Susie Wolff (Managing Director of F1 Academy)

Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome to our expert experts on expert. I'm Dan Chepard. I'm joined by Lily Padman. Hello. We got a fox in today, but her name is Wolf. Oh good. Yeah, Susie. Oh, oh, we love her. She's so incredible. We love her. She's so incredible. Coolest person on earth. Yeah, I felt really lame. I said it. Yeah. Well, I did too. It's hard not to feel lame. She makes me feel lame, but she is also so sweet and nice and kind and inclusive. But her gift is to make you feel lame. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's her gift. Susie is a former professional racing driver and current managing director of F1 Academy. She's also one of I think either the only one or maybe one of two women to ever drive an F1 car on a track on a race weekend. Incredible. And if people remember the total wolf interview that is her husband and he said she's a half second faster no matter what he does when he cheats he uses different tires puts weight in her car. She can't get anywhere closer. She has a new memoir out called driven very appropriate title. Please check that out. Susie Wolf is a blessing on planet earth. Enjoy. You ever fucked with the top of Chico though. This one bites hard. A lot of carbonation. Yeah. It's good. It's very good. And I didn't know they had different. And there's a shortage. This is only gaining value as we sit. No, I feel really bad. I'm taking one. No, you must take it. You must take it. I only had one. I would want you to. That's right. No, it's a whole world sparkling water. Like the size of the bubbles and the volume of the bubbles. The whole thing only has sparkling water because he has this theory that he doesn't need to get up for the toilet in the night. Oh, I'm not convinced. Okay. Yeah. How successful is this? Well, he's still up, right? He's still up. He's still up. He's still up. He's still up. He and I are not the old man. Yeah. I think it's an age thing, but I'm not going to tell him. Yeah, I think you just keep drinking. He's just going to hear it on the pop. I will tell him. I will tell him. But it was so funny because I flew in last night and he's like, "Oh, where are you going?" I said, "Dad, I can say I've been there." Again, I know. He's like, "You're going to really enjoy it." I think you called him while we were interviewed. You did. We have this bypass where we can always reach each other. I know. Which can be embarrassing. No, I adopted it since that interview. I didn't know that was an option, because in general phone just off, right? It's so annoying. Who can break through to you? Toto. That's it. Okay, Jack doesn't have a phone yet. No, he doesn't have a phone yet, but it's a good point because I should put my mum on it because she's on duty this week. But sometimes Jack grabs her phone and he calls me to ask me trivial things like, "Do I really need to have a bath today?" Yeah. Like, yes, Jack. Just do whatever your grandmother says. Oh, my God. He doesn't need a bath. Do they get you? He does. He might be thinking of and there's nothing worse than smelly boys. Yeah. I know. And they need to learn early. They don't want it. Exactly. Hygiene. There's nothing worse than smelly boys. Now I'm paranoid that I smell the one that gave you hugging you. It didn't do very good. But I have girls, so maybe I've been misled because we were bathing them every single night. More is the routine to get them sleepy. And at some point we're like, they're not getting dirty enough to justify your bath. Now it's pretty, you know. No, now they bathe, right? They do, but not every day. We need to get, I think, because we're getting into some hormone tape. Well, yeah, yeah. Now it's probably time to pick up the -- It's time. But I think that comes to realization on their own. Of course. What was standard in Scotland? You were bathing every night? It's no way, right? What happens in Scotland is not really relatable to the rest of your life. Yeah, what's the vibe in Scotland in the 80s as a little person? The vibe was maybe we were discussing recently memories of your birthday parties when you were younger. My memory is my dad bringing in an ATV, like a four-wheel-terrain vehicle home, with a trailer, 9-10 kids on the back of the trailer, hanging on for dear life, and him going through a huge mud pit on this mountain behind the house of a big hill. Wow. And I was going, "Fast down, poor mud!" And then we got home and he just sprayed us all down, having my mom walk there. It was a really outdoorsy life. Yeah. It was, if I look back now, a brilliant, brilliant childhood. None of the pressures of city or expectations, it was just so wholesome. It's a little town on the western edge of Scotland on the water, right? It's a tourist town. Yeah. Well, it was where everyone took the ferry to all of kind of the outer hebrides, so it was more like a hub where people would arrive. Did you say Hebrides? Outer Hebrides. Yeah, what are Hebrides? Outer Hebrides. It's like Island. Oh Island. They're all these islands. I thought it was my accident first. Oh, we just don't know that. Okay. Yeah. Well, the Hebrides are like a whole area of Scotland off the waste coast. Okay. And you took the ferry from Oben. Would there be transient boyfriends? Like a new boy comes into town in the summer. He's with his family. They're on vacation. You fall in love. They have to return home. What kind of girl do you think I am? That there was a fun guy. A one that's driven by his aggressive determined of the kind that could snag any kind of boyfriend she wanted. Not at that age. Not at that age. I was completely uninterested in boys. You were. And my dad, I remember so distinctly when I was younger around the age of 12, and my brother was only 15 months older. And he said something about a girl in his class. And then my dad looked to me and said, you are way too young to have a boyfriend. And I was like, yeah, you're right, I'm way too young to have a boyfriend. And then there was this moment in my childhood that this person will never know when to affect the head. Because one of my dad's good friends who owned a pub. His name was Mario. And he said a throwaway comment to me and I must have been like 13 or 14. He said, you'll be pregnant by the time you're 16 and working in your dad's shop. What? Also, that is a crazy thing to say to a young girl. Maybe he did it is like a reverse engineering. I was like absolutely not. So then it was like stay away from boys. Okay, you have kind of my dream childhood. Not even kind of. You have my total dream childhood. In that your father owned a motorcycle dealership. Let's start with grandpa. It probably starts with your maternal grandfather, yeah, being into motorcycles and whatnot. So my mother's father was works motor cross rider in the 1950s. Wow. Yeah. And he was an English dare devil. Anything he did he was really good at. Did he write trials bikes? Yes. And he was sponsored by BSA? Yes. He was a BSA works rider, which in his day was like, he's a god. But what for, you know, I have to do this for people who don't know that it is. He is one of the like historic motorcycle bikes. Yeah. Okay, great. Okay. And he had a shop also in England that kind of sold the bikes. And when the Japanese bikes started to arrive and kind of took over the market, he realized it wouldn't be a proper sustainable business. They couldn't really compete with the in fluxage. And he didn't adopt selling now. No, because he's a staunch. Yeah, yeah, yeah, nationalist and loyalist. Now his motorcycle shop was in Scotland. No, he moved there to open that. He moved to Scotland to do diving. He was changing completely his career. Diving into water? Yeah, he was a commercial diver. Was he welding underwater? No. No, I think he was more like in the west coast of Scotland. There's a real industry there to go and collect propellers which had fallen off. Okay. Because there were so many boats and fairies and stuff like that. But then I don't really know much about that period because of course he got the bends and became paralyzed. So yeah, he lost the use of his legs, yeah. He had done a dive when he hadn't been feeling well and came up too quickly. And he tells the story of them dragging him onto the boat. Now bearing in mind, it's a super athletic guy, very, very sporty. And he remembers lying and his leg was falling off the edge of the bed. And he said there was a moment where I realized I couldn't bring my leg back up. Oh my god. Yeah. Well, that's how you can do seeing that's when I realized this is not good. So I've only ever known him in a wheelchair. But you shouldn't think that that stopped him. I mean, I never once heard him complaining. He did paragliding as he got older. He opened a car. And so he very much pivoted around. He even had crash landings in his paraglider. Broke his ankle. Poor grandmother. I guess it doesn't matter. But just to add in there, my grandmother never got a carer. Wow. She looked after him all in her own and dedicated herself. Which if I look back now with the perspective I have with age and obviously becoming a wife and a mother. Incredible. Yeah. Really incredible. Wow. So the results of having that risk take gory of a grandfather is that your mother herself was also quite a risky young woman. Yeah. And she rode motorcycles from what age on? Well, my uncle kind of took after my grandfather, the trials bike and nearly one the Scottish six day trials and was very talented also on a bike. But when the accident happened, it was difficult for them because suddenly the whole family dynamic changed. I think my mum lost quite a lot of confidence because suddenly this father figure who so many people looked up to at that time came back home a different man in a way and relied so much on my grandmother. So she lost a couple of years of her teenage years to that whole dynamic changing. and And I think when she was 16, my grandfather said to her, "Go down and see John Stoddard and get yourself a bike." And she loved speed. And she is very much, you know, get up and go, like my grandfather. And that, of course, is where she met my dad in the bike shop. - Oh, this is such a great story. - I love stories. - I love this. Meet you. - I just wouldn't be who I am today without my mum. 'Cause you say your role models, but she set the foundation. She had her own business. She raised bikes. It was such an equal marriage between the two of them. And she had as much get up and go as my dad. It absolutely shaped who I am. - Yeah. So she was in a motorcycle, they meet and fall in love. What's the age gap? She was 16 when she went to buy a motorcycle? - And now you're testing me. - Yeah. - This is not make them look bad here. Well, she got her first, so you have to be 17 to drive a motorbike and so on. So she was maybe 16 turning 17. So maybe she went at 16 to get ready to buy the bike for which more 17. She was dating someone else when my dad's friends. - Oh, scandalous, small town. - Who was not treating her well. - Oh. - And it was a really good friend of his. He went on bike tours together, everything. And then it became clear that my mum and dad were better suited. - Simmering. - Simmering, yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I think actually quite similar to me, I think it was my mum was the first one to say, actually, John. - I'm going in this direction. - I think you and I fit. - Yeah. - Okay, so yes, they fall in love. They get married and then father's running a motorcycle shop, but he's selling everything presumably 'cause you're getting quads and jet skis. - Yeah, and outboards for the fisheries and the fishermen. And basically in a small town, you know what it's like, you sell whatever anyone needs. - Yeah, right. - So it was motorbikes in the summer. A lot of motorbikes would tour through, do the whiskey tour up through Scotland 'cause it's beautiful scenery. But then the all-terrain vehicles for all the farms. - But so basically you had access to every single thing I wanted as a kid. Your first bike's a PW50, yeah? - Yeah. - How old were you when you got that? - Well, no, my very first was a little three-wheeler, but yeah, I had a three-wheeler. And then PW50, I must have been five. - Yes. - Five or six? - This one, my daughter got her first PW50. - Love it. - Yes, yes, yes. - And then PW80, love that PW80. - Sure, sure. Now you're shifting gears with the quads. - No, that's not T100. The PW80 doesn't have a clutch, no? - Oh, okay, here are the 80s all-head clutches. - No. And I remember the first time I tried with the clutch, I was just like, oh, okay. (laughing) - Yeah. - It's a humbling experience of hers. - Dear brothers and sisters? - Well, the older brother. - Yeah, 15 months older than me. - Oh, yeah. - Yeah, so I would imagine it's kind of a perfect storm for you because similarly, I have a little sister, and I think if you have a little sister and she likes you, she's just gonna trend a little bit more into, I don't know, conventionally boy stuff. What do you think about that? - I think so, and I think it was also my character. Like, well, anything he can do, I can do. I was very competitive. - Yeah. - And he was a wonderful brother. He still is a wonderful brother. So he kind of took me under his wing. There wasn't a huge rivalry of, you know, and I don't want her around if he went on his motorbike. He was on his R-T-100. I was on my P-E-80. - Aww. - P-E-80, I was on the P-E-50. It was always that we were together. - He was probably proud of you. It's cool to have a little sister who rides. - True, he'd go as far as to be proud. - That's too much. - But we definitely did a lot of things. See, and my parents never really differentiated between the son and daughter. It wasn't like I ever had the feeling that I shouldn't be on a bike or that I was doing anything usual for a girl. It was very much if you want to do it. You do it, and if you don't, you don't. There was no real pressure or feeling that I was doing something unusual for a girl. - We do have to take one second to worship your father because for people who aren't super in the motor sports, the craziest form of racing is definitely MotoGP. It makes the F1 drivers look cowardly. So that just start there. And then the scariest thing in the motorcycle world by far is the Isle of Man TT. And for people who don't know, they're racing on a public road on the circumference of an island. What is it, like an 80 mile, 90 mile loop? Every single year someone dies pretty much without exception is the most dangerous motor sport imaginable. And your father raced in the Isle of Man. - And lost his best friend there. - Lost his best friend. Just stand there. - It's so funny you say that now he literally is going there this week. - Oh yeah. - Yeah, 'cause it starts, I think this weekend. - And he now goes and obviously. - He had a team for a while, but this year, those no team, he's just spectating. Have you ever been? - I haven't. I've been invited by Ducati and I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna go, but I know I'll ride on Saturday. - You need to go. - Wait, you're gonna ride in it? - On Saturday, the public can take a lap. - Yeah, but you can take it easy there. