Hmm.
Should we do comedy, as we say in the biz, let's do comedy, all right, ready, Tony Michael. Do you have any idea what it took just for me to be here in the studio with you today?
You know I do not. I have a feeling you're about to tell me.
Well, I'm gonna tell you. Okay, Okay. I got up, I put on my shoes, I took the sea train, I stopped at the cafe on the corner here, great coffee by the way, I took the elevator, and here I am.
That seems pretty straightforward.
Well that's the thing. It's anything but straightforward.
Okay.
Think about the amount of logistics happening in the background to get me here today. I'm talking train conductors, policemen, barristas, coffee farmers, dorman, elevator technicians. When you think about it, it's a logistical miracle that I'm here with you today.
Well, I surely feel blessed.
For my heart pots one on one studios and Sports Illustrated studios.
This is choosing sides, yes, one wow wow. Someone once told me there's no plan B when it comes to logistics. You know, we joke about Ferrari's plan A, B, C, D, E, F G, And they'll say, well, what's interesting is in logistics there's no plan B. Plan A has to work, those freights have to make it to the destination on time. Is that true?
I mean, I think it would be wrong to say there is no plan B because in a way, there never is a plan. It's constantly evolving. So we start with Plan A at the beginning of the season and we end up with Plan Z in a few months, because it's just everything happens. I mean, we had COVID, we had strikes, we have wars, we have weather, we have pandemics, we had I mean we saw that literally the moment we said, okay, what next, what else can happen?
Something else was happening, happening, So we thought COVID and the pandemic was the worst moment of our life. Now even worse. Yeah, So I think we become expert of dealing with issues, of finding solution to a problem, and we always get to a plan in the end and we make it happen. But to get to that make it happen, we change multiple times. So I mean I would say, yes, we always make it happen. But to get there, there are a lot of plan ABCD.
There's lots of pivots happening. Yeah, this is Georgia Tierra Bassi, DHL Motorsports track side manager.
If I had to list what I do, I think we would be here for hours.
She's going to help us understand all of the logistics that goes into the Formula one race we can.
I know you're expecting me to be skeptical about this week's topic, but I'm actually I'm all in great.
I admit I didn't peg you as a logistics man.
You know, I think it was US General Omar Bradley who once said amateurs talk strategy, professionals talk logistics. So yeah, I hold that to be inherently true.
I absolutely love that there we go. So there's a lot of focus on Formula one that goes into drivers, the speed, the money, the glitz, the glamor, and all of that is true and all good and well. But to me, truly, one of the things that astounds me with this sport is the logistical component of it all.
Yeah, I mean, you've described it, but I've also heard other people describe it as a traveling circus. Help me understand why that's true.
There's nothing else like it. Really, there is nothing else like Formula one logistically because of all the different components that go into it. I mean we're talking about the car is alone weigh two thousand pounds.
This is Joe Pompiono.
Hi, Joe.
Joe's a banker turns sport expert. He loves everything that has to do with the underbelly of the sports machine, so finances the in this model, but also the logistical efforts underlining it all.
They're racing at top speeds of two hundred miles per hour. The drivers are like movie stars relative to what's come out over Netflix over the last few years and their popularity, and it's just unlike anything else that we have in sports today. And I think it's really challenging specifically because it's really one of the only global sports that we have. There are sports leagues that play in other places. There's you know, European football teams that play friendlies in the US,
and even the NFL goes international. But Formula one is global in its blood. It's everywhere. They travel every single year to the same places all over the world, and it makes it really challenging because it's not an asset like business where you can just kind of pick yourself up, fly over there and then do the event. You need the cars, you need grand stands put up, you need premium hospitality. You obviously need to bring hundreds of employees.
You have to have the motor homes set up and the hospitality areas for the teams themselves, and that's really challenging logistically because there's so many different moving parts.
So remember when we talked about sponsorship a few episodes back, and we talked about F one having official sponsors and teams and drivers have their sponsorships and promoters have their sponsors. Well, DHL has been one of the longest standing sponsors for Formula one for over forty years, and DHL is one of those sponsors that helps F one make sure that they can put on this traveling circus.
