[music]

Alison Stewart: You're listening to All Of It. I'm Alison Stewart, live from the WNYC studios in Soho. Thank you for coming along for the ride. If your weekend plans involve seeing the new Dungeons & Dragons movie, which USA Today calls clever and often hilarious, we will talk about it on Monday with the shows, with the film's directors, and we'll take your calls. That is in the future, but now listeners and racers, start your engines, it's time for Formula 1 racing.

[music]

Yes. This weekend, the top Formula 1 drivers in the world will meet in Melbourne, Australia for one of the sport's most anticipated Grand Prix races. Formula 1 or F1 has been around since the very first European Grand Prix in the 1920s, and it's long been a popular sport around the world with a fan base twice as large as the NFLs. Recently, the sport has found fanatic followers in America who are driving up viewership for F1, even as it's decreased for other sports in recent years. A big part of that growth has been thanks to the Netflix docu-series Formula 1 Drive to Survive, which premiered in 2019 and is now in its fifth season.

The series is part sports doc, part reality TV show, squeezing all the drama out of the races and behind-the-scenes moments. It's also made by Liberty Media, the company that purchased Formula 1 for $4.4 billion in 2016 and has been revamping its image for a younger audience. Lily Herman has host the podcast, Choosing Sides: F1 with Daily Show correspondent, Michael Kosta, and author of the Formula 1 Culture newsletter, Engine Failure. Lily, welcome to the studio.

Lily Herman: Hello. Thank you so much for having me.

Alison: Journalist Maria Sherman knows a thing or two about Young Fandom. She joined us earlier this week to talk about NSYNC as the author of the book about Boy bands. She's also the author of a recent piece in The Cut titled The Fangirlification of Formula 1, which explores the sport's newfound popularity. Welcome [unintelligible 00:02:11] pass for you.

Maria Sherman: I feel very comfortable here. Thank you for having me again.

Alison: Listeners, let's get you in on the conversation. Are you a recent Formula 1 convert or maybe you're a lifelong fan? We want to hear from you whether you're a newbie or a longtime motorsports supporter. Give us a call, 212-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Oh my gosh, calls are already coming in. How did you get into the sport? What keeps you coming back? Who's your team? What's your team? Call us, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or you can hit us up on social media at All Of It WNYC, that is both Twitter and Instagram.

Okay. Lily, I'm going to ask you to set the table. Let's get to the basics for people who really have no idea what Formula 1 is. In the US, we have NASCAR, we have IndyCar, the Indy 500, which used to be part of the Formula 1 championship. Tell us how is Formula 1 similar and how is it different from these more traditional and more well-known American car sporting events.

Lily Herman: Yes, so F1 got its start first and foremost in Europe. As you were saying, it has a history going back almost 100 years. It's actually a little bit longer but formally got going in 1950. It is open-wheel racing, so in contrast, you have stock cars in something like NASCAR versus open-wheel in things like IndyCar or Formula 1. Formula 1 is particularly interesting because you have only 10 teams, only 20 drivers. It's a bit of a kerfuffle every time someone new wants to join the grid, so it doesn't happen often. There's a lot going on in the sport with that right now.

It really is as much an engineering competition as it is a race in competition. You have two different championships every year. You have the constructors, which is between the teams who's built the best machine within the parameters that are set. Then you have these 20 drivers all competing for the World Drivers Championship. That's more typically I think what, especially as Americans, we think of who's winning and we think of that sort of thing.

There's a lot of really interesting complexity with Formula 1 despite this very simple setup. The drivers, for instance, get points if they get anywhere in first through 10th place. You have teams that are, just because you're not winning a championship, there's a lot of money at stake if you get let's say fifth place overall versus sixth place or seventh place. You've got a lot of, I'd say, drama in terms of anywhere on the grid that you're looking. That's I think one of the things a lot of people really like about it.

Alison: Now, Maria, how did you get into the sport?

Maria Sherman: Personally, I was living in Germany in the early 2000s when Michael Schumacher was winning his fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh world champion. In my childhood memory, I remember seeing the cutout of him in his red Ferrari race suit, who's like the Michael Jordan of my childhood in Germany. It was more of a nascent interest, so I dropped it. I thought of it as more of something geared to my brother's interest and my father's interest until Netflix's Drive to survive came to be. I started watching it during the pandemic, like so many of us, the first season coming out in 2019, of course, and I was deeply obsessed. I scratched an itch of childhood nostalgia for me, but also just a curiosity about this kind of athleticism, and really drove home a dramatization of the personalities behind these athletes.

My work in music fandom, I find that people typically like people more so than maybe what their actual talent is. This was an opportunity to engage with that. Especially, on an international arena, it just felt very luxurious and exotic in that way.

Alison: Lily, what keeps you engaged when it comes to F1?