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You need to take it easier. - Oh, that's my concern is how easy I'll be able to take it. But yes, I do want to do that very bad. - I ended up taking total and it was an incredible experience because you just cannot comprehend the speed and the bravery until you get there. - The sides of much of the public road are cobblestone walls. So if you come off, you're going into a cobblestone wall. There's new numerous. - You're not into it, I don't want to. - No. - Monica, there's numerous hills and dips where the people are at 195 getting air for like 130 feet and landing as full on. - It is truly the most hair-raising, scariest motor sport in the world. - It is. - Your dad did that. He's a warrior. I just want to worship him for one second. So I gotta imagine if dad is doing that, it's hard to take anyone serious if anyone's saying like be careful or maybe that wasn't even being said in your household. - It wasn't being said, but it wasn't like we were kamikaze either. I guess there was a structure to it that it wasn't just like grouting a bike and go flat out. We built a little track kind of in the hills behind where we lived and of course we got to stop watch out and it was who could go quicker. But we weren't kamikaze because there was an element where you always had to have your helmet on, you had to have your proper boots on and you had to respect your clean your bike when you came home, you put it probably away in the garage. So we weren't kamikaze, but we loved speed and we loved that life of being old and that feeling of, you know. - Yeah, adrenaline. - Were you scared when your dad went to do this thing? I was too young to even realize. - Oh, you were. - And actually my mum made him stop when he lost his best friend and when we were young kids because I think for her she's spelt well. That's way too risky now that we've got two kids here. - I also doubt they said like, okay, so daddy's going away to the most dangerous lethal race in the world this weekend. - Oh yeah, but like. - They probably kind of pushed that part. - The war pictures up in the wall, but I never really comprehended until I went, I never really comprehended what he did. - It's madness. - Promise me your goal. - Oh yeah, yeah. - Because you would really, really love it. - Okay, when do we get into a cart eight years old? - Slightly before, because my dad had a bit of a middle-life crisis and went back to racing road bikes for his 40th birthday, he got himself a bike. So we would spend a lot of time at not kill the only track in Scotland, but because we were not really that interested in just watching my dad, there was a kind of perimeter road to the track where we would be doing laps in our Pwe50 and Pwe80s, taking on our T100s and water cooled one to fives, and there was a little cart track there. And I remember to think it was five pounds for 15 minutes. Well, we hounded my parents for five. And another five, another five. And then eventually, I think my mom said to my dad, "Listen, we come to these race weekends. It's all about you. I think it's time that the kids did something." - Yeah. - So we got a go cart kind of around our eighth birthday. - A shared go cart between you and David? - No, 'cause he was bigger than me. I mean, they were second-hand. They were, I never forget Swiss hot lists. It was red. It was quite rusty and peeling with pain. I was so in love with this thing. And did you show more aptitude in that relative to David? Like, you had to be a mildly competitive with your brother. And did this feel like something shit I might have the upper hand here? - At that time, no. We would be out on the higher carts, smashing lumps out of each other to see if we could win. And then suddenly, when we got to our very first race, we were a bit like, "Oh, there's like 100 kids here." - Yeah. - It wasn't any more me versus him. It was more like, "This is big now. We've got a lot of competition." - Intense. - And we never really had, well, no, that's not true. I was gonna see, we never really had a big wrap. But we did have one race where I should have won. He took me out on the last lap. - Okay. - And we didn't speak for the whole way home. - Oh, great. - And after that, my dad always made sure we were in different categories. - Oh, smart. - So we moved my brother up and I stayed and then we never raised each other again. - Your father had Serena and Venus on his side. - Yeah, that wasn't that smart. - So were you receiving instruction or were you just kind of learning as you went? - I definitely wasn't a clear talent at the beginning. I mean, it was quite daunting being on a much bigger track. Lots of other kids out there. I always tell the same story. I went out the first time and it was like scary. And I came into the pits and I said to my dad, "I really don't like it out there." I mean, that's a lot. - A lot of chaos going on. - A lot of chaos in the kind of like, getting hit as you were getting passed. And it was just aggressive little boys. - Yeah, lots of aggressive little boys. - Yeah, are you're the only girl there? - I was, but I never realized I was. - Yeah. - No, because we're all wearing helmets. Nobody really spoke about me being a girl at that time. I was just Susie. And my dad said, "Well, we got two optional suits 'cause his nickname for him was always suits." We put the cart back in the truck and we head home where you go back out there. You try and go quicker and when they hit you, you're gonna hit them back twice as hard. So me being the character I was, I was like, "I'll go back out there." I will get faster. And then it was something that just became all-consuming in a very good way. - You're so cool. - Yeah, she's so cool. - Oh my God. - Oh my God. - I feel so, so lame. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I'm lame. - You're not lame. - No, no, you're not lame. - You're not lame. - No, no, no, I am. I think it must be a meant. It's like, how do you not have fear? - I'll let you answer your other question. - Both of you can answer. - It's funny enough, I'm watching it right now. So I went to our oldest daughter when she was about seven or eight. And at that point, she already rode dirt bikes. She had an off-road razor, like a vehicle she's great at driving that like a real immediate aptitude and I said, Hey, we could get carts. You and me. We have a tour bus. We could just start hitting races. I'm ready if you're up for it. And she was like, Well, take me to the cart track and let me see if I like it. I take her to the cart track to go go to one of the juniors. It's all boys. We've already done it a bunch of times. She has one session. She comes back and she's like, I don't like it. And I went, Okay, heartbroken. All I wanted as a kid was someone to support me doing that. I now have the money to do that. She just was not interested fast forward to like maybe eight months ago. So I want to go back to the cart track. Take her back. Now she's super into it. She's 13. It's too late for anything competitive. It's not. No. Okay. Well, that's encouraging. It's definitely not. Point is is what I got to observe, which was the most rewarding was in soccer, when she played soccer, she didn't have that like, I'm going to kill this person for the ball. She's didn't have that, which I could care less. But within three sessions at the track, when she started getting good and there were slow adults out there, I started noticing like, Oh, she wants to kill these people to get by. That magic thing has just kind of happened. And yeah, you kind of either have that one of us is going to the center of this turn. It's going to be me. But you know what I'm doing now with F1 Academy. It's because of girls at your daughter because I'm pretty sure if that little girl at eight at her first time at the cart track, it's in another little girl out there. Yeah. It could have changed her whole experience of it. But because that first experience was daunting, like mine was daunting, but I had that older brother who was like, Well, she's, she's doing, I figured out. Yeah. And now she's 13. She's got a bit more confidence. She's a bit older. She asked to go back there. Uh-huh. It's in her. Anyways, it's not about her. No, but this is so encouraging for me, because that I think is the shift that's happening within motorsport now. Because before it's always seen as this ayuristical, macho, male-dominated world, it's changing. And it has to change because there's so many talented young drivers that are female like your daughter out there that just need to be exposed to it because they've got that passion within them. You were saying in a different interview, I listened to you in which I hadn't thought of this. There's only really three sports where the men and women are together and it's horse jumping, riding or jumping. Oh yeah. The sailing and driving. Whoa. And all involve either a big piece of equipment or a big animal. Yeah, that's true. Weird. I definitely don't believe in having been in this sport for as long as I have that there's any reason why women can't compete at the very top. It just comes down to the talent pool and the kind of pipeline. Whoa, let us for the most skeptical audience member, what about someone who's like, what about just testosterone as a aggressive hormone that boys at 18 have an excessive amount of? Do you think there's any deficit for not having that? Listen, I would never claim to see a man and a woman or a young boy and a young girl are the same biologically. Right. Clearly we're all made up, definitely, but it also comes down to individuals. Exactly. And it's so funny you mentioned testosterone because when I was racing, I won't see what age I was. I had a medical and I had high levels of testosterone. We were just never taking supplements or anything like that at that time. And immediately, immediately, the guys that did the kind of assessment said, oh, this is an outlier. Can we do some more tests and studies because I think this is maybe why you're a racing driver. And I went away and thought about overnight and came back the next day and said, no, I don't want me being singled out. Yeah, yeah. And I don't think my results are the basis or should form what a female racing driver. Exactly. Because I think it comes much more down to characteristics of the individual. There are some girls who are really tough. Also, they were chicken and egging it. And I would argue your participation in it, your body starts reacting like we have tons of data on stockbrokers. When they make riskier trades or testosterone goes up, which begets more riskier trades, it's working in both directions. Yeah. So yeah, your body could have been like, oh, no, we're in a situation where we need more testosterone regularly. But I don't think that the aggression is something which can stop a woman not being successful in the sport. Because you can also argue that red mist and overaggression is a real negative. Exactly. Yes. And unless you're somehow maxed for staff and in your balls, whatever that thing is, or it's like, I'm really done. The nerve agreeing 24 hours. Yes. Incredible. He's such a god. It's crazy. Yeah, it was impressive. I know 13's a pivotal moment. But between eight and 13, when you're starting to cart a lot and you're starting to race, walk me through some of those challenges and you're slowly, I bet it, it starts occurring to you. Oh, I'm the only girl here. I want a very few. Not at that age. I wasn't your stereotypical tomboy. I loved pink. I played with Barbie. I asked for pink sideboards for my go cards. I had a pink race suit. Your father was using Barbies as leverage to get you to do things. He offered to buy you a very specific Barbie. Cowboy, the cowboy Barbie. Cowboy Barbie. I still have her. Oh, so cute. And it was when I was 13, I was taken to watch a Formula 3 race at Donington. There's an English driver at that time called Jameson Button, who of course went on to be a world champion. He's also fucking gorgeous. I just, sorry. I can't judge drivers is hot or not. You can't. I always had this rule I would never date another driver. And even now when, obviously, there's a lot more in chasing after one and they're like, oh, he's having like, is he? Yeah. It is a stable of the cutest boys in the world. It really? Yeah. It's asymmetric to any other sport where it's like, why are they? Well, I kind of have a theorem. Why they're also good looking. They're often the children of rich people. Right. I mean, that's just the fact. No, not always. Oh my god. Let's go through the current. Lewis is not from. Yeah. He's an exception. Kimmy, Antonelli is not from huge wealth. Okay. You're right. George Russell is not from huge wealth. Huge wealth. Okay. Okay. No, no, no. Okay. Okay. No. I mean, his father sold his business recently, but he didn't have a lot of them. That's why he relied on junior program. Landos family. Landos. Charles. Charles is Uncle. Uncle who was supporting his uncle helped, but he comes from a very humble background. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But he's just so he's a model. He is a model. Oh my god. I wonder if this is a thing she plays for total. I know. I wonder if his wife is beautiful. Yes. She is beautiful. They're a beautiful pair. Great couple, but total is so hot. Oh, totally hot. Yeah. He's the hottest. Okay. So back to F3. You saw an F3 race. Jensen button. I interrupt you. Yep. And that's when I think it all changed in my haker. Suddenly, what was just a hobby? I suddenly thought, oh, wait a minute. I can do this and that environment, the card, I'll never forget the first time I walked into the garage. Everything was so immaculate and precise and the engineers. And I just thought, this is where I want to be. And suddenly I was like, okay, I can be a racing driver. I can get some carting, move to single cedars and get to F3 and then maybe get to F1. And never once did I question why there was no woman in F1. I simply had David Coolhat on my walk because he was Scottish, Jack Vielner because he was in the Williams. And at 18, we'd done the World Championships and Louis Hamilton was there and he could Rosberg. You said Wayne Rainey on your wall? Wayne Rainey, Kevin Schwartz. There we go. In the Kevin Schwartz Fine Club. Love him. With a yellow bandana. Love him so much. So once you saw that and you got more focused on, okay, I want to do this as a career. Did you start taking your time the weekends at the race to start educating yourself? Like I want you to explain to people what you had to learn about the mechanics of the car and the engineering of the car. Your job's not just to get in there and drive the car. You could do that. But the great drivers in history have been able to give really important feedback to their mechanics and their engineers to make the car faster. If they don't have that vernacular, there's going to be only so much you can develop the car or the car. This is kind of a big component of it. It really is. And then when you get to European or World Championship level, it comes down to the finest details like what told you're running, what camber, what sprocket. It's not like you need to sit down and really educate yourself. You live it. So you're trying different things with your carts to get a small advantage, like different thicknesses of rear axle, tire pressures, how many, what do we call them again, seat supports because that changed the way where your weight distribution was in the car. Yeah, and I always had to carry extra weight. So we would move the weight around to see which was the optimum. Which could have been nice because you could put it on the weak inside wheel. We took the same length. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But some people don't. I want to give you credit. Some people don't take the time to do that. Sometimes it's exhausting. I'm a real perfectionist. So I was the one that curated all the folders that had the set up sheets from every race so that when we came back, I knew exactly where to start from, what we changed, my notes on each track. I loved like the color coordinated folders and all the set-up sheets. I also want to introduce when is juggling the pros and cons of being the only girl at these races because there's upside and downside and I want to explore what those tensions were. I think the only moment I really, because I'd grown up racing with Lewis and that generation. Let's talk about that. So for a while, you were in the Scottish league. Scottish, then you won driver of the year, 14 people. Well, yeah, that was really national. But then you step up to the British carting. Yeah, and I had a bit of success in the British carting, which allowed me to qualify them for the European championships. And where do you meet Lewis at what run of this? Oh, very early on, like I think I was only nine. We would go down for our first British race and they were all talking about this little boy with the yellow helmet who was outstanding and it was Lewis. How old was he? He will have been eight. Oh, so you're a year older than him? I'm nearly two years older than him. A little boy with a yellow helmet. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, really cute picture. And did you race against him? In carting, we were at the age of kind of 14. We ended up in the same class because then became 14 to 16 year olds. So we weren't always there at competitors, but then became competitors towards the end and then when he moved into single-seaters, we were always nearly, but I was sometimes the category above. 'Cause you're a little older. podium where I made P3, he won the race and I couldn't get my champagne open. He was a lot more used to winning than I was, so he grabbed the bottle from me and opened the champagne for me and gave it back to me. Oh my goodness! If I go back to the World Championships, I'd finished 15th overall, which was solid because there were over 130 people there, but I was called to the podium ceremony. And when I was called, the team where I ran, there was like maybe 20 of us in the team, we were all like, "Why are you being called?" I'm like, "Oh, I hope I haven't had an issue with my card or something or I'm disqualified from the race." And it was really weird that they were calling me over the Tanoi. So I run over the podium ceremony's happening and I'm called up on stage to receive an award for top female in the world. Oh my god. And I was like so embarrassed in front of my whole team. And my first thought was, "I don't even remember seeing another girl." And it was always actually, I think there was four of us. What if you had won the best and worse female driver? I mean, seriously. Slaw is the best. It feels like a pat on the head. And I think the organizers, they were probably just trying to be nice. Yeah, I'm sure. But I think that was definitely the moment. And of course, everyone made jokes afterwards with the fact that, "Oh, you're great. You beat three other girls." Right. But it was the moment I definitely thought, "Oh, this is going to be different than I thought." This is a thing. They see me as different. When I moved into single-seaters, it became the topic. There was a girl trying to make it and racing. Yeah. Stay tuned for more armchair expert. If you dare, we are supported by Allstate. Checking Allstate first could save you hundreds on car insurance. Not checking what the warning light means before pulling out of your driveway. You absolutely convince yourself it was probably just a sensor thing right up until you were standing on the side of the road waiting for a tow. Yeah. Checking first is the right move. So check Allstate first for an auto quote. It could save you hundreds and for fast, reliable help when you need it, add an Allstate roadside plan today. You're in good hands with Allstate. Potential savings vary. Insurance and roadside assistance plans are subject to terms, conditions and availability. Insurance are provided by Allstate North American Insurance Company, Northbrook, Illinois. Roadside assistance plans provided by Allstate Motor Club, Incorporated and Allstate Affiliate. Now, again, there's trade-offs with that, right? Is it fair to say maybe you would have gotten a sponsor easier? Definitely. I got a lot more media attention. Didn't always know how to manage it? Yeah, that's a lot. You kind of need it commercially because racing is expensive. But in other hand, I remember going to some photoshoots and there was stuff, I'm not wearing that, you know, I'm a driver. At that time, the sport isn't what it is now and there was very much stereotypes of you were a girl that had to lay their own and pause in a car or you were a girl that drove the car. Yeah. Right, right, right. And I would imagine too, you want to be asked about driving and they probably want to ask you about being a female. All they wanted to ask me about was being a female. And that's fair enough. And I always thought talking about it can help others maybe be inspired, but I were not being inspired because at that time, I was never out to inspire others. You want to win races because you didn't have a car. And I realised pretty quickly that it was all about the performance on track. Yes, you could talk about my gender, but it made it even more important that I went out there and showed what I could do because everyone seemed to have an opinion that I was either not going to be good enough or not physically fit enough for. She's just there because she's a girl. She's only got the sponsor because she's a girl. So for me, I needed to go out and have the validation of her results sheet to say, no, this is why I can do it because look, I'm quick enough and I can compete. So it was always that validation through results. And that's what I love about sport. It's so pure. Yeah, it's empirical. It's objective. Not subjective. I would struggle in your industry. Yeah, this one is pretty subjective. Yeah, but sometimes you hit the hot streak of the subjectivity. I don't think I'm better than that guy, but I'll take it. Yeah, what kind of neuroses arise in this period? Because you're young and you're asked to represent all girls in racing, which you didn't sign up for. You're a token. I'll just advise you to listen. Do you know who Malcolm Gladwell is? He's like a very famous American writer and he has a great podcast called "Rusiness History." And he did an episode called The Token and talking about the weight of being a token and how it's not fair to judge someone like Sammy Davis Jr. Because he was first one through the door and what he had to deal with just to be there so other people could walk through. I don't know. It's just until you take a minute to stop and think about the pressure of being a token. I think it's a really isolating. Did you feel very isolated in that experience? I remember real periods of loneliness, but it's difficult because I only have my own experience, so I don't know how different it was to someone else that wasn't a woman or a feeling lonely anyways, but I definitely struggled sometimes in the environment because there was very much of a male kind of match or egoistical. And that's why I decided I wouldn't date another racing driver because I would overhear the way they spoke about women and girls and I thought, well, I never want to be spoken about like that, but I didn't feel like in that situation. I could always be the one saying, hey, don't do that. You should be saying that or that's not fair in her. So I just kind of detach myself from it but thought I never want to be spoken about like that. I just had a love for the sport that meant I didn't want everything around my gender to take away from my love for just doing the sport and achieving. But you're giving up a big chunk of your life when you're a kid. Did all your weekends or that? You're traveling. So if you don't have friendships at the races, then you're really missing a big opportunity or a big chunk that you would. Did you have friends in the race? I shared a house with a bunch of Irish drivers and they became like my big brothers and there was a lot of camaraderie. I did have friends who looked out for me and who we had a laugh with, but there was always just that invisible line. Yeah. Looking back now with the perspective I had, I think there was definitely moments where I would walk into a garage, especially if I joined a new team and I could feel the skepticism. Many people say, well, what did they say? I said, it's not a direct comment. I feel the skepticism or this idea that, oh, we have her, we didn't get him. And then when you have a bit of success with that team, first of all, they're a bit like, oh, you can. But then at the minute you get them with you, they are loyal. The environment and everything that comes with racing aside from being in the car and performing, you just become used to, well, that's part of it and that's part of the game and it's an important part of the game because if you're not doing the media and the sponsorship commitments, you're not racing. Yeah, talk about the financial stress of that whole period. Well, I'm giving away my age here because my main sponsor was British Telecom because they were launching something called Broadband. Okay. That's how long ago it was. But