Is Lando Norris back in the championship race?

Daa! Da-na-na-na! Na-na! Uh-oh! Big hugs! It smells like teen spirit, Nirvana! So it just all escalated out of control? Yes! Oh, yeah! Burning! Burning Kingston hand down! Someone Toto Guth would never dare describe as a Teletubby! A fan has made me a hat, do you want to see? Yeah! So look at the Demonte! In 2026, he finds himself not having the pace of his teammate. I'm never wrong for that long. Hello there and a very warm welcome, warm welcome in the sunshine here to the F1 show sponsored by Audi. It is the mid-season break but don't worry, we are not going to bore you by tediously rating the teams out of 10 at the roughly halfway stage of the season. We are looking for fresh insights and understandings and I am confident we will get them with our two special guests today who are Bernie Collins, that paragon of the pit wall, someone Toto Guth would never dare, never dare describe as a Teletubby. And we also see a big uh-oh and offer big hugs by the internet. La-la, la-la, la-la, lights out and away we go, legend, David Croft. Well, I am exhausted after those introductions but it's good to see you, David. Good to see you, Bernie. I'll kick off with you, Bernie, because we have to talk McLaren first of all. Lando Norris, first Grand Prix win of his title defence but such an interesting race in strategic terms, especially for that team, you've got, well, Oscar Piastri getting into the lead early on, Lando Norris clearly the quicker car or so it looked, and then Ferrari threatening them from behind. So in a sense, did Carlos Sainz do the team a little bit of a favour by just holding up Piastri? Yeah, I think, well, to start with it was a really interesting race because it was very unsure were we going to end up with one stop or three stop. We don't often have that sort of situation. I think all teams find themselves in this question mark of how early was too early to protect from an undercut or go for an undercut or all these types of things. And that's sort of where McLaren ended up. Their first stop, let's say, their hand was forced a little bit by cars stopping behind. I think the second stop then, I think it was quite tactical actually from Lando Norris. He came on the radio and he'd said he was quicker than Oscar Piastri ahead. Then he said he wanted to do the pit stop. Then McLaren obviously have to offer it to the lead driver. Then the lead driver or their strategy team has a decision to make. And I think from that point, then it was set out. It was set out that Lando Norris would then gain the position. I don't think Carlos Sainz, although obviously there was that little bit. I think that Norris was quicker. So they just escaped a barge in there. But you think the team were orienting the strategy towards that scenario or not? I don't think so. I think that more from Lando Norris' side, he knew that he had the pace either way or he believed he had the pace either way. So he either pushes Oscar Piastri into an earlier stop that he would sort of ideally like to stay on that two stop strategy. And as we've seen, Oscar Piastri gets stuck in some traffic or he goes first himself and tries to make the better use of his pace and free air. So I think he sort of helped push the team a little bit in the direction of getting him some clean air. Okay, fair enough. Crofty, I mean, I think we're both big Piastri fans, have been since last season. He does still do some of the big moments well. I mean, those overtakes on the first lap were first class, weren't they, from him? Do you understand his frustration on the radio when he knew his teammate was going to be ahead of him? He qualified it, to be fair to him, after the race and said he understood it would have been, well, naive to think the team would have held Lando up. To allow him to stay ahead. Absolutely. I thought his move at turn two was exactly the sort of move we expect from Oscar Piastri. He is a fine, fine driver. But in 2026, he finds himself not having the pace of his teammate. And not just in Budapest, but I think consistently over race weekends, he hasn't had as much pace as Lando. McLaren have got to give both drivers as big a chance as they can to do as well as they can. But they can't ignore the fact that one driver is going to go on and win the race. And the other is going to come under pressure if they keep him out in front. I think McLaren actually did a decent job with the strategy. I didn't hear any complaints at all on that one. I didn't see anything to complain about. But Oscar's got to find a way to match Lando's pace. And if he can't, then I think McLaren. With Mercedes as fragile as they are, and Ferrari's strategy as fragile as it is, McLaren have got to find every way to maximise every advantage. And for me, one of the big things coming out of the summer break, can McLaren carry this on? Are they going to put their eggs in a Lando Norris basket? And is it going to come up trunks once again? The Constructors' Championship, I think, is still very much up for grabs. The Drivers' Championship, I don't think Lando is that far behind that he can't make up a deficit. And seriously, I haven't even gone on holiday yet. I can't wait to get back to business in Zandvoort. I don't want a three-week break. I want the racing thick and fast. Well, listen, yeah, I would never be a strategist or, frankly, anything involved with numbers in Formula 1. Because when Lando Norris asked me at the end of the race how far behind he was, I said 98 points, when he is actually only 91 points. Oh, there you are. And unfortunately, because of that, a whole number of news outlets decided it was 98 points. But it is 91. I'm never wrong for that long. I mean, in that regard, Bernie, and actually picking up on what Crofty's saying, Andrea Stella did note that it's maybe this year's cars with the downforce removed, less grip, suits Norris more than Piastri. Piastri is good relative to the rest on high-grip tracks with cars that grip as well. And maybe he's finding this season a little bit tougher. So, yeah, Craig, I think that's right. I think we're seeing big differences across drivers this year that we didn't last