Back At Base S3: 4. Flying High

Pibisi podcast ei se pohsi puhsi kun äänsä, että itse on ykk. Kuten ajan liittymä turvallisellaan, että itse lauksella. Puhuu, ei te tulis käymään. Ei, te mä koodaan! Atoppaa DNA-alta tulis ole postia. Siskana on monia. Eikä mitään nää? Ja siis näyttää mulle Närhemmonat. Niin voi kulta pieni kuin DNA on uusiin liittymiin kuluturvallinen nettiselaus. Se ei sitä ihmisiä menemestä se mulla jossiustoille. Kirottua DNA! DNA huoleton on uuden ajan liittymä turvallisellaan, että itse lauksella. Hi everyone, Kinne here. Just sat on the plane for, I don't even know how many times I sat this year. But going off to Mexico, I'm not supposed to sleep during the flight, but I don't want to stay awake. So I'm just going to sleep even if Serge doesn't like. Then we might probably play a bit of chess. Gonna try to beat him. Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli is on board with his trainer and performance coach Sergei Avila. And they're facing a familiar dilemma, trying to pass the time on a long haul flight. But if you want to fly high in F1, then first you have to be prepared to spend a lot of time in the air. Yeah, just another flight. Go use to that now. You can watch a lot of movies. You can sleep. You can get as much food as you want. Sometimes if the menu's good, I take some cheeky sandwiches, some little burgers, even though Serge doesn't want to, but I try to do it when he's distracted or when he's sleeping. Oh, and yeah, when he's sleeping, I always take picture of him. I have a full collection of all the flights we took together this year. Picture of him sleeping with a mouth open, and his nerds, glasses excited. And see you next time. I'm Rosemann Pike, and in this series, we've been given a first-class ticket to join Mercedes-Style, Kinney and Taneli, and British has High Flyer Olli Berman as their rookie F1 seasons take off. And we're on the ground with the Cadillac Formula One team as they ramp up their 2026 preparations. The cars haven't been built yet, but they found a surprising way to take on their rivals in a real Grand Prix. And great lights, go. F1 journalists Sarah Holt and Broadcaster Holly Samus are our intrepid guides. Why are there so many people here? Tell us what's going on. With a VIP pass to the team's factories and driver life on the road. Is there a little bond between the rookies? And George Russell, a race winner for Mercedes in 2025, gives his verdict on the next generation of F1 stars. Certainly, you're no longer just a racing driver. You're like an ambassador. The cars are unbelievably complicated, and it's my job to worry about all of it. I think it's easy to become complacent when the results are coming. When the cars are on track, the headaches and all of the troubles go away as soon as the radio is on. Every driver wants to be their teammate, and that's how it should be. It's going to be, I think, the biggest step this sport has ever seen. This is F1 Backup Base, a new era. Episode 4. Flying high. Formula 1 is no place for the faint hearted. It's a lesson fast-being learned by Hass Rookie Olli-Bermann. It's round 19 of 24 in Austin, Texas, and as the sport moves west, the stars are coming out at the circuit of the Americas. Looming over Bermann is the threat of a race ban. The slightest split-second mistake could see him sideline, not that you would know as the 20-year-old shows country music star Kane Brown around the team's garage. How you doing, man? How you doing, man? Good, good. The crazy thing about getting in the F1 car is you start like six times your body weight? I saw the force. It was like five and a half. It's got to take a deep breath. Yeah, that's wild. In the back of his mind, he knows he must navigate the next two races without major incident. In the U.S. Grand Prix, it's a case of job done as Olli-Begs two more championship points. Olli-Bermann, back to back points scores, Singapore, ninth, Austin, Texas, ninth. The next hurdle comes in Mexico City. The race is the highest in F1 at over 2000 meters above sea level and one of the most physically demanding of the calendar. From 10th on the grid, Berman climbed to a career high with Hass as he went wheel-to-wheel with title challenges Max Verstappen and Oscar Piestry. Olli-Bermann in the house down the inside of Verstappen what a move from Berman with a career best result. It is rookie air, Berman takes more. The emotional celebrations were started by his dad David before he'd even left the car. If dad's here, he's on the top. Not again. Hurry up, dad, I gotta get out the car. Oh, sorry. What am I? Before reaching a crescendo with his ecstatic crew in the house garage. And the house hero also took time to reflect on the landmark moment in his F1 career. So guys, we just finished P4 here in Mexico. I can't believe I'm saying that, but I'm so proud of the team. We had one of the fastest bit stops over this season there in