Yeah, DHL are the longest official partner of F one. I'm not a Formula one fun I mean I like the logistics behind it, but anything to do with Fromula one, like drivers, teams and everything else, I kind of know it because I'm working in it, so I have to have a basic knowledge. Yeah, but I wouldn't define myself as a Formula one fun if they ask me who won after the race nine times after ten, I'm like, no clue. I need to go on the internet and check because I don't have the time to actually watch
the outcome. I need to focus on Okay, did they crash? Yes, then I have to ship more frame.
You are my dream expert who's just like, yeah, yeah, Formula one, that's all good. Let's talk logistics.
Yeah. The race is the only time we have where it's quiet because everyone, of course is busy watching it, so we don't get customer in the office. It's the only two hours we have to catch up on emails to relax a little bit, so we actually we use that time to relax and catch up on anything we
haven't been able to do. I focus on air freight mainly, but in our job, there is I mean, there is nothing really you can focus on because we are track side and we are the face of the company in a way, so we need to know a bit of everything. We have an office at the circuit in every single event, so if there is an issue with any kind of shipment air fhrase, see freight customs, anything, we have to have the answer.
The HL the shipping company, the.
Shipping company, that same company that a lot of people complain about that loses their package.
Right. I don't even know what DHL stands for, but thankfully there's internet connection here.
No Google it for us or bring it for us.
I'm going to bring it for you guys. Let's guess drove it here myself. I like that DHL acronym meaning.
Gilblm put up a portion of his student loans to start the company, bringing in his two friends, Adrian Dalcy and Robert Lynn as partners. They shared a Plymouth duster that they drove around San Francisco to pick up the documents and suitcases. Then they would rush to the airport where they booked flights using a relatively new invention, the corporate credit card.
Dalzy, Hillblom and Lynn as expected, an American founded German logistic company providing courier, package delivery and express mail service, delivering over one point eight billion parcels per year. That's what American founded German logistics. I'll tell you what when it comes to logistics, the Germans, I'm I'm pro German. There you go, when you say DHL sponsors. What does that mean, like who's paying who here?
So it's a bit of a mixture. And again the numbers and the finances in F one always a bit opaque, but I think on this one they probably look some sponsors paying kind and what I mean by d is they pay with the technology we mentioned Oracle, Aws, et cetera. Google, they offer the tablets and all of that. I think with this one there's a fair amount that DHL puts
up front. But also it's not because we're flying DHL planes that Formula one doesn't actually pay for this, so they're chartered planes and we'll get we'll get into the n antiquity of that because the teams then have to pay Formula one for spaces on that plane as well.
I see.
So there's a couple of layers to this.
Jeez.
They've been working with DHL, their their logistics and chipping partner for forty years now, and DHL actually sends thirty five dedicated specialist Formula one to every single race to oversee it.
So yeah, in total, we always have up to fifty people on site at teach events.
It's one of those things where they're obviously presenting sponsor of the series. They get paid a lot of money and they get a lot of value out of the partnership that they have with Formula One. And this is their gig right, this is their job, this is what the company does, so they've obviously put a lot of resources towards it to make sure that everything runs smoothly.
We have got our air freight team, We've got C Freight, We've got PADO Club, we have got our TV guys who focus on the TV broadcasters. So everyone is a specialist in something, but as well as they know how to do everything, So we tend to have one team that has got one specialist on each side, but overall they can all cover each other's job. We all know each other. We're all like a little village dealing with the same people. You're just in a different country. So
it's like we were all a big team. Just move in from A to B and BB to C. So it does feel like a big family.
So we used to have a much lighter calendar. And actually that's another hot topic in this sport of people saying we don't need I'm a big believer in that that we don't actually need more races It used to be that we had maybe twelve, sixteen, eighteen races in the season, which meant that more or less between each race weekend there was a week or two or three.
Now we're adding more and more races, the calendars getting bigger and bigger, which means that we now have to squish a lot of these races together, which means we end up with double headers and sometimes triple headers.
It's the nature of the business model, which is race promoters paying extravagant fees for the traveling circus to come to town, and they're really giving a lot of the annual revenue to Formula One. It's the basis of their business.
