Miami GP Preview: The Wait is Over. F1 Returns

Five Live Formula One. Oh, it's been a fair while. Formula One is back. Two race cancellations mean we haven't had a race weekend in about five weeks. So there could be a fair bit of rust to shake off, and that's just for my commentary. But it's good to be back. We welcome you. Is now round four on the calendar here in Miami. It's Harry Benjamin coming to you from the Miami Dolphins NFL Stadium with Sat.

in the sort of gully in between the back of the garages and some of the hospitality area. Nigel Mansell has just walked by, the music's blaring, and I find my two esteemed colleagues Jenny Gao and the BBC's F1 correspondent Andrew Benson alongside me to preview what's to come this weekend. I don't know, Jenny, does it feel Almost like it's the the start of the season again. We've had we've had three races, almost like preseason testing. We've tweaked a few things and now we're ready to roll.

Absolutely and the ends between the last season and this were so short Well actually this was the proper break that I think everyone needed apart from the fact that the teams have been working flat out. So there are some people in this paddock who were nicely relaxed, they're tan, they're looking great. There are other people who have been working around the clock to make improvements, find better cars, find some answers to questions. So it's a real tale of two halves.

It certainly is. I mean I w I w it was quite nice to get some time off Andrew, but I know a lot of people still been working hard. And it's uh Andrew Benson of course. Um but o we should say obviously it's as a result of uh the the conflict in the Middle East. So we had Bahrain and Saudi Arabia both cancelled. That's why we had the gap. And there there is still a little bit of uncertainty as to well how long is this season gonna be because we have

Race is coming up at the end of the year in Qatar and Abu Dhabi, but closer than that, we've got Azerbaijan on the way, I know there's questions over that. So where do you think this is this is gonna go and when does Formula One have to make a bit of a call here? Well, as to where it's gonna go I think you ask have to ask Donald Trump that question.

And I think Pull More at the moment is just playing a waiting game. Obviously if it gets to set if it gets to like end of July and the war's still going on then Baku looks very shaky for obvious reasons. It borders Iran. Rydyn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd

And I think they have time to have contingency plans. They didn't have contingency allowance when it all kicked off in Australia. Now they have time to put contingency into place in case they need it. And I think that's an important thing to remember. Well there'll only be a contingency plan if they can find a race that pays them money.

The problem is all the races that you can find to pay the money are in the Middle East. And the Middle East is where you can't hold races while there's a war going on. So it's a little bit of a catch-22 situation on that front. We just have to wait and see. It's as simple as that. That's what Form 1's doing. I'm sure conversations are happening in the background about what if. But they're not they're not making any decisions at the moment.

Benson, you know regulations very well. Is there some form of regulation with the championship of how many rounds have to take place for it to be ruled as an official championship or is that by the by? I haven't looked at the But we're nowhere near that, Jenny, are we? It was a twenty four race calendar. It used to be sixteen back in the day. Louis would dream.

It's now twenty-two. If they lost another couple of races it would still be nineteen, nineteen twenty. So that's longer than the vast majority of seasons in Full 1 history. So um I'd have to go back and check the sporting regulations, Jenny, but uh I don't think there's any real risk of that.

Lovely, nicely dodged, Benson. Um look, let's uh let's leave that'cause we'll have to just wait and see on that front. But Jen, we've had this break. Lots of teams have still been able to work and work hard. When we left things in Japan, Mercedes very much out in front. Kimi Antonelli winning and taking the championship lead, George Russell.

demoted down to second. But with everybody able to work on their cars in this gap, who do you think's benefited most from this break? Are Mercedes now gonna be sort of looking behind them a little bit more? Can the likes of Ferrari or McLaren make some big leap forwards? An obvious thing to say in answer to that was everyone's had the same length of time. They can can use the brake as they see fit.

So who had the best brake? We don't know because we haven't seen any cars on track. We don't know what they've come up with in that brake. The venants were already in place. So I'm really excited about this weekend, not only because it's Miami and it's fabulous and it's a sprint weekend and the sun is shining for now, um but also we will get a real gauge of who has

taking the ball by the horns and who is slipping away a bit. I think every team you speak to will say, oh yeah, we've found this, that and the other. But it's important to realise they have been analyzing data. Five weeks. And F1 teams are very good at data analysts and analysing them and and I'm I'm excited to see what they've come up with.

