Canadian GP: Chaos, Red Mist & Rental Cars!

Canada gives us the kind of Formula One weekend that makes you argue with your mates for days: big pace swings, strange tyre choices, and just enough chaos to expose who is thinking clearly under pressure.

This week on Two Soft Compounds, Rick and Damien jump straight into the Canadian Grand Prix story that left everyone shaking their heads: McLaren starting on intermediate tyres on a track that was basically dry, despite Oscar Piastri telling the team it made no sense. We break down what they were trying to solve, why it backfired so badly, and how quickly a race weekend can unravel.

From there, we dig into Mercedes and why the upgrades suddenly make them look like the team to beat, while the Russell vs Antonelli fight shows how easily thrilling turns messy in modern Formula One. We also cover Hamilton’s strongest Ferrari performance yet, Verstappen’s blunt take on the new regulations, Hadjar’s frustrating penalties, Aston Martin’s ongoing problems, and why Canada may finally have given Formula One the kind of unpredictable racing it wanted from these new cars.

Plus, Monaco is next, the weather may turn and if these cars hit the rain around the principality, absolutely anything could happen.

Production Credits:

Presented by: Rick Houghton & Damien Reid
Studio Engineer & Editor: Ben Dover
Executive Producer: Ian Carless
Produced by: W4 Podcast Studio 

Transcript

Global Intro And Canada Setup

Rick Houghton 0:00

Hey, welcome to another edition of Two Stuff Compounds, the Formula One Podcast with me, Rick Hutton and Damien Reed. It's a truly international affair, this podcast. Our executive producer is sat in Kuala Lumpa in the surroundings I can only describe as palatial with air conditioning. My co-host Damien Reed is sat in Dubai. Uh, I'm presuming with fine AC working at all times, Damien. Is that correct?

Damien Reid 0:22

Uh the AC is beautiful here, um, even though it is uh quite hot and humid outside. But yeah, I'm uh I'm doing okay. How about you, Rick? What are you up to?

Rick Houghton 0:29

Well, here in Liverpool, the temperature unexpectedly has risen to 33 Celsius. I have no air conditioning in my studio window, points directly at the sun. So let's get on with this before I start melting.

McLaren Start Tyre Blunder

Rick Houghton 0:40

We're talking about the Canadian Grand Prix here, which to many I think is probably the most exciting Grand Prix we've had so far this season with the rule changes which have divided opinion. Um, it was an exciting weekend, it was a sprint weekend, and McLaren seemed to get everything right in the sprint.

Damien Reid 0:55

Um yes, in the sprint they did, but in the actual race itself, well, I don't know. I think maybe uh they they picked up some Ferrari strategy calls that sort of drifted over to the McLaren side of the fence because I don't know, Andrea Stella has sort of inherited some of the Ferrari stuff with him. Why they went out on intermediates, I don't well, actually, I do know, and it had nothing to do with water on track, it was to do with tired temperatures. But you know, will someone please in that company, in that team, listen to Oscar Piastri occasionally because he was complaining on the radio on the outlet saying, guys, this is ridiculous. It was a Landau decision to go with the inters, and despite Oscar's very clear disapproval, they still went with it and it bit them in the backside. From what I understand, every other team on the grid was just looking at it, just laughing, openly laughing, going, What are you guys doing? It's not raining, it's not even wet.

Rick Houghton 1:46

Yeah, Max Verstappen thanks McLaren for their strategy call. He said it uh probably increased his finishing position by at least two places. And it was bizarre because they had two outlaps. There was a malfunction with the with the starting procedure. So they went round for the second outlap, and during the second outlap, Oscar is again on the radio going, Come on, guys, let's just pit the end of this, get it over and done with, and then we'll start the race from the pit lane, but that's fine because we can make up positions. Um he wasn't listened to, and that's quite strange, McLaren. Normally they they take a they take a little bit of a lead from their drivers, but this weekend they just didn't at all.