And in other sports, if we want to talk about American specifically, if you think about the NFL or the NBA, or any of the major sports leagues here in the US, that position of power is really with the media companies, right It's with the ESPNS, the Fox, the CBS, those companies, because they're the ones that are providing the most revenue to the sports leagues. It's no secret if you look at the NFL, they make about twenty billion dollars a year in annual revenue, but about ten or eleven billion
of that is coming specifically from their media partners. So there's this constant tug of war going on of like, we're going to give you better games if you do this,
and vice versa. And I think that's the relationship in Formula one that belongs with the race promoters because they're the ones that are essentially I mean, if you look at some of these races, they're paying upwards of fifty million dollars every year for Formula one to come to town for like three days, right, And that's obviously a lot of money, especially when you break it down on an annual basis per event. And I think that's the
reason why these race promoters have so much power. And that's not to say that Liberty Media and Formula One don't have power. I think that they just have to kind of work together to figure out the best schedule, and it's not always easy when you're moving twenty to twenty five different partners around.
In Unison, I think we are hitting the limit because we keep adding and adding and adding, and you don't realize that we have got one team of people that are doing this race. So at the end of the day, to ask a person that has got a life, that wants to have a life to do even more races. I mean it means a lot of days away from home. From what I have seen, people are starting to complaining now because it's I mean, you don't get any work
life balance. It's just work. It just never stops. I mean sometimes it feels like we're shipping organs or I mean we are saving lives, like your doctors saving lives. The stress that you feel is enormous.
This year, we're going to do Vegas and then we're gonna go and fly in Abu Dhabi, which is insane by the way, because it's a twenty five hour trip from Vegas to Abu Dhabi and then there's eleven hour time difference between the two, and then we're expecting these drivers to drive.
It's not safe.
I actually tweeted something out last year when the NFL traveled to Germany for their game, and there was a huge debate about when the team should get there. I
forget who was. It was either the Dolphins or the Chiefs that got there like three to four days before the other team, And the argument was that if you're not going to go a week early, you're better off just going like two days early, because then your internal clock is not going to be as messed up, and by the time it reverts to that, you're moving back.
And I made a comment just kind of like a throw away comment, essentially saying that it's really hard on the body, and Formula one drivers have to do with this, but the fact that you're getting hit, you know, makes it that much harder. And I did that, and obviously people got upset form of the one fan saying this is a really physical sport. And I went back and I hated that I did that because I'm not one of those people that say Formula one isn't physical. It's
extremely physical, right. The g forces that you have in certain corners and the toll that it takes on your body, not only physically but mentally is really challenging. And I think that's where jet lag comes in is I read this quote. It was in the New York Times a few years ago, and as a physio for one of the teams, and they were essentially saying that what they want to do is they want to get to a
location that they're going to race. If it's one hour time difference, they want to get their one day ahead. If it's three, they want to get their three days ahead. And when you're racing in a time zone like Las Vegas to Abu Dhabi, that's I don't know how long ahead that is. It's probably like eight to ten hours or something like that. That is extremely challenging, and it's impossible
because the race is actually only seven days beforehand. They have families, they want to hang out at home, they want these other things, so to do that. You've seen this. I mean in Singapore, a lot of the drivers they're completely inverting their schedule. Las Vegas was the same thing. They're staying up until the early morning hours because quality isn't taking place in some instances, or practiced till one or two in the morning.
We were having breakfast at four pm, lunch at midnight, and dinner at like two am when we would get back into the Hope. And you think, and I don't need to get in a car and race and experience the g forces and I'm already messed up.
Yeah. I mean, the half of the drivers and the team members probably don't even know what time it is when they go to certain places, right, because it's just it's like a blur and you're doing it for several months at a time, and that's obviously difficult on the drivers. They're the athletes that are performing, but I think one of the most underrated parts is really how hard it is on the team members too.
In Las Vegas, we were starting at a three pm and finishing at six am in the morning, so you adapt to the actual schedule of the race. That is another interesting part of the job. You just have to work when you have to work, and it's like your body adapts to it.
Also, these little boys can raise their little cars around the track yep, yep today, heart's content.