The most interesting one is McLaren Harry I think. They're talking about having a completely new car over the space of the next two races in Miami and Montreal. Um and their record with upgrades is almost a hundred percent over the last two or three years. So and let's not forget Oscar Piastri could have won the Japanese Grand Prix uh had the safety car not happened when it did. Um

Whether J maybe George Russell would have passed him, we don't know, but he was he was leading that race. Yeah, he was certainly in the fight. And so it wouldn't take much for that McLaren to become a genuine threat to Mercedes. It's got the Mercedes engine in it of course. So I think they're the ones that most people on an objective level will be having their their eyes closest on this weekend.

Was it twenty twenty three when they were at the back and then they just had that upgrade? Well they had one upgrade that flipped suddenly flipped them forwards, then Austria, another one, and it suddenly went they were suddenly back in the fight. Uh Austria was the big one and then there was another one in Singapore that year but then the other the key one was this race in twenty-four when um Norris and Piastri started the year the car wasn't that competitive.

They got here, Norris won his maiden Grand Prix victory. And then from there they were basically at the front challenging Verstappen from then on and haven't looked back until the start of this season. So can they keep up their big sort of upgrade record is the big question.

And that that's interesting because up and down the field, uh, I think a lot of teams are bringing upgrades. I was speaking to some of the guys from Racing Bulls, obviously they're more in the in the midfield, but they had an upgrade planned for I think it was Bahrain, which they're bringing up to this weekend, and then they had another upgrade planned.

for uh next summer in Canada. So they're gonna have back to back big upgrades. So we could see some quite big leaps forward. And that could really affect the I don't know, the mind games, the competitiveness between the likes of George Russell and Kimmy Antonelli, where it's been a bit of a two-horse race so far.

I think it's also worth pointing out that they've extended the first practice session to an hour and a half because they're very aware. They've tweaked regulations, they've had all these upgrades and the chance to look at the car and ha how it's performing.

So they want to give the drivers a chance to give them a spin out before they're suddenly thrown into qualifying for the sprint race. So um the drivers are all universally quite relieved. But it's interesting that Mercedes from what I've understood so far have not bought a big upgrade this weekend to Miami and they're one of the only teams not to have bought an upgrade here that's significant and I wonder is that because

Exactly'cause they seem to be, but speaking to the drivers like Charles Leclerc, Ferrari, he was saying, Yeah, we'ren' Ferrari haven't gone away yet. They haven't um you know, Mercedes can still be caught. And of course he's gonna say that, but I do believe him and there's all sorts of tweaks that the teams can do throughout the year to give themselves a bit of a boot.

Well Ferrari's an interesting question because their upgrades their record on upgrades I should say c is the exact opposite of McLaren's. Um they've tended to fall back during seasons. Um And, you know, they've they've kept one trend going this year, which is when a regulation set changes, they often make a competitive step forward.

Um like they did in twenty twenty two for example when the last big ed uh regulation change happened. But then if you remember that year they just went backwards and backwards through the rest of the year. So th There will be eyes on them too, but the pressure on them is very different from McLaren. Can they keep it up?

So where does that leave us then, Jen, coming into Miami with this uh Mercedes Intra team battle that we've got going on? Because I think maybe I'm speaking for myself, but There's a presumption around George Russell would would be the the clear dominant force. But Kimi Antonelli has come alive. He leads the championship. The youngest ever driver to do so, that's surely gotta ruffle the feathers of Russell.

Harry, I'll just cast your mind back to Austin last year at the point in the podcast where you said George Russell champion in waiting. Collective memory gal. I definitely have. But I I think the car is good. And both drivers can be very good at different times. They have different ways of doing it. And yes, George Russell has years of experience in this game and Antonelli is the young pretender.

But look how Kimmy is getting into George's head. George is making mistakes. He's not had the best of luck, I get that. But I I just wonder There's more to Kimmy challenging this year and I think psychologically that could be key. I know you don't genuinely believe me. I'm going to argue with you in a second. What mistakes? Well he's been unlucky with the timing of the safety car. Yes.

