So I don't want to say was it luck or not luck for Ugo, but was it a bit of just that this was the worst possible weekend for Freddie to have had a bad qualifying because it ruined any chance of him having a fair fight to beat up and make it overtakes to cling on to his championship lead?

Yeah, I mean, none of us knew exactly what the track was going to be like in racing.

The F3 drivers got to do an in-season test there, and they absolutely loved it.

You know, Freddie said it was one of the best tracks he's ever driven, and that was echoed by a lot of the other drivers.

They all loved driving it on a single lap, and then when we did that sprint race, no one could overtake each other, so...

That was sort of a real shame, really, because the track looked fantastic.

And I'm sure really good to drive, but you just can't overtake there.

But it's quite interesting to see how they've come on this year, Campos, when the big hitter names that we'd have seen in the past, like Prema or... say ART have maybe not performed quite as well at Prem in particular had quite a poor season this year how do you see that having kind of played out this year do you see it being a swap next year or Campos maybe going to struggle if they move up their drivers to replace someone are we going to see a bit of a shake up or are they developing themselves now as the new these are the ones to be every single year going forward

Right.

And if I were stood behind you and tracing down your spine, it would be a lovely straight line.

So this is, Angela, what you perhaps need to ask your husband.

He needs to have a look at you when you're lying on your side and literally run his finger down the middle of your back and see if your neck kinks down towards the bed or kinks up if the pillow's too high.

Because then you start stretching things, and then you start to develop a bit of guarding muscle spasm to protect you.

when it comes to that?

I mean, some of the hollow fiber and microfiber synthetic replacements for down and feathers are, are really good.

They don't tend to be as good in terms of wicking away the heat, and the hollow fiber, um, wicks away the heat a bit better than microfiber.

Could we see a repeat of that next weekend?

Yeah, there's no reason why not.

I mean, it was really good to see Joshua Dirksen win, first of all.

I think it's been a long time since that win at the season opener.

And he's had a bit of a tough time of it at times and things.

But then he is next to a driver who's just won two titles in a row.

And he's with the championship winning team who's won it twice in a row.

starts the feature race last on super soft tires pits before lap six pits again on lap nine under the safety car and when the red flag comes out he has the net race lead he then battles rafa camera for said net race lead loses out he then gets a five second time penalty for track limits offenses he crosses the line fourth but is relegated to seventh with the penalty he then gets disqualified from the feature race because a team guest of his has picked up a headset with a microphone on it a breach of fia formula 2 sporting regulations um well thank you it's not quite the the list of penalties that chris had to read out ahead of the formula 3 sprint race but it's very close so chad who wants first dibs on whatever that was for leon

Is that an assessment you'd agree with?

Yeah, I think that's a very good assessment actually.

That was a very unusual error for him to make when you look back at his career.

He's not really someone that goes out and makes big errors like that.

That would cost him a win.

But then his performance at Barcelona for me is still, I think, arguably the most outstanding we've seen of the season and one we've seen for a long time.

But yeah, again, it was another mistake, wasn't it? Perhaps two, one off the line, one going rounds the outside off the circuit and then having to give the place back.

Just how impressed are you with his performances in recent races?

What have you got for us this year? What is Australia's offering to Henley Royal this year?

Yeah, so 21 crews this year, which at one point I did think that it wasn't going to quite get up to that level, both in terms of the things happening in the Middle East and all the rest of it, and as well just the lashing that the Australian crew suffered last year.

It wasn't, apart from obviously winning the Grand in fine fashion, You know, as you mentioned, St. Ignatius, who really didn't execute in the whole tour.

And I think a lot of schools and programs were a bit taken aback and hesitant to come.

So 21 crews, as I believe it is, is a strong contingent from a number of clubs.

for a deeper dive there is two podcast episodes on uh rowing down under chatting to five of the clubs uh coming over which uh not to toot my own horn all of the coaches and athletes i spoke to were very very interesting it is a good listen if you've got a spare couple of hours um I think this year marks a very different way that a lot of the Australian clubs are going about Henley.

We've got two clubs entering cruise in the Princess Elizabeth.

Is there not something about composites and duration of time of membership at a club to be eligible?

But is there an added element of you have drivers on the grid who are maybe vying for the same development programme spaces as you, who maybe have been in development programme races with you? What's that dynamic like and how does that affect drivers?

Yeah, absolutely.

Alpine have three development drivers this year.

So you want to be the lead one.

And when you get to Formula Two, you know that a good season here can lead you straight into a Formula One seat or a Formula One driver development role like we saw yesterday.

with Leo Fornaroli, and that didn't happen until he was champion.

So, yeah, they're all very aware of that being the case, particularly Alex Dunn coming into his second season.

When we're looking at the Formula 3 championship and you have drivers such as Finn and such as Lindbergh when he was younger, kind of being brought up so quickly into the ranks of international single-team racing, what's their goal, I suppose? Is the Red Bull idea for these young drivers to be managing them slowly or is the goal ultimately always to just go as fast as you can? Yeah.