year. So, you know, Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris were so close last year throughout the entire season. One circuit might suit one more than the other, but it was very, very tight. And we're seeing that with other drivers, Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc. Lewis Hamilton seems to have found form over Charles Leclerc in that Ferrari. Same across the Mercedes drivers, Kimi Antonelli versus George Russell. There's many pairings of drivers, I think, up and down the field with this new regulation of cars suiting one more than the other. And it's how quickly can Oscar Piastri adapt to that? Because he's not had anything near the form that we expected coming into the season. Crofty, is it no surprise that McLaren turned the tables on Mercedes at a track where power is not a significant factor? Do you still think they have to learn to exploit that power unit almost as well as the works team can before they can take them on in places like Monza that we're coming up on soon? We're 11 races into the season now, and I think McLaren are understanding the power unit way better than they were at the start of the year. Is it a surprise they did so well in Hungary? On past form, no. They were 1-2 for the last two years in Budapest. But it is a little surprise given how strong Mercedes were in Monaco. I mean, that might be driver-specific in that respect. It might just be that Kimi was exceptional that weekend. But I don't think the Mercedes is necessarily weak at a track like Budapest. What delighted me in terms of stronger competition to the championship leaders, and we want to see this championship go right to the wire because that's way more fun, was that McLaren's upgrade worked. And they've taken their time this year to play catch-up, but they are now catching up, I think. I think the signs were there right from the start as Lando built up the pace into the weekend that this was a good upgrade. They had the pace, and they were ready to challenge Mercedes. To be fair, Mercedes had a poor weekend. They really did. George Russell, with the power unit problem, the water pump problem, scuppered him at the final part of qualifying. But George was nowhere to be seen before that. Kimi was kind of up there, but he made a mistake with the yellow flag. Learned it from Austria in terms of keeping his cool, but didn't learn to lift off enough in this respect. And then during the race, we'll marvel at the fact that Kimi got a podium, and yeah, he did well from seventh to get a podium. But he took advantage of Oscar Piastri retiring and a Ferrari strategy that if you were sat on the sofa, Bernie, I'm sure you were wincing at during the afternoon. We'll get on to that in just a second. Just finally on McLaren and maybe a Norris title bid, Bernie, I suppose it's significant whether we have, well, 21, 22 or 23 races this season, isn't it? Because still you think from where he is at the moment, we're talking more about can he apply pressure to Kimi Antonelli? Yeah, but I think this year is going to be an upgrade. It's going to be about upgrades. It's going to be hooking it on top of these cars, the best out of the cars, the best out of the engines. For example, I think we've done at the moment as the calendar sets, we've done 11 rounds. We've got 12 still to go, so there's still lots and lots of points on the board. And we've seen McLaren this weekend at least have a little bit that upper hand. And maybe Mercedes have been a bit distracted with each other in some of the earlier races as well. So I think that it's still all to play for. I think like Crofty alluded to, you've pretty much got three cars, maybe Verstappen as well in that fight, that I think who knows as we go through later races who will be at the front week in, week out. And that's really interesting to watch. OK, well listen, let's get on to Ferrari, their strategy, were there mistakes there or not. I'll let you give the expert, the fully expert view in a second Bertie, but Crofty, I could tell on Sunday your own frustration seeing things unfold, maybe for Lewis Hamilton in particular the way they did. What did you make of, well, yeah, the strategy he was given in its totality on Sunday? I didn't get it. I didn't understand it. I didn't see the need necessarily for him to stop so early for the first time. And then I just didn't see anybody. And he got stuck behind a car from his first stop. But then they pitted him for a second time and brought him out directly behind Isaac Hadjar. Now, if he was racing Max Verstappen at that time, the person you don't want to come out behind is Max Verstappen's teammate. So you either say, and correct me if I'm wrong here, Bernie, we wait a couple of laps to see if Lewis can actually have the pace to get out ahead of Isaac Hadjar, or we wait a couple of laps to see if he'll come out a little bit further behind and therefore run into clean air and then Isaac will pit and kind of make way for Lewis. But that lap that he was stuck behind Isaac, Lewis is losing time, hand over fist at that particular moment. His second stint wasn't particularly good. And I wonder if that was because he was brought out a bit behind the racing bull and that affected his tyres. But it just kind of went, it went from bad to worse. And then Lewis made it even worse with another careless mistake. You know, we shouldn't look in isolation at the Ferrari strategy. Lewis is making careless mistakes. Now I'm told it was five metres early. Yeah. Four penalties, isn't it, Crofty, in as many events now or something like that? Exactly. Well, I've got them here. I'll read them out to you, Craig, because I actually made a little note for this one. Lewis Hamilton, five-second time penalty in Monaco, speeding in the pit lane. That might not have been his fault. Silverstone, five-second time penalty for moving before the start signal. Spa, five-second time penalty for causing a collision with Russell. Hungary, three-place penalty for impeding Piastri. Hungary, five-second time penalty for speeding in the pit lane. He released the button five metres too early, apparently. And, you know, two of those mitigating circumstances. And one of