But that's not a mistake. And I think the thing about Russell is that he's had some bad luck basically. Technical problem in qualifying in China. He probably would have been on pole there. If he'd been on pole in China, he probably would have won the race because he'd have been the lead Mercedes driver rather than Antonelli winning it.

then uh in in Japan there's there's a bit of a debate about who would have won the race if even if the safety car hadn't happened. But basically the safety car handed the race on a plate to Antonelli. Um But he was on the back route already because of Saturday and what happened on Saturday was apparently a mistake that he made. So there have been things that haven't gone his way but there also been some faults along the way as well.

I would yeah, but I wouldn't call them like big mistakes uh that he was making. Um it's it's more I think if anything the championship fight is more to do with circumstance at the moment and also one of the interesting aspects of it is that uh Antonelli is actually the one who's made three bad starts in a row. He's been able to recover from that because of the pace of the Mercedes Particularly.

While Mercedes have a competitive advantage, that's gonna keep happening. But if the other teams get in the mix if McLaren move forward for example, it's gonna be harder to recover from any mistakes. And that you know, that's the big question. Can he so in terms in terms of ironing out issues Antonelli has to look at those starts. He was running sixth in the opening laps in Japan.

got very fortunate with the timing of the safety car. Mercedes were arguing that maybe he would have won the race anyway there because he was his pace was so good, but that's only if he'd been able to carry on at that speed on those tires.

um and whether his pace would have continued. So lots of unknowns there. I think th the d the the deliciousness of the championship fight at the moment is it's only just starting if in a way the unexpected driver is at the front um and the wrong driver in a way is at the front in terms of the competitive balance in terms of pure speed over three races but it's only three races and there's a really interesting dynamic developing.

Shall we hear from George? Go on then. He caught up with Jed in the pen. I think we're a bit surprised some people brought their upgrades to Miami. I think if that was probably more they were meant to have brought it to Bahrain or Saudi. Um, we expected a lot of teams to be bringing their upgrades to uh Montreal will have sort of a slightly bigger upgrade we hope in in Canada.

Um because obviously there's still two weeks after Miami before Canada. So um yeah, let's see. Hopefully they haven't caught up too much. Psychologically, how did you go into this break? Because obviously the results before didn't go exactly your way, was a bit of bad luck involved. So did you have to kind of work on how you deal with that and how you're dealing with coming back in or wh what was the thought process through that break?

I gotta be honest, it didn't really impact me too much because it was something that was outside of my control what happened in the last race. And watching the London Marathon gave me a bit of perspective of what an F one season has in common with a marathon, which is it's such a long distance and, you know, we're now

three races down, it made me think of a guy three miles into the race, who's at the front, either leading or a few seconds behind or a few seconds ahead, isn't necessarily thinking about the finish line, three miles in to the marathon. And that's the position we're in. You know, we're uh three races into a twenty two, maybe twenty four race season. Um it was a very unfortunate race in Japan, but

that's a championship of that's you know, every race can't be perfect. We go again this weekend and uh ready to fight.

So George speaking there and uh well you caught up with him at the Silverstone a few weeks ago. So uh one of the other things actually George has been maybe unsurprising uh not unsurprisingly quite positive about the regulation change from the start of the year. We've talked about it a lot, the huge overhaul, and Jen's already mentioned it. There's been a few tweaks coming into this weekend based off of feedback from the drivers, the teams, and all of us watching. Andrew.

Uh in in the simplest way possible, can you lay out what what the main changes are that we need to know? I'll lay out what they're meant to do. Okay. The drivers had two main requests. One was to return qualifying to more flat out, uh, because one of the issues with this sort of fifty-fifty split between the internal combustion and electrical energy in the

in the engines and the size of the battery has been that the cars are energy starved and there's lots of energy lots of energy management going on, even in qualifying. The want the drivers wanted that to be reduced as much as possible. and to reduce the possibility of massive speed differentials in the race where one driver's deploying their full 350 kilowatts which is uh 470 horsepower in normal uh power speak.

Um so it's basically essentially a five hundred horsepower difference when you whether when you're deploying energy and when you're not deploying energy. So you can imagine the potential speed differentials there. So they've made us a few tweaks to the technicalities of the regulations to reduce those possibilities. They are what m Max Verstappen described today as a tickle in the right direction. Sorry, au revoir. A tickle. A tickle.

right direction. That's probably the best quote of the day, um, in his written media session. Uh Russell was saying they're good. Lando Norris, the world champion, was saying they've gone about as far as they can with the current situation. And what he means by that is this the current hardware, the engine, the battery, the electrical components.

to make a bigger change to return qualifying more to the flat out side of it um that they w uh that the drivers would like to have, you need a change basically in the ratio between the internal combustion engine and the electrical power. Ideally that would mean increasing the uh power from the engine. That would mean an increase in the fuel flow. That's not possible in season because it's effectively It would it would mean a new engine, the dri the engine manufacturers are saying now.