probably the highest pressure moment we've had all year. So, you know, everyone really did an excellent job. I'm so proud of them. That's our joint best result for this team. For a moment it was looking like a podium. Didn't quite materialize, but that gives us all huge motivation, you know, two cars in the points. I'm really proud of everyone. Now we're going to take a big photo to commemorate the occasion and yeah, a big cloud on the back to everyone in the team. In the drivers' championship, the British star is well-a-heard of fellow Newcombe Gabriel Bautiletto, but remains behind RB's Isac Haja and Kimi Antonelli. But the ties between the four rookies go beyond mere race results as Oli explained to Sarah from his Monika apartment. Do you all keep in touch and sort of compare notes? I would say closer than with the other guys who have been there for a while just because we've known each other for longer. I've known Isac and Gabi and Kimi for the past two or three years and we've always been racing against each other. So we have a good relationship. We're always congratulating each other on whoever has good results and a good result in a Mercedes or a V-carb is a bit different to a good result in a hassle or a solver. But still, I think we recognize what we're doing when it's good and congratulating each other and keeping in touch as well. Because often we're having the same experiences, making the same mistakes because we're all in the same boat really. Do you have your little, the WhatsApp group? I know there's a general drunk Ivers one isn't there but how do you communicate with Kimi and Isac and Gabi? It's mainly in person really. With Gabi we're a bit closer because he literally lives just over there. So we see each other quite a lot. But with the others, you know, we do get a bit of time of the track in press conferences or on the drivers' parade. That's a good 30 minutes where you can kind of talk to each other uninterrupted and just catch up, which is always a really nice thing. Bam and May have a neighbour in Bortoletto, but for all of last year the man next door to him in a racing garage was Kimi and Tinelli. The two paired together at Formula 2's Prema Racing, extending a friendship that goes back to 2021 and their days battling it out in Formula 4. With both now in the elite tier of motorsport, we brought the pair together for an off track reunion and right from the start the pair were in a playful mood. Hi everyone, I'm Olli Berman. And I'm Kimi and Tinelli. And today we're going to be interviewing ourselves. What was the toughest thing to adjust to in F1? The least like you expected. Probably I would say the extra media that we're doing. Back in F2 we would arrive on Thursday and just talk to the engineers all day. It would be really boring Thursday. And now we don't speak to the engineers on Thursday because we're basically doing media all the day. We did from one extreme to the other. I don't know what I prefer, but that was something that I was not expecting in F1. No, definitely. It takes a lot of energy as well, out of the soul, just to like watch out. Best sleep of the weekend is on Thursday night. Yeah, exactly. Who would you say is the most competitive out of us all on and off the grid? With the most, I think we're all super competitive. I'm very competitive. Also off track, I was just playing chess with my coach on the plane. He's quite good at it and he beat me like five times in a row. So after the last time I lost, I just. Let the ball. I threw a fist on the ball and I broke it enough on the plane. So that's competitive. It wasn't super happy about it. But yeah, I think we're very competitive all of us. What would you be if you weren't an F1 driver and what do you do most love about racing? I think if I wasn't driving I would probably still do something about racing, maybe engineer. I would feel sorry for my driver if I was engineering. I would probably help my dad with the team. When did you first meet me and what was your first impression? I don't like that one. Back in 2021, F4 on the podium. On the podium. In Monza. I remember that race. He was doing a different track than the rest of us. You are much taller than me back then. Yeah. I remember standing. Not much taller than me. That was so much shorter than him. I remember looking at him in the podium. But he was a baby. I was just coming back. I was just coming from Cardiff. No, but to be honest, we got to know more each other in the next two. It was a fun year. We had a good time. Did you always want to be a former one driver? Easy question. Of course. Since the very beginning, I was cutting and like all of us here fell in love with the speed, with the adrenaline, with the feeling. Since the beginning, I wanted to be an F1 driver and very happy to be here. Yeah, likewise. Nothing to add. It's the easiest question of the whole day. This is a good one. On the drivers parade. Who do you