Lily Herman: A big question. Yes, I love everything about it. I think that there's so much to love about the racing and the engineering, which I think drives a lot of people to the sport. Also, you have a lot of really fascinating cultural elements, that is the fashion. This race weekend we have Zhou Guanyu who showed up in quite the artistic-looking fit of the weekend that everyone's talking about. Same with Lewis Hamilton, who's one of the greats of the sport. I know that there's burgeoning interest in a real cast of characters outside of the drivers and team principles that are really fun to follow. Just infinite number of things you can love and really obsess over when it comes to Formula 1.

Alison: That comes back to your point about it's the personalities as well as the excitement of the event.

Maria Sherman: Right, and then beyond that, there are just so many elements that make Formula 1 compelling. I can't underscore the international aspect of it because I found that across entertainment mediums and in sports focus on global entertainment has become prevalent in this country. I believe the World Cup numbers were even up last time in the US were just more-- I think of something like Squid Game or like K-Pop or Land Pop sort of across the board, people are interested in international phenomenons even if maybe they're not inherently interested in sports, but they find their way into Formula 1 through one of those other avenues.

I think it's this awesome co-viewing experience, which is something that Netflix does really well, which is find something that, regardless of age and demographic you can be invested in. If you have a sports person in your life, they'll sit down and watch it, and then maybe they'll watch the Grand Prix if you have the sort of reality TV fan. In the article I wrote for The Cut, there was this one quote that I've heard a couple of times and I believe Lily shared it with me too separately when I was interviewing her, that Drive to Survive feels like The Real Housewives of Formula 1 so that there is something to those interpersonal rivalries that just feels so much larger than life. As Lily was saying just automotively, this is the pinnacle of engineering and innovation, and if you're curious about that at all and how couldn't you be? Going 300 kilometers an hour is still mind-boggling to me while being on the ground. There's lots of love.

Alison: Let's take some calls. Line six, let's talk to Justin. Hi, Justin.

Justin: Hey, how are you doing? I came to Formula 1 through Drive to Survive. I've been doing sim racing things for a couple of years and then I saw that there's this TV show dedicated to this motorsport that I knew nothing about. Then I saw that they were featuring Lewis Hamilton that season, but then I thought, "Oh my God, this is this Black driver. He's the greatest of all time. He's incredible." I started following all the things that he was doing around racial justice and social justice and he's an incredible racer. I couldn't shut up about him to the point where my wife bought me a piece of carbon fiber from one of his cars that is now hanging on my wall in a place of honor.

I'm super psyched about Formula 1. Can't wait to see Lewis get that eighth championship, watch all the seasons of Drive to Survive and I've got my paid streaming subscription to F1 for this season too.

Alison: Justin, she's a keeper. That's all I've got to say. Thanks for calling in. Jeff is in Park Slope. Hi, Jeff, thanks for calling All Of It.

Jeff: Hey, thank you for having this segment. You have made my months. I've been a fan of Formula 1 since I was a kid in the 70s, so I'm an old-school and a fan, and I'm a car guy and I went to school for mechanical engineering. I never wound up doing it, but hoping I become a race engineer. This is my sport and it was tough. I loved that Netflix has promoted it and opened it up to a bigger US audience because, boy, was it lonely for 40 years of fandom and having no one understand what those two letters together meant. Literally, parties, bars, no one knew what was up, and why the hell are you getting up at four o'clock in the morning to watch practice? Yes, although I do want to say something about The Real Housewives comment, real hardcore fans have a little bit of an issue with some of the fake drama that they've built up. It's entertainment and they have to make it appeal to a broader audience. Hey, look, I don't want to share, I don't want to keep it to myself. When you've got teams that have 900 members trying to get a car across the finish line, like, engineers, mechanics, and people on the back end, it's just a wonderful sport and I'm glad that people are learning about it.

Alison: Thanks for calling in. Let's talk to Andrew from Greenpoint. Hi, Andrew. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Andrew: Hi, Alison. Thank you for having me. I started following Formula 1 in 2017. When you watch it on tv, they focus on the bigger teams, the Mercedes, the Red Bulls. Once Drive to Survive came out, I think it really helped me understand the differences in the ways of a lot of the bigger teams and the smaller teams, in particular the first season, they featured Haas a lot. They become the lovable losers in my household. Whenever one of the drivers on the team gets points, we get a little excited over here. Over the years, I've been to two Grand Prix at the US Grand Prix in Austin. I went in 2019-

Alison: Cool.

Andrew: -and in 2021. Seeing those cars actually go by you at 180, 200 miles an hour is a huge difference than watching it on tv.

Alison: I'm sure. Thank you so much for calling. We are talking about Formula 1 with Maria Sherman. She is the author of a piece, The Fangirlification of Formula 1, and as we found out long-time follower, and Lily Herman, author of the Newsletter, Engine Failure and the podcast Choosing Sides: F1. Lilly, I'm going to ask you, for people who are listening to this and saying, I'm not sure I understand the team names, like Red Bull, Mercedes, what is actually happening as they're going 300 miles an hour around the track? Could you lay out the basic rules for us and how the teams are formed?