those, the three-place grip penalty, he still should have been watching in his mirrors. I'm sorry. He was the first driver to start a lap. Therefore, he should have known that other drivers would have been starting a lap as he was finishing. And you can't throw away good positions by making these sort of mistakes. I don't want to go too hard on Lewis. I think he's the greatest of all time. But these are not moments that a driver, his ability and experience should be making. I mean, it feels like Lewis is having to... Well, he knows it's a knife-edge thing whether he has a title challenge this year or not. And some of these moments are race critical. And he's maybe just overstepped. Yeah, I think... Is it down to that? I get the point, Craig. But I think that maybe a little bit... We talked a lot about it last year, the move away from Bono, that calm and influence. You know, Lewis has not been making these mistakes over the last 10 years. This isn't something... We don't always see him coming out with these things. And there have been points during that period where he has definitely been in a title fight or on the brink of a title fight. So some of that comes down to just a little lapse in concentration, let's say. And maybe he would have got a little reminder at other points this week on pit exit. Yes, it was close. We knew it was going to be close. But those five metres meant it wasn't close. Equally, the penalty in qualifying, three grid positions. And we did hear Lewis' frustration on the radio about it. But aside from the Monaco one, these penalties are very accurately measured and looked through and all of that. So, yeah, I think you look at the end of the year and you look at all of the points that you've been lost. And he would be very frustrated when he looks back at the ones that are related to those penalties. Picking up on what you just said, Bernie, do we think the race engineer situation is not solved? Is Lewis... And then as a result of maybe, well, the strategy, will he again start to question the strategy he's given in a race? If you look at it... Is he thinking about it more than he should be? Yeah, if you think of it from a slightly different angle, let's say, if you look at Kimi Antonelli and Bono, he's had two races that are crofty related to one being Austria where he lifted too much for the yellow flag and one being this week where he didn't lift enough. Now, that is just a learning process between him and Bono. It doesn't mean that Bono is the best race engineer out there, although I do rate Bono very, very highly. It's just a learning process between driver and engineer, what they need to be reminded of. The same with Lewis and Ferrari now. Over the years, you pick up this catalogue of things that you know you need to remind your driver about or you know you need to sway him in a little direction. That process is not done overnight, so I think there's a bit of that element potentially still ongoing to not lose focus in qualifying, to say there's traffic coming behind, to remind him of the pit limiter on exit is one of the things we used to give a driver. I think that is just an ongoing process. Okay, just while I've got you on, as a full stop on the strategy thing, the final pit stop for Lewis, afterwards he said maybe I shouldn't have made it. It obviously got him into extra bother. What do you think in the circumstances, Bernie? I think the final pit stop is fine. You can never not make a pit stop because you're afraid of your driver being wrong on the pit limiter. So, the final pit stop is fine. The issue for Ferrari, and Lewis in particular potentially, came at the first pit stop. If they're on a two-stop strategy, you can't pit on lap 13 of a 70-lap race. You've pitted with less than 20% of the race to go. And then his second pit stop came, just let me check my numbers, his second pit stop came on lap 30. So, less than halfway into the race, potentially he's done his second and last pit stop. The numbers just don't stack up. I listened to Crofty and Martin at the beginning of the race, very clearly say the undercut will be strong, but it's about having optimum stop laps. So, with the best will in the world, and no offence to Crofty, if Crofty and Martin knew that, then the Ferrari pit wall should have known it as well. So, I think that the two early stop laps were too early to make a two-stop strategy work. And then they were in a position quite similar to what you outlined with McLaren, where Lewis had stopped a little bit earlier than Charles Leclerc. He was slower than Charles Leclerc at that second stop, and I think that's part of the reason Ferrari stopped him, and he ended up behind Isaac Hajar. So, it just all escalated out of control. Crofty, say what you want to say, and also tell me, do you think Ferrari will have a car now to regularly challenge for wins in the second half of the season, and really put Antonelli under some pressure? I hope so. I don't know, but I hope so. It's the hope, I think, that keeps Ferrari fans going. It's the hope that probably gets you in the end as well. But I want to see them have that ability, but I'm sorry, it's not about whether they've got a car or not, it's whether they've actually got the ability to hook up. If a driver for qualifying has to hook up three perfect sectors, can Ferrari hook up three perfect pit stops during the course of a race, and actually have a strategy that gives both of their drivers a chance to win a little more regularly than they do? One more thing on Lewis Hamilton, he will kick himself when he looks at replays of the Max Verstappen overtake, which, in all honesty, overtaking the season so far, I thought that was brilliant from Max. The car control to do that from so far back, absolutely mega. But Lewis left the door open, and you could view it as another moment of carelessness, to be honest. He didn't expect it, but Max has shown, three years ago, that he'll try that one at that particular corner. So he kind of should have been expecting it, and I think he'll kick himself that after doing so well to be ahead of Max, he's now back behind Max again, and that cost him too. Okay, well, listen, great stuff, guys. We will take a short break there. When we do come back, we'll talk a little bit more about Red Bull and Max, who had that bizarre car degradation, as Max termed it, during this race weekend. And we'll also look back at what could be a very important podium, indeed, for Kimi Antonelli in his push to be the youngest F1 champion ever. Quick word on our show partner, Audi. The philosophy of Audi Sport isn't just about winning races, it's about pushing boundaries. 