to see because I don't feel people see the real Max.

That's my people see that.

And then when people comment and say he was really difficult to you

in the interview and things, I love Max.

I think he is a phenomenal talent.

You read in the book, like all the times I praise him

and all the stuff I say he does on track.

He is honest, which is what I want in the pen.

Whatever the answer is, as long as they're being honest,

brilliant.

And I think he gets a hard time because of his personality

and how blunt he is.

But away from the track, he's a brilliant, friendly, funny guy.

And that doesn't come across.

I think social media is changing a lot with Max, a lot.

I just think people are being forced to like him.

That's how I'd describe it.

Why forced?

Because I take my friend Adam as prime example.

Harcore Formula One fan.

I've known him since we were like 17, 18,

and really close friends ever since.

So I remember sitting down prior to Abu Dhabi 2021

and we'd have what's called brown food F1 Sundays

where we were only allowed to have any food that was brown.

Nuggets, chips, browned off, everything.

That was it and sourced with it.

And a few of the lads just hated Max, hated him.

They hated the way that he was.

They hated his bullish overtakes.

They said that it wasn't fair and the other drivers

didn't behave like that.

And five years of watching Adam, Adam now is sending me

the video of Max racing in the wet,

the one that Red Bull have just put live

and beaten the 500 driver.

I can't remember what car it was.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

By two seconds in the wet, he's just two laps

and he's gone, this bloke is off the rick to scale.

And like the Nurburgring laps and you see what he does

and then he goes somewhere else

and you see what he does or he pulls an overtake

or down the inside of it to the start of that race.

And it's like my friends have made it part of their F1 passion

since I have a W2021 to not like this bloke.

And they just can't anymore because they see talent,

like the talent shines through.

That's kind of how I've seen it, it gone.

It's like even the people that say don't necessarily like him,

like whatever, go, oh yeah, but he is good.

Now, so I think there's been a systematic change

in the last maybe two years with him.

Yeah, and I also, I mean, remember when he came in,

he was so young and he was thrown into that Red Bull seat

and he had a lot of learning to do

and he had to do that on the track.

So you remember in Mexico when they were talking

about the Verstappen rule and his battle with seven,

things like that, that was in people's memories.

So it's taken him probably a lot longer to get people on side

because of the way when he first came into the sport,

he was driving, but he's learned and he's changed his driving

and he's become so much more skillful.

And you get a wet race and Max is starting P20,

you are watching that race, right?

Because you know he is going to do something incredible

and come through and probably win,

get on the podium at least, but possibly win that race.

And that's what our sports are all about.

So if I could get that one shoot, I mean,

Red Bull, when I first put it to them said we'd love that

because we want people to see that other side of Max.

But Max is somebody who, I'm not going to say he doesn't care

about his image on social media, but it's not important to him.

What's important to him is his family and his racing.

And that's what's important in his life.

Do you think you'll ever get that piece?

No. And do you know what? That's fair enough.

Really?

Yeah, I think that's fair enough.

Because he recalls, I recall how much you

messaged Skye just to get your original interview.

Do you hang these people like that?

No, because I also respect the fact that he wants to keep his home life private.

So there are some drivers who will open up and there are some who are like,

absolutely not.

And even though I said to them, look, we won't show where he lives.

If he takes us to his gym or takes us to his favorite restaurant,

or we'll go for a run on his favorite route,

something like that, we could do all that.

But no, he wants to keep that part of his life completely private.

And I respect that.

Absolutely respect that.

But the funny thing is, if you want to know more about Max,

listen to other people talking about him.

So listen to the likes of Gabby Bottoletto,

listen to the other drivers on that grid who tell you what Max is really like.

I mean, Gabby is great friends with Max.

And the way Max has helped him and the stuff Gabby's learned from being friends with Max

is quite telling.

That's what you need to listen to,

listen to how those other drivers talk about him.

And you'll hear about a different person to maybe the one that stands in front of a microphone.

When you were introduced to the endurance race inside of things,

you've obviously been buried inside F1 for the last 14 years.

But I've heard you mentioned that you've been to like the 24 hours of Nerva Gring,

but you're a really big fan of the Indy 500 stuff, am I right in saying?

No, more, probably more than 24-hour stuff.

Been to a couple of 24-hour races.

Because I think the people get on board with F1 because of how easy it's become to understand it.

Yeah.

Qualifying occasionally a spring.

Even this year.

Well, there's that.

Qualify, well, there's a problem here.