Damien Reid 2:18

Well, it's not strange to not listen to Oscar. They've done that for the last three years, but you know, it was so, so clear when you have got two formation laps for a third start, then yeah, if you want to come in and and do the stop and start from pit lane, sure, it's not a good day. But it's a lot better than pitting under a green flag on lap three and and then going through it because then you see what happens. Um, it was just uh an absolute unmitigated disaster in terms of of that tire strategy for the for the start. To be fair, it helped Lando off the start. Oscar had a great start as well, but he was kind of boxed in a little bit with with some jiggling around in front of him and then just went back. But yeah, I mean, Landau was caught only a few laps later and and it started just just to unravel massively. So yeah, it goes down with Qatar last year, it goes down with Monza, it goes down with so many other really, really bizarre uh strategy calls from McLaren. They're good at shooting themselves in the foot,

Mercedes Upgrades And Rookie Fight

Damien Reid 3:16

that's for sure.

Rick Houghton 3:16

Yeah, definitely, without a doubt. Mercedes brought some upgrades to this scrum period weekend. They were already the fastest car on the grid, and now they're a little bit faster. Uh, but I have to say the opening um battle between Russell and Antonelli was was good, but uh it it they both made mistakes lap after lap, which I thought was interesting. Both ran deep at times, Antonelli locked up behind Russell and almost had a massive accident. Um, then he needed telling uh telling off from the team to give the lead back when he attempted it a little bit later on. And then, of course, George Russell had the uh complete system failure, which ended his race.

Damien Reid 3:51

Yeah, I mean it was, you know, I don't know whether Toto did actually say anything to them after the sprint or whether they just ignored it because they clearly didn't listen to Toto after the sprint. As you say, they both ran wide of the hairpin. The message came over the radio for them. The both of the drivers were under investigation for illegal passes at one point, and and they're told to cut it out, or else there will be penalties, penalties, or a crash, and they kind of ignored that. But you're right, I think what happened with George was his battery just ran out of power, so it was a result of him not doing enough super clipping or clipping or whatever you want to call it in his battle with Kimmy because you've got those massively long straights in Canada, and you don't have the opportunity to recharge the battery as often as you do at other tracks, and eventually that's what cost George Russell his situation. So, yeah, I mean, it's unfortunate in a way because it would have really answered for sure the question that we're asking ourselves on Friday is does Kimmy Antonelli have it to take it up to George Russell? Because this was a George Russell track. He's had pole position twice leading into this weekend, got it again. He won last year, and it was shaping up to be such a good race, good battle to see how these were guys were going. But one question it did answer was Kimmy Antonelli certainly is is is not short of taking the brave pills and and putting pressure on George Russell for the second race in a row.

Rick Houghton 5:11

Yeah, he really is the real deal. We saw glimpses of it last season, but he had a disastrous Europe last year. But this year, uh things are going as well, 43 points ahead

New FIA Light Rules Land Well

Rick Houghton 5:20

in the World Drivers Championship at the moment. Now, going into this weekend, I I thought the worst, the FIA came out with this statement. I thought, oh my God, they said, right, the lights on the back of the cars are going to change. So you used to flash red when it was recharging the batteries. Now it's going to flash purple when something happens, and now you're going to flash yellow lights. Oh, and if it flashes green, then the race director's buying you a pint on the flight home. I was just like, come on, more rules, more complications. But actually, join the race. I didn't really see any of that happening with the cars, did you?

Damien Reid 5:50

No, I didn't see uh any any different colored lights off the back of the cars. And and and I have to say that the changes they've made was for the positive. I think the winners out of this Grand Prix was also the FIA and Formula One and the fans, because uh it all came together, it worked out really well just in time for Apple and Netflix to join as broadcast partners for North America. So a whole lot of new viewers were happy with that, and also I think the weather just quietly did all of us real F1 fans a favor because it was too cold to have any celebrities on the grid. There were no celebrities on the grid. They're gonna be back for Monaco and they're in Miami. But apparently that was the reason why there were no big stars on the grid because it was just too cold. And I enjoyed that. I thought that was quite good. They actually spoke to people who should be there, which is fantastic.