You get used to sleep when you can sleep, so like like you have eight hours off, okay sleep, that's I mean, it's just something that your body understand when you have time to sleep, sleep, because any other time you just have to do something, so you just you learn to use the time you're given.
In some instances, they're also away from their family for months at a time. Right when the European schedule comes out, it could be two months at in a row that you're away from your family most of the week. So that's really difficult. Not only them, but their families too, if you have kids and other things like that. So I think part of it's the driver's, part of it's the teams, and it adds up to this just extremely
complicated scenario logistically that's almost impossible to solve. But they're getting better at it each year.
Look, we all want to grow whatever sport we're talking about, yeah, but they all get sucked into this idea football, baseball of more and more and more, and it dilutes the quality of the sport and it puts the athletes at risk. Don't do it, and it's interesting. That's not what this episode's about.
No, but it's a fair point because one of the arguments that I make all the time is not we're diluting the championship. The less races there are, the more important each race is towards the championship and the championship points. The more races you add. The fact that we have this year Maxwistappan who's won the championship and there was what four or five races still to go, is an interesting problem that we are in now.
So it's a long flight to Abu Dhabi.
It's a long flight, and.
Think about those special gloves with the monitors on them at heart rate? What if that gets lost in the flight. What if you just get a left glove.
And that is part of the.
Then you'll only know what the athletes left hand heart rate.
Is the left. Yes, we're digressing.
Let's take a short logistical break here so we can listen to some ads. So back from the ads. So let me ask maybe a silly question, maybe a brilliant question.
Sure it's a brilliant question.
It wouldn't be so sure, honest alpine races they come in, what are they usually coming? Fifteen sixteen? It depends. Okay, it doesn't matter what midfield. Okay, midfield for the sake of this question has no bearing on the question. Okay, they pull into the paddock at the end. Where does the actual physical car go?
You will never see a full car. It's always in pieces. The only time you see a car, it means it's a show car. So it's not an actual car. It's too sensitive to send it completely built, so it is completely put in parts and sent as each individual item. You will never see a car. You will only see a box containing parts of the car.
How much equipment are we talking here?
You know.
A couple of trucks, four or five trucks, Is it just like the Formula one cars and they put a little good track on top.
I love that.
And they can get there faster because they can go so fast.
The visual to that is pretty spectacular.
Would effect win track?
Yes, yes, yes, Okay, if you want numbers, I have numbers.
Yes, they want numbers, okay.
Fifteen hundred tons of equipment throughout the entire year and they're traveling seventy five thousand miles.
The DHL cargo travels in six or seven Boeing seven four seven cargo planes.
In Europe it is up to nearly four hundred trucks for every race.
If you had too much time on your hands and you wanted to put each of these trucks one in front of the other, they would make a convoy longer than five kilometers.
They're not all the HL trucks. The teams have got their own hospitality trucks and garages which are all rended.
Each team ships the equivalent weight of eight elephants per race.
How many kangaroos is that?
Michael assuming Tony is referring to an average African male elephant and Michael has in mind the male red kangaroo. The answer would be one thousand and three hundred kangaroos worth of freight per team per race.
Over a season, the teams will ship six hundred and sixty tons of air freight and five hundred tons of sea freight.
But what's that on elephants?
You know, it's funny that you as I have the number in elephants. That's the equivalent of one hundred and sixty five elephants. I think that's all the stats that I have for you related to logistics.
I weigh roughly point zero one five of an elephant.
That's not too bad.
One of the more interesting parts is actually the kits at the beginning of the season. So again everything's loaded up on maybe two, three or four cars that are going to European races and driving to each other. Most of the equipment feels fits on there, excluding the motor homes, which are obviously a little bit bigger need to be on bigger trucks. But when we talk about flyaway races,
all of that equipment is mostly transported. That isn't the cars and other things on these kits that are sent at the beginning of the year.
They have got between five to sik set and they can rotate them in between races and they can cover the whole year.
And I think that logistically is one of the more challenging parts because those are happening in elite frog positions. Right, They're not only going to Zanvor and then going back to the factory. They're going to Miami. But instead of going back to the factory, they're staying on the road for another three months, and they're being transported to Austin, to Las Vegas, to Canada, to Mexico and other places in the same area.