And I think that's what's causing people to fall off a lot this year.

But traditionally it's been qualifying, then a spring coming,

people don't really understand what that is on the whole, like wider audiences.

And then the race.

And then there's, you know, X-Matter teams, X-Matter drivers,

I think people get on board with it.

They've all got a big different color.

Yeah.

But with some other races, especially when it involves different classes being out on track,

people just like, that's just too complicated.

Do you think there's another race that will come,

another motorsport that will come through like Formula One?

And do you think it maybe it would be from Max's influence,

going to the Nürburgring or something like that?

Possibly, possibly.

What is the next F1 in motorsport?

God, I have no idea, to be honest.

I have no idea.

I mean, I will occasionally watch a motor GP race because I love watching it.

And I just, my brain cannot fathom how they do what they do.

I mean, they're incredible.

Probably also helped by the fact that Barry Sheen was a neighbor and a friend.

When I was little.

So I used to watch some of the motorbike racing when I was little.

And then he'd fly his helicopter over our house as he came home.

So he used to live over the road.

So we would hear him coming back from a race.

So it'd be like, oh, he's coming back now.

And he used to fly really low to wind up my dad because we had a batch roof.

And so he'd fly his helicopter really low just to wind up my dad.

And it was just a running joke.

And so I sort of, I'd seen some motorbike racing when I was a kid.

And he'd turn up on his motorbike and come around and see us and stuff.

So I watched that occasionally.

But I don't know in terms of other motorsport coming through.

So much has been put into Formula One in terms of liberty and their vision.

Drive to survive coming in, all of that.

Unless another motorsport category has that much put into it.

I don't see it.

But Max doing, you know, the GT racing, doing the NLS.

Maybe there is a company like Liberty out there going, hang on a minute.

This could be the next step one, but that's what it will take.

I think it will take a company like that going,

we are going to invest in this and send it through the roof.

But like you say, it is, if it is more complicated to follow,

if there are more teams, if there are more cars, if there are different categories,

you've got to find a way of engaging with the audience properly with it.

Your motivation to do what you do.

Do you kind of rethink that every major set of rule changes?

Do you look at it as I'm now locked in for six more years?

I've got to grips with everything that's going on the hybrid battery system

where I'm attempting to, like is this ever changing?

I've now got to lock myself in.

Do you look at it in the same way that drivers would approach maybe like Max?

I'm going to stay for this next set of regs and then I may be gone.

Do you look at like what you do in a similar light?

I look at it as am I still feeling challenged in my role?

Am I still getting the same enjoyment out of it?

Am I still doing a good job essentially?

Have you ever questioned that?

Yeah, I probably have.

I think the only time I ever questioned whether I could carry on was actually probably 2014

with Jules Bianchi.

That's probably the only time where I've thought, do I want to do this anymore?

And that's because that was the toughest moment ever in my career in sport,

probably, I wouldn't say maybe in life, but that was a very, very tough, tough moment.

And the problem I had with that was when I was saying before about not being friends with drivers,

I has had a running sort of joke with Jules that weekend and the weekend before even,

the race before in Singapore, where he'd said to me in Singapore,

you never interview me in the pen.

You always say, because I have to prioritise drivers and interview pens.

So sometimes you just have to shake your head and say no, not today.

And he'd said to me in Singapore, so you never interview me in the pen.

And I said, oh, get yourself a seat at Ferrari and I'll interview you as a joke.

And we got to Japan and I think it was said was moving teams and there's been some news.

So his name was being linked with Ferrari again.

And so he came into the pen on the Thursday and he was going to walk past me.

And I went, no, no, I want to talk to you.

And he goes, oh, you want to talk to me now?

And I said, yeah, because you've been linked with Ferrari and we had a little joke about it.

And that was that weekend in Suzuka in 2014 when he crashed.

And I was due to fly home from Japan straight after the race.

And everyone else was going on to Russia.

And I just remember when Suttle went off, I was in the interview pen

and waiting for Suttle to come in.

And then we heard that another car had gone in.

And it was standing there in the pen and we didn't know.

And I was just, all of us were just staring at this timing screen trying to see

as the cars came in, you know, it said pit, pit.

And next to Jules, his name was just a blank space.

And that's when everyone realized it was Jules.

And they weren't showing it, which is when you know it's bad.

If they're not showing it, you know it's bad.

And then everything that unfolded then I then flew home from Japan.

And I had to go straight into Sky Sports News and put together his obit.