Rick Houghton 6:37

Yeah, and of course the cold conditions um really dialed in the tyres in a different way than we've seen so far this season. So that was gonna be interesting always. I mean, I think it would have been more interesting if we'd have had some spells of rain, uh, but that, you know, remains to be seen for the rest of the season on how these new cars cope with that

Hamilton Versus Verstappen Clean Battle

Rick Houghton 6:55

and how the tyres cope with it too. Um I think you'd have to agree it was Lewis Hamilton's best performance in a Ferrari, wasn't it? Oh, for sure.

Damien Reid 7:03

I mean, you know, the I think that because that that's the first time that Lewis Hamilton has been happier with a car than than Charles Leclerc, I think. And uh yeah, it it you know, we've said this a few times. He's he's in a different headspace this year compared to last year. And I think also the fact that he had the edge over Charles for the first time, the groundswell of confidence, swung his way into Garage for the first time. And my goodness, if he's gonna carry that confidence going into Monaco, Charles has got an uphill battle, I have to say.

Rick Houghton 7:32

Yeah, he nailed the start and he was very patient in battle, and it was really nice. And I think both of the drivers acknowledged it after the race, and I think they both thoroughly enjoyed the battle between Lewis and Max. It was great to see them going at it, which we probably haven't seen really since 2011, 2012. Um so that was great to see those two drivers fighting it out, and this time doing it very cleanly. Hamilton made a remarkable overtake into turn one to get past Max at one point.

Damien Reid 8:02

Yeah, he did a really good job. And you know, you can see that that side-by-side battle was was amazing. And, you know, compare that to the other side of the garage with Charles Leclerc. I mean, you know, he was losing a second to a second and a half a lap compared to to Lewis. You know, Friday he had the brake problems Saturday, Sunday. He said he was doing everything to just avoid crashing, which is bizarre. He blamed himself partly because his driving style doesn't suit Montreal, plus also he doesn't like low grip conditions anyway. So all of this was playing into Lewis's hands and he was capitalizing on it. And he was going against you know his old rival, Max Verstappen, in the Red Bull. And I found it interesting that they were the two guys that were leading into the Grand Prix weekend on Friday, both of them saying, Listen, don't believe what you've what you've been reading in the in the press leading up to the Grand Prix. We're not going anywhere, we're gonna stick around for quite a while. However, Lewis's uh sorry, Max has come out afterwards saying, Well, if if these cars still don't keep improving, I am gonna leave. I'm out of here. But it was good to see the old guys get their heads around these new cars and get both of them on the podium. I thought it was great.

Rick Houghton 9:06

I thought it was interesting. Uh Max Verstappen said after the race, he said, Listen, put us in rental cars and we'll still put on a great show for the fans. So he's still clearly not happy with the new format and the new regulations. Um and he was talking about racing in the Nurberg ring, which he did last week, and he was saying, Well, that's completely different. That is pure racing. This is still not pure racing. Um he faced the unusual situation of his tires cooling down in the final stint, which made life difficult for him late on. Obviously, Hamilton made that sensational move on the outside at turn one. Um, but he probably made the most as what was underneath him to

Hadjar Penalties And Rising Challengers

Rick Houghton 9:40

take his first podium of the year, Max Verstappen. I'm going to talk about his teammate though, Isaac Hadjar. My goodness me, he can be so frustrating at times. Hadjar's the one that beats himself up when he puts in a bad performance or makes a mistake. He's the one that's uh wrapping his helmet with his hands and going, Oh, I can't believe it. I'm so terrible and what have I done and blah, blah, blah. And then in this race, he gets a fair crack of the whip. You know, the car's much improved with a couple of small upgrades. Uh Hadjar eventually finishes fifth. He was a lap down and he incurred 20 seconds worth of penalties. He knows not to move under braking, but he's so hot headed under that helmet, he's making rookie errors and rookie mistakes and putting other drivers and cars at risk. It's just got to stop.