What part of this job do you sit back and go, I can't believe we pull this off.
This makes nose, I would say, what is chocking me every week is how quickly everything is part done and moved because you wouldn't even imagine it.
Do you have any idea when they start packing up, for example after race? Yeah, like right after the race, do you think there's like a day to.
Like, let me tell let me tell you how the Daily Show does it? Okay, Okay, So we go to Atlanta last year for four shows and Thursday the show ends at eight thirty one pm and they start packing up at eight thirty two pm, Like before you're even done finishing, they're taking the lights down. I would assume that F one is that time's a bit bazillion.
It's very close to that. They actually the moment the cars hit the track, they already are.
They're already doing it.
While the race is happening, everyone is focused on the race itself. Everything else is moving and you don't see what's happening because you're focusing on the race. But in the meantime, everything else is being parked because a few hours afterwards everything has to leave. So it is just crazy how it takes maybe three four days to set it up and a few hours to pack it crazy and unless you are on site, you just don't realize how quickly that happens.
It's not uncommon for the entire F one presence to be completely gone eight hours after the Grand Prix is finished, like everyone's just disappeared, which is kind of crazy.
It's like a one night stand right.
Here, and then you're not and.
Then you're gone, just longing, just.
Just gone on the bedside table.
Miss me and I'm gone.
When do we go by boat? When do we go by plane. Okay, when do we drive? When is it horseback?
No?
What what mode of transport are we using? And why you can't go Vegas Abu Dhabi on a truck?
No you can't, Right, So it depends on how much time you have in between certain events. Right. So the kits that I talk about, those will move on boats because you have several months before you need them, and then once they get to Miami or Brazil or wherever they're going, then they'll be transported on cars to the next races from there. But things that would go on a plane would be the cars themselves or things that you need to get there immediately.
The air freight is normally the most valuable items, which is normally like what is extremely sensitive? Yeah, it cannot be replicated. It's one set only, and that goes air freight.
A lot of like the general equipment we'll call it carjacks, tables, chairs, things like that will already be there because it'll be on one of the kits. But obviously the cars need to get there, so that will go on a plane and other like immediate things that could be necessary that you don't necessarily want to put on a kit several months before that you're going to use at the actual race that are either expensive like the cars or extra engines or things like that will be transported via plane.
And the trucks are really just used for the European races, so those are things that will transport everything from the cars to the engines, to the tables and the chairs and everything in between.
Right.
Of course, an influence is also the costs. Of course, air freight is more expensive than sea fraight. So what they're trying to do because of the cost cup is they're trying to send as much as they can sea freight because it's cheaper to send it sea freight than air freight.
So at any given time, there are ships and planes with f one cargo going around the world. Only imagine plopping all of this up on a map is pretty insane. They but for the flyaway races, they divide the cargo into really important crucial equipment and then the stuff that can go slow that we also have four five different packs the same version of the same stuff.
Then it's going to land in a port and run through customs.
Customs.
I mean, I've like in my little comedy world, I get hung up performing in Canada because I got to go through their like tax department, you know, and then it's like now I'm in the States. And then they go to Australia and it's like this is just me and I can only imagine it's insane.
I don't think there's a single story where a race couldn't start because the cargo didn't arrive. But there are many stories of just like riots have broken out in a country, or there's a canal that's been blocked because lots of and so all the ships are being waited, and at that point they will take a snap decision and go, well, the cargo that we were sending to another location, let's dock it, let's put it on a
plane and get it back here fast. And so you have these insane decisions that come up those moments because the world is what it is and certain things that we can't control.
Yeah, I think this year a race was canceled because of a flood, Right.
There's not a flood. Tire amphibious vehicles, those things are sweet. There's your kids ever do those?
It's gonna turn on the propellor.
He's gonna hold lord and we're gonna quaggle.
Lot it roll. I think one of the craziest things to me is the motor homes at.
The European races, which makes sense if you've ever gone camping versus taking a plane trip, you can take a lot more with you. So those motor homes that you're talking about, they aren't much bigger and is more to build because they bring more at the European races.