Whether that's really the case, I don't know, but it's all but there is a reliability question because the engines are designed to work optimally at this fuel flow, change the fuel flow, obviously that's going to raise reliability concerns. The question I have off the back of this is at what point will Mercedes kick off about this? Because they and Ferrari have probably made the best start.

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Yeah, so basically everybody's worked in harmony on this particular rule change. Everybody agreed in Formula One that it wasn't right, particularly the way the way it had changed the essence of what racing driving was over a qualifying lab, the whole sport agreed that that was wrong. Although Stefano Domenicali gave a couple of quite controversial interviews in the break with to a couple of the specialist outlets. um which have raised a few eyebrows. That's the F one president.

They are talking about keeping an open mind about what changes could happen next. I'm not sure how much is possible as I was saying earlier with the current hardware. What's going to be interesting now, Jenny, is what is the appetite for further change into next year. Certainly from Max Verstappen's point of view, for example, as he said in his interview with you in Japan, he's questioning his future if they can't change the end the regulations significantly. But time's running out.

The voting structure in Formula One is quite complicated. The governance process has got to be for changes for next year you've got to have four out of five engine manufacturers and the FIA and F one all in agreement. So will they get to that you know that the uh ratio change that I'm talking about or will they not? They're already talking about the next set of engine regulations in twenty thirty or twenty thirty one um and whether that should be uh a pure ch return to

naturally aspirated engines with just sustainable fuel, no hybrid at all, no turbo. Um there's all sorts of ramifications for that. One of which is that um Stefano Domenicali He likes this kind of like gaming aspect of the racing at the moment which these um which this increased el electrical element allows you to have. You know, this sort of yo-yo racing as George Russell's called it.

Which has been very appealing for the fans and actually for some of the drivers as well. Think about the battle between Hamilton and Leclerc in uh China. So if you go back to naturally aspirated engines with no hybrids, you can't do that anymore because you've got no buttons to press to or levers to pull I should say to allow that to happen.

So lots of conversations to have over the next little while. I think from a purist point of view, from a driving point of view, everybody would like to see that ratio change for next year. Is it is it also worth noting that I think it's after this weekend, because we have this engine freeze rule where after this weekend the FI are gonna look at the data and see uh basically whoever's the slowest, Kov Kov, Aston Mar and Honda.

You you effectively get a get a a a Joker and you can work on your engine and develop it, right? So how's that gonna play into this overarching look at the engine regulation? Well that's kinda separate. So basically it's called adjuvo in Formula One jargon. That's additional development upgrade development upgrade and

additional development and upgrade opportunities. Um it's all about percentage of difference in internal combustion engine power output. If you're within two if you're less more than two percent away you get one upgrade allowed. If you're more than four percent aware you get

two upgrade allowances allowed. That's nothing to do with the way the engines work. It's just with how much to do with how much performance they have. The hybrid aspect of it, the electrical aspect of it, that isn't even counted.

So Honda without question will get at least one adjuve, probably two. Um then the question becomes does anybody else get it? Because Toto Wolf, the Mercedes engine boss, is saying, Oh no, nobody else needs it. And everybody else is saying we do.

Definitely do. Uh just something to keep in the back of your heads. Um right, so that's the uh slight tweaks to the regulations coming into this weekend you need to be aware of. Jenny's also said that we've got a longer F P one session to make up for the uh the break and all these new tweaks. It's gonna be nine No, it's gonna be ninety minutes. It's a sprint weekend by the way, so we're straight into it and that's also a reason. One practice session.

Weather update, Jen. Have you got one for me? Sunday looks like it is going to be pouring with rain, and that's actually could have some quite big consequences on the race. So I was at an event last night speaking to some people who move from Uh the Netherlands to the UK and then they moved out here for what was meant to be a year or two. They've been here sixteen years and they were talking to me about weather because inherently they are still very keen on weather chat.