Damien Reid 10:24

I agree with you 100% on that. You know, I mean, fifth was a good result, but you know, he gets these penalties and and uh, you know, I mean, the the onboard camera coming up, you know, behind him doesn't seem to show that he moves twice, but then you see an external camera, and you can clearly see that he that he's moved twice. It was the overhead shot. So yeah, I totally agree with that penalty. And then the 10-second stop. I can't remember the last time there's been a stop go penalty anyway, but let alone a 10-second stop go. I mean, that's as that's as uh as heavy, as heavy as the penalties get in a for an in-race situation. And and you know, again, I kind of agree with it to an extent because he was going past George Russell, there were double-waved yellows. George Russell had just thrown his headrest out onto the track. Luckily, it didn't go into the path of cars, but that's why the double waves yellows were there, and George was getting out of the car in a very dangerous position. Now, as we all know, anyone who's got a racing license knows that the rules say when there's double waves yellows, you've got to be in a position where you can bring the car to a stop should there be something you know dangerous on track. Yeah. And there was, there was George's headrest on the track, uh, and he went flying through. So I do kind of agree with the fact that they gave him such a hard penalty, just to remind people what double yellows actually mean.

Rick Houghton 11:41

Yeah, definitely. And it's just, you know, I suppose you give him a bit of praise to break the second seat curse at Red Bull by taking the top five. Uh, but of course, the penalties, as we've discussed, gives real big evidence of improvements that he still needs to make. I thought his defense against Charles Leclerc was fairly strong, uh, but he definitely moved too late, as you mentioned there. And uh, yeah, despite that, finishing in fifth, Franco Colapinto has quietly but effectively become a real challenger for Pierre Gasly in recent races. Um, he looks pretty good, doesn't he? Finished in uh which uh sixth place he finished in. Um and I thought it was a pretty decent stint from him for the whole weekend.

Damien Reid 12:19

Yeah, absolutely. You know, that's his best result yet, sixth place. And uh it was a good drive from the Argy. He put a good effort in, and on Saturday as well, and and you know, last weekend in Miami, that was his best race finish until this weekend. So he's on a bit of a roll at the moment, and yeah, Pierre's got to start thinking about that because uh you know, up until sort of kind of this point, Pierre is just sort of rolling along, assuming that that he's the number one driver and everything's going great. But with the talk about what's happening inside uh internally with the Alpine team, with they're looking for buyers, they're looking for investors, the Renault connection is is not as the French connection is not as strong as it once was. So, yeah, I think Pierre's got to be just keep an eye out and make sure that he's gonna be quicker than Franco Colapinto, especially as we go into the Monaco Grand Prix, where every sponsor and every potential sponsor in town is gonna be on a boat somewhere keeping an eye on things.

Rick Houghton 13:17

Yeah, that will be interesting, and we'll come on to uh do a little mini preview of Monaco in just a bit. Continuing down the finishing list in seventh place, Liam Lawson said that he didn't have a great weekend up until the race. But you can't ignore that he did 36 laps on the soft tires, and I thought was really uh handy when he was defending from Pierre Gasley.

Damien Reid 13:37

Yeah, look, I honestly I think Leon did a great job, considering the fact that he missed pretty much all of Friday and he started P12, because the thing with Canada, the unusual thing with the Canadian circuit is that if you stop the car and track, you can't recover the car, they can't take the car back because there's a there's a massive lake and a rowing thing down the middle of it. So he lost pretty much all of Friday and he came back. So I think overall, you know, Ford were happy with the weekend despite Lindblad, his start incident, because you know you had Max as well up there, and and I think that was oh well because the the track in Canada is closer to the Ford factory in Detroit than either Texas or Miami. So there were a lot of people from the Ford Motor Company who were there either in the grandstands or in the VIP area. So three out of the four uh with with Hadger as well was a was a good result for the Ford for their first year in Formula One with Red Bull. Yeah, Liam did well for the factory.

Rick Houghton 14:30

Uh let's talk about the McLaren's then. Um both drivers just had a bit of a nightmare race. Again, we've mentioned they started on the intermediates, which was definitely a mistake on a completely dried, bone-dry track. Um in Piastri's defense, it was raining a little bit, but it cleared up, and Slicks would have definitely been the way forward from the start. Um and he made an unusual error going into the side of Alex Albon. All right, he locked up, these things happened, but it was quite unusual to see him make an error like that.