Lily Herman: Every team has its own path to becoming a Formula 1 team. It would take me a while to explain for every single team but basically a lot of teams, you obviously have to raise a ton of money. You have to have the right connections. There's a lot of politics involved and politicking as to who gets to be on the grid, who the sponsors are and it also within F1 really matters, for instance, not just who's the team name, but who's going to be your title sponsor, who is going to supply you engines. You'll hear about Ferrari engines versus Honda engines, all these different, you hear about power units a lot.

You do have a lot of times where sometimes a lot of times teams will actually buy an existing Formula 1 team and just rebrand it, maybe give it some new cosmetic changes. In other cases, they're overhauling. That's the easiest way to go. It's much rarer to hear of teams building up from scratch, just because that is hundreds of millions of dollars just to get that going, let alone paying people, keeping things going over the years, et cetera. Typically, you're hearing the team name is typically the main person who's running the team whether it be Red Bull. You'll often hear they'll have some other title sponsor attached to it. Haas, as someone mentioned, for instance, has MoneyGram this year as a sponsor, so you're hearing a lot of Haas MoneyGram is how the drivers have to discuss the team as time goes on.

Alison: Maria, I'm curious, in your reporting on this story, do people root for teams or do they root for drivers? What seems to be the attraction?

Maria Sherman: I think what I really love about Formula 1 is it's all across the board. You can enjoy it in any way you want. Even the person who called in and said he did like The Real Housewives quote, I love that. There is many different ways to be a fan of Formula 1. Baby, I was about to make some hasty generalizations about gender, which it will not do. I found that there are some people who will root for a team specifically, and then when they learn about a driver's backstory or perhaps they were a fan of his father who was also a driver, there's a lot of legacy in this sport, maybe that's who they follow. I don't know. Lilly, what do you think? I think it's across the board.

Lily Herman: As you were saying, I love that people can identify with the sport in different ways. I'm, for instance, a little more team agnostic, but tend to have a couple drivers in particular that I'll hype up. I've found a way to, I think, like or at least admire or empathize with almost every driver on the grid for the most part at this point. I think that that's the other great thing is a lot of people in F1 follow storylines a lot of times more than just simply a team or a driver or in addition to, I should say.

Maria Sherman: But everybody loves Ferrari, right?

Alison: Let's talk to Siva in Manhattan. Hi, Siva. Thanks for calling in.

Siva: Absolutely. It's weird to call you in the middle of lunch because I listen to you all the time.

Alison: [laughs] Tell us about your association with Formula 1.

Siva: I work for a company in Barcelona called Bold. We specialize in composite structures and our founders come from F1. We work with I think two teams now on building out the composite parts during the season.

Alison: Did you know of F1 before you began this work?

Siva: Yes. I was a child in a small town in India and I thought I could will my way into F1. I used to race around the little go-kart, saving up on pocket money until I realized I certainly don't have the money if not the talent. I've been following F1 since I was, I think 14. Every practice, every race. Before F1 had its subscription, I used to stay away from the news for three days until I read copy was available of F1 so that I can download it and watch it. My wife would joke, if the world ended, you wouldn't really know until you finished watching your F1 race.

[laughter]

Alison: Siva, thank you so much for calling in. Thanks for listening every day. Let's talk to Tracy calling in from Brooklyn. Hi Tracy. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Tracy: Hi. I haven't watched Formula 1, but I would. I love speed. If there was a women's team or two women's teams and electric cars. Electric cars are very fast.

Alison: All right, Tracy. Thanks for calling in. Electric cars, can you share with us anything about that, Lily?

Lily Herman: Yes. There's actually a separate car series called Formula E that does electric car racing. Interestingly has some former F1 drivers who are in it who also won it and has also become an interesting path for a lot of people coming up through those junior formula ranks who don't quite make it to Formula 1. I will say, within F1, they have said that they will never go electric though they claim they're trying to be more sustainable and environmentally conscious.

Alison: Maria, I want to ask you about the series, Drive to Survive. We've been referencing it. It premiered in 2019, as you said. A lot of people watched during the pandemic. When you describe this series to someone, how do you describe it as someone who writes about popular culture? Do you think it's a docu-series? Is it a reality show? What do you think?

Maria Sherman: A hybrid. I think the most successful docu-series are typically with the amount of programming I watch about like cults or whatever. It's obviously not the same thing and maybe it's a false equivalency, but there obviously is heightened drama. I think what's beautiful about Drive to Survive is if it inspires real fandom in you and you start watching the Grand Prix on race weekends and watching with friends going to the sports bar. There are many bars in New York now that will show it in the middle of the night which is wonderful. It becomes more of an active fandom. I totally lost my train of thought. I'm so sorry.

Alison: That's okay. You know what, I'll play a little bit of the fifth season trailer.

Maria Sherman: Thank you very much. [laughs]

Alison: You can pull it together. It's fun. I know you will. This is a short clip of the trailer for the latest season, which premiered in February. The trailer features audio and footage of various F1 drivers and figures. This is from Drive to Survive.

