Ben Hocking

speaker

4,984 appearances 8 recordings 1 series first heard Jun 2026 last heard 5 Aug

Ben Hocking’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 8 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 5.

Appearances

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The Late Braking F1 Podcast · Revisiting our 2027 F1 grid predictions: What's changed? · 5 Aug 2026 podcast

Well, that was my prediction as well, and I'm not changing, so... Good.

We're going with the same old, same old at Mercedes.

We'll start with you, Sam, as you're the one who's changed your prediction.

At least part of your reasoning back then was, and we'd only had a few races at that point, obviously, was that Antonelli had already proven himself to be a match for George Russell, right?

So you don't think there's going to be a swap now?

Are you saying that's more Verstappen-led rather than Mercedes-led?

The other question I had for you on that was when you predicted it would be Verstappen and Antonelli, you mentioned that in terms of the timeline, Toto Wolff and Mercedes really needed to strike while the iron was hot, like getting there then and there and then.

They didn't.

So is that kind of swaying the fact that they couldn't get it done earlier in the season?

Now you have carried on with your prediction, Harry, that it will be Russell and Antonelli.

any reason why you don't think it will be Verstappen to go into that seat or indeed anyone else?

I suppose a bit more generally about this driver transfer market, because it feels like either a lot is going to happen or very little is going to happen.

And it's going to be one of the two extremes.

It does feel like Verstappen is almost that first domino that needs to go.

So we're all predicting that he'll stay in the same, not stay in the same place, but we're predicting he won't go to Mercedes.

So it'd be interesting to see how that has a knock-on effect with everything else.

I'm staying with George Russell and Antonelli because whilst Russell is definitely struggling, and I know there have been some mitigating circumstances, I also don't think you could deny Russell is struggling far more than any of us expected to this year.

I feel like if it's not Verstappen, it's not going to be anyone else.

I don't think anyone else other than Verstappen is a guarantee upgrade over Russell.

I think you could argue if Norris or Leclerc went into that seat, they might be, but I don't think it's a definite.

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