And I said, Well, you're not really expecting it to rain that much, are you? What's the rain like here? And they looked at me as if I was crazy and said, Oh no, it's gonna rain. and it's gonna rain hard and heavy and there's a chance that the race won't get on the way and I was like, Are you joking? And they were like, No, we're deadly serious. And I said, I haven't bought my coat. So I I've got mine, Jen. You can use mine. And you've got an umbrella, Andrew.

I I got the umbrella that I bought when we were in Japan, Jenny, yes. Um Patrick, have you got a spare coat? No, he said, Oh dear. So to put that into context. We there was an electrical storm here in Miami on the first time Form One came here in 2022 and I was driving back to the hotel in that storm. It was one of those ones where the lightning, you can see the fork light lightning really dramatically sort of

sparking down to the ground, you know, lighting up the sky. It was so wet that people were driving, including me, at twenty miles an hour on the freeway. You couldn't go any faster. It was that wet. And that's a road car.

with proper ground clearance, not a Form One car which aquaplanes and so so on. So if that kind of rain th there's no way that the Grand Prix can take place during that. Also there are quite strict rules in America from the National Weath Weather Service about events And electrical storms, basically they can't take place in the middle of an electrical storm for for public safety reasons. Now. Formula One loves a debate about weather and is this gonna happen and is that gonna happen.

Obviously the Formula One and the FIA have got their eye on the weather forecast. No serious discussions have taken place so far about changing the schedule, for example. They're going to keep an eye on how things develop. Of course there's always the facility to do that. They don't like T because of T V schedules. So it's really just a watching breech.

Eighty percent chance of thunder and lightning on my app on Sunday. Um and just they've already changed the schedule quite heavily this weekend because F two is suddenly here as well. So It's worth bearing in mind that the schedules are already squeezed. So if they have to squeeze it even more like an earlier race, then that's gonna have knock-on effects.

Well it if I remember correctly last year, Benny, it rained quite heavily, was it before the Sprint and Charles Leclerc went off on the way to the Sprint and hit the wall? So Well that we've had rain here before and these are t these are made up of temporary, you know, public and and back roads that this track makes. So where does that leave things like the drainage if we do get an absolute deluge? Well it's not even public roads, it's a car park that's not a good thing. Um yes it's very flat.

this circuit and drainage is not great. We saw that was that's why I mentioned aquaplaning uh with a you know it was there was aquaplaning on the motorway that day I was describing to you. So there was certainly aquaplaning here at the Grand Prix track last year as well. I think If the sort of rain levels come that they're talking about, then nothing will happen until it abates. What we don't know is whether it will. And so we'll just have to wait and see.

Also, if it is raining and they're able to get the race underway, it's gonna be fascinating because we've not seen these cars in a full wet scenario. No and the the elect that's the with the electrical power that they've got now, the high levels that that one of the rule changes is to reduce the amount of electrical power that that can be deployed.

avoid in racing conditions. And there's also some other tweaks to do with the tire regulations and how warm they can be and so on before they go out on the circuit. It will be a socket and see day if the rain comes. Is it weather related why when I accidentally touch people I get a static shot? Anyone else getting that? Why has that happened here? I think it's the astrotas that we're all Read it.

Charges is I I was filming something with our other producer Joe earlier and we we kept accidentally touching it like four or five times and kept going ah ah ah Stop touching people and you'll be fine.

No, it was accidental. Right, anyway, well that let's leave the weather chat there. Um we've been away obviously for a few weeks, so we we haven't actually had the chance to discuss some of the major news that came out over the last few weeks and uh One of them is that, well, the the I think it's the second longest uh driver engineering duo only behind Lewis Hamilton and Pete Bonnington, that would be Max Estapan and John Piero Lambeese, will be splitting up, not quite yet.

But GP, as we all know him, will be leaving Red Bull for McLaren, we believe in twenty twenty eight as Chief Racing Officer. We don't know whether it will be in twenty twenty. We know that his contract runs out at the end of twenty seven so he can join in twenty twenty eight at the latest, but McLaren were very careful to phrase their press release to say that by twenty twenty eight. He's leaving.

So he's definitely leaving, there's no question about that, he signed a contract, uh as you know Will Courtney, he is the head of strategy at Red Bull did uh a year or so ago, um, to join as Chief Racing Officer, which is a role that uh Andrea Estella, the team principal currently fulfills.