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Did he finally get a little bit of luck, because he's had his share of bad luck this year? Yeah, but so has his teammate, in that regard. Look, it's all significant. Every point helps in a championship. What I thought Kimi did, as I said, very well, was he just took advantage of others that were having problems. You know, Piastri's DNF, Ferrari's strategy, and George Russell's start. So, if he started seventh, and there's four drivers that have had issues, he should be finishing on the podium, really. There wasn't another challenger for that. What I would say, in caveat to that, is that he was probably on for second place. If it wasn't for that late virtual safety car, and the fact that I think that enabled Max to keep his strategy without coming under too much pressure, second place could have been his. Now, that would have been a proper champion's drive to get Max in that regard. But, look, no complaints. I'm not going to criticize Kimi, but he did, I think, what was expected in that race, because four drivers around him had issues. Yeah. Well, let's talk about the most significant issue on that first lap, Bernie. We saw the little video. People have seen Antonelli in the cool-down room, hesitating, I guess, at what went wrong for George Russell. It's emerged that maybe it wasn't that. He just didn't quite keep control of the revs. What was your reading of all of that? And also, well, does it completely take the pressure off Russell now, in a sense? It's a tall order for him, in the same equipment, to come back at Antonelli in the second half of the year. You would think he's just got to find himself somehow. Yeah, I think, well, the first thing is, I wouldn't really rustle out. I think Russell's a very consistent driver. He's proven to be very strong over the years. So, a bit of a summer reset, and like I say, more races in the second half of the year than there has been at the first. Reliability seems to be their downfall, if anything. So, if Russell gets a bit more luck on that front in the second half of the year, it's all to play for. So, I wouldn't rule George Russell out versus Kemi Antonelli at this stage. I think the start was really unfortunate. We'll never quite know. Mercedes will never quite say exactly what's getting wrong, or whether it's driver error, or system error, or whatever the case may be. But I can only imagine how dreadful it is to be sitting on that start line and just watching other cars drive by you. And that really, really hampered Russell's race. So, I think he needs a bit of a break, a bit of a recovery. I just think to pick up on Kemi Antonelli's race a little bit, I think they did some of the right thing from his starting position. They went longer than everyone else did in that first stint. Stopped in a nice clean air on that hard tyre. Opened up the possibility of the one-stop strategy. I think if I was to be critical on anything, they should have stopped earlier. The second time would have been better. And I don't know how many races now we have seen the safety car or the VSC one lap after Kemi Antonelli pits. I think there's probably pretty good odds on whatever laps he stops, one lap later there being a safety car or VSC. Because I think it happened twice in Monaco, in Austria as well. So, he'll feel like he probably could have been more fortunate in that race, because that would have been almost a guaranteed second if he could have had the VSC. But, yeah, I think there's some strong moves there from Mercedes earlier in the race as well. Yeah, I mean, you're right. In mathematical terms, we can't count George Russell out. It's just I sensed from his own tone at the end of the race that he just can't believe what's happened to him this year. And he can't almost see a way to sort things out. We spoke a little bit after the race, Crofty, and is it time now for George to have a look at doing things differently? And if so, what exactly does he do differently? Does he need almost a completely different approach to a race weekend? Hard to see what that would be, but what do you think? Well, I'm no driver coach, but if there is a way of studying the data from his teammate and finding out where Kemi's making up a tenth there and a tenth there throughout the course of a lap, that would be a good start. And then get on the sim and practice, practice, practice. It's as simple as that. The tools are all there for the drivers to adjust the way they're driving and to get more out of the laps. And that is George's challenge, and it might go against his driving style. But as Lando Norris, I think, said to you, Craig, I change my driving style every year. You know, if you are the best of the best, you can do that. That maybe is what George needs to do. Look, we were told this when we were at school, and only Bernie actually listened, paid attention, and went and got a proper job, that, you know, if you actually do your homework and you actually study and you learn, then you can get on in life. I mean, obviously, Craig, you and I bucked the trend on that one, but Bernie proves that it is possible. Well, I mean, at least Bernie, are we confident relatively so that maybe the battery issue is sorted out for George now? And if it is, that will give him, if you'll excuse the pun, a boost for races coming up. Yeah, very good. Yeah, hopefully, you know, hopefully it is, and hopefully that's understood. I think that if I was to caveat that in any way, Budapest is not the biggest test of the battery. So if they don't, unless there's a really good understanding of the underlying issue, then any sort of slight down won't be available in Budapest. It'll show up in later races. So I think I'd