[Strailer starts]

Driver 1: This season, Formula 1 has changed beyond recognition.

Driver 2: The points go back to zero.

Driver 3: It has to be the comeback.

Driver 4: We are competitive, a feeling I've never had before.

Driver 5: I am confident. I know how much work we've done.

Driver 6: This is not going in Drive to Survive.

Driver 7: The high you rise, the sharper the knives. The best way to become unpopular is to win.

Driver 4: I'm going to come after you.

Driver 7: And you start to see cracks.

[Trailer stops]

Alison: It is dramatic. Maria, Drive to Survive is produced by Netflix in partnership with Liberty Media, which owns Formula 1. I'm going to say that again. Drive to Survive, produced by Netflix and partnership with Liberty Media which owns Formula 1. What does this make this? Does this make this a really good long commercial? Does this make this some sports propaganda, sponsored content? What is this?

Maria Sherman: I think all of the above and then also still a very good docu-series. What I was going to say earlier is if you get in through Drive to Survive and then maybe you participate more actively in Formula 1 fandom and then you go back and watch a new season of Drive to Survive, it might seem too dramatic for you. At least that's the experience I've had and I've seen with a lot of friends who've gone into it now where they're like, "That's not exactly how it went down." I remember that instance in Monaco or whatever the situation was. Which I think speaks to what you were alluding to because maybe it is more of a commercial for the sport. Whatever the case, it really works, and it really plays into what Americans like in their documentary reality television programming.

I think it also does a really good job of illustrating the low barrier of entry to get into the sport. Like what Lily was saying about it only having 20 drivers, I can remember 20 names, or I can try my best to. I don't know if I could do that with something like the NFL, and also, it's more of a motorsports gallon, and it's a different phenomenon in terms of the sport.

Alison: We are going to continue this conversation about Formula 1. If you are a recent Formula 1 convert or maybe you're a lifelong fan, we want to hear from you. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. We'll have more with Maria and Lily. We will check in with the hosts of the web show P1 with Matt and Tommy, after the break.

[music]

You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. So far, we've been focusing on the American Fandom of F1, but there's long been a strong F1 base in other parts of the world. Right now I want to bring in a couple of Brits, who are F1 mega fans and analysts and hosts of a web show called P1 with Matt and Tommy, Matt Gallagher. Hey, Matt.

Matt Gallagher: Hello. Hi. Thanks for having me on.

Alison: Of course, and Tom Bellingham. Hi, Tom.

Tom Bellingham: Hi. Thanks for having us on.

Alison: Matt, for an American audience, how would you describe the place of F1 within British culture?

Matt Gallagher: Oh, that's a good question. I think that we very much take it incredibly seriously, I would say, of course with the likes of Lewis Hamilton being the greatest of all time statistically. It's very much taken over the British culture. I think that we see a lot of fans, a lot of viewers listening to our stuff on P1, and they're very passionate. I feel as though the American audience are also getting that way as well, which is great to see. To see Formula 1 grow at the rate that it has because I've watched it since about 1996, to now see where it is today, in all countries is just completely crazy to me.

Alison: Tom, how can you tell an F1 fan from another sports fan? What's unique about F1 fans?

Tom Bellingham: Oh, that's a good question. Like Matt said, extremely passionate I think. Formula 1 fans, they know the sport inside out, and it is very much. I think, one thing I've found with Formula 1 is people are a fan of the sport first, a lot of other sports, you maybe have a team that you support, and you still do get that in Formula 1, but I think people that like Formula 1, they just want to see a great race, great drama, while they do have the teams that they support, not necessarily it's all about that team, you just want to see great action overtakes drama, and all that side of it as well.

Alison: We're going to get more deeply into our next segment, but this year, the US will be hosting three separate races out of 23 races, more than any other country. Matt, how are you feeling about that?

Matt Gallagher: That's brilliant. I love the fact that-

Alison: Good answer.

Matt Gallagher: -America is opening their arms to Formula 1. I, personally, I've been to Miami and Austin, very luckily, hopefully maybe Vegas this year. The experience I've had in both of those Grand Prix was amazing. It was really such a vibe. As well, Austin is a brilliant track. Miami has its own special hook to it as well. Vegas, only time will tell, I think it's going to be again a big spectacle. Will it challenge the likes of Monaco as the biggest street race of the year? We'll see, but I love it. I reckon there's going to be a couple more that will be added to the calendar over the next few years.

Alison: Tom, what have been some of the exciting stories emerging from this year's race season?

Tom Bellingham: I think the biggest thing this year, we've got Red Bull who seem to have carried on the success, and Max Verstappen being a bit clear of the field. I think the big story has been that Aston Martin have come from nowhere, and we've seen Fernando Alonso hasn't won a World Championship since 2006. A very long time and he's 41 years old. A lot of people thought that he might never be on the podium again or win another race and Aston Martin have come from absolutely nowhere and seem to be this regular podium finisher. It looks like we're seeing the very best again of Fernando Alonso, he definitely feels like the main character this year of the sport.