And specifically Red Bulls. Red Bull is famous that they bring their motor home to Monaco and they've stood it in the bay, right, And what they do is they literally bring it to the bay and they construct it. It takes twenty five crew members thirty six hours to
assemble it and one day to take it down. They put it on a barge and they bring it to Monaco, right, they float it down the Italian Riviera, which I think is just absolutely amazing, and it speaks to the lengths that these teams will go to to make sure that
everything's set up. Because part of what we have to remember here is that most of Formula one revolves around sponsorships, right, certainly at the lower level teams, the majority of their income is coming through sponsorships, and maybe a little bit less called forty percent of their income is coming through sponsorships at the high level teams, but these teams are making you know, hundreds of millions of dollars in some
cases from sponsorships each year. So entertaining those sponsors in places like the paddock club or in the motor homes themselves is especially important to the income and the business of these teams. So Red Bull certainly takes it seriously. Mercedes Ferraris and a bunch of these teams take it really seriously because they know that if people come to the races, they have fun, in some cases, they're going to spend more money with the team next year, or
it could sell a sponsorship in the future. And that's a huge reason why Formula one kind of gets this reputation for just being this luxurious, you know, sporting event where there's champagne and there's caviare and there's lobster and there's all these things. And I think part of the reason why that's true in some cases is because they're entertaining corporate partners that are paying tens of millions of dollars annually to make sure that everything runs smoothly.
Yo, Hi, this is when you would play my stand up my stand up comedy joke on my special about packing for driving versus packing for flying.
When you fly somewhere, you really think about packing. You know, you talk it out with each other. We stuff things in the shoes. That's a good spot. But if you're driving somewhere, Brillian, bring it. We're driving, brigand.
Honey. Should I bring the blender?
Yes?
I may want to make fresh tomato soup this weekend.
What about the treadmill? It's already packed. We're driving.
We're driving, person your see fill twelve of you ride?
Does there happen to be I don't know a fun fact.
I feel like Mary Poppins going in my bag. Now, give me a fun fact.
Give me a fun fact.
There's a rule now that states that when the team crates are placed on the pit lane of any venue, that's when they all arrives. Teams are not allowed to access their team crates until every single team has received all of their cargo.
Exactly exactly.
Love this, like fence. Love this.
And the reason I think why every team is on board with this is you just never know what could happen to you, and if it could be you so I think that's pretty cool. It's both but it's also a safety and security thing as well, that you can't have one team upfloading stuff well and other team's not doing anything, because then those people are probably hanging around on the pit lane and all the pitwalk and they shouldn't be there.
And I also love that F one with all of its data and game strategy and logistics, they all just agree like sometimes they fuck up your luggage, so we're all just gonna wait, like even like they're there's so in control of everything, and but they're still just like, look as if at a fairness. I thinks I love this rule.
And it's even if there's like two or three shipments, like you wait until everyone, which I think is a nice role. I do that now with my husband when we both order something and we're both waiting for it, we will open up our packages when we've both seen.
That, oh that's not what I did.
Won't be doing that.
We're at a point in my family where if your food's ready, you eat it. You you know, but I'm I don't. I'm hoping we also change that eventually. But with we have kids, two little kids, it's just like you eat when you can eat.
We're hoping that everyone in F one is adults at this point.
I would love it if we could hire an F one logistician at our house, like one, because that would help me manage my life tire as well to its full capacity. Let's keep moving moving. One of the attributes that I'm really enjoying this season, okay, of learning about F one is this cooperative competitiveness. Tennis has this a lot, Like you end up having to practice oftentimes with someone who might be your opponent because you have to and both parties are like, we're both in this town or
country together, we need to practice. Or you split a hotel room with someone that's in the draw. You might play that person. But I'm really enjoying learning how F one has some of that cooperation.
Yeah, I must be the same, and I imagine answer this for me. They're practicing amongst themselves because there's no one else that's better than the coming.
Right, you can only practice with so many people. I like that, all right, So what's being moved? The cars?
Everything?
The wheels, does PERELLI take the wheels, the gloves.