they weren't my savior. And actually, I had a really tough year in 2005 because they were my main sponsor for Formula 3 and then I was at home visiting my grandmother, I went out to buy her milk, slipped, broke my ankle. Oh, no. And those were dark months. I lost my race license, I lost my sponsor, I lost my seat in the A3. And you were how old then? 22. And you'd already laugh because you went to University of Edinburgh for a year? Yeah, I was a very conscientious student because my parents always said, can't race unless you do a little school. I'm a grafter. I don't have the natural ability, but I have no problem to work really hard. So I ended up second in my year in high school and there was a lot of expectation that I would go to university. I picked international business, the easiest thing when you've really no clue. But really felt like a duck out of water university. They were all partying drinking. I'm like, what am I doing here? Is that because you had a certain immaturity because you hadn't been hanging out on the weekends and going to dances? I think my charity is maturity. I've been doing something so far. You don't feel like you had missed out on childhood at all by racing? Aspects of it. Like boyfriend, girlfriend, stuff. Social stuff. I'm not a big drinker at all, even to this day. So I would see them all go out and get blind drunk and be like, what are you guys doing? Yeah, yeah. And then I would have races on the weekend. So I would be kind of training and I was just in a different planet to the planet I got transported to and did never feel right there. So I left after one year. Was that hard? Do you feel like you were disappointed in mom and dad? It was more hard that it's what everyone expected me to do to have this backup plan. And I remember going into the economics lecture in the first day of my second year. I'd gone back and I just thought, what am I doing here? I'm here because everyone tells me I should be here. I'm just a sheep that's following the vlog. I just don't want to be here. And I called home and one week later I had all my possessions in a little golf TDI, which was my parents' car. I rented a room near Silverstone, worked as a marshal waving the flag in a little shop that sold race wear and focused fully on racing. You get into Formula 3 in 2001. 2001 to 2004. Was that not Formula Renault? I'm sorry, I'm looking for no. So now you've gone from carting to a single seat race car and you do pretty good there. 2004 you finished fifth overall? Yeah, I nearly got third and that's the break through year because I got nominated for British young driver of the year, not just girl. And that was the first time a girl had ever been nominated. And that's when total first heard my name. Oh really? We were a support race at this big festival and he tells the story of coming over the loudspeaker, the Formula Renault race coming, this girl that was fighting for the podium. And at the time there was just no girls racing, never mind fighting for a podium. And he remembers things to himself. I need to confine this Susie just because he was interested because he was driver managing at that time. Right. But let's just say I wasn't very polished version myself then, so I'm glad he didn't find me. Okay, so you break your ankle. I read joggy, now you're saying to help grandma. I was exiting the news agents with the milk in the bread and I slept. How are you so mad at grandma? No No, grandma had taken care of grandpa, she deserved it. No, it was the other side of the family. Oh, the other side of the family. Yeah, you could be a mad at her. No, yeah, you could. Okay, so what was the formula three experience? You are on the feeder for formula one. Yes, if three, if two, if one. If we had to like make an analogy to US sports, to go from Carding would be like, you're on a state champion, a high school team, and then to go to single seat Renault, you've gone into college. And now when you get the formula three, like, you're in the professional league, or this is very serious. You're bubbling. How many female drivers were in formula three at that point or had been there were a couple racers at the time, like Catherine Lague, who's in Indy 500 now. She was racing at that time. And how would y'all get along when you saw each other, because this might be counterintuitive. You might think, oh, you would get along so well, but maybe not, because often the tokens are pitted against each other. Exactly. And I felt it was unnatural to try and form a relationship with someone just because there was another girl. Yeah, right. And I remember distinctly, then when we made it to German two, they would always arrange these photoshoots just with the girl drivers. I was always so against it. Yeah. Why do you pitter against each other when we've got everyone else that we need to be there? Right. Okay. So how did formula three go? Well, it didn't, because I was testing and then the anger, and it didn't ever compete in a race. I lost everything that year and I went to a really, probably the toughest time of my life. And then I got from an old team boss, I was testing World Series, which was like a competitor to F3, with the thought that I would be racing that the following year under kind of like a sponsorship agreement. But I got called into a meeting in February six weeks before the first race and got told that they kind of miscalculated the marketing budget and I'd need to bring 250,000 euros or pounds, which just was completely unrealistic for me at that time. I walked out of the meeting and I remember, like, yes, I was sitting in my golf TDI and I called my dad, it sounds like I only speak to my dad, I speak to my mom a lot as well, just in those moments it's my dad. And I remember saying to him, well, what am I going to do? So I had a note to it and as I was kind of not really knowing what to say to him, a German number was trying to call my phone. I said to my dad, there's another call coming and I'll take this and I'll call you back. And I picked up the phone and this gentleman in a very thick German accent said, this is Gerhard Unger from Mercedes-Benz Motorsport, what do you think of German touring cars? No, I tasted the car and the British young driver of the year award, so I knew the car, it was 500 horsepower, mega touring car. A C-Class Mercedes, right? Monica, this is your car, Daniel. I have one of those. You have us? Well, it was a gift. She's 63. She has a C-43, she's not. He didn't think I was ready. You're a good colleague. It was. It was a dreamy car, they're not, but that's a really nice car. He's not but she was making a lot of money and I borrowed her car one day and it was this fucking beat up Toyota Prius and I was driving in traffic in this car and I was like, you're not fine with it. Don't say that. I was and then he was like, you can't have this, we're doing too well for you to be driving this car. It's gonna cap your. It's so much about you, which car you drive. See, I'd not go up like that at all, so it didn't, but all to say, I love my car and I love driving. And I can hear him coming through the gate when she goes to her house across the street. Do you really mean that? You get the joy now of I understand what it does to you internally, not the speed, unfortunately. But it does something to your identity. It does. It does. You infuse it's muscularity and it's agility and it's too confident. It says something about me. It's a signal. Yeah. I think it's more than a signal because I give you the counter argument. I live in Monaco, which is really superficial and everybody drives supercars. So what do I drive? A 1972 pogoda. I buck the trend of everyone trying to outdo each other. Yeah. I get my pogoda with the rift on it. It's like from the 1970s. So you kind of like bounce along. But I love that I'm not trying it. These are also on a 300 SL on IC, so I'll give you that. Yeah, okay. I'll give you that. I'll give you that. The nicest Mercedes in the world. I know. That's your dream car funny enough. I know. And Toto said he was going to give me a ride. Yeah. That was exciting. Come to Monaco and give you a ride. I know. To Monaco. Monaco. I will. Now that you're into cars. Yeah. Come to Watch Formula One. Come along and have a ride. I'm watching. Okay. So you get this call. We got to get to Williams, but you have a long road to Williams. Well, the DTM years everything hung on that taste. I got myself out to Barcelona. And one story will appreciate I arrive at the track and the Germans are very direct. So I got my seat fitted and they're like, okay. And then we'll do a warm up. I say, yeah. Can I just do a lap of the track? Like a lap of the track? You don't know this track. It's like, no. I've never driven Barcelona before. And they kind of looked at me. And then Gerhard Runger kind of said, okay, Mika, come over here. And it was Mika Hackanan, two-time a fun world champion. Show this girl around the track. So there I am in a higher car. Mika Hackanan is showing me the racing lines. Is he sober? Oh. I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that. So, now you obviously give it the all in the test. They leave me waiting 10 days, but then finally get called over to Stuttgart. Get off at a one-year contract. And then, of course, end up staying for, for seven years and, and chose to leave off my own back. Met total there. I thank my lucky stars to this day. That was my big break. Such a sexy car you were racing. Way different, though, right? So heavy, so big. Was the transition out of one Cedar easy for you? No. And because I missed that year of F3, I was up against really, really quick drivers who were after F3 levels. So I had a lot of catching up today. But that's where I come into my comfort zone. I drilled down and I kind of had a great engineer at the time. HP, who got me so well prepared for the season. 'Cause I knew this was my one shot of one-year contract and managed to pull off a couple of really good races. Now here's where we get into the fun. This is your history with Barbie and your history with pink. You've at times had to kind of silence your femininity or felt inclined to. And so they put you in a pink car or you had a pink race car. You had conflicting feelings about this. It's really good water. Good bubble density. Strong, right? And you've let it cool for a while, too. Yeah, I think in my teenage years, I went from that little girl that loved pink to feeling that my femininity was seen as a sign of weakness, so kind of boxed it away. And then it was really by being made to drive a pink car in DTM 'cause the sponsor was a magazine that had a logo that was pink. But then realising that I think because I was older by that point, I was more confident in myself. And suddenly all these little girls started peeing at the track and dressed in pink and they all asked me, "Is it the Hello Kitty car?" 'Cause it was a big Hello Kitty time then. And I think that made me realise that, well, actually, if pink is going to inspire the little girls to come and see my car and to racing, I can drive a pink car, it's cool. And I think it was also a transition of my life where I got married and Total was so good at it. I never wrapped me in cotton wool, he was tough, but we were a team. And I wasn't on my own anymore. And when we got married, the Mercedes Cums and marketing department were like, "Oh, you can't change your name." I was like, "Oh, I'm absolutely changing my name." I'm not on my own anymore. I'm a wolf. It's a good name to take on. You kind of hit the jackpot. And that also gave me a confidence that it just wasn't me and my own anymore. He tells the story, so he had crashed at the Nürburgring and he was in the hospital and that you came to see him in the hospital. Well, no, we were testing in Portugal, 'cause this is the start of our love story. We were testing in Portugal in a track called Asteroel and Hands You and Mathets, who was a team manager. He came in to the awning world, the drivers were, 'cause I had 17 mates. And he said, "Total wolves had a really bad accident." Now, I remember the first time I even saw "Total" in the hospitality. I was, well, I can share with you the very first time. So we were sitting at a team dinner. And Matthias Lauda, Nicky Lauda's son, was opposite me. And he was a very good friend of mine. Him and his brother look us even to this day. But in a brother's sister way. And Total walked in and I'm following him thinking, "Who is this guy? I haven't seen him here before." And Matthias is watching my eyes. And then turning around to see what I'm looking at. And he was like, "You're looking at him." And of course, my face went bright red. As I well know, who is that? He's like, "Well, his name's Total Wolf, and you've got no chance. He's dating Miss Austria." Oh, my God! Oh, my God. This is what all your friends are meant. This is how they talk to you. So, I obviously noticed how he was off-bounds. And then, when Hands You and Mathias walked in and said, "Total wolf had a really bad accident." I was kind of like, "I hope he's okay, it hit me." Yeah. And he said, "Well, I think it'd be really nice if one of the drivers you called as a group." And Gary Paffer, who was kind of de facto more senior driver, said, "Yeah, that's a really good idea. Suzy, you should call him." I was like, "Yes." I'll call him. I guess I have to. I guess I have to, right? I'll do it on behalf of him. And then suddenly, I had his number. Oh. And then you'll go see him in person. No, I called him. That