Alison: The name of the web series is called P1 with Matt and Tommy. Matt Gallagher and Tom Bellingham, thank you so much for joining us. Appreciate it.

Matt Gallagher: No problem. Thank you.

Tom Bellingham: Thank you.

Alison: In studio with me, Maria Sherman, the journalist who wrote the piece, The Fangirlification of Formula 1, and Lily Herman, author of the newsletter Engine Failure and podcast Choosing Sides: F1. We're discussing F1 this hour. Lily, F1 had its largest audience ever in 2022, and most of that growth came from people between the ages of 12 and 34. What do you think is attracting a younger audience?

Lily Herman: Oh, goodness, so much. I think in addition to obviously, Netflix and Drive to Survive, being a place that lots of young people love to watch or consume their media. I think the other thing that Formula 1 has done super well is having a lot of content online, whether that be YouTube videos, whether that be TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, wherever you go, you can easily find the community and the content you want within F1. Obviously, given that young people tend to be a little more well-versed on things like that, it doesn't surprise me in the slightest, especially given my own aptitude for the internet.

[laughter]

That's what drives a lot of younger folks to sport.

Alison: Speaking of younger folks to join us for, my son is obsessed with Formula 1, and he's called in. Hi, Isaac, are you there?

Isaac: Hi, mom.

[laughter]

Yes, I'm here. I'm obsessed with Formula 1. It's probably top two sports for me right now. What interests me so much is the combatting aspects of both the mechanical part of the sport and the driving part of the sport. It's kind of multi-layered in a way. It's not all about, "Oh, who's the best driver?" It's also about who has the best car, which I just find to be incredibly interesting, and so different from many other sports where it's like, "Okay, which has the best players, it's less about the organization of itself."

Alison: Also honey, I often hear the name, Lewis Hamilton come out of your mouth.

Isaac: Oh, yes. Lewis Hamilton, favorite, favorite driver of all time, he's the best. Oh, my gosh, Lewis Hamilton is my favorite.

Alison: Why?

Isaac: He sets such a positive example for young biracial men, just of how to be. He's such a positive person. He's the greatest driver of all time statistically. He's just, I don't know, he's just awesome.

Alison: Isaac, thank you for taking a moment out of your spring break-

[laughter]

-to call into the show. I'll talk to you later.

Isaac: Bye, mama.

Alison: Let's take Stephanie from Brooklyn. Hey, Stephanie. Thanks for calling in.

Stephanie: Hi, how are you?

Alison: Doing great. Tell us your affiliation with F1.

Stephanie: This is an old family history story that we recently uncovered. My son who's nine and a half is very into Formula 1. When we started getting really into watching these documentaries on TV, but also watching live races, my mom reminded me that her brother was a mechanic for Bruce McLaren in the '60s.

Alison: Wow.

Stephanie: I never met my uncle because he, unfortunately, was killed in the Vietnam War, but the last few years of his life were spent with the Bruce McLaren team in the UK. It was just within just diving deep into this history, and what he was doing with the team at that time, and some really nice folks at McLaren have been open with us and welcomed us into that history and putting us in touch with some people that are still living. It's just been an amazing part of Formula 1 history for us, but a very special part of our family history, and it just makes my son love Formula 1 even more. We're all very into it and still watch religiously.

Alison: Stephanie, thank you so much for sharing that story. Really do appreciate it. Let's talk to Naomi. Hi, Naomi from Rockland County. How are you?

Naomi: Hi. I'm well. I have a daughter who was not at all interested in cars beyond learning to drive a stick to take over her uncle's Miata, but she married a car guy and got into autocross. After they got married, they waited almost a year to take their honeymoon so that they could go to Monaco for the Grand Prix.

Alison: Naomi, thank you for calling in. Maria, there's a statistic you cited in your piece. Women made up 352,000 viewers per race, a 34% growth from 2021, meaning they made up 28% of the 2022 audience. How do you understand the growth and then the appeal of F1 for women specifically?

Maria Sherman: Yes. This was the source of my thinking for the piece because I found that it was very fascinating that America seemed to care about Formula 1 after coming from this German perspective but also with young women. In talking to Lily, who is seated right next to me, and other female Formula 1 fans, female-identifying Formula 1 fans, excuse me, I found that a lot of it comes from Drive To Survive, a lot of it comes from the fact that teams and drivers are more available on social media and online as Lily was talking about earlier. A lot of it is this low barrier of entry of being able to interact with the sport without needing to know all of its history immediately.

A lot of it is the fact that because this is a new sport stateside, I'm speaking specifically for American women, they were able to create their own rituals and behaviors around how they enjoy Formula 1. It's not immediately the maybe intimidating thing of going to a sports bar to watch a football game and interacting with other football fans. In the case of two women who I talk to in the piece who host this podcast called Two Girls 1 Formula, it's creating a brunch menu stylized after the country where the Grand Prix is taking place that weekend and sharing that with their online communities. It was really this beautiful thing of identifying something that they like about the sport and also making it their own and creating their own practices within it, which is just so mind-blowing. It's so cool.