like to talk to? And who do you like to avoid? Tell me. Am I allowed to say this? Yeah. It's not that I like to avoid. People I talk to, well, recently I've been talking a lot to lose. Mainly pre-driort parade with masks. But yeah. Mainly like when I'm on the truck, I will lose. And you? Oh, the question was for him. Hi, hi, hi, hi, hi. What is something you want to see in your future and mine? Together, whatever romantic. What should we do together? Fighting together for the World Championship. Agree. This is not the future we were promised. Like hell that out for a tagline for the show. From the BBC, this is the interface, the show that explores how tech is rewiring your week and your world. This isn't about quarterly earnings or about tech reviews. It's about what technology is actually doing to your work and your politics, your everyday life. And all the bizarre ways people are using the internet. We are going into the Cadillac factory. The other 10 teams are in Brazil. They have a sprint race coming up. But at Cadillac, they are going to be doing a sprint race simulation exercise. So I'm really intrigued how that is going to work out. The team may not have cars to race, but the sense of anticipation is real. Rose of desks are filled with engineers, headphones on, in front of monitors rolling with data and the live track action from Brazil. A similar scene is being played out at the team's transatlantic base in Charlotte, North Carolina, where a live stream of the team's driver simulator is also being beamed back to the UK. The team is gathered together with one aim in mind to replicate a race weekend. Cadillac won't hit the grid for real until March 2026, but it's crucial they iron out any gremlins now. To keep them fueled, there's a giant bag of Yorkshire teabags and a cotton-of-ice doughnuts. And with a copper-in-hand, Holly also found head of performance analysis, James Napton. Okay, so this is our operations room for Formula One Race Weekend Support. Now, we're not in the 25th Championship, but what we're doing is we're practicing racing as best we can. We haven't got a real race car yet, but we've got a simulator in Charlotte in North Carolina that we're using as the real race car this weekend. We've got a second little static simulator here in Silverstone in another building, and we're doing our very best to do practice everything we can for a race weekend. So the procedures, the talking on the intercoms, the discussions you would have with the FIA, submitting data to the FIA that we have to do to Pirelli, that we have to do all these things as much as we can practice. We're trying to do that. And there's a sprint race that is about to happen in Brazil in just under two and a half hours time. What time did you get here? What time did the rest of the team get here? And what kind of things have you been doing up to this point? So we got in about 10 o'clock today. The paddock opened at 11 o'clock hour time in the UK, so everyone's just setting up, preparing for the day. We've now had briefings about how we're going to operate the sprint race from a strategic point of view. What to do if it's wet? Because the weather's looking a bit variable in Brazil. On top of that, we've got media here this weekend, which adds a little bit of an extra. Thank you. It's another thing that's going to happen in real life that we've got to get used to. It's absolutely fascinating. You're practicing for the real thing. Yeah. You've got two drivers that have signed for the team. They're not in the simulator, are they? Yeah, so the race drivers aren't driving for us this weekend. They have other commitments and things they're doing elsewhere. So we have a pool of simulator drivers who normally drive for us. At the minute this weekend we've got a guy called Alec Udl, who's a Corvette GT driver, part of the GM Motorsport organisation. He's our main race driver, but the point is we're not trying to go fast. The point of this weekend is to get a second set of data rolling through the system. While there's no need to simulate people power, it's not quite so easy to conjure up the nuts and bolts of a race car that doesn't exist yet. But Chief Mechanic Nathan Divey, who will look after the cars at every race weekend in 2026, still has work to do in the virtual world, as he told Sarah. Tell us how it works, because I think what's most fascinating is that your job would be in the garage, wouldn't it? How can you do that virtually without any cars? So we have our simulator running, so that gives you a visual representation of where the car is. When it's on track, when it's in the garage, we have our run plan, as though you would do if you were normally a race weekend. We're responding to that, so the calls are okay, the session starts in five minutes, it's a car ready to go. We would then go through our normal confirmation checks to to confirm to the race engineer that the car is ready