Um it's apparently a big career move for him. Um and uh I suspect that there'll be some negotiation going on between McLaren and Red Bull to try and get him out earlier than that, but we'll have to wait and see. Surely it depends on whether Max is there or not as well. If Max leaves earlier because he's already said to us that he might leave at the end of this year, you might as well say, G P you you're free to go.

Well Vistaffer said today that Lambiese's future had no bearing on his own future in terms of his decision. Whether it works the other way around, I don't know. I suspect that the same would apply. Um it's it's an independent independent thing, he he's they know he's leaving, it just becomes a question of when. Well it's been a formidable partnership uh and Max was talking about that relationship in the pen with Jen.

Of course I knew that a bit before. Um we had a good chat about that. Uh and it would be stupid from my side to try and hold him back when you get an opportunity like that. So I was very happy for him and we're still working together this year, next year, you know, so Um yeah, and then you know, times change in in your career and uh that was a a really good opportunity for him, so I'm happy

for him and as a team of course you know we keep pushing together, we keep looking forward as well and of course uh in the interests of the team for the future we are trying to uh find the the best people to to replace him. I can't imagine there are many people that wanted the brake more than you, so it must have been nice to have that time away with family and and do the other racing. How did it feel like to come back into this paddock? Uh

Uh yeah, good. I mean it's fine. I've been here a long time now so Well. Even when you have a break like that, uh when you come back it's it's it's alright. It's warm. So that's probably uh yeah, gonna be a a very hot weekend in general. Um but I'm also like excited for the team, you know, they've worked really hard um to try and try and find improvements and hopefully yeah we can make a a little step forward.

I mean i you hear some of the snippets of their team radio sometimes, Shiny, and it sounds like they're you know a a married couple bickering but It just highlights how brilliant that that relationship has been and it and it will lead to further questions on on Max Verstappen's future. The continued mass exodus it seems of Red Bull happening in front of our very eyes. What do what does Red Bull needs to do to to

convince Max to s to stay. Obviously there's the performance element, but they've got to do something. I don't I don't actually think it's in their control. Max is now such a powerhouse, he does what he wants to do. A lot of people have said why is he racing at Launch Life?

Why is he doing all these other things when they're dangerous? When you know crashes can happen and you could break your legs and not come back into this paddock, which is you know what he's paid to do in F1. Max is his own animal now. He will do what he wants.

Um so I uh you know, I don't think Red Bull can do anything with Max. He'll do his own thing. But what they must do is find a way to stop key people in the team leaving. From what I hear, there are other ymwneud â phobl sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n I g rebuilding Red Bull to where it was is gonna be a very hard task.

Well they have had a few um senior management changes, Red Bull. They're also they're doing well no recently, they're doing a big push on recruitment in general. Uh they've also continue to build this new wind tunnel which will be I'm sure a big intrigue to Max Verstappen at their factory in Milton Keynes. So that will be a topic that we continually follow. But talk of management changes, Andrew, a little further down the grid. Big one down at Audi.

Obviously we lost Jonathan Wheatley, uh he resigned uh from Audi as their team principal uh a few uh probably about a month or so ago now. And old friend of Five Live, Alan McNish, has been named as Audi's racing director. He was already involved in the fold. Is this a replacement or a whole different role?

It's a new it's a different job title. Uh J Jonathan Wheatley was team principal and Alan McNish is racing director, but it's a de facto like for like replacement. Uh Wheatley ran the racing team, Alan McNish is running the racing team. Um he's got plenty of experience in that. He was the Audi's Formula E team principal for a number of years and he's got plenty of experience at Audi. He's been there for a very, very long time as an advisor to the board.

He won Le Mans three times, twice for Audi, once for Porsche, which is a sister brand of Audi. Um so he and he's been involved in the Audi F1 project from the very beginning. When they announced it in Belgium in twenty twenty-two, McNish was there. Um Is it a bit of a surprise that he wasn't named team principal?

It really was, actually, to be honest with you. And um obviously Jonathan Wheatley was a kind of like name recruit. Uh it would have made a lot more sense to re to appoint Alan McNish in the first place. Maybe there was a reason that we don't know what it was at the moment. It feels like a more I mean, this has been, I think it's the fourth.

major act management change at Audi since they announced a project in the first place, which is quite a lot considering they've only done three Grand Prix. But it kind of maybe feels a bit like they've got to a place now where they might have got two in the first place. They've got a guy in charge which is Mae'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid

I went to see him earlier on and I just gave the most massive hug because of course he's been part of the BBC F1 team in the past, is a a familiar face and you know I love working with him. He's such a great analyst of all motorsport, not just everything. He's such a good commentator.

I I just I love him and I love what he brings to this sports and I think A as Andrew said, he's the right person for that role and whereas I think the organization of what was uh Sauber and what is now Audi, he'll get 'Cause he w knows that framework and and I think he'll he'll do great things with the team and whilst Wheatley was able to generate change and passion and a culture shift I think now Alan can come in and just steady the ship and be very reliable presence and and for us It's

because he knows what we do and uh I'm sure he'll uh not commentate but come and join us and chat.

Let's get him in the box. He might he might draw the line at that. Um, well, look, so that's the change down at Audi. Uh, right, we are nearly done, but This is the moment you've all been waiting for. It's episode two of when Harry met Arvid Limblad caught up with him back in Australia. Rookie, what did he go and do? Points on debut. He's had a pretty pretty mega start.

And I began by asking him if he's used the opportunity of this break to reflect on these first three races and life as a fully fledged Formula One driver. Yeah, I think so. Um I I mean I think the first three have gone gone pretty well. Uh I'm overall quite happy.

We've had quite a long break now, which was nice obviously because the the season started very early. There was almost no winter break. But at the same time it does feel a bit weird almost the start of the season and have it suddenly stop.

Um but no it was good, you know, just to also use the time to like I said have a bit of a downtime, spend time with friends and family but also to to work with the engineers, analyse the first couple of races, beyond the scene to prepare for for this week as well. Has it so has it actually been quite nice to have a bit of that downtime to sort of have you b had proper time to switch off?

Yeah, it's uh it's I mean there's pros and cons to it. It was nice to have a bit of time to switch off to sort of decompress, but at the same time I also love driving, so you know I just can't wait to get back in the car. Well, you've come to Miami, it is hot. You've never raced here before, right? What's the experience? He's not been on the track yet, but it's a lot to take in. We're literally standing on an NFL pitch. It's ridiculous.

Yes. It's uh it's pretty nuts. I mean it's gonna be my first US US Grand Prix, um, you know, and I've heard that, you know Here in the States they do sports really well, entertainment, you know the the the show they put on is is amazing. So I'm really looking forward to driving the track but also just to being being a part of the just seeing the the weekend, you know, seeing the show. Um like you said, standing here in the NFL stadium is is pretty nuts. It is cool. Um

A lot to get to grips with though. Not only you've had the time off, so to try and work on the car, no, there's uh an upgrade package here. Uh but also we've had some regulation changes, a few tweaks. What have you made of them? And what actually what after the first three races, how did you feel about where Formula One was at? And how are you feeling now going forward with these tweaks made to hopefully give you a bit more flat out in qualifying, for instance?

Yeah, I mean the the upgrades that you touched on initially, I mean uh yeah, we've got some good stuff, you know, coming this week. Um we'll see we'll see what it's like. In the end, you know, everyone's gonna bring an upgrade so um it's gonna be about

relatively how big they are. Um but it's exciting. In the end it's gonna be it could be a quite big jumble up uh of the field. Um and then on the regs, yeah we tried it in the sim, um but it's it's hard to really know until we get on track. So uh we'll see tomorrow.

Now I know you're not a guy that likes to set yourself too many sort of specific goals, but next time I catch up with you, I think we'll be at a European track, somewhere maybe Monaco. Um what what would you have liked to have achieved in the next few races once we get back underway? Can I pin you down to one?

I don't know, I think I mean in the end, you know, I'm enjoying driving these cars at the moment. I've been having a lot of fun in in qualifying. Um, you know, I've had two Q threes in the first three races. Um I don't know. In the end I I you know, I I want I wanna you know I wanna have Q threes, I wanna get in the points, but at the same time that's that's also an outcome goal. I'm very focused on myself and my performance because

you know, and do and the process and doing my bits right because then it will lead to that. So it'll be nice to have a couple more Q threes if that's possible, you know, maybe some points. Um yeah, we'll see what happens. I'll throw that back to you in in Monaco and we'll see where we're at. Well Monaco's two races, so Rebel Ring. Maybe Silverstone.

Yeah, that'd be a nice one. Yeah. Lastly, Arvid, uh from our first chat, I believe I asked you if you had any nicknames, and you said you didn't, or you were a bit coy on it. Now, I've I've actually I've done a bit of brainstorming. Oh dear. Well I've come up with some and I want to see how you how how you feel about it. Of Right. Ave. Yeah. Limblads. Lin Lad. Lindlards. So I I think I like you saying my surname now. No, it's sort of like an S on the end, you know.

or limb bladders. Any of those took me fancy? I'm gonna be honest with you, I really appreciate the effort, but I think you need to go back to the drawing board. You kinda set the tone with Av. Well, we got better and better than right? No. Alright then Silverstone I will also have s fresh set of nicknames for you and by the end of this year we will have a proper nickname for Arvidin Blad. Deal? Yeah. But they didn't you didn't say Deal. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Arvid there really avoiding uh the subject of me picking a nickname for him and also clearly didn't agree to our meetup in Monaco, which I'm pretty sure was scheduled. So it might be Silverstone. But he didn't like Arv, Arvinator, Arvitron, Limbladders, no guys? They're trying to come up with a nickname for Arvid, so I think his name is so cool he doesn't need a nickname. Everyone can have a nickname. Haza? No. That's c uh people call me that. Well we all call Andrew Benny.

Yeah, but his name isn't cool as Andrew. Arvin it's so cool. And I like the yellow that they're wearing this weekend, the Miami yellow. It's I mean it pops. I love it.

Right, well anyway, always good to chat with Arvid and he's uh he's in really good spirits. You've seen the Mercedes pink graysuit, J. Look, people have come up with some snazzy kit this weekend. I like the way that Carl Ross Saints down at Williams said, uh wouldn't probably wear this any other time, but you know, I'm loving it'cause it's Miami. Contractually obliged.

Yeah, there's a lot of uh uh special Miami uh merchandise liveries as well up and down the field to celebrate, well, the first race in America for the year. Um okay, what are we looking out for this weekend? What are you expecting? expecting to happen predictions if we get a race underway on Sunday regardless of the weather. What are we saying for for poll and the wind? At this event last night someone asked me, could Perez win for Cadillac?

Okay. And I said absolutely no chance whatsoever unless there's an almighty deluge and something crazy happens. And then I had the conversation about the weather. So Cadillac, Perez, done. Surely, no? If you wanna stick with that then that's on your head beer. No, I'm not gonna stick with that, but I do think that Norris can do something special here. We've seen it in the past with the upgrades. I'm gonna go for a maybe another Kimi Antonelli pole for the sprint race. Oh okay.

uh and the race, but I think it'll be Norris that wins the race. on Sunday, okay? Kimmy's just more positive. Speak of the devil, Kimmy Antonelli in that uh rather dashing purple uh racist and pink hat as well. I I think I would you think I could carry that off? Yeah, could you? I think purple's actually a bit of my colour, so I think I'd be alright. Good. Well Antonelli was very strong here last year. Don't steal this from the biggest.

Um so I think Jenny might have a point there. I think Antonelli might get poll. Um but I think this is a weekend that Russell's gonna bounce back. Okay, so I so you're going from pole for Kimmy and a race win for Russell. Yeah. Uh I'm gonna do poll for Kimmy, race win for Kimmy as well, because of last year and how he came alive last year. We thought this was welcome to the party Kimmy had today. Didn't quite happen, but a year on and he he really is showing that full potential. Alright guys.

I think we're just about done. Thank you very much, Andrew. Thank you, Jenny. We uh have kicked off the weekend nicely and we'll be bringing you the Check and Flag podcast throughout the weekend as well, reacting to uh the sprints, Grand Prix qualifying and the race.

Which is available both as a podcast and on iPlayer and YouTube. You can listen to the Miami Grand Prix from 8pm on Sunday, lights out at 9pm on Five Live and on the go with the BBC Sounds app. Right, I think we're off somewhere for dinner. This has been an IMG production for BBC Radio 5 Live. Hello, I'm Nikki Campbell. This could well be the podcast. We are calling it. Don't say a word. Don't listen to that song.

that book, don't watch that If you sometimes sit on the fence because you're worried about it. Don't say that. Two listen to this podcast with me, Nikki Campbell. Listen on BBC.