Absolutely everything you see and that is used during a race weekend is most likely being transported.
Apart from the circuited cell. Yeah, that's the only thing that that.
Sense because the circuit doesn't actually belong to Formula one. It actually belongs to the promoters. So that's not going anywhere. Even think about even like we talked about all the data, there's data storage systems and data servers that are being moved as well. There's cable that's being moved like that list.
There's a guy with a handcuff on a briefcase that's got the hard drives.
Never met him. Oh you want a fun fact? Yeah, so want of fun fact doesn't involve a guy with a briefcase and handcuffs, but it does involve a guy called the f one tailor with a backpack. There is one guy that walks up and down the paddock who is sole job and only responsibility is to tailor anything that any of the drivers need, whether it's their gloves, the suit anything. There's a fantastic story that I was told by one of the team's last see about Fernando Alonso.
The way they they work with very specific manufacturers and very specific teams. The people who do the under garments, the people who do the race suits and everything is tailored to absolutely an inch of their lives. And the person who had been doing Alonzo's gloves for many, many years changed and apparently Alonzo when he tried on his gloves, he was like, this doesn't feel right. What's happened? And they said, oh, we've got to do it, and He's like, I can feel it, and so I'm going to need
a few jass the changes. So there is there isn't a guy with a briefcase, but there's a guy with a backpack who's called the tailor, who gets called into whenever any of the drivers need a bit of tailoring. That's call job.
There's an a called tailor for these drivers.
Correct.
You know there's a guy in New York. Yeah that you probably know this. YOHI Endzoltan. There's a guy in New York who twenty four hour emergency phone will saw your couch in half? Wait what then move it because it won't fit in your apartment. In New York City, people have a huge problem of their couches won't You can get in the apartment, but you can't get in the building or in the elevator. Called the couch doctor.
He'll saw your couch in half and then move it upstairs for you and then reassemble it for you.
Yes, I just had a situation with a puppy.
You'll saw the puppy and half.
Quickly give us the rest of that story.
No, I mean the point. I'm just gonna go right to the point here. But if you guys need to have a really good and I think you know, not cheap, but like you know, you get your money's worth couch cleaner yea, if anybody needs so, yeah, yeah it's not.
Let's talk about my favorite part of logistics when it comes to anything which involves large groups and travel. Carrots food, yes, close, but yes, carrots. Like if you're if if Lance Stroll loves his carrot and he's in Las Vegas and they're going to Abu Dhabi, Like, is someone going grocery shopping in Abu Dhabi? Is they bring it's just caviar? Sorry but bad example, but catering food? Like, how is all this happening? Someone's in charge of this, Someone is in charge of the food.
You've actually absolutely there's someone in charge of the food. And you've probably just named one of the few things that doesn't really travel with the flyaway races, so catering is mostly organized on site. Also, things like you mentioned, like the amount of people moving, like things like booking hotel rooms, cars, even internet connectivities, all stuff that's generally done on site. You know, they're not creating motor homes
for all of these people. They are maybe for the drivers and the direct teams in European races, but in flyaway races, this is all stuff that's left to what happens when we land out.
But what about the like data cables.
Data cables I think is a mixture. I think the teams have the cables and the connectivity that they need for their own screens. But then, as with there anythinking F one, there's the stuff that the f I needs to govern that race. There's the stuff that Formula one needs to put on the race and run f on TV and all of that, and then it's all of the stuff that every team needs.
It has to be perfect, it has to be perfect. Mix CHAMPI slow like oh you know Vegas, their internet's a little slow, Like what's the password? Like, it's got to be perfect, it's got to be perfect.
There are days where you just can't keep up. You just hate it because the stress is a lot, the deadlines are just unbelievable. But when you see that it's a team efforts. So when we all work together as a team, which we just learn to understand each other well, learn when is the right moment to ask something, to do something, well, learn when it's the right moment. Maybe just avoid any additional stress. So it becomes in a way, a little family where you all know how to deal
with each other and you know how to make it work. So, I mean you can actually see that by working as a team, we make it happen. And regardless of how much we may argue and fight in between, at the end of the day, we have made it happen together. So every single individual has done something to make it happen. And that's what makes it rewarding at the end, because on Sunday night, after every race, you can see that your effort have made it happen.