was just a call. I called him. And then he said, "I'm going to get better in the next kind of 10 days. I'll be fine and I'll see you in Dusseldorf for the big presentation of the championship." So, of course, I'm counting down the days of Dusseldorf. Outfits, thinking, "This is going to be brilliant in Dusseldorf." So we have this big dinner here, the night before I did everything. And I'm sitting at the dinner. He's not there. And I'm thinking, "Okay, he's going to walk in any second." Long story short, he doesn't turn up the dinner. Oh, Jesus Christ. And I am. And I am. Got it. Photo. Thank you. Come on. So, comes to breakfast the next morning. And I say to myself, "I'm not even going to get injury." Who cares. Straight into my rave suit. Hair tied back. Who cares about all that? It's an original dream. Exactly. So I go down to breakfast and he comes over to the table all jolly and kind of sits near me. I said, "Well, what happened to you at the dinner last night?" He said, "Yeah, I called one of your teammates to check where it was and he said, "Don't bother coming. It's boring." Oh. And I'm looking at the guy that he called me. That person was in love with you. I know. He wasn't even. Yeah. I like that take. Yeah. Yeah. Or you don't want to call everyone just laugh. Really boring here. It sounds like almost like- I was just going here, like, Hong Kong. Everyone got food poisoning. It's a mess, don't come. So we talk a bit, and all the butterflies come up. And then I go off to do my thing, and he's off to do his thing. And then at the lunch break, all the drivers and kind of the management are all on the talking. And of course, comes to people's love lives. And I was actually dating someone from another team, but who was a manager, not a racing driver. Someone then said to a total, how is it going after Miss Austria? And then someone said to me, well, isn't it time that you dated someone in Mercedes, Susie? And I kind of said, well, there's nobody in Mercedes. And then, total. In front of everyone said, well, sure, there's me. What about me? Of course, my face. And I'm looking down at the camera her. I'm trying to laugh a lot on her. So I didn't really see him for the rest of the afternoon, but when I left to drive back to Switzerland, I had one of those thoughts for all it. It's now or never. So I got my phone. I pulled into a fuel station 10 times drafted this text message. And it basically said, if it had to be someone from Mercedes, it would only ever be you. Wow, Susie. I put it in. I put it in. I put it in. I put it in. I put it in. I know. I'm jealous of what this text is all about. So I sent it, and then got back on the motorway, and I got to reply pretty quickly. And I remembered, because it could have gone either way. Like, I was so sweet, but no. Yeah, give real. Miss Germany has just become available, it turns out. I'll sort of go back after I get there all the misses. I've got a few more countries to go. Yeah. But no, the message back was something about I'm getting in a plane. Oh, that's nice. I'll call you. I'm like, what? Oh, boy. So it wasn't like a no, it wasn't a yes. But then he called two hours later, and that was-- That was it. You guys were engaged eight months later. Then it's fast. You bought the ring six weeks later. Oh, my gosh. And we were engaged eight months later. It was an immediate click. OK, quickly. Are you sensitive at all about talking about total or no? No. Oh, great, great, great. Because I wanted to ask, tell me about the cultural chasm between the Scottish and the Austrians, right? So you've already hinted at a couple of them. It's like very direct. Very direct. Some of the things he said to you over, you'll get to, but when you drive for the first time and form you alone, he's like, don't be shit. It was like giving you a pep talk. Well, I thought it was going to be this big pep talk, and he just looked at me and was like, don't be shit. Did you get enough fight? Did you say, hey, you need to be a little softer or no? No, that fires up something in me up to myself. Well, yes, your whole life is about saying, like, you think, OK. You think I can't? Yes. It's her feel like Jordan. Yeah. Did you want some last names? The blue game. Yeah, and he just has to come up with an enemy. He's like, I'm going to pick this guy from the team. And you know, he makes up a story why he hates this guy. It's a good way to share with you just how direct he is. The night before our wedding, well, the day we were signing the paperwork, he was very quiet. And the next person is, is everything OK? He's like, yeah, I think I've done a positive and negative list. Oh my God. And there's more positives than negative. And I'm like, oh, my God. That's not very romantic. Excuse me. I was like, OK, what's on that list? We're getting married. We're getting married tomorrow, OK? Do you like for that list? Throw that list. Oh my God, that is so funny. I think I was really lucky that Toto was nearly 10 years older or just over 10 years older than me. So he'd been married once before. He had two wonderful little kids. So he'd kind of been through it and knew exactly what he wanted. Probably what to do differently, hopefully. Exactly. And I come from such a wonderful family who really embraced him. And he lost his father at a young age. So I think through me, he saw this sense of family and this loyalty to each other that we stick together to stick to it. And he probably, his dream dad, but can race in motorcycles on in a shop, speed, speed, speed. Yeah. That's a good family to click in. And I definitely struggled. And I have obviously speak to my stick kids about it. Now, I struggled at the beginning because I was the selfish racing driver who suddenly on certain weekends would have to be a mother. And I just had no idea how to be in that situation. And I knew from my childhood, and obviously the respect to his ex-wife that I didn't want to come in and pretend to be like a second mother. So that took a bit of navigating. But then things come up and you are mothering. Yeah, and there was a little girl. I mean, Rosie, the cutest little girl you could imagine. And you feel so much affection, but then you don't want to overstate. Yeah, to fine line. And we weren't married then. So you're just trying to navigate. That wasn't easy at the beginning, but he was very understanding of it. And then when we got married, it all became just much easier because we knew, OK, we're a unit, and we'll figure this out. And it wasn't like I was going to disappear or anything. I'm going to talk in broad stereotypes right now. So forgive me. There's going to be tons of exceptions to this rule that are Austrian. There's tons of exceptions that are male. But a very common tension with men and women around me is the woman says something. The man here is, oh, she's asking me to fix this problem. And then they start laying on, I'm going to fix this. And the woman's like, hey, man, I just wanted some compassion. I wanted you to just be with me with this. So that's already a male female thing that kind of exists. And then I think Austrian, Scottish, Scottish are much more fucking gay-lic. We got flutes. We're very expressive, right? We're dancing around in the kilts. You know, it's a different culture. So I feel like that would even compound this male female thing a little bit. Completely. Because I'm someone that's pretty tough. Like, give me something like, when I get ill, so do you need anything? I'm like, no, no, I'll be okay. So it just disappears. Like six hours later comes back. I'm like, did you have a nice dinner? You're like, yeah. Are you better yet? Do you think that's bringing me anything or checking on me? Oh, my God. Well, are you better yet? I'm like, no, you're like, oh, well. And he's like, no, you said you didn't need anything. It's worth him. Where's, if he gets ill, the world stops. The world stops. And he's like, no, but what you had can't be what I have. Because it's so bad. I can't. Certainly, the same virus. I gave it to you. No, you have it. No, do you like it? Exactly. I definitely have to see he's got better with age. I arrived here yesterday and he wanted to surprise me about coming to the airport, which after we've been married 15, together, kind of 17 and a half. And I always had a car boot to pick me up and he wanted to surprise me, but he didn't realize it. One of the group chats that he was speaking to our office on, I was also on, so he's like, I want to surprise him. I'm going to cancel her car and come into the airport and I'm reading this in the airport and I'm like, it's so so much tension, such a good intention. That is sweet. It's very sweet. Yeah. Okay. So now, back to your racing. Back to racing. After racing for DTM for seven years, I guess, how do you get called to Williams? Frank Williams had come to watch a German tour and car race, the DTM race at Brandt Hatch. But at the same time, Toto was looking to possibly enter Formula 1 by investing. He looked at Toro also at the time, was looking at Williams. So I don't shy away from the fact that I was on the radar, obviously also being Toto's wife. And Frank, I remember at the time, because his daughter hadn't started running the team. No, she was simply working in the team. Okay. And it was actually Toto was a big part in picking Claire up and saying, you need to be on the board. You need to be more involved in your Williams. But let's just say for Frank, he came from the era where women definitely didn't go out on the track to race. You know, they were very much behind the scenes and I was teammates at that time with David Colter and Ralph Schumacher, former drivers of his. He was always so interested in asking me about my racing and how did you start your Scottish and he went to boarding school and Scotland and hated it. So we always had this joking about how I loved Scotland and he hated Scotland. And I've said to him in one of those conversations, well, it's my big dream to drive a Formula 1 car. And at the end of the weekend, he called over Adam Parr, who was a CEO at the time and they said, we've got something to tell you. We're going to give you 25 laps in an F1 car. And that's all that was ever supposed to be. And at that point, you had not been in a single-seat, massive, narrow car. So like, you're rusty for this. Rusty, but DTM was a high level, so it wasn't like it was completely detached. But just open wheel, close wheel, tons of downforce. The Formula 1 car is completely different to anything else. Yeah. We've interviewed a few drivers at this point, but just to remind people, the easiest way to say it is like, the car is creating so much downforce. It's a reverse airplane. It has a lot of aerodynamics to create. The opposite a lift. And so it's pushing the car really far down in the current carways like 980 kilograms or something. That's how it's formed. He's very informed. But the car is creating 2,000 kilograms of downforce. So for real, the car at a certain speed could drive upside down just fine. So just got to remember, that's the element in F1 that's not in other racing. Yeah. And that's why at Silverstone, you can take a right-hander and seventh gear going 190 miles an hour, a sharp right-hander, and be stuck to the fucking. And that's a leap of faith. It is because it's counter-intuitive that the more speed you have, the more downforce you have. And the more you're going to stick to the ground, you've got to unravel everything you've learned almost. But the great thing is, and I was really lucky because as soon as that decision was made, I mean, really hats off to Williams. I was put through my pasties in the simulator, straight line tests, everything to get me ready to perform in that test. There was no way I was getting in without being really ready for it. Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare. Let's talk about the physicality. The physicality was harder to prepare for. I ended up getting access to the machine that Michele Schumacher built at the end of his career to build up only your neck muscles. And interestingly, when I stopped racing within months, my neck had just shrunk in size because neck muscles build up quickly, but shrink quickly. Susie, where's her hair always down to cover her neck? She's insecure about how big her trowel is. No, anymore. I mean, with the ball. Back in the day. Back in the day. Yeah, back in the day. My Botox guy says, "I have a thick neck as well." Oh. Is he. Botox that thing, huh? Well, I guess I do. We work to keep it small. Oh. But maybe I could have driven at one. Oh, my God. I miss my car. But in a nutshell, so yes, your body at rest if you weigh 150 pounds at one atmospheric pressure, you weigh 150 pounds. But as G-Forces go up, there are moments on the track. I know the one that got you really hardcore was breaking. You'll hit 4.5 G's breaking. And it's like something coming behind you, forcing your head forward. Because you're strapped so tight into the seat and the seat's made for you and everything's down to the millimeter. So you're really well strapped and you need very, very strong breaking leg because the break pressure is important. And then there's power steering in the car. So it's not actually your arm muscles that take a strain, it's your neck. But Lewis had said to me, "Put a neck pad in, paint it white so people can't really see it, fade into the car." This is in Barcelona, there's one really, really long turn. And he's like, "Use it because if your neck goes, you had to do 72 laps at Barcelona." It was a test to see if I could do a race distance. And he said, "If your neck goes, which means you just can't hold up anymore, he said you'll have to stop and you don't want to stop." So he said, "I do it at the beginning of a season as well. Before my neck muscles get built up." And that was one of the best tips because he said, "I should just enter the right lean." So don't even try because it's like being a rollercoaster but trying to keep your head straight, it's nearly impossible. 