Because if that happens to a driver or anybody, anybody who gets to a certain age

in sport or anybody who's seriously ill or ends up in hospital,

you put an obit together, it's a horrible side of the job.

The worst side of the job.

And I spent two days putting this together and

Just to explain the meaning of obit.

So obit is the obituary, short for obituary.

And it's basically the tribute to that person's life.

So I was putting together a vt of basically Jules's career up and life up to that point.

So I was having to watch all the archive footage we had.

I'd done, I'd been there in Spain when he'd gone for his seat fit with Manor as it was then.

And we'd had to stay really late at track that night in order to do it.

And he was just this lovely guy who came bouncing over, gave us an interview,

let us film his seat fit.

Really lovely guy.

And yeah, that was really, really hard putting that together.

And that made me question it.

It was so fascinating.

Did you know Will Buxton back then?

Yes.

Whose name's right there.

Wrote forward for my book.

Only because Will described when he spoke to me how Jules was the reason

afterwards that he decided not to become any closer with drivers.

Yeah, same here.

Again.

So was he different to the rest of the drivers then?

Because let's just think that the majority of people listening on average

may be drive to survive onwards fans.

And if not, maybe a bit like me 2018, 2017 onwards.

There's not that many as a percentage of people that may have understood exactly

the meaning and the driver that he was.

And why so many people talk in this certain way about him compared to maybe others?

I think for a lot of us of our generation, it was the first time we've been confronted with death

at track.

So I think the fourth sport had been so safe for so long.

It was, and it says on every pass, motorsport is dangerous,

but you're just like, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever.

So I think that moment hit a lot of us very hard, firstly because it was our first experience.

For a lot of us, you know, in our thirties or whatever,

it was the first time we'd come across death in our lives for a lot of us.

It was someone younger than us.

It was someone at the start of what should have been a phenomenal career.

I mean, you know, he tested that Ferrari and he'd been quicker than the race driver.

You know, he tested the Ferrari at Silverstone, he'd been incredibly quick.

So the talk about him was of this incredible future that should be coming.

He'd had that race in Monaco where he'd got them the first point

and Will would have been in the pen alongside me in Monaco and we spoke to Jules and

you know, what it meant to that team.

And he just was a very lovely, likable guy.

And I wouldn't say more likable than anyone else on the grid,

but I guess there was just something about it.

He was so young. He was at the start.

He was being talked of in so many, you know, promising terms by people.

He was a lovely, likable guy bouncing around the paddock.

And the way it happened shouldn't have happened either.

You know, it absolutely should never have happened.

So yeah, I think that's probably why it was quite so tough for everybody.

It is, even as a viewer, shocking one.

I mean, I will never, ever, ever forget where I was the moment I saw

Grosjean crash on that race because I've watched it live.

Never. I stood on my kitchen side, been forced out to get to a dinner on time.

I was like, just trying to take the iPad with me, playing it to see what's going on.

And I remember the other half of a sort of family was saying,

it's time to go down. It just went, even for a view, it just went silent.

I was like, I cannot believe what I've just seen on this iPad.

The fact that he survived that was unbelievable.

Otherwise, I think maybe my generation is an F1 fan,

may have gone through a similar thing as what the generation of fans went through

with what you're describing with Jules.

Yeah. I mean, that, I was in the office next to Simon in Bahrain watching that.

And Damon was there and Karun was there.

And the race starts and they've just come in from the paddock

and adrenaline's still flowing because they've just been live.

And I'm sitting there because the pen is very close to where our office is.

I was watching the start in the office so I can watch it clearly.

And then I'll go to the pen if something happens or someone crashes out.

And I remember it happening and there was just silence from everybody.

And actually, I think we all looked at Damon because

he's the person who's going to know how bad it is.

We can only guess.

We've obviously worked in the sport, we've got experience.

But I looked at Damon and Damon just looked so shocked.

And he said, that's bad or whatever it was he said.

And then you go, okay, it's really bad.

If Damon's saying it's bad, it's really bad.

And then we were just in silence for that 27 seconds, whatever it was,

waiting to see something.

And I think all of us, I mean, in my head, I'm going,

right, okay, what am I going to ask?

What am I going to ask whoever it is?

Because I might not get to speak to Grosjean after this.

So what do I say to the others?

How do I approach this?

And it also actually took me back to Jules because

the toughest thing with the Jules thing was,

there were some drivers in the pen that day that wanted to talk about it

and there were some that didn't.