to go. Confirm the correct set of tyres are fitted, confirm any other settings that they've asked for, and then once the session starts, we would then run through our run plan, as though we would do in real life. Mateo, ready to check? Loud and clear, Carla. Yours, so thank you. And what about the data? Where's the data coming from? So we have the live data coming from the simulator, which is the trace that you'd normally receive from your car, which you're responding to from the Cadillac point of view, and then we also have all the live timing data coming in from the circuit, which all the teams have available. But how are you going to simulate a race without any competition, without any other cars on the track? We select a car within the race that we then say, okay, that is us within the context of the actual race that's going on. How would you react to the scenarios that are happening around that car? We will react to when that car is, say it's coming into the pit lane, that will then trigger and initiate the calls for the pit crew, as though that is their car coming in for a pit stop in the race. And so who have you chosen to follow in the sprint? Oliver Behrman. Remind me where he's EP15? I think so, yes, yeah. Okay, most people here in this room today are going to be taking all the data from Olly Behrman and his has car, seeing how he does in the race and then reacting to it, you're going to make your own decisions based on what he's doing. Yes, based on how his race is going, what we do if we're in that situation. Now the operation rooms in the UK and the US fall silent as they prepare to go racing. But we can still listen in, as the team have given us action. access to their internal radio communications. OK, we'll tell the Auckland Air Traveler moving to Internagos. As the teams in Brazil warm up on the formation lap for the sprint, the simulator crews run through checks of their own. An engineer gives some final instructions to his driver, Alec Udall, in Charlotte. Now, if you come to a stop, engage neutral and hold the engine RPM at a constant valley, perfect. Thank you very much. Send out who pull away and do a modifier check. And in the UK, its race engineer, Carlo Pasetti's turn, to give the final countdown to stand in driver Matteo Yelichi. Pants, I got stuck off. There's no time to waste in the sprint and the 24 lap race bursts into life. As the engines roar in Brazil, you can still hear a pin drop in Cadillac's operations room. The clicks of computer mice and tapping of keyboards indicate the total focus. And almost immediately, that is put to the test. The house of Oli Berman, which one half of the Cadillac operations is modeling, is spun round on the opening lap. And there's soon more drama to deal with in the team's race rehearsal. Piazzi, in the wall, coming out of turn three to that tanner. He hits the barrier and we've got more cars off. As the red flag flies in São Paulo, it's up to race engineer John Howard to explain to his driver, Alec Udall, what has happened. It looks like Piazzi hit the curb and then got spun off and as he did so, it's a bit water onto the track, which then the next two cars lost control as they drove over. This is the first time Cadillac have faced a red flag during their race simulations. And every nugget of knowledge cleaned now will be tucked away for when they go racing for real in 2026. As they await the restart, there's a chance to practice their own strategy. - It's just talking about tires here. - Medium versus soft, we think this soft is better for the restart compared to the medium. Just question for you, are you happy to try and stick with the soft? - I think it's good information. - Okay. - But just like the 10 teams in Brazil, Cadillac have two cars in the hunt. And at Silverstone, Pissetti is also readying his driver for the restart. - It's going to be a rolling start. Stay with charge button on all the way up to corner 11. At 11, I want you to come out of charge. - Okay, cut it. - Then it's time to go racing again. - Four, three, two, one. Green lights go. - In Charlotte, Udall simulator car rattles and rolls as if it were riding every corner of the interlagos circuit. The data his dummy car generates streams across the computer screens back at Silverstone as the mouse clicks once again intensify. But it's not only the unknowns of real-life racing scenarios the drivers have to contend with. Cadillac are also throwing in a few curveballs of their own. - All right, we need to do a fail. So we need to fail A to A on. Do I need to do it right away? - Yeah, can I? - You can do it on the front straight. Let's fail Alpha 2 Alpha on a firm. We are confirming. Thank you for that. - Then there is one final test from Brazil before the checkered flag falls. And engineer Pesetti is soon on the radio to warn his driver. - And it's going to be yellow flags in corner 14, 15 as well. Watch for Bortoletto here on the