20 turns for 72 laps, it's like impossible. Yes. Yeah, if your head weighs 18 pounds, it now weighs 90 pounds in the turn. Yeah, there was very first 20 laps. It was a damp track to begin with, which helps you for us, but it's more challenging to be on a damp track. But there was never a moment on that day where, because they'd done such a good job in the preparation, obviously there was so much media around the fact that a girl was getting back to the F1 car, which they had underestimated and I didn't even think would factor. But to your point earlier, it then worked to my favour because they realised I did well on the day and this is a big opportunity because this amount of interest for the team is hugely valuable. So they developed a role for me because it was in November and the team was already set for the full year of development driver, which is a common term in F1, that development driver. Yes, so what were your duties as a development driver? Lots of simulator work, lots of straight line tests and then some testing throughout the season because it wasn't as limited as it is now. Okay, so when you get called and told, you're going to drive in practice at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix, at that time it had been 22 years since a female had been on a track in a F1 car. Wow. How'd that decision come about and what was your response? So I did that one test that went well and then it became development driver and I was doing steady work of not crashing the car, straight line tests and it was all kind of a natural development and I was obviously also pushing to say, "Well, what's next?" Because you're getting used a lot in the media and there had to be an authenticity to it. And to be fair to Williams, they also just didn't want it to be a show. It had to have some. Well, people were accusing it of being some kind of promotional media. Completely. So we felt then there had to be substance to it and that's why it just kept progressively getting to be more opportunity. So just talk about the morning waking up. I can already imagine this. You'd love to go into that day very rested, but of course the brain is like, "There's no way you can sleep the night before, right?" And totus next to you, he has a race as well. He's now principal of Mercedes in this time. And so you're just up all night, right? Yeah, it was really difficult because there was so many thoughts going through my head and the first thing I did when I woke up is you immediately checked the weather because that place is such a big part. And if it was going to be damp. And the very difficult thing with the FP1 sessions is that I was taking faltery botancy's car. And if I caused any damage, it had a huge impact on his race weekend. So you're very much told by the team, we're going to let you go for a fast lap because it means nothing to me if I can't go out and do a fast lap. Everyone's looking and I'd rather not drive than just drive around slowly. Be 20th on the. Exactly. But the golden rule is, there's no way you can crash that car. Yeah, the amount of stress that you're taking on, it's not even a real fair test of what you can do. This moment that people that aren't in a car is what I understand. The most humiliating thing you can do is fucking stall a car. So even just right there, you getting out of the garage is like packed with stress now. Yeah, and that was your stall or not? Got out of the garage. And it was the first thing my dad said to me about it came and he's like, "Thank god you didn't stall." Oh my god. Yeah, they're going to stall or spin the tires which you don't want to do because then you're all out of control even the garage. It's like this tiny little window. Yeah. But you get out, you got to be like, "Okay, we've got to get it installed, right?" For a turtle. And then you get out there and what does the experience like once you're on track? Well, my very first test was a great experience. The FP1 at Silverstone. My wonderful Mercedes engine blew after one lap and that was such an anticlimax. Oh, yes, yes, yes. Okay, but then you go back out, you do another practice session in Spain? Hulkenheim. That was where I made my German touring car debut. Now, this is a big day because on this day, you ended up finishing the practice session just two tenths off of Philippe Maasas. Was it two? I thought it was one. Okay, the internet says two. No, it was probably. No, I think I probably my head I have is one is probably two. Two tenths of a second next to the team driver is fucking awesome. But that was such a different mentality to Silverstone because I think the disappointment of Silverstone, I got to Hulkenheim and I was in such a different statement. I was like, "Yeah, let me get out there. I have to use this chance now." Yeah, it's a good fuel source. And I was so thankful I had that other chance because I thought if it had just been that and the engine had gone, so I was so grateful. And there was just one corner. I knew that there was a chance of hitting the gravel, so that's where I lost about the tenth and a half. Everywhere else on the track, I was on the limit. Uh-huh. The feeling of driving if one car on the edge, I think there's nothing else that comes close. Everything's happening so fast. There isn't a single stray thought about anything else. It requires such concentration in looking ahead and on stop that it is a unique state to find yourself. Completely. And if you ask some of the current F1 drivers, some even prefer qualifying because it's all down to that one lap. Whereas in a race, you always have to think of, "Okay, when I'm the pit stop, where you are in the race, everything." Whereas in qualifying, it's everything into one lap and it's such a hyper-focus. It's a special feeling. How fatigued did you feel at the end of Germany? Zero. I was so hyped and pumping with adrenaline. The neck was huge. I won't say that by the. Yeah, I was like. You need to tell your Botox soldier if he wants to see a big neck, I'll send him a picture. I mean, don't get me wrong, by the evening I was completely. The adrenaline had worn out, but for me, it was the best day of my career. You ultimately retired in 2015, although you do have a race in 16 race of champions. Yeah, that's more like a fun event for current and extra drivers. You have cute Jack in '17. Best thing I've ever done, yeah. Oh, yeah, what could be better? Be it become the team principal in Formula E for Venturi Racing? It was a team that was at the back losing a lot of money and I was searching for what to do after stopping my racing career. I was fighting a complete lack of identity. Yes, I could have fallen as much as I love being a mother very quickly realised that I can't only be a mother, so I was searching to find that thing and then the Formula E opportunity came and I was a real skeptic of Formula E at the beginning because I was like electric racing cars. That wasn't my era, but it gained a lot of momentum when these will get happened and the electrification became a big thing. And a tough challenge. Yeah, 'cause team principles are much different role than driver. Huge difference. Yeah, you're a manager, you're an inspireder, you're so many things. And I had a lot to learn, but I had watched total closely because I started to become very successful on F1 and I kind of had a front row seat of hearing what his challenge is where of watching him do it. So I knew what the job entailed and Formula E obviously is a much smaller scale than F1 and my business partner who offered me the role and took a real leap of faith in me, Gildo Pastor, was someone I just had a good connection with and felt that I can trust him and we turned a team around and then nearly won the Formula E World Championship. Yeah, and then you became the CEO of that team? Why did you leave, you left in 2022? We sold the teams, Gildo wanted to exit and move into the space industry. We wanted to build an electric rover to go on Mars. Oh, okay. Which we were set to do together again until I got the call from Stefano Domenicale for F1 Academy. All right, so tell people what F1 Academy is. F1 Academy is a series started by F1, which is for all female drivers. We've nearly fully fund the drivers in the series and it's basically a platform or series to give female talent the opportunity in the sport to break down the preconceptions that it's a man's world and to kind of inspire the next generation to see that there's a place for women in the sport. And it's a response to noticing, right, the demographic of fans was changing pretty dramatically. Like a lot of young females were coming in as spectators of the sport. It had shifted massively. Because of the show. I bet that's a big part of it. I'm sure it's a big part of it. It definitely got a lot of people who didn't know about F1 to be part of it. I'm into Formula One because of driver's surprise. I was like, oh yeah, I was like, that's the boringest racing in the world. They don't ever pass each other. Who cares? And then once I found out like, how much is going into the nobody passes? Is anybody I'm like, oh, there's so much going on that I just didn't know? It's a science fair. I have one. It completely is. And then there's drama off track as well as on track. The politics. Yeah. What a show, what a show. So yeah, they all had all these new female spectators. And a very young female demographic. And I have to give credit to Stefano to Liberty. They said, okay, we need to create something that gives opportunity to young women. Because they recognized that it was shifting. And would I have started an all female series? I mean, we were the only race series in the world that over 80% fund our drivers. So basically, we're giving half a million euros to every driver in order to just season and really have the possibility to nurture their talent and allow them to develop it. But in some weird way, did you have to step over the notion that this is going backwards? We're trying to get women and men to race together. So if we split this off, is that lowering the bar for the women? Yeah. And there was someone that had tried and failed before called W series. And people would always say, "Oh, why didn't you get involved in support?" But I didn't get involved in understanding the business model. I didn't understand how they were going to make it work. And they were doing it as a business venture. So it was more that I didn't understand the sustainability of how to make it into a business. Whereas with F1 Academy, it was backed by F1. It had the investment from Liberty. It was set up very differently. I think we should talk about that. When you got there, the driver was responsible for a third of the budget. Liberty was going to give a third. And then F1 gives a third or someone else. The driver won third, the team won third, and Liberty won third. Right. So this is a lot of onus on a young driver. And there's not a lot of sponsor money flooding into this new thing. So when you got there, it wasn't actually tenable. It wasn't tenable at all. And I will never forget the first time I, because there was a lot to get the car on board. Obviously I had to exit from this base project. And I was letting Gildo down. So it all took a bit of management. So by the time I got to my first race, I remember getting near. It was Paul Ricard and South of France thinking, "There's no cars around. Why is this so empty?" And I got to the entrance. And there wasn't even a security guy on the entrance. I'm thinking, "It's really strange." And I get to the paddock. You thought you had the wrong date, maybe? I thought I'd said something wrong. Yeah. And I get out of my car and I'm immediately met by drivers to say, "I just want to give you the heads up. I can't find the one third sponsorship money." It was 150,000 euros. Then some of the team managers came and said, "We're not finding any sponsorship out there. So we're out." Oh boy. You're finding out you've taken on a reward. It's collapsing basically. And I called Stefan and I said, "Listen, this is not working." And he's like, "Okay, what do we need to do?" He's like, "I don't know just now, but let me figure it out. Give me time." And that's when I quickly realized, "Okay, we need to race with F1. We need to get F1 teams on board. And we need to get commercial partners on board and bring all the assets in house." And so then you go through this precarious building of commitment from the teams and you go to total first. Because, like, get everyone else and date with me. I don't need the first one then you're going to have to get six. And then I can be the seventh. Total! No, you can't show a favoritism. Exactly. And I completely get that. It wasn't even that I felt angry, but I completely understood. So you were able to do that though. You got six teams. You had to go to Horner, which is its own unique thing. Because of the rival between total. But to be fair to him, he was great. He was quick in. You were able to make this kind of a viable offering. And