like to see more than one race on that to be totally confident that any sort of deployment issue isn't going to creep in again. Okay. One thing I would say about Mercedes, and we need to have this in the back of our mind going forward, is that both George and Kimi will take a grip penalty at some stage during the course of the second half of the season, where, I don't know, Austin might be a good one. Actually, you can get some overtaking done there. But because of the issues they've had so far, there is a grip penalty coming. Now, whether it's back of the grid, or whether it's 10 places, they're going to run out of their allocation. So we need to just keep that in the back of our mind. It's coming somewhere. Yeah. And, well, will anyone be well-placed enough to take full advantage of it? I suppose that's the question in terms of, well, if McLaren can push on, if Ferrari can get rid of these errors we've been talking about. What about Red Bull? What about Max Verstappen? I've never heard someone complain so much Crofty and finish second in a Grand Prix, which, in a way, speaks volumes for how Max coped with the platform he had in the race. Or does it say that maybe the car was a little bit better than his radio traffic suggested? You know that bit where I keep telling you we should stop talking about Max and his future because it's getting boring now? Maybe we ought to go back to that. Talk about it, yeah. What's the underlying reason? Max is certainly not advertising for a job as a second-hand car salesman. The way he was talking about his Red Bull. But is there something behind this? Is there a genuine issue, or does Max just want to put it out there that he's not satisfied whatsoever with where he's at? Now, from what I understand, the Red Bull is a decent car. When it's in perfect condition. But when there's a slight discrepancy, you know, a little bit of damage caused by a stone kicking up, or the front wing has had some contact, or whatever, it doesn't take much to throw it out of kilter. And when you throw it out of kilter, then it becomes very, very hard to drive. So it's kind of on a knife edge all the time. When it's good, it's very, very good. When it's slightly bad, it's ugly. But for Max to be complaining as much as he was, constantly throughout that race, that makes me think that there's other motives afoot here. What they are, then who knows? You know, is Max still trying to... Not Max, but Max and his representatives as a team together, are they trying to engineer a way out of Red Bull and maybe into McLaren? Could that happen? We've talked about it. We don't know the answer. Yeah, well, we do know he can get out. He's out with the top two come October. I mean, do you buy that, Bernie? Would he need to do that just to say, I'm not happy here. I'm still potentially available. So don't give up. If you're very keen or interested in getting me, you know, we can have further talks. I mean, there could be an element of that against that. Maybe it just was... He talked about it being the car degrading in its aero performance, as though as the race went on, somehow the aerodynamic package diminished, which is an unusual thing to think about in F1. But have you noticed anything like that before? Yeah, I guess I've had less experience of reading drivers' ulterior motives than Crofty has, so they're probably a bit more naive to it. But what I was just going to say was that like, when you look at even last year, Max Verstappen would complain a lot about downshifts, upshifts. He seems very, very sensitive to that element of the car. Now that all the cars have less downforce, that element will definitely be worse than it was last year for all of the cars. But we know Max is sensitive to that. The degrading thing, I think you said at one point during the race about a dampener. So if there's a damper in the car that has lost a bit of fluid or lost a bit of performance, then maybe the aero platform of the car moves around a little bit more and therefore it doesn't have the same stability that it would have had previously. So I can sort of understand from a technical side all of that. I think the other thing to add to that is Max Verstappen and Red Bull held their breath when others did not. So when you think of his second pit stop in particular, the one that allowed him to stay out under the VSC, that was five laps later than Charles Leclerc and 11 laps later than Lewis Hamilton. So he actually allowed himself to be undercut by Lewis Hamilton and protected the position from Charles Leclerc. But they accepted that undercut and said, well, we want to stay on this sort of more optimum strategy and then that allowed him to stay out of the VSC because it wasn't a full VSC. So many things they sort of held their heads. As they say, held their heads when all others are losing theirs. And so I think there was a good teamwork from Red Bull there, but he complains a lot, Max, on the radio, even when the car is doing very well and they seem to just buckle down and get on with it. So I think he's just, I often feel that he's pushing the factory and the race team not to say, this is P2, the job's done. Yeah, it could be that. And also raising things which he thinks can be acted upon and dealt with, which is in a sense, is a positive message for Red Bull to improve what they've got. If we're talking about upgrades and cars on the limit, I think it's probably the point to talk about Aston Martin, Crofty and how well that upgrade package did. Has it got the rest of the midfield a little bit nervous now to see a significant step forward there if Honda, and it's over to you now, Honda, to show you can get your side of the car done if they can deliver on the PU front. Yeah, it's only half the upgrade. The rest comes in Zandvoort. Yes, I think it will absolutely awaken the midfield, but I think they would have been expecting that anyway. To be honest, I spoke to Adrian Newey. I had a chat with him on Saturday after qualifying and he looked a lot happier than the last time I saw Adrian Newey. He was thinking about his holidays as well. He's off to the fields in Norway and I suggested that he might want to just drop his phone