wall. That was a big shunt from Bortoletto. - The driver is good, the driver is fine. And then you're taking the checkered flag. - And at the team's operations in Charlotte, engineer Howard brings his race home to. - That was a good run. We've mixed up race P12 for the cars we're following. - Yeah, I think nice job on the tools in the red flag. Car balance is much better for me in the second run. I'm good data to review. - All right, and we'll check Warren's at the Alpha. - Okay. Yeah, nice job guys, thank you. There's no time for the team to kick back and crack open the donuts just yet though. With all the data and experience gathered from the race simulations, the teams on either side of the pond gather for a debrief. - Hit lane, and we stop both cars early onto plan A. And with you, Alec, that meant undercut in the car. - After each of the departments goes through their detailed feedback, it's time for team principal Graham Loudon who has been listening in closely all weekend to give his verdict. I think this exercise has been extremely helpful again. And the big thanks to everyone at Silverstone and everyone in Charlotte. It's actually so realistic listening to it. I'm gonna wish everyone a good flight home. It feels very real. - Back at base, once Holly and Sarah have removed their own headsets, they debrief with executive engineering consultant Pat Simmons. - How did it all go for you? - It was a very good simulation actually, because it's first time we've done a sprint in our simulations. And of course to have a red flag in the middle of it just makes it all that more difficult. And that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to find all these difficulties and how we react to them and checking that we have everything in place to really just act like a proper racing team. And you know, having two cars is not like twice as much work. It seems like 10 times as much work, because there's so much more going on on all the intercom channels and so many things happening. - And the other thing that I noticed during this exercise were there were a few kind of little, I don't know what you could call them, little bombs that were thrown in for the engineers. You know, like, oh, the fuel pressure is through the roof or something particular happened. - Yeah, absolutely. So we're always trying to practice on the worst case scenario. So you're quite right. We had a pretend fuel pressure problem. So we had to get the driver to operate one of the defaults, which actually was one of the few things that went wrong in the whole simulation, because the command to the driver was absolutely correct. All the engineers were good, but he actually did the wrong switch settings. So, you know, it's just another thing that we learned from. In Mexico, we had too much plankware. Here, we got too much breakware. So we artificially put ourselves in these difficult situations, so that we can make sure that when they happen in real life, we know how to react to them. - And tell us about the communication between all of you working here at Silverstone and then the team you've got working remotely in Charlotte, because that is one of the things that is unique about the Cadillac teams, is that you're a truly transatlantic team. - You know, you almost don't realize that you've got people in a different area. You're sitting at your desk, you're talking to someone. They could be in the next row of desks. They could be 3,000 miles away. It really doesn't matter. To me, it's just one team. - These virtual race simulations are the ultimate exercise in team building. The team members even eat lunch and dinner together just as they will at the track. But for race engineer Carlo Pasetti, who will work alongside Sergio Perez in 2026, it's also about rehearsing his physical reactions to navigating a race from the pit wall. - We heard you're not doing the sprint race simulation on the radio. Tell us how it all went for you. - So for me, this type of rehearsal is really important, first of all, because it gives me the impression of being on track. And it's really useful to connect my brain cells and assign to each person their voice, their tone, their pitch. So using the radio is really important for me. And you end up with headache, for sure, because everything is new. Even the faces are new because we're all new here. And that's the difficult bit. I realize when the cars are on track, all of the difficulties, they come away because of the degree of adrenaline that you have to deal with. But that makes your connection and your voice, you know, being a bit faster. So the connection between what you think and what you say is shorter. I don't know how to describe it. And yeah, they extend all of the troubles, go away as soon as the radio is on. - While Cadillac turned to meeting milestones back at base, others are still in hot pursuit of them in Brazil. Interlagos, an unforgiving, unpredictable