And I had no idea when they came up in front of me who wanted to do it.

So I got criticism online for asking some drivers about it.

But that's what they wanted to talk about.

So even if I'd said to them any other question,

all they were going to answer me with was something about Jules and his crash.

So it's really difficult in that moment to know what the drivers want to say.

And I have to let them just speak.

And they'll tell me what they want to say.

And so with the Grosjean, I then got sent into the paddock

and I had to go and interview Gunter Steiner.

But thankfully, Grosjean was out of the car by this point

and we'd seen him go over the barriers with Dr Ian Roberts.

And out of some incredible miracle, he was okay.

So I knew, speaking to Gunter, it was going to be,

wow, is he okay?

What do you know?

Fantastic job by the medical team and everybody at the track to get him out.

You know, you can turn it into slight positive and what was horrendous.

But yeah, that was another moment where everything just stops

and you just pray, pray, pray, pray that he's going to be okay.

You've all been together so long with your team, Simon, Ted, yourself.

You've all been together so long.

Are you now, do you have quite a bit of say in who comes and joins you

for like clicking and personality test?

No, that's all down to our boss.

Our boss makes all the decisions of hiring and firing.

So if someone's on the team, it's his call.

And if someone isn't on the team, it's his call.

Wow, you look surprised.

Who is a current driver in the grid?

Yep.

If you could handpick them to be a future pundit.

Fernando.

You knew I was going to say that.

And you say he's not your favorite.

No, because he's so honest.

Because he's not your favorite.

But you know what you're going to get with him.

You know he's going to tell you how it is.

Nico is fantastic at that.

Nico says things that a lot of people think but would never say.

But he's in that space now in his head where he feels free.

And if you got a free Fernando, it would be phenomenal to hear what he says.

If you were to hang up the microphone and move on to your next thing,

what race would you return to if you could pick one every year?

Wow, probably, I would say Silverstone.

Absolutely.

But if it wasn't the British Grand Prix, it would be Austin.

Very cool, somewhere I'd love to take a van and interview as Texas.

Oh my God, you have to go to Austin.

Honestly, it's just the best place.

It is, everyone buys into the race weekend.

The track is great.

The racing has got so much better since the first race.

The first race was awful.

But it's got so much better.

Yeah, turn one is amazing.

Yeah, definitely.

I think you should go to Austin.

Take the van to Austin.

The people at Texas are brilliant.

You would get some great content.

Look at that, viewers.

She was ready for another tough question.

She had to think about that.

She did that and sat back, as if she's going to be shot with a question.

She's got to prepare for that.

I think you've done so well on being on the other side of the mic.

Thank you so much for your time.

I urge people to go and look at F1 Racing Drive,

because it has so many more of those stats, intricacies,

and things that you talk about that can't fit into two-minute questions with the drivers

that you should really do it if it's something that you enjoy learning about.

So thank you very much for coming on Road to Success.

Thank you for having me.

It was fabulous to speak to you.

Thank you very much.

About this episode

Rachel Brookes talks about how brutal race weekends can be for interviews, from dealing with “one happy person and 19 miserable people” to asking tough questions right after dramatic incidents. The conversation moves through qualifying pressure, media rules, and how social media spreads comments “all around the world in seconds.” Along the way, she shares her own path into motorsport—from amateur racing and paddock life to learning track nuance in a Radical SL1—and explains why she stays careful with what she says.

Austin Bahrain banking British Grand Prix contact deliberate downforce driving in the wet endurance records F1

Original notes

Get 50% off your First Hello Fresh Box with code “50FOWLER” 20% off the next month and free treats for three months with this link - www.hellofresh.co.uk/50FOWLER

Rachel Brooks has spent over 14 years at the heart of Formula One — interviewing world champions, navigating intense rivalries, and dealing with the pressure of asking the toughest questions in motorsport. In this episode of Road to Success, Rachel opens up about her clashes with Max Verstappen, the abuse she received online, the reality of life inside the F1 paddock, and the sacrifices it takes to survive at the top level of sports broadcasting.

From Sebastian Vettel’s coldest interview moments to emotional stories involving Lewis Hamilton, Lance Stroll, Fernando Alonso and more, this is a fascinating deep dive into Formula One from someone who has seen it all up close. Rachel also reveals the behind-the-scenes politics of Sky F1, what really happens in the media pen, and why drivers today are more controlled than ever before.

If you’re a Formula One fan, this episode gives you a completely different perspective on the sport, the drivers, and the human side of racing.

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