Alison: Let's talk to Lance calling in from Montclair. Hi, Lance. Thanks for calling. Hi, Lance, are you there? Oh, wait a second. Let's try one more time. Is Lance there? Oh, we'll come back to Lance. I was saying that I hear the name Lewis Hamilton a lot. I think a lot of people know about Lewis Hamilton, he's extraordinary. Who are a few other names that people who just want to get into F1 and think like, "Oh, I might want to know a little bit more about this person or that person, who would you say, Lily?

Lily Herman: Oh, goodness. I feel like there's all, they're the people who as you were talking to the P1 guys about the names Max Verstappen will come up a lot because he's the reigning world champion and has always been this prodigious F1 driver. You also have Fernando Alonso, who they also spoke about who has just been in the sport for two decades and is I think one of the most fascinating people probably on the grid just from a longevity standpoint as well as mentally, how do you grind that out for two decades.

I will say I am personally an enormous Valtteri Bottas fan. He was Lewis Hamilton's teammate at Mercedes for five years and left right before the 2022 season. He's more of a little bit of a wild card pick but I tend to love him. He is from Finland and he right now is sporting a mullet and quite the farmer's tan in Australia. You can immediately tell who he is on the grid

Alison: Let's talk to Jacob calling in from East Harlem. Hi, Jacob. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Jacob: Hi. Thank you for putting me on. I'm one of these new fans that you guys are talking about. I started watching Drive To Survive a few years ago. Since then I've been to the Montreal Grand Prix and I'm going back this year. I'm very excited. I was joking with your screener. You were talking about how female fans are also growing tremendously. My wife was told by a friend that the drivers were very good-looking. Then she started watching the show with me and she was attracted to the action more than the drivers obviously because it is an exciting sport. Now we're both into it.

Alison: Sounds great.

Jacob: Also, I love that you had Matt and Tommy on. I love them. P1 is a great podcast.

Alison: Thanks for calling in. Let's talk to Kevin from Woodbridge, New Jersey. Hey, Kevin, thanks for calling All Of It.

Kevin: How are you today?

Alison: Doing well, sir.

Kevin: Good. Really quick. I'm a huge fan. 58 years old been into F1 for-- Gosh, probably 10 years I've been to open wheel school, Skip Barber School. I've taken race car driving lessons and I watch practice as well as qualifying in the race every week when they're racing. The point that I wanted to make, I wanted to build on what Isaac said. He said that it's a multi-layer appeal being the mechanics of the car as well as the skills of the driver but there's also one more layer I want to add to that and that's the strategy. That's when my wife actually really got into F1 when she realized that it's not just cars going fast around a track and making turns, it's a lot of strategy from the crew, from the pit area, and the different tires that they used. She'd always ask me what's the difference between medium and hard. Why is that such a big difference and why are there different drivers using different tires? There's just a lot of different strategy and that's just one of them that goes into it as well.

Alison: Kevin, thank you so much for calling in. Before I let y'all go, is there anything that either of you wanted to add about F1 that I haven't asked you so far?

Maria Sherman: Yes, I actually want to build off what that caller was saying, and I meant to mention it earlier. I think the strategy, of course, it also comes into play when you're thinking about individual teams because there are two drivers to each team and you have these two championships. There are situations in which maybe a driver has to play a little defense even and sacrifice his lead a little bit to support the other driver. Those conflicts I think make for one amazing television and amazing athleticism but also the just great drama that we mentioned.

Very quickly I wanted to mention that while we're also talking about Formula 1, it seems like culturally I'm making this argument that we're in a little bit of a motorsports moment. I don't know if there are any big fashion listeners out there but you'll probably notice there are more moto jackets and race suit-inspired boiler suits on runways and music. There's Rosalia's Motomami, the K-pop groups are using car sounds, on NBC there's American Motor. I think we're definitely in a moment that is full on with motorsports and Formula 1 is absolutely a catalyst in that.

Alison: Lily, final word?

Lily Herman: Yes. I think often in especially American sports, there's a tendency to think I need to reach a certain level of knowledge to fully understand it or watch it or whatever. I think what's great about Formula 1 is you can turn it on typically in the mornings if you are stateside, sip your coffee or your tea or your matcha in my case, and just watch the cars drive. You'll immediately get it. I think a lot of stuff will add up and that's always my pitch to everyone. I say watch Drive To Survive for the vibes, maybe consume a little bit of media elsewhere, and then just jump right in. You don't have to wait to a certain point to really get quote-unquote what's going on.

Alison: Lily Herman is the author of the newsletter, Engine Failure, and co-host of the podcast Choosing Sides: F1. Maria Sherman is a journalist. She wrote the piece, The Fangirlification of Formula 1. Thanks to both of you for being with us and taking listeners' calls. Up next we're going to get into the history of F1. Stay with us.