racetrack, does not give away its secrets at the first time of asking. But Mercedes teenager Kimi Antonelli is thriving on his debut at São Paulo's famous circuit. He's in love with the track and it shows. The 19-year-old aces the sprint race. - Kimi Antonelli gets second to head of his team-mate, George Russell. - And in qualifying, claims another front row start for Sunday's Grand Prix. - What about Kimi Antonelli? Never raced around here before, up to the top second place for Antonelli. (upbeat music) This is a track where championships have been won and lost and won that seems to ignite a fire in the drivers. But on race day, the fierce competition on track nearly takes Antonelli out. - Piazz street to the inside, it's great, it's bold. When it pay off the Piazz street, no, this comes up with Antonelli. Le Clare actually loses his front left arm, disaster for the Ferrari. - Antonelli recovers second place only to find a charging max for Steppen in his mirrors. So we are now defending this position. 16 laps remaining. But the Mercedes-Driver defends well against the World Champion, claiming the best result of his career. Kimmy Antonelli gets his second podium of the season and holds off Max for stappin'. P2 mate. Oh my goodness, that was stressful. Oh my goodness indeed. As he left the circuit, Kimmy hadn't forgotten his journey with this podcast and he sent us a voice note. Although he did have to cling onto his phone amongst a sea of fans. Done here in Brazil. You know, incredible weekend. I think was a weekend of P2's. But I think we maximized the performance and we did everything we could. And yeah, just gotta keep pushing because job is not done. We need to achieve the ultimate goal, which is P2 in the constructor. And on my side, I'll try to make that ultimate step in order to achieve the first win. But now the goal is to keep performing like this, keep delivering from no results. And such a special weekend. I mean, it was really nice. I really enjoyed the whole weekend. The support from the fans has been amazing. So thanks to all of them. And it's been a emotional one. When Mercedes chose an unproven Antonelli to replace seven-time world champion Louis Hamilton, there were murmurs of surprise. But the Italian is fast-proving. He could be the breakout star of his generation. Sarah spoke to the man who set Antonelli on his path to F1. Mercedes driver development advisor, Gwen LaGru. Is it true that you were the person who discovered Kimi when he was cutting? And how old was Kimi when you found him? I wouldn't say I discovered him, but we have a strong network in GoCart. People run me and told me that Gwen, as there is a kid who is showing something different, you should come and see. So I went on a couple of races. And indeed, he was someone apart, a kid that different than others. And that was back in 2017. He was 11 years old at that time. What was it that you saw that was different about Kimi, even at that young age? Well, first of all, I think he was already very mature. He had this natural leadership. You don't see very often. He was not shy at all. He was very enthusiastic. And also for me, what was incredible was his passion for a motor sport and his passion for racing. The way was defunding, the way was preparing a move, his approach, his attitude, et cetera. I mean, he was ticking already so many boxes for such a young kid that I was immediately convinced. He was probably the next big things. I haven't been as impressed by a young driver since Max Verstappen. I would say. What was the process for you to then persuade Mercedes to take Kimi into their junior driver program? And how soon, after you spotted Kimi, did you put in the call? I think I did call Toto when I was on the go-kart track looking at Kimi. And they told him, yeah, we need to sign him. Seven years on, Antonelli has been thrown into the deep end of Formula One with Mercedes. Most rookies get the chance to find their feet at teams lower down the order. But things worked out differently for the kid from Northern Italy. Has he been under more pressure than some of the other rookies in 2025? Of course, for an 18-year old kid becoming Mercedes F1 driver, the pressure was probably higher, but we have also put him in knowing that we were not probably going to fight for the title this year. And it was maybe the best opportunity for us to take a risk by promoting Kimi straight away into our car and not putting him in a smaller team. We had also previously this experience with George, because we had him for three years at Williams. And when he moved to Mercedes, it still took us half a season to get him up to speed. So we knew that if we didn't take the opportunity to promote Kimi in '25, then we wouldn't have him till maybe 27, 28. We took this risk with the clear goal to make him ready for the fight, upfooting in '25, but more surely in '26. It will be down to Antonelli and British racer George