Chapter 1: What are the key highlights from Day 3 of F1 testing in Bahrain?
Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the P1 Podcast with Matt and Tommy. It is the final day of the first week, second week, however you want to say it. The first week in Bahrain is the end of it. Day three, done and dusted. Three more days of testing to go until we look forward to the first race of the season. So much beefing, Tommy. The teams are going at each other.
The drivers are going at each other. It is. We haven't even turned a singular competitive lap yet. And this feels like it's bubbling along. Drive to Survive already got three episodes written, I've heard, because there's been so much going on already and lots to recap once again on this third day.
Absolutely. I was thinking the very same thing, that there's going to have to be about eight pre-season Drivers of the Live episodes because, my word, they are just going absolutely crazy. There's quotes flying around. They're all throwing shade at the rules, the regulations, each other. It's wild.
It is absolutely wild. But for this podcast, we are going to talk about a Mercedes 1-2 because that is what happened. Antonelli, Tommy's champion prediction, topping the times with the fastest lap we have seen, I believe, the entire week. Ahead of George Russell and then Lewis Hamilton in third, then Piastri and Verstappen rounding out the top five. Let's get into the questions.
Patreon member Justin asks, On a scale from 1 to 10, how heavily is Mercedes downplaying their true pace? I can't keep up with this. I can't.
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Chapter 2: How are teams reacting to the new regulations in F1?
Because it is... There's so many rumours flying around. There are teams talking to media about other teams and trying to give away either just complete and utter fabricated lies to put pressure on other teams, or maybe it's the truth. We don't know. The thing is, Mercedes may well not be having any sandbags at all.
And it could well be Verstappen and what we were speaking at the start of the week about the efficiency of the Red Bull engine and this, that and the other. You've got Lando Norris saying yesterday that Ferrari are quicker than them. You've got Red Bull and Pierre Wache saying that Red Bull are fourth fastest. You have Mercedes saying that Red Bull are clear... I can't keep up with it.
And if you're expecting answers, you're not going to get them in this podcast because nobody has the answers, not even the teams, because they don't know how fast the other teams are.
They don't. The only thing we maybe do know is that Aston are really slow. That's really slow. I would be absolutely unbelievably amazed if the top four is not in some order. Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull. That seems quite sure. Maybe Haas are going to be best of the rest. I think that's a given though, right? That's a given. Yeah, true.
But in a new rule, you think that maybe that might have been unusual. There was also...
maybe my fears more than others but i know a lot of people were saying it that when we went to 2014 and it was an engine regulation it was literally like just based on what engine you had so the fact that you've got yes they are the four kind of powerhouses of formula one but they've kind of got different engines between them you know like there's a mercedes there's a ferrari there there's the red bull powertrain ford uh thing so
there's difference there and it looks like it's very hopefully close like we're going to go into a lot of negatives about the new rules in terms of a positive I think it's great that we're still trying to guess and no team is ever going to say yeah we're miles clear we're the best And you're exactly right.
Every single quote from these top four teams is just throwing kind of the tag of favorites to someone else. It's literally like hot potato, like pass it on to the next person. One day it's McLaren saying, no, it's Ferrari. Then Mercedes is saying, oh, actually, it's Red Bull. Max Verstappen came out and said, oh, we'll see when Mercedes turn the power up.
I mean, if they turn the power up, they'll want to today. They're going to be very nice indeed. But no one wants to admit their favorites. And I like the fact that we don't know yet. I think it's great.
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Chapter 3: What insights can we gather from Mercedes' performance during testing?
I will take that right now. I haven't seen confirmation of why Hamilton stopped just yet, because we're recording straight after. But if it is due to the fuel, that's perfect. We're winning it all. Now, as we said at the start, lots of comments, beef being thrown about, flown about, and something we didn't speak about yesterday but we'll talk about now were Lando's comments about Max Verstappen.
And, of course, Max was speaking about how it's anti-racing, these new cars, and not happy at all. Lando was, of course, asked about this and poking the drivers for quotes. And Lando essentially said, well, not essentially, this is a quote that, He said, a lot of fun. I really enjoyed it. If he wants to retire, he can retire. Formula One changes all the time.
We get paid a stupid amount of money to drive, so you can't really complain at the end of the day. Any driver can go and find something else to do. It's not like he has to be here or any driver has to be here, but it's a challenge. So Lando, yeah, bit back, said, you know what? I enjoyed myself.
I don't enjoy his comment about the fact that, you know, you get paid a stupid amount of money to drive, so you can't really complain. I think that is a dangerous precedent to set, and it shouldn't be the way Formula One is, where if the sport is going in a direction that a driver doesn't like, then they should be able to voice that. And Max clearly doesn't like the idea of the energy...
and how you have to go driving. And as we've said as well, Alonso, all of these sort of more veteran drivers are not happy with the way in which Formula One is moving. So for me, it doesn't matter how much you get paid. I would like to know when Max is feeling upset about it and or it doesn't feel like it's a very fun car to drive. You're allowed to have your own opinion.
If Lando likes it, that's all good. But I would also like to know when Max doesn't like it.
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of drivers' comments on the new regulations?
Yeah, definitely. You should be allowed to have your opinion about it. I think in terms of how you take this quote, it's obviously Lando being cheeky. He's not legitimately being like, Mac should retire. Obviously, all the tabloid newspapers will lead with the headline, Lando Norris, Max Verstappen should retire if he doesn't like it. Go away. Which is not.
He's more just kind of like being like, well, I like it. So if you don't, then it's almost like a passing cheeky comment. But that being said. It reads worse than when he actually says it. Yeah, 100%. For sure. Definitely. Definitely. But you're right that, you know, Max has got every right to kind of voice his concerns. Max is one of those drivers that has always voiced his concern.
He's very much the hardcore old school Formula One fan. He's like the voice of the old school Formula One fans. You know, if Max Verstappen was in charge, we'd have V12 engines. We'd be racing at, you know, the old Hockenheim again and stuff, right?
the way he does things max is the one that will complain about you know las vegas saying it's all gimmicks and these kind of things and drive to survive and things that he doesn't like about new formula one and he's very old school in that in that sense um so yeah he he's he's kind of max has had that voice of a lot of fans that have said you know i don't
This is not my Formula One that I don't want to. And I do get the fact that, yes, Formula One evolves, but you can also be in a situation where you say, I don't like the direction it's going because I totally understand that because...
it's not this doesn't feel like what formula one is meant to be where where it's all about battery saving and stuff like that that is the most uninteresting like kind of thing formula one is meant to be like this glamorous exciting amazing sport and if all we're seeing is four different ways to charge the battery that's not that's not kind of elite motorsport is it
No, and I don't want to see overtaking done. I mean, we've spoken about DRS passes. It's going to be 10 times worse if the only thing we're watching are passes where someone has more battery than the other one, and it's nothing to do with skill, nothing to do with outbreaking. It's just literally just in a slipstream, off they go, because they've got more energy.
There are ways in which it could be interesting with defending and thinking about when you do deploy your energy, but... It feels like there's a lot of talk about battery and this is not Formula E. This is Formula 1 and they're supposed to be different in that sense. But I'm seeing some massive similarities after watching Formula E for the last few seasons. So that was Lando's comments.
And then Russell today essentially was agreeing with Lando. Unsurprisingly, you know, George and Max...
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