[music]

Alison: You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. We're putting the pedal to the medal now and continue our conversation about Formula 1, a sport with a growing audience in the US but while it's widespread, fans are among Americans, it's a new development. F1 itself is not new to these states. Back in the 1950s, the Indy 500 was an official stop in the Formula 1 championship. Eventually, the US host moved to Watkins Glen, upstate New York. Since 2012, the US Grand Prix has been held in Austin, Texas with 400,000 people attending in 2021.

This year, the Formula 1 calendar features three races in the states, which is more than any other country. First in May will be the Miami Grand Prix. In October, Austin will once again hold the US Grand Prix, and in November, Vegas will host its first-ever Grand Prix in which drivers will race down the Vegas strip. Before then this weekend the drivers are in Melbourne, Australia. Joining us now to talk about the news and the history of the sport, are Magnus Greaves, co-founder, and publisher of F1 Magazine RACEWKND. Nice to meet you, Magnus. Thanks for being with us.

Magnus Greaves: Thanks for having me.

Alison: And Elizabeth Blackstock, senior editor at Jalopnik, author of Racing with Rich Energy: How a Rogue Sponsor Took Formula 1 for a Ride and co-host of the Donut Racing Show podcast. Elizabeth, thanks for making time too.

Elizabeth Blackstock: Thank you so much for having me.

Alison: Magnus at F1 has been around officially for the past, seven decades. What has changed about the sport over time in terms of rules and technology?

Magnus Greaves: I think the rules always change in order to make the cars go faster but also to reflect the wider environment, whether that's developments with automobiles, with types of petrol but then also on the business side. For a long time cigarette ads and sponsorship is what drove the sport in terms of financing but that was banned. Last year there was a lot of crypto companies. Now those are gone. I think there's a lot of developments on the racing side but also on the business side which is something that we take a lot of interest in as well.

Alison: Elizabeth, beyond F1, there's also F2, Formula 3, Formula 4, Formula E. What's the difference between all these competitions?

Elizabeth Blackstock: The Formula tiers that you mentioned, 2, 3, 4, those are the ladder steps up to Formula 1. These are the places that drivers will compete. I think about this as there's the major league baseball, and then you've got the lower tiers. These are the things that the drivers have to progress through in order to move up the ranks. Formula E is its own separate series outside of the Formula 1 ladder, although it is open-wheel, it is the top tier championship for open-wheel racing for electric vehicles.

Alison: Magnus, the Australian Grand Prix is this weekend. Can you give us some context of how big a race this is in the calendar?

Magnus Greaves: Physically, when you're there, the experience is one of the biggest. I had an opportunity to go there in 2016 and they put on such an amazing show. It's in Melbourne, which in itself is an incredible city, and it's just packed with so much entertainment and support races. Usually, or for the last, I don't know how many years, the Australian Grand Prix has been the first race of the season. Now it's coming in third, which for people that have been watching it for a while seems a bit out of sync. It's an exciting race to me because although Red Bull seems to be already running away with it with Max Verstappen, there is a nice tension brewing with his teammate.

I think if you're going to be into Formula 1, you can't just be into who's going to win the race, you have to look a bit closer in how some of the other teams are doing, but also that rivalry between the teammate, so that's fun to watch. As others were saying this resurgence of Fernando Alonzo as the oldest driver on the grid, but also in Aston Martin, a team that was struggling and now coming through. There's a lot of great storylines with the drivers and some of the competitions within the teams themselves.

Alison: Elizabeth, what are you going to be watching for in the Australian Grand Prix?

Elizabeth Blackstock: I'm definitely going to be keeping an eye on the Red Bull drama as we're seeing it unfold. I think the beautiful thing about Formula 1 is that there are so many entry points to this series. If you're interested in tech, perfect, you've got the cars. If you're interested in the mind games and the drama, there's more than plenty of that. The Red Bull drivers got into quite a little spat last year. Max Verstappen was en route to win the championship and was not at all willing to help his teammate take second place, so it was quite interesting to watch that play out and that tension has built up a little bit more as we've gotten into this season while everything's still at play, we've still got plenty of opportunities for either driver to take the championship.

Alison: Magnus, I want to follow up on something you said. Red Bull is currently top of the standings. They're also the current world title holders. How do you understand their success?

Magnus Greaves: Well, having had a chance to visit their factory, you can see the passion, the money, the commitment. It's pretty cool to see an independent team, it wasn't a manufacturer-based team coming to the sport, and just get somebody like Adrian Newey who's an absolute legend in terms of designing race-winning cars. I think the mentality, the ethos of the team is just one about doing everything to win. They obviously had a period of dominance a few years ago when Sebastian Vettel won four championships in a row, which at one point that got a little bit boring, seeing Red Bull be so dominant, but this is where the whole inter-team rivalry comes in. Sebastian Vettel was battling it out with his teammate, Mark Webber, and the tension was so high and they're both in the fastest car, and both of them wanted to be champions.

I think a lot of us are hoping that something like that emerges this year with Max and Checo. Just a spectacular team, and the boss, Christian Horner is a real character as well, which people have gotten to know from the Netflix series. Just a great team to have out in the front right now.