Russell to lead the line for Mercedes in F1's new era. Russell has already put the silver arrows on the top step of the podium in 2025. Round the final corner for Russell, who wins the Singapore Grand Prix, his second winner the season. And as Holly found out, he's also enjoying the challenge of pairing up with a new teammate. In 2025, you've been working with one of the sports rookies in Kimi. What has that been like watching his journey? It's been a very different compared to being teammates with Lewis. And it's the first time for me being the oldest driver of the two with him, the team. So a slightly different experience for myself. But Kimi is a great kid and he's a great driver. And of course, he is a rookie. But he's not a rookie in terms of race and experience. He's been racing since the age of seven or eight. So for same as all of us in F1. So he's actually got sort of 10 years of race and experience under his belt. And he knows exactly what he's talking about when it comes to the race car and the setup. So it's been a fresh start for us all. But he's done a great job. What are the differences for the team from working, like you said, with a seven-time world champion in Lewis. And then working with the rookie this year. Every driver has sort of a close group of engineers who work directly with you on a daily basis. And I guess for them, that's been the biggest change because when you are working with somebody new, there's lots of procedures that you have to learn. There's new circuits and new places you've never been to. And his small group of engineers around him will be helping him on that journey. But comparing with somebody whose experience knows exactly what they're walking into. But going into a season like 2026, it's new for everybody. And there's benefits of having past experience. But there's also benefits of having an open mind and no previous experience. So nothing can sway your thought process. So in 2019, you had your rookie year coming into the sport. And you came up from F2 as well. Can you give us an idea of just what it's like coming into F1 for the first time? Well, it's really not linear this progression. You go through a ranks and you'll drive inside the faster cars. And you start when I race in F4, there was one engineer for three cars. And you had one mechanic each. In F2, we had two engineers per car and three mechanics per car. And now in F1, you have 2,500 people. So that process isn't linear. And then in terms of the spot light that is shown on you, Formula 2 is filmed on television. There's a few media and interviews. But suddenly, when you get to F1, you have televisions from 25 different countries around the world. You have Netflix, Philmin, everything you say. You're representing all of these different sponsors that we have on our race suit. And suddenly, you're no longer just a racing driver. You're like an ambassador for the brands, for your co-workers. And that for any young individual is not straightforward. And there's also a bit unnatural. You're 18 years old, and you're co-leading the team with your teammate and the team principal. Do you give Kimmy advice, or is it pure competition? Because obviously you want to beat him. Neither of the two really-- my door is always open. And he's often asked me questions. And I'm very willing to help out. Because every driver wants to beat that teammate. That's no secret. I want to beat him every race. He wants to beat me every race. And that's how it should be. But if I beat him and I finish in fifth place, and he's in sixth place, I don't go home and open the champagne bottle. We're not here to compete for anything less than a world championship. And we need to push one another to get more from the team, more from Mercedes, to give ourselves a chance to fight for a world championship. So you need to work as a team. There are now just three races left for our rookie drivers to show what they can do against the stars already lined up on F1's Elite Grid. Now is not the time to play it safe, even as a world championship battle rages on around them. Formula 1 is about to hit the strip in Las Vegas, a city of high rollers. For one of our rookies, will their high-risk race strategy pay off? Everyone's going to be looking at Antonelli, because that is an interesting choice. Next time on F1 back at base. We debrief with the drivers. It's easy to become complacent when the results are coming like they are at the moment. And the countdown continues for Cadillac. You know, the next time that the lights go out, we'll be on the grid. F1 back at base was created and produced by Holly Sanos and Sarah Holt, and is an IMG production for the BBC. Black hell that out for a tagline for the show. It's about what technology is actually doing to your work and your politics, your everyday life, and all the bizarre ways people are using the internet. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.