So there's boats, Yeah, there's planes.
Explains six to seven planes.
There's trucks. None of this sounds good for the climate or environment.
It's probably not. I think it's not up to me to decide. Probably where Formula one is on their net carbon neutral promise, but they've obviously made that and it's something that I know that they're serious about. So we'll leave it up to Liberty Media and Formula one to give us some numbers in the near future about what progress they've made on that, and hopefully we're at least trending in the right direction.
I don't want to come across as snooty because this is a competitive sport. It's all gratuitous and you know, we don't need to have ye so there is an acceptability of like the stuff costs money and costs resources, but f one it seems a little bit over the top, like maybe we could do a better job.
These other times where I really miss Sebastian Vettel because he was so good at talking about I absolutely realized that I race in the sport that guzzles fuel as we travel around the world, and at the same time I'm campaigning to save the bees because we need to save the environment. And he has such an.
Edgy campaign to save the bees.
He bought bees this year to Japan and built opponent's helmets.
They were on the track, they had.
These like little bee hives on the track. That they were like painting. I don't know if the bees were actually on track, but the beehives one track, but maybe the bees were there too be meet up. But he's so eloquent at talking about both things can be true, like this is a sport that's constantly you know, we have to do.
Better, because that could also be seen as like rich pro athlete is so out of touch so with reality. But you're saying he did it in the right way.
He did it and I these are not my words, but one of the people who used to work very closely with him explained it this way, like he is middle class, white sis married man, and yet he always campaigned for all of the right things. He always found time. He's the last person who needed to campaign for LGTBQ rights, He's the last person who needed to campaign for eco friendliness. He's the last person who needed to campaign for you know, equality and diversity, and yet he was always there and
he still is. I only say that as he's no longer in the sport and left last year, But he had such a good way of saying, I have to be comfortable driving and being in this sport and also doing good in the world. One doesn't take away from the other as long as you're conscious and willing to have And look, here's the amazing thing about him is he had those conversations under the Aramcobana and got very comfortable at doing that.
In the world of Sebastian Vettel, the B and LGBTQ was b's.
So, Michael, final thoughts. Are you a logistics fan?
I am a logistics fan. I'm impressed and I don't know if it's going to make me turn on a race to know that all this school logistics is happening. But to even just watch Su Paulo, Vegas Abu Dhabi, it just blows your mind that it's the same teams and the same drivers in such a different part of the world. It blows my mind. And you know, there's like a wife that's like, how's Abu Dhabi this week? And he's like, it's actually I'm in Vegas. You know, it's like, oh, well, whatever, I don't give a.
Shit, you're not here.
Yeah.
Exactly what you've helped me appreciate is when I'm watching the race, there was just so many factors that made this race happen, much like me getting here today, with you, blessing you. You said you were blessed?
What was the existence?
What'd you say it was? We as we all feel blessed. We all feel blessed watching F one race, knowing all the things that needed to happen to make that happens. Bless you.
This has been Choosing Sides F one, a production of Sports Illustrated Studios, iHeart Podcasts and one oh one Studio Podcasts. The show is hosted by Michael Costa and Tony Cowen Brown. This episode was edited, scored, and sound designed by Senior producer Jai Maythan Scott Stone is the executive producer and head of audio, and Daniel Wexman is Director of podcast Development and production manager at One on one Studios. At
iHeart Podcasts, Sean Titone is our executive producer. And a special thank you to Michelle Newman, David Glasser, and David Hootkin from One on one Studios. For more shows from iHeart Podcasts, go visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts, and whatever you do, don't forget to rate us and tell your friends it really does mean a lot.
So next week, I'm Choosing sides f one, the gossip. What is Formula one without the literati? The gossip, the scandal, the drama. It's going to be salacious watching and Hi inappropriate.
Let's get down there we go.
We will have the awkward celebrity moments, we will propagate unsubstantiated rumors, and we will have a pandemic of luxury. Watch feels cool.
Can't wait? Talk about that shit.
Let's go, oh dear,