Alison: Let's take a call. Alyssa is calling in from Bergen County. Hi, Alyssa, thanks for calling All Of It.

Alyssa: Hi. I'm up there in age and I come from a car family, and particularly English, British, German cars, and so my older brother had one of the first MGs, I think, in the United States. I went to school in France in my teens, and so I was introduced to Le Mans, and Monaco, and the Grand Prixs, and came back. When I came back and I started dating, I dated a lot of guys with racing cars. I guess, I like speed and I liked really good drivers.

[laughter]

I came from a family of people who were exceptional drivers. Then I spent a good deal of time going to races here up in Watkins Glen and at Pennsylvania racetrack, and I even dated a guy who was starting to race and had a Lotus.

Alison: Oh my gosh.

Alyssa: I remember once packing brake drums with him, and then we went upstairs and he had this record that he played and it had all of the sounds of all of the racing motors. He would say, "Oh, that's a Mercedes." [laughs]

Alison: Alyssa, you have good stories. My goodness, we went on a journey there with Alyssa. Thank you so much for calling in. Elizabeth, what does it mean to have a good team in [crosstalk]?

Elizabeth Blackstock: A good team, there's a lot of different factors that are going to come into play. You need to have a great designer, first and foremost. The person who's going to build a car that is fast, and that is reliable, and that the driver is actually get along with. It can be really difficult to have a driver who just doesn't mesh with the car. You want to have the ability to have conversation. You don't want to be at each other's throats quite as much as perhaps the Red Bull team sometimes gets because ultimately you're working together and you're working to score the most points and you want to make sure that your team principal is also on your side.

There's so much butting heads that can go on. You really want to make sure that you are maintaining everyone's good graces so that when you get to the race track, you've got the best car or the best car you can possibly get, and that you are getting the absolute top tier of the strategy.

Alison: Magnus, the US will host races in three cities, Miami, Austin, and Vegas. How many countries have ever hosted three races in the same year, and why is the US getting to?

Magnus Greaves: Well, this has never happened before. This is why I think this sport has really changed. You asked how it's changed over time, I think the girl fanification of F1, we love that, but also the American fans. American fans experience sports in a different way, and Formula 1 is starting to see that. The demand just is what has brought three races into the United States. Each one of them is really massive in terms of attendance, but it's going to have a very different flavor at each of them. I think Austin just expands every single year and accommodates all types of fans. Miami was obviously very over the top, very expensive, but quite a cool situation.

We're working really closely at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, and I think that's just going to set a whole new standard in terms of the spectacle, both on the track and then what happens away from the track. One of the things that people find when they go to certain F1 races is that the city and the activity is far away from the circuit itself. In Las Vegas, they're literally driving down the strip, and it's going to be a night race, so you're 30 seconds away from the nightclubs and everything else, and so I think that's going to be a whole different level of Grand Prix experience for people.

Alison: Elizabeth, I feel like I--

Elizabeth Blackstock: Magnus, I do quickly want to note, there actually was three races in America in 1982, but it just all fell apart after that then.

Magnus Greaves: Okay. Well, there you go. I was setting you up.

Elizabeth Blackstock: Got you. [laughts]

Alison: In our last minute, Elizabeth, I do want to ask about, are there any ethical issues surrounding F1? We saw we have issues with NFL and with FIFA. Are there any ethical issues people should be aware of?

Elizabeth Blackstock: There are plenty. We have a lot of issues still with women in Motorsport with how they're treated, especially in more European-based series like Formula 1. It's very rare to see women competing or being treated equally in the paddock. We're also seeing a massive influx of countries spending a lot of money in Formula 1 to wipe out their long histories of civil rights issues and human rights issues. Specifically, Saudi Arabia currently is spending more money than I think any other country in the history of the sport has in order to host the race at the start of the season and also to be the title sponsor for plenty of races throughout the season.

These are things that we're seeing a lot with Saudi Arabia and other sports, including golf, and boxing, and other things, so Formula 1's not immune. We have our own issues here as well and it is worth keeping a critical eye on those.

Alison: Magnus Greaves is the co-founder and publisher of RACEWKND, and Elizabeth Blackstock, a senior editor at Jalopnik and author of Racing with Rich Energy: How a Rogue Sponsor Took Formula 1 for a Ride, and co-host of the Donut Racing Show podcast. Thank you both for your time and your expertise today.

Magnus Greaves: Thank you.

Elizabeth Blackstock: Thank you.

Alison: That is All Of It for today. On tomorrow's show, we'll play selections from this month's Get Lit event from the New York Public Library. I spoke with writer, Rebecca Makkai about her novel, I Have Some Questions for You. We'll hear some of that conversation along with questions from the audience and some gorgeous music from special guest, Dar Williams. I'm Alison Stewart. I appreciate you listening, and I appreciate you. I will meet you back here tomorrow.

[music]

 

Copyright © 2023 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.