Damien Reid 14:56

Yeah, I mean, there was a there was a couple of things there, and certainly he made an error and he went and uh and admitted that to Alex, and Alex took it on the chin, but you know, he he was behind two cars, one of those being Albon's at the front, and Albon was going slower than both drivers expected. So he kind of approached him quicker than he thought, and also lost the arrow and lost the down force in the braking and then cannon into him. So it's a combination of driver error and and situations. Now, McLaren brought minor upgrades to the front wing, uh, which they decided to not use in the race. They also made a few changes to the to the arrow on the halo and the engine cover, so but it was kind of inconclusive. You'd not sure whether it worked or not. So the big upgrades that came to Miami were great, fantastic, and everyone was saying, well, what we were led to believe was that that was 50% of the upgrades, and there's gonna be another big 50% upgrades coming in Canada, didn't quite work out that way because they didn't even use their front wing.

Rick Houghton 15:51

Yeah, talk about Audi now. Both their drivers started on intermediates, which was another anomaly. Um Nickel Nicole Helkenberg uh brought it home in 12th, uh Bortoletto in 13th. I've been quite impressed by the progress that Audi have made. You consider they're making their own power unit, which is, you know, a first for for many in many regards, because we've always had Mercedes power and Ferrari power or whatever. So they're now making their own power unit. And I think to get results like this four races into a season after the reg change, that's got to be pretty impressive, hasn't it? I thought they did quite well.

Damien Reid 16:22

Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And you've got to remember there's been a bit of internal turmoil as well, with Jonathan Wheatley leaving, you know, so soon after the project hits the ground running. And so that's surely, you know, given given the uh a bit of an upheaval inside there, Mateo Bonotto is carrying it now on his own. Alec McNish has joined, has been promoted. So all that was happening behind the scenes whilst they're trying to develop their own power unit. So really good effort. And I but I think this is probably where, and I think we discussed before, where their hybrid expertise has come through with their years in Le Mans, and uh, if you remember, they did the DACA with a hybrid car as well and Formula E. All this is kind of fast tracking the development of their power unit, which is which is great to see. And Gabby Bordoletto at the same time is maturing, is he's doing a great job behind the wheel. Yeah, I don't think anyone expected them to do well in their first season. Uh it's it's a multi-year contract or development phase, but they're certainly punching above their weight for sure.

Rick Houghton 17:20

Yeah, Carlos Sainz was the only Williams finisher. Um, he rose six places from start to finish, which wasn't too bad. Uh, another driver that chose to start on the intermediates, which was again bizarre. Uh, but he rose through the field. He had several stints where he was pretty much on his own on track with big gaps in front and behind of him. But this it's nice to see him back, I suppose, because he's had some disappointing performances, as have the team this season. Uh, they must be looking uh for the next few races to start turning some kind of corner because they really need to get on with it now.

Damien Reid 17:51

Yeah, they must have been frustrated by it by the Albon incident with with Piastri because you know both of them were were uh should have should have been on for a good race. Albon just had a disastrous weekend. He hit the marmot on Friday. Um and I understand that his I think he was his personal trainer had to clean the helmet. Uh it was full of it was full of marmot, which is not nice. Yeah, pretty pretty pretty disgusting situation. But anyway, that side of the garage had a tough time. But um Carlos Sainz, yeah. I mean, I think at the end of the day, he got on the plane with with James Vowell saying, look, if we had if we hadn't known we're going to get that result at the start of the weekend, we'd be pretty happy. So, yeah, I mean,

DNFs Safety Fines And Aston Woes

Damien Reid 18:30

Roll on Monica.

Rick Houghton 18:31

Let's talk about the non-finishers, quite a few in this race of the weekend in Canada. Uh, Sergio Perez, he didn't finish. Obviously, we know about the McLaren's of Lando Norris and the Mercedes of George Russell, who had that uh system shut down. He's facing a fine, by the way, isn't he? I think it's a suspended fine of $5,000 for throwing his headrest out. Um, sometimes George can can come across as a bit of a baby, can't he?