then how has the success of it unfolded? With the F1 teams, I didn't sign them up long-term. I said, "Listen, if this doesn't work, you can all leave. I'm not obliging you." Because what I didn't want it to be was a charity. A charity, but also, like, a feminist crusade, as against the world. It wasn't. I said to them, "You know, I think this will be for the greater good of the sport. We have this new fandomographic. But it's got to work. And if it doesn't, you're all free to leave." Because this is not something I'm obliging you to do that you feel you have to do. And then within the year, it kind of started gaining momentum. And then when I kind of at the beginning of this year went to all the teams, it was clear that they wanted to sign up for the long-term. And we have commercial partners. But it's just really gone from strength to strength. But I don't take all the credit for that because I do think the sport in itself should take the credit because they've created this opportunity. And they've all got them bored with it. And they made some compromises they hadn't in the past, like, they're letting you use the logo in a way that other teams can't. They've carved out some provisions to be helpful. Completely. And then you've got some major sponsors. You've got Hillfiger. You've got a makeup brand that I don't know about. Charlotte Tilbury. Oh, we have Saffora. We have Pepsi with Gatorade. We have American Express. We have Marquis. Yeah. We made an F1 Academy car. Oh, cute. The commercial partnerships were very strategic in that I want your 13-year-old, or however old your daughter is. Yeah. To feel some affinity, well, I can belong there. There's a place for me in this sport. So when she goes to her car truck or another eight-year-old goes to car truck, she's like, I can do this because she's seen others doing it and she sees the pathway. And it just takes one, but it can change everything. It makes that reality possible. Yeah. Do you have any part of scouting who will join the Academy? Do you have fun observing young racers and thinking who would be? Are they already coming by way of the teams? It's kind of a mixture. I get a lot of fun and that's a little bit why I wrote the book of passing on all my learnings because I really feel as a woman, especially when you have knowledge and experience, it's so important to pass it on to the next generation because it can help so much for others not to face the same battles you did. So I do love that I'm giving them a chance because I've got chances in my life that I'm kind of passing on the challenges that they can learn from. They don't have to go through themselves. And I love being on the race weekends and seeing them take this opportunity and we still have our skeptics and we still have our egomaniacs in the paddock who will always be negative about it. I know them and I know their opinions are never going to change but that's okay because I feel the momentum of it as a whole. And I think ultimately we see more young girls turning up a cartoon tracks. And a lot of the young women are very popular. They'll outpace the popularity of some F3 drivers. If I look at Instagram and stuff, you have some drivers that are pretty wildly popular, which is cool. Which is very cool. Now, if you had to distill everything you know of your last 30 plus years navigating a fully male environment, what advice do you have as far as like, no, you can be loud loud and be pink. But also here's a reality that you're not going to get around. I mean, do you think you can be out loud and pink? No, I do. Looking back and it was so funny because at the end of the book, my brother kind of said, oh, what would you tell Little Suzy? And when I sat down, it was like, not what I can tell her. It's what that little girl that believes she had in herself, that fearlessness, that ambition, that little girl who said it's 13, I want to make it a F1. Despite the fact there was nobody that looked like her doing that. And I sometimes think that if we go back to the child and us, what would your life be if you had no limitations? If you didn't have societies, preconceptions, shoved on you of what your life should look like and what you should be for all my years. And that's where the book's giving me so much perspective, because I think I can't part mentalised. I'm always looking forward. I never really looked backwards to think, okay, well, how was the journey? What did I learn? But I think it's having that belief in yourself. And sometimes there'll be moments of your life where you do doubt yourself. There's moments where I'm not sure I've got this all under control, but you've got to have that belief. Are there like domains that you've seen where it's like, oh yeah, that's how it is? And this is where I can make progress. I think where we are in the sport now compared to even just five years ago, even ten years ago, there's been a huge shift culturally. And maybe it's linked to society and the whole me two movements. And some say I went too far. It helped industries like hours because let's say the behaviors of certain individuals, and I don't want to say it's black working everyone, but the culture changed. You don't get away with it anymore. You're seeing it everywhere across the board. You're seeing these older figures in Formula One putting their feet in their mouth pretty regularly like in the last five years. There's all this residual racism that you're like, whoa, what do you say? The German driver has a different mind than a Mexican driver. You know, there's been a lot of rapidly evolving. And I think Lewis should take some credit for it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, he's someone that the easiest thing to do is just follow the Trottenpath. But he chose to be different. He brought a culture into the sport. He made that entry into the pits like a catwalk for all of us, which has been great for the sport. But he chose to stand up for what he believed in. And he chose to be different because that's who he was. And that also helped moved it all forward. Yeah, when you're most valuable asset is being out loud about racism, what choice do you get? You can't silence that person there. And he's a goat. Yeah, exactly. He says it. People are forced to listen back to the objectivity. You can say what you want. This guy's 100 races. He has the good. Yeah, but definitely what I see now, the minute I go into an important meeting, I can tell within the first 10 minutes if the man at the table has a daughter or not, because it's such a different view when you're a man with a daughter at the table, because it's as if you're able to see the situation through what your daughter would experience. Yeah. And you want the world to be the most inviting place for her. And even some of the decision makers in the sports who maybe their daughters are not going to come into sport, but you can see them understanding, yeah, I get that because actually, would I want my daughter to be treated like that or not get that opportunity? No, I wouldn't. And so they're much more proactive. And I think that's also changed because the leaders now, they're the next generation. And they want this sport to be in the right place. Yes, Stefano is just a good dude on top of everything else. He's not like some of the previous heads of F1. No. Yeah, he's an evolved guy. You've been fearless. What has it been like watching your son being carts? Well, it's so interesting. You're sorry with your daughter because Jack is really into racing. He has been for my age and you could argue while he's surrounded by it, but total is very against him getting into racing, because you kind of feel why would we do that to ourselves, you know, but the name and it's our industry. And I kind of said to my get that, but I got given that chance. And if he really wants it, I'm not going to not give him the chance. Yeah, he got scared. Total got scared by one accident. He is a parent that has fear for his kids or just anything happening in general. Yeah. But he also, when we started going to the car track, you could see how much Jack got into it. And now we have the life of the motorhome. And those are some of the best weekends we have, because it's back to basics and it's together as a family. And it's seeing this little guy have to dig deep in moments and yes his name makes him a target. Yeah. But I say to myself, well, it'll toughen him up because no matter what he does in life and whether he's good enough or not, he'll have to figure it out. But I think sport for a young person just teaches you so many life skills. How about you driving? You still get joy out of driving? Do you do track days? I don't have capacity because now every weekend that I'm not on a f1 weekend, it's with Jack on the cart track. I kind of feel I had my turn. It was great. I'd still love driving fast. Total and I think if we would have a free weekend, we would love nothing more than to get on a race track with a GT car or something. But then it can always end up with us not speaking to each other because we both want to be each other. Yeah, but he was very honest about he tries to cheat every time that you're always a half second faster, no matter what cheating. I love that. He put different tires on the car. He put ballast in your car. Can't be beat. No matter what, you're still half second always faster. Yeah. There will be a moment in time where we will be the old ones out on track. I hope we're best. Hang it on. I'll be there when we have. So cool. Well, I'll tell you what your book does a great job of. The book's called Driven is you really do a good job of helping people understand what it's like to be sitting in the car strapped in. The experience of it is so unique and you do a great first person job of explaining what that feels like. That's a very unique perspective. Well, that's a real compliment coming from you. Yeah. No, it's so unique. And I think it's so applicable to any situation where it's like, okay, I've been aiming at nothing, but this we're now here. Oh, fuck. You don't have to be into racing to have that experience. You're pitching for the first time as the head of your department. And this is the day. And I think it's highly relatable. I adore you. And I'm really glad I got to meet you. You're going to make me blush. This is so great. But Driven is out now. Also, people can listen to it, which I advise. You read it? I read it. Yeah. Was that daunting? You know, my publisher, now you need five days. It's like, I don't have five days. I did it in two. Yeah. It's like, but I thought they're put it in a way. I kind of go into a rhythm. I really enjoyed it. And did you have this moment? I think sometimes when I've read what I've written, it helps me integrate what happened in my life. I found it was a lot more work than anticipated. And we were perfect. We got to nine drafts, my brother and I, but I found the whole experience really enjoyable and therapeutic, definitely. Yeah. It helps you take a minute and recognize, oh, right. I really did go through all those things. And I survived all those things. And I can survive a lot. Did you get unexpectedly emotional while reading it ever? Yeah. What parts? The hardest was the letter to Lil Susie. I took like five attempts to keep whaling up because I guess it was the moment where I was speaking to myself in a way, but it was very emotional. But I know what was going on, which is Susie's been talking so mean to herself since she was a little kid. And you got to be kind to her and you probably deserve a little kindness from yourself. Yeah. And that's really hard, right? That is so true. It was always more. It was always you're gonna keep going. This is not good enough and keep ventilated and suddenly I look at that little girl and I want to give her a hug. Yeah. Just take a break. Yeah. Are you proud of her? And so thankful to my parents looking back. But this little girl who had this dream and drive ambition is like, I just want to hug her and say, you did okay. Yeah. It's stressful having a huge dream. Yeah. Oh God. Well, Susie, I adore you. This has been so fun. Everybody. We're so much driven. I'm so glad you wrote it. You're so good for the sport. And I hope we get to talk to you again. I really hope we're like in our 70s driving the Nürburgring together on a weekend. I think let's do a trip to the TT and then from there, go straight to Nürburgring, do a few laps. I'm in. I took Kristen the Nürburgring in a rental. But do you know the track? I didn't. That was my first time there. I rented a car, Avis rental car at Frankfurt Airport. And I asked the German Avis rental guy, could you put into the nav because it was all in German? Can you put in the Nürburgring? Oh no, you must not drive his car on the ring. I said, Oh no, no, no, I would never drive this. No, you must not. I go, no, no, I'm going to go spectate. I just want to look at it from far as okay. He reluctantly put it in. Sure enough, we went and just bought laps. And yeah, we went out and we were in a pack between a GT2 and a GT3. We're in like base 9/11. But it was so fun. But anyways, Kristen, just like reading a magazine the whole time, like, on the balls coming up, you got to look at the way she could care less. She's like reading. Yeah. I just have one funny story with you when I just joined Mercedes-Benz for DTM. We'd done pre-existing testing, we'd done the first race, and then I got told to go to Nürburgring. And I was a young Scottish girl that really only in