at the bottom of the field and just get away from it completely because it must have been a hell of a few months for him. He said, yeah, we agreed in Australia that this would be a B-spec car. We wouldn't do anything to it until roundabout Spa Budapest time. He said, but then people started running out of patience, so it's been a bit tricky, but he is happy with the way it's gone, but this is only getting Aston Martin to a platform where they can build on for the future. This is not the end of the road whatsoever and it's not where they should be either given the resources that they've got at that team and he knows that. So over to you, Honda, and then we'll see what else comes throughout 2026 and into 2027, which, right, put your hands up. Who thinks Fernando Alonso is going to be there or not? I think he will be there. Bernie, Bernie keeps her hand down. I'd like to know if Bernie, but Bernie obviously worked at Aston Martin, so she probably has heard some whispers from there. No, I wasn't going to comment anything on the whispers. I was just sort of thinking that, who would have guessed at the beginning of the year that just on chassis, Aston Martin would have had that much to find. I think that Honda have come under, and rightly so in many ways, a lot of negativity about the performance of that engine and the reliability of that engine, but we've seen a massive percentage upgrade in just the chassis, so that will worry others, but I don't think anyone going into the year would have said that a chassis that Aston Martin produced would have been that far off based on chassis alone, so who could guess what Alonso will do? Well, Crofty, we should indulge in a bit of fantasy speculation at this point. If Fernando Alonso did not continue, Carlos Sainz to Aston maybe, would he be tempted? Who would be in the box seat and have the appetite to go there? Well, let's have a look at this one, because it is silly season and you're by the pool already, so let's indulge. Fernando Alonso says, I have a contract, because he and Franco Colopinto and Carlos were having this discussed in the press conference. Yes, he has. He's got a five-year contract, as far as I understand it, of which two years was for driving, three years was for ambassador with Aston Martin, but the choice was Fernando's as to whether he wanted to move to an ambassador role or carry on driving, so balls in his court. Carlos Sainz would very much be on the list of drivers Aston Martin would like, I'm sure. Charles Leclerc has been on their list in the past, but he is now tied in at Ferrari. Oscar Piastri, I think would be a driver that they would very much look at. If Max was to go to McLaren and Oscar finds himself out of a drive, he would probably go straight to Red Bull as a swap there, but Aston, I think, in the background for him. Olly Behrman, I think, is on the market because he can't stay at Haas if Haas don't get the funding they need to give him and Esteban Ocon a car that they can drive properly without inconsistencies, and there are too many inconsistencies there, and it's not helping either driver, and I feel really sorry for Ayo Kamatsu, who I saw at the airport and had the chat, and said, you need the funding, and you're not getting it at the moment. I don't understand why, so that's just a little aside. Piastri, Behrman, and Fernando, and Carlos Sainz. One of those four, I think we can put into the mix, and I'm putting Olly Behrman in there without any knowledge from the Behrman camp whatsoever. Maybe Alex Albon is another that would be looking to move free of Williams and could put him in there, but I think he'll stay. Well, that's a fair chunk of the rest of the midfield, isn't it, which does illustrate how desirable potentially that seat is. From a Newey perspective, Bernie, I think he quite likes working with Alonso, and I get the sense now Alonso understands just what Adrian Newey can do, given a little bit of time and money, and will probably be angling to carry on driving, even if his contract doesn't absolutely insist that that's what he should be doing. Yeah, I think for any driver, if you can see the car developing at that sort of rate now, we've obviously got the next step to come with the engine. If you can see that development and that forward progress, then that's a real motivator to stay at it, to stay fit, to really want to be in that car in the next year, to campaign for that seat if there's any campaigning to be done, which I question there isn't from Alonso's side. I think the team would be happy to keep development with that sort of level of consistency, let's say, the driver. When Alonso first got in that seat, they were so impressed with what Alonso could do when he first took over the test. So I think it is about trying to motivate everyone with this forward direction, get everyone on the same page. And I think that has been difficult for Aston because they've made so many changes, the PU, the gearbox, the design, the wind tunnel, the new factory, to get everything gelling together has been a struggle so far for that team. Okay, yeah. Crofty, listen, if you're a straight choice, if you are Carlos Sainz and you had a straight choice between Williams and Aston Martin, where might you go? He keeps seeming to say, I listen to him a lot in his interviews, I have things to think about. He's admitted he's got to sit down with his management and discuss his medium term future over this summer break as well. You do feel for James Vowles, who had a lovely bounce when he came into the job, but it's looking like a really hard job now. He put on this quiz for us midweek in Hungary. He absolutely raced. He became third podium, not bad. But he raced through it so he could get back to work, I think. He made a generous with his time, but that is looking a tough job. And you wonder if they've got some hard choices to make about the rest of this season to get things right for 27. Yeah, well, they did that last year to get things right for 2026. James Vowles has always impressed me. I think he's a fine team principal who has gone in there and not accepted second best and gone about trying to bring Williams back to their glory days. But