Damien Reid 18:56

It kind of reminded me of of when he had the big accident at Monza when he was in the Williams and and he and he went up to Veltry Bottas when he crashed into Valtry in the rain and he dared to smack Valtry on the head when it was actually George's fault. Yeah, he's one of these drivers that needs to go back and sit down and watch the monitor before he goes and talks to the media and and preferably try and contain himself a little bit on the on the side of the truck because yeah, I mean, he he he deserved to get the penalty. Everyone knows in open wheel racing is that you one thing, you don't throw the steering wheel away because you get a big penalty. Um, and secondly, it's the same with the headrest, it's the same penalty. You just don't throw stuff onto the track. It's uh it's a pretty obvious safety situation.

Rick Houghton 19:38

Yes, you're quite right. Uh Fernando Alonso, another DNF. Aston Martin really are nowhere. I mean, Stroll finished in 15th, but he was four laps down on the main pack. Um, have we got any updates from Aston Martin what's happening? Because I know that Adrian Newy's being taken ill, and there seems to be uh the usual amount of turmoil behind the scenes in that team with uh Lawrence Stroll cracking the whip but not getting much results from it.

Damien Reid 20:02

Yeah, I picked up on a couple of things with Aston Martin over the weekend. Uh at the start of the weekend, there was a sign on the car parks um saying um uh uh Jonathan Wheatley, team principal of Aston Martin, and uh sort of sent the sent the rumour mill flying, but apparently that was a genuine mistake by the Canadian organizers, whether they believe the rumors or not, and trying to get ahead of themselves. But it was quickly changed by Sunday as being Mike Crack as team principal and and not Adrian Newey. So, yeah, I mean Adrian's last race that he went to was the first one in Melbourne. So he's got some health issues as we've as we we kind of know, and we we hope that he gets better. But um, but from what I understand, with um Fernando's car, yeah. So good news and bad news with Aston Martin um is that the good news they seem to have sorted out the vibration problem. They left the chassis in Japan after the Japanese Grand Prix. Honda got got cracking onto it, and they've sorted out the vibration problem. That's the good news. The bad news is that they've made a design tweak to the seat of the car and they've made it low flat for better aero. And to me, I'm thinking this is another newy thing coming in where he's not thinking about the driver comfort, he just wants the driver to sit lower. Um, so it's made it more of a even more of a reclining situation. And what that did on Sunday was with poor old Fernando, he's not the youngest bloke you know in the field, and it pinched a nerve in his back, and he he he was just in too much pain. So that was that issue on Sunday. So hopefully that's an easy fix, but it does, it does smack of another newy thing, doesn't it? Where he just like he's so uncompromising, he doesn't care about the drivers, he just wants the quickest car out there in terms of design, but they forget that they got they've got an old like behind the wheel these days and he he needs to look after his back.

Rick Houghton 21:49

Yeah, um we've seen Newy do that on numerous occasions with different teams down the years. I want to mention Arvin Limblad because he was one driver that didn't even start the race. So a disaster. Weekend in that regard, but I actually saw a fairly lengthy TV interview with Limblad, and I gotta say, he comes across as totally focused, really calm and relaxed, knows exactly what he needs to do to improve his driving and to improve the racing bull car with his engineers. He just seems cool as a cucumber to me.

Damien Reid 22:20

Yeah, I mean this kid, you're right. This kid seems to be, you know, he's 19 years old, he's so mature. And uh when we did the launch of the Red Bull team in Detroit at the start of the year, he was the only driver that wasn't part of the of the launch lineup. It was the other three. It was it was Isaac Hadjar and Max Verstappen and and uh and Leon Lawson. And uh I think what they're doing was they were trying to protect him because it was his debut into Formula One. And in hindsight, I don't think they needed to. I think he would have handled the uh the enormity of a massive media launch like that uh without a problem in the world. The guy is very cool, he's very calculated. He's not a hothead in the way, in the same way that Hadger is. Yeah. And I think that, yeah, I mean, this guy, keep an eye on him, keep an eye on him, because I think he's got the he's got the the right mental attitude to not be flustered in that piastri kind of way, but he's also and Verstappen kind of way, if you want to look at it that way, and he's he's got the pace, you know, he's got the runs on the board in the pre in the junior

Monaco Forecast And Who Dares Pass

Damien Reid 23:20

category.