single-seaters had driven nationally in the UK. So, Baron Schneider, who was like the king of DTM, they go, let's still go and do a lap of the Nürburgring. And I'm like, what's the Nürburgring? He's like, come with me. Oh boy. Yeah, okay. Get in the C63. The buyer goes up and he takes off. And I'm like, and because I didn't know what it was in the corners, this is the never-ending racing track. It's like a 12.8 mile lap and there's every different surface. You're almost on cobblestone at one point. You're like, you're in cement bowl, then you're on asphalt, then you're in the woods. Incredible. And then if it starts raining, things get really exciting. What happened to us? Okay, I adore you. Thank you. This is great. Thank you so much. We hope you enjoyed this episode. Unfortunately, they made some mistakes. Well, I don't like time again. Why? Because that was so sad and sweet. That made you miss the time that's gone by. Yeah. Should we play the audio of that? I don't know if it's good enough audio. You really see the face. It looks like it makes between Rumpelstiltskin and Thromama from the train. Okay, Dax found an old video of Delta. Yeah, and she's been interviewed for the quote "documentary" that Lily's making. I wish we could show it. We can't. I know. God. You know, Delta just said to me the other day, if there's ever a way I could be on the fact check again. I was like, I miss you on the fact check so much. I know. We can put a bag over her head. Yeah, that's amazing. So Delta, why don't you tell us what your favorite thing to do is? My favorite thing to do is play basketball. She's never played basketball. What is your, what are your talents? Multiple. My tell is I try to be like Lincoln because Lincoln does good stuff. It's so sweet. I'm trying to do it too much today. She re-things. Lily says, what are your talents? And she says, my talents are my talent is she switches it to singular. I just feel like Lincoln because Lincoln does good stuff. God. Yeah, I guess it's heartbreaking, but it's, but they got for videos. I know. Like there's no video of me doing anything. Me there. None of you. You guys had probably camcorders, right? We had those big camcorders, and you know, we put the tape in. Yeah. So there was some tapes, but they're all gone. They haven't been digitized. Uh-uh. It feels like something your mom would have done in her retirement is digitized to VHS. She needs to call block box. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What is it, Rob? Jesus. Well, I feel less bad. In him, Rob. Doesn't know something. It was called like safe lock. No. Legacy box. Legacy box. Are they still with us? Uh, they're, they're alive. Yeah. Oh, great. I don't know if they're with us though. You should y'all do your mom make out digitize our stuff, mom. Make me a milkshake. Yeah. I have a sandwich. And a sandwich too. And digitize everything. She should. She really should. Yeah. Um, but also it might be like lackluster back then. Like, I can't, I bet it was a mess. There would never have been a two camera. Like it would have been like a fifth grade, some singing or so, you know, something like that. In a van. There wasn't just random candid b-rolly shot like it is now. I don't think so. Yeah. But this is a ding, ding, ding, because time is sad as we know. Uh-huh. The passage of time. Yeah. And uh, yeah. It is a father because he's just so mean. He's strict. Yeah. He's strict. He's what is final. He won't lay up. Like he won't just like give us a break. No, his word is unwavering when he says the time has passed. It has passed. There's no going back. Yeah. So rude. Bridget, Bridget. Very, Bridget. Yeah. Stuck in his way. But I think it gives our life. It's meaning without it. What's the meaning? I have a wreck. Oh, it's here. And a curiosity. I hope you are. Are you watching Widows Bay? Oh, yeah. I think, I think I told, did I not tell you? Yes. I am. But okay. So pinning that that. Okay. Um, well pinning whichever, I guess. Oh, okay. Do we want to move forward with? We can come back to the other one. Widows Bay. Yes. I'm watching. I'm not caught up. Okay. No spoilers. Spoilers. Everyone's dead. Great. Um, it's like a comedy horror show. Oh, the comedy is comedy, though. Well, yeah. So funny. Well, it's Katie Dippled, who is so funny. She I used to watch her at UCB in the in my heyday all the time. Okay. She was a big star there. Yes. And um, she created it. and she is so funny. She wrote for Parks and Rack and she's just like, I think she's written some stuff for that Paul Fiega's directed. She's just brilliant. And so when I saw that it was her, it's like, oh, I got to watch this. And it's fantastic. Well, what I was so pumped about is Nancy from Blessus Mess. Do you remember Nancy on Blessus Mess? She works at the museum at the Widows Bay Museum. If you've seen the first episode you saw, they go to the museum and it's the history of the island. And what's so funny is, of course, which burning is a real black mark on Salem. But when she's walking this reporter through the museum, they get to this bloody outfit from a burned witch. And she said, oh, here's a source of great pride for us. We found them. We burned them. Her deliver you. Well, she was in bless this man. Yeah, she was one of our neighbors. And she was so I loved her so much. She was so fun. She needed to mean like a couple of scarves and stuff. She was a knitter. That's so cute. Yeah. Who's the actress? Nancy Lennahan. Oh, cool. And she's so good. Well, it's also shot. A lot of it's directed by, um, hero. Yeah, who did a lot of Atlanta. Yes. So it's just it's brilliant. Power powerhouse crew. Yes. Can't recommend it enough. It's so silly. It is, but it's also getting scaly. And it's Matthew Reese, one of our friends got so good. He's so, so, a movable feast. That's the name of his boat. Oh, in Manhattan. My God. Yeah. Check that episode on the archives. Give it a listen. He's so charming. He was he was COVID though. He wasn't in person. Was he? Yeah. God. So I really want. I want to sit with him. Okay. So back to what I was going to say about time. Yeah. Okay. So yesterday, I can say this because it's been announced. Um, Elizabeth came over because she's moving. Her and Andy are moving to France for a whole year. What's the opposite of we Lee? No, no, no, no, no, not a we we I know. And like, it's going to be great for them. They're going to have so much fun. It's a beautiful thing to do. And I'm well, they be podcasting from France. They will be okay. So that's so fun. Yeah. And like be very fun to listen along on their adventures. And you know, that'll be great. But I hate it, you know, I really hate it. But then it's, you know, Elizabeth is kind is is a cryer. Okay. She's her tears come easy. Okay. And, you know, she like gets out of the car. And she's like already like, I didn't bring I didn't wear mascara like on purpose. I know I'm going to cry. This is to tell you that they're moving. No, like it's just the last time I'll see her. Wait, they're moving tonight. Well, I leave on Friday. Okay. And then they leave like a couple, they leave like a week later while all gone. Oh, yeah, I should say. So this is the last time I'm going to see her before they leave until you go visit in front. Where are they moving in front? For Joe. But what tell me about border? That's the wine country. I guess. I don't know. Yeah. It's like there's wine there. Did I don't remember should I don't know much about it? I've never been. How did they pick that place? Okay. So they just wanted to be so close to the wine? No, they don't even really drink much. So they went last summer. It's always been a dream of Elizabeth's living France. So last summer, they went to just test the water. Yeah. They went to test the waters and try it out. And they loved it. But they had to come home a little earlier than expect because unfortunately, Andy's father passed away. So they they they came home. They loved it. But I didn't think they loved it that much. Right. Like I wasn't like, oh, like there's unfinished business. Everywhere I'm at on vacation, I'm certain I want to live there for a year. Exactly. I mean, everywhere I go. Virtually. I know. So she so I didn't expect this really. I thought they kind of got it out of their system last summer. Or like maybe they go back for another summer break, but like living for a whole year, I didn't expect it. And so anyway, she came over and she was she was like, I'm going to cry, you know, just she was like, oh, yeah. And there was another friend there, Sophia, who's kind of a new friend. So it was good. I was like, well, Sophia's here. She'll like buffer. And and Elizabeth was like, you know, she's kind of like, well, I don't that's not going to stop me. And also like, I don't need that. Yeah, let's go. Right. And so, you know, we talked a lot. And then does it make you nervous that she's going to cry because you feel obligated to cry and return? So okay, this is what we started talking about because I was like, you felt pressure. Well, I think Elizabeth was like, you better cry. Oh, well, that that's direct pressure. That's not even in your head. At one point you said that. And I was like, I'm not gonna. I said, I said, I'm not going to. Yeah. And then and Sophia was like, you better cry for her. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, no. Oh, no. And I, you know, I didn't. Yeah, I knew. I didn't. Oh, I didn't. And and she, you know, at the end, in 10 years, I think I've seen me cry like three or four times, four of the seven cries, I have seen me cry, like disproportionately, than most people. Right. And even still, yes, not that often. Correct. Yeah. Anyway, so I didn't cry at all. And then, you know, we were hugging by and I still wasn't crying. Where are you trying to make yourself? Could you feel yourself like focusing on your eyes? A little, a little. She was like, wow, not even not even a little, not even a little water in there. Yeah, not even a well up. Yeah. And I was like, well, it's, it's there. It's there. It's on the inside. You know, and it's a ding, ding, ding, to the graduation, Delta's graduation, where everyone was crying. And I wasn't crying. Yeah. And everyone, and I was like, some people are performing here, but really they weren't, you know, they just cry. And I, you're just self conscious that you weren't. Yeah. Of course. Yeah. And I, I, when I was sad, at the graduation, and I was sad last night, but I have a problem. Look, I know this very well. I'm like, you know, deaths and people getting arrested and friends dying. And yeah, I feel the pressure of someone like waiting for me to have this expected reaction reaction. And then kind of once that occurs to you that you're supposed to, for me, trains left the station. There's no reaching the cry point because you're now self conscious about not crying. Right. And that's just not the frame of mind to cry. I know. Like they say, you know, the trick in acting is to try your hardest not to cry. Exactly. I love that trick because I can do that. Yeah. Yeah. But then, but I'm, I was never good at crying as an actor. I'm caught between wanting to give another recommendation, but also wanting to talk about an actor I saw that was using menthol. And I don't ever want it to be exposed of who. I use menthol in employee of the month. I would have felt unethical about doing that like in parent note, but I did not feel on that go about doing it. Because I had one like I had one of a ring competition. And I thought it would be hilarious if I was just like uncontrollably sobbing at this victory. Yeah. And yeah, I use a lot of it. And my eyes were fucking on fire. And I was going to spray more. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't know. I just don't think I cry when I'm sad. You cry when you're mad. I cry when I'm mad. I'm frustrated. I'm frustrated. I cry. Wolf. No, never. I don't cry. Wolf. Blizz is at the window. She was there. Oh my god. I might cry right now because I'm being frustrated. I misunderstood. I don't want to frustrate you. Not for the break. Yeah. So yeah, I think I cry when I'm angry and I cry when I'm frustrated and I cry when I'm embarrassed. Oh, yeah. That's the first time I try. That's the first time I told you when I ran into the window. Yeah. I ran I went into the car and then I cried. Oh, you held your crying until the car. Yeah. I mean, I was walking to the car. Oh. So it was probably it was probably starting immediately, but no one had. When you turned back, I thought I saw what was the beginning of break. I definitely thought, ooh, like who cares about banging in the glass, but the look was like, oh, we're going to have some crying. Yeah. Yeah. And the sum people, what was the event that night? There was some was in town. Yes, Bob Mervak was in town. And it was the first time I ever met him. It was a long time and it just happened. Some people are quick triggers for me. As I said, I cried in front of you a fair amount. I've cried. My parents often can get me to cry. Yeah. Well, then this is consistent. Dad's. Yeah. I mean, Bill so far hasn't. He hasn't. Yeah. He will. I hope not. I don't have to cry in front of him. - Okay. I wanna be like-- - Will you let him hold you? - No! (laughing) I don't let my dad's hold me. No, no, no, no. Yeah, so anyway, I just feel like did she left and I was like, God, like-- - I need to cry more. - I can't, I wish I did, I wish I had cried then, but I wasn't gonna happen. - I don't cry out of sadness. - I cry out of my heