Belgian Grand Prix

I, uh, I, I was, I was way, way, way...

It looked like you've just come fresh from the, um, practice session at the Spa Grand Prix or Monza, wherever you've been this morning, but it's nice to see you-

Yeah

... actually in after 50 laps there practice session.

...

the delayed Belgian Grand Prix.

Yeah.

Because the June race had been called off 'cause the track was, uh, disintegrating.

For the first time ever, right?

Yeah, man, Spanish Grand Prix.

The second time, of course, we've been to Spain this year, but the first time we'll ever go to Madrid.

Um, it's very rare that we get to, to preview a brand-new race.

Um, but yeah, that's why there won't be a qualifying review on Saturday, but we'll be back with a race review on Sunday.

Uh, let's preview this one.

Uh, round 14, of course, marks the final scheduled race in Europe this year, but the first ever race, of course, at Madrid, a new street circuit which will host the Spanish GP.

Uh, whilst this is a brand-new circuit opened this year, it's not F1's first time in Madrid, with the Spanish GP previously held at the Jarama Circuit between 1968 and 1981.

Top 40.

And there's a little bit, yeah, kind of a little bit of... kind of reasoning with this as well was it was the first time a non-top four car has taken pole in a dry session since 2009 now of course the top four cars in that time have changed around a little bit because of course Williams took that pole at Austria didn't they obviously they're now not a top four car but obviously definitely were back then 2009 Belgian Grand Prix Jamie which of course was

Giancarlo Fisichella I listened to his podcast on the plane the other day good lad

His podcast or his on F1? Well,

brilliant stuff

that's a that's a good story that's a good story that's kicking it off that's a great one that's exactly what we want to hear non-disabled dear pagani hurrah my first ever time here which is probably my best story but i'm gonna i've got lots of one so i'll shut this one off to start with now uh my first ever grand prix that i can remember being at was the 1993 belgian grand prix i was saying you can remember yep um So I was, what, seven, eight years old? And I have a photo that sits above my bed to this day.

I am age 41.

Of me with my brother and a certain Ayrton Senna, which was signed.

I'm not sure when it was closed, the original one, but it got too fast and too dangerous.

It was the old circuit as they put it.

The original pre-war circuit 1921 to 1938. the old circuit which we are i think we're more familiar with with the grads the master king and um what's that big sweeping right under at the bottom of the hill malmedy not malmedy That's the circuit that was around between 1939 and 1956 there was another configuration that was so that one was 14.120 kilometers then we went to 14.1 and I'm not sure what the variation was between 1957 and 1978 but 1978 the old circuit and remember we had a Formula One Grand Prix in 1970 where and that was a slicks and wins formula um going around that the old road circuit but at the time it was we had you know road circuits like Clermont-Ferrand we certainly had the Nürburgring which didn't have the safety features that we see certainly on the Nordschleife now um and then in 1979 we had the new the Grand Prix circuit that was built to 6.947 kilometers with the old bus stop chicane The Grand Prix came here in 1983, didn't it, for the return of the Belgian Grand Prix to Spa.

And as Ben said, his dad would have been around the Formula One paddock at that time, and everybody hated it.

Mercedes have had some reliability concerns all year, uh, and across the customer teams as well.

So Lando Norris already took a new battery in, uh, in Spa and had a 10-place grid penalty.

Antonelli is, is basically replacing the whole lot, so he'll start from the back of the grid.

The reason is that Mercedes think they're basically gonna have the fastest car, and it's a circuit where they can overtake quite well.

However, they have bought a, a, an upgrade to the power unit, so i- it remains to be seen how effective that is at, at narrowing the gap to Mercedes.

My, my hunch says that the, the deficit they have on the straights is just gonna be too much.

They actually had a pretty good showing at, at Spa and Silverstone where, uh, well, Charles Leclerc won at, at s- at Silverstone, and he wasn't far off in Spa.

But that was a little bit circumstantial as well.

Safety car finish, but Norris beat Piastri.

Belgian Grand Prix...

Piastri did beat Norris.

The gap was six seconds.

Look, let's talk about 2026 now.

You've ticked off all of the big race wins in your career, right? Already, we're talking Monaco, we're talking Monza, we're talking Spa.

And then, of course, Silverstone came just before the summer break.

How important was that win?

And again, to be working in this environment is difficult.

And then we get to Silverstone where it's a track that I love, but I didn't really know what to expect.

And on paper, actually there was a lot of negativity because Silverstone and Spa was going to be the two most difficult race weekends of the first part of the season.

So I was like, okay, my God, this is not a great timing for me.