it will take time, years of underinvestment and I don't want to say mismanagement, but I don't think that the leadership team got it right more than they got it wrong for many, many years there. Has he got the budget that he would like? Probably not within the cost cap. Is he hiring the people that he wants? I think so. There are good people going to Williams to bolster what is a very good workforce there anyway. And I think in time, they will absolutely get it right. But if you've got the chance to go to a works team and ask to Martin of the Honda Works team, you take it. It's not negative towards Williams, but it's a positive to be at a team that makes their own engines or has the engines made for them. Williams are a customer team to Mercedes and we've heard a lot of talk this year about how being a customer team can impact your performance when you go racing. So I think that's a no-brainer. But if Fernando's staying, then I think Carlos probably needs to stay where he is for at least a year and then make the move at the end of 2027 if there's a seat available. But watch this space with interest. Okay. Well, let's rattle quickly through the other teams. Bernie, with you, Racing Bulls, three into two there in driver terms because Solov from F2 is looking extremely strong and yet you'd say neither Arvid Lindblad nor Liam Lawson deserve to lose the seat the way they're driving at the moment. Yeah, I think Liam Lawson has had a real turnaround since he returned from the big team, if you want, from the Red Bull team. And I think he's scored a lot of points within that team this year and the two drivers seem to be working reasonably well together although quite tight oftentimes on track. You know, and it's good to see Arvid. He seems to have had a very flawless start to the season. He's working quite well, seems to be getting the results that he deserves and needs. So it's difficult to see who would move from that position, I think. But that team is looking, as they have done in previous years, actually, like a good car, well thought together package, very rarely see mistakes on the whole in terms of strategy, whatever, and challenging, I think. You know, they're at the front of that midfield position now and so it's how quickly can Audi develop, which I guess you get on to. Yes, yeah, we saw Dan Farlow's at the airport actually and he's back with Risky Bulls under the Red Bull umbrella again. Yeah, I mean Audi, Crofty, looking like they will chase down Haas over these remaining races, you would have to say. And so they should. They're a works team. You know, they've got way more resources than Haas. Whatever issues the engine might have given them, you know, they're a works team that inherited a team that was established anyway. So, that should not be a surprise if that happens and they probably will. And I've also got to say, I think Hülkenberg and Portoletto complement each other really well. I think they're both fine drivers and I wouldn't want to see either of them leave Audi, you know, for speculating that someone could do a better job. Yeah. Alpine, Bernie, tough race they had in Hungary, need to find a little bit of direction again, had a good start to the year, gone off the ball just a bit. Yeah, I think maybe their development hasn't been as strong as the others, I guess is one thing to say. You know, Gasly, as maybe it's always difficult to say, outperformed the car but has a lot of points on the board relative to Colopinto. I think Colopinto had a struggle at the beginning of the year, sort of found form in the sort of second half of the first half if you want to put it like that but he has progressed through the year and become stronger through the year. But this year is going to be a development race. It's going to be pretty relentless and we're going to see ups and downs depending on when upgrades come and how well they work and, you know, as Crofty mentioned, with Haas, how much development and money is put into that upgrade. So, this is not going to be one where you can start the year as the fourth fastest team and finish the year as the fourth fastest team because that's just not going to happen anymore and they need to get on top of that I think pretty quickly. Yeah, well, it looks like Cadillac will be finishing as the slowest team. It was a bit red-faced Valtteri Bottas about having to use the wall to slow the car down coming back into the pits but I mean, listen, we're cutting them every slack they deserve because it's the first season and they are showing. Well, go on. You can cut the slack but I don't think they'll cut the slack themselves. You know, and this really impressed me and I've talked to some Cadillac team members on the way home and they were gutted about what happened with Valtteri's brakes in Budapest. Another, you know, short track, hot conditions, brakes caught fire again and they thought they'd solved the issue and they're like, now we've got to get to the bottom of this. This is not acceptable. Now, they don't think we're a new team therefore we'll cut some slack. They think, no, we've got to get on and fix this and I love that attitude. That's exactly what you want to see in Formula 1. We've got a problem. Get out there and sort it. So, I hope they do because there's going to be more hot tracks coming their way at Singapore, Malaysia, to name but two. Oh well. What a wonderful segue talking about hot tracks because we're going to have a little bit of holiday fun now, Bernie and Crofty with some hot tracks, musical tracks. We're going to have apparently a music quiz now. Can I just say this is biased? This is biased to Crofty, this is. What? Well, let's see. How do you prove it? Do you know the answers already? No, it's because if you were to pick a quiz, if you were to pick the people on the team and say who's best at music, you would put Crofty in that round and I'm competing. Let's try the quiz and then we'll judge if this has been secretly engineered by Crofty, but it is. We have to name that tune in traditional fashion and then explain how it relates to the world of F1. Let's listen in. Right, that's Elton John's I'm your host I'm still standing. That could be