Rick Houghton 23:20

Yeah, definitely. Um, right, before we go, let's have a quick preview of Monaco. It's a race I get excited for every single year with the glitz and the glam, and then when everything starts on track, I'm like, oh, here we go, another procession. You know, the cars are a little bit smaller, but it's not gonna make any difference to overtaking in Monaco. It's still gonna be as almost impossible as it always has been in the modern era of Formula One. Encouraging signs for some of the drivers, including Lewis Hamilton, who definitely confidence-wise is gonna go into this one uh feeling super confident. And also the Mercedes team, you know, they know they've got the best car on the grid, surely. They just have to uh stick it first and second on the uh qualifying laps to nail the race, basically.

Damien Reid 24:01

Yeah, I'm really, really interested to see how this one's gonna pan out because as we know at Monaco, it's not about horsepower, you don't have to have the best engine out there, so you know it the the the advantage that Mercedes has is not gonna be there this uh for this race. Uh as you say, the cars are a bit shorter, so hopefully that will help them a little bit, but not too much, but it will be a tiny advantage. And then you'd you know you've got the you've got the over the push-to-pass kind of situation, you've got the clipping situation. You you don't have the long strokes where you're gonna deploy the battery and lose the battery. So hopefully you'll have more cars on full power for longer, and we'll see who's got who's got the bravery pills to to overtake in areas where you shouldn't overtake, as we've seen in in races so far leading up to it. Who's gonna have the guts to actually try and find overtaking places where traditionally there haven't been any? I'm actually really looking forward to it. It's it's throwing a bit of unpredictability into this one.

Rick Houghton 24:59

Yeah, I'm just looking at the uh long-range weather forecast for Monaco, and they're saying that the uh there is a chance of some thunderstorms. Temperature there today, as we record this, is 25 Celsius, which is lower than Liverpool, England, which is basking in 33, as I've already complained and mentioned. So, yeah, the weather can uh can turn turn the tables in Monaco. That's um that's one thing to be excited about. If that happens, if we get a short, sharp shower, um that would be really interesting to see. Obviously, safety cars are always an issue in Monaco. Someone clips the wall, which we normally see either in practice or qualifying, and sometimes during the race. So we have got a few hot-headed drivers who are going to be taken to the track in the principality. Could be an exciting one.

Damien Reid 25:41

Yeah, it could be. And if that weather does come in, then you know, we were talking about this weekend being the first race, the first wet weather race with the new cars. My goodness, if Monaco is the first race where these cars are out in the rain, no one knows anything. No one knows what these wet weather tires are like. No one's done a lap on these wet weather tires. And you're gonna do it at the principality where there's no runoff, no areas. Yeah, uh, you know, again, I'm just thinking that there they could actually, this could actually be the Monaco Grand Prix that has overtaking. Whether it's artificial or not, at right now, I'd be happy for small mercies. If it means overtaking at Monaco, yeah, great, let's go for it.

Rick Houghton 26:17

I mean, I suppose the one exciting thing is with the with the cars the way they yo-yo in positions that we've seen so far this season, if that happens in Monaco, the chances for calamity are fairly high. I mean, if they if they're trying to make that overtake up the hill towards casino square, then it's a very narrow piece of real estate they're all fighting for. And if your car suddenly loses a bit of charge and the one behind you gains some, then you never know what could happen. At the same when they come out of the tunnel, you know, there could be absolute carnage, but it might make for an exciting spectacle to watch.

Damien Reid 26:46

Yeah, you're right. You know, and I think I think the older, wiser heads will probably do the right thing. And I'm thinking of the the two Ferrari drivers and maybe even the two McLaren drivers. But right now, all eyes are on Mercedes, and I don't think I think George has got the red mist, and I think and Kimmy's he's just a young fella. That could be the fireworks heading up into the casino square.

Rick Houghton 27:05

Yep, I totally agree. So Monaco is next on the Formula One calendar. Damien, thank you so much for joining me on the podcast.

Damien Reid 27:10

Thank you, Matt. Always look forward to it.