that could be for the Ferrari mechanic that Lewis hits in Spa because he is still standing and I'm really glad that he is. But other than that, over to you, Birdie, for a segue. Yeah, so I wouldn't have got the name of the song, but yeah, um, no, I think it has to be the Ferrari mechanic, surely. I think Crofty's right. I think your interpretation of the F1 relevance is also good. So let's move on to the second question. The second one. Come on, Crofty, what's that? I have no idea. Sounds like Lincoln Park and numb, but I don't think it is. I have become so old but I'm told it's not. Oh, no. Oh, is it Nirvana? It smells like it smells like teen spirit, Nirvana. Oh, very good. Yes. Oh, there you go. We've got a Lindblad and Antonelli still, who's not yet 20, but that's coming up soon. Crofty, I think. Uh, uh, Arvid Lindblad, why do you do this to me? Right? I haven't, I, I actually have my notes up in the commentary box. There's got all the birthdays of the drivers on them. And then you asked me a birthday question, but I'm not in the commentary box, but hang on two seconds. So Kimmy Antonelli on the 25th of August. So he's got a while to go. Yeah. Arvid Lindblad. Uh, he might, he might just be 19 by the time you, uh, you watch this podcast, but that's the correct answer. Well done. Very good. Thank you very much. No, it's way too poppy for me. That one. Bernie, come on. No, I'm, I'm just, I've just given up on this. Was it the clash, uh, London calling? No, if you said clash and it's an F1 theme, it should be, should I stay? I think you're right. That's crafty. You're right. That's gotta be Max's theme tune, right? Very good. Yeah, that's absolutely right. Okay. We got one more. Sounds like that actually sounds like the opening to a hallelujah. Yeah, that's what I thought. I was thinking of Shrek. Shrek. Yes. Hallelujah. Hallelujah is played in Shrek. Yes, it is. So who looks most like Shrek? Well, I was thinking one of the lines is, um, we know that I've been here before. Is that not one of the lines on that? Martin Brundle often says in commentary, I've, I've not been this disappointed since Shrek two. It's one of his great lines. So you think Martin Brundle and the Shrek, and that's the final answer. I'm definitely not saying that without seeing someone looks like Shrek. I think that's a safe way to go. Let's, let's give that a tick. And here's the one more, one, one more track, final track. Singing in my head. It's Tracy Chapman. Yeah. Tracy Chapman. Yeah. Well, not just Tracy Chapman. Of course it was, it was covered by Luke Combs and, uh, he did a very good cover of that one related to Aston Martin. A great song. Classic song. George Russell said that he loved this car, but that was Australia. Things have changed a bit. Colin Chapman. And Lotus, We've got Tracy Chapman and, uh, Colin Chapman. And I'm going to say that is the correct answer to give myself a single point from this quiz, but, uh, well anyway, uh, enjoyed that. Well played. Mr. Charles Nelson from St. Monica's Catholic primary school. Mr. Charles Nelson played a blind. Uh, really appreciate that. That was fantastic. Uh, just finally, before we go, we have our friend of the show, Bruno as ever. And he has one last question to pose to the two of you. Over to you guys. Um, well, I'll go first with my favorite race so far, I think was actually Monaco. Cause I think there was lots happening there. More than a normal Monaco. And be, I actually quite enjoyed being on the pit wall for that one with, um, everything that was going on, although that's probably doesn't stand out to others as a fantastic race. Uh, I enjoyed that one. Well, I'll go for, uh, I think Barcelona was amazing to see Lewis winning in the Ferrari and, drive so well and just hear that note of excitement and his voice again on the radio as, as, as he knew the wind was within his grasp and to see him convert. It's so convincingly, it really rolled back the years. Fair play. Um, first 30 laps in Canada was superb. Love that George and Kimmy really go for it. First 51 laps of the British Grand Prix were magnificent too. Uh, so the safety car, uh, worried the fact that we didn't get a final lap for the 52. So, uh, I, I'm going to say the British Grand Prix was my favorite race because it just, everything was brilliant that weekend. Uh, and the sun shone. Um, what am I looking forward to most? Uh, going back to Sepang. Uh, I can't wait to get back there. Uh, I'm sorry that we haven't gone to Bahrain, but thank you to Bahrain for, uh, for putting in an awful lot of the cost to, to host that Grand Prix and, and for bringing us back to Sepang. Uh, I hope we stay there for a long time to come, uh, with Bahrain on the calendar too, but Austin, um, I think will be a magnificent race, uh, this year with these power units. That's, uh, that could be sensational. Bernie, for you, what are you looking forward to? Yeah, I think it would be interesting to go back to Sepang. I think that'll be a big challenge for everyone. So yeah, I agree with Crofty on that one. I'm not looking forward to the humidity. That's not, not for the Irish and me, but let's see. Yeah. The frizz, the Bernie Collins frizz will be back. Yeah. I've got a solution for that Crofty actually, is it's a good segue, but a fan has made me a hat. Do you want to see? Yes. So look at the De Montis. Oh, nice. That is beautiful. Little fan hat. So I'll wear my fan hat. Yes, done. I like that a lot. Well, listen, it's been great to have your company. Summer holidays, right? Is it summer holiday time? It is, it is summer holiday time. I just hope there is a full calendar. I hope we get 23 races if, if we possibly can this year with Malaysia coming in and, and let's hope those final two can happen in the Middle East if, if peace is restored there. But thanks to you, Crofty. Thanks to you, Bernie. We will be back with another F1 show at the other side of the summer break. And we'll be looking forward to the Zandvoort Grand Prix, the last Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort. Remember, we'll have a couple of bonus podcasts as well to keep you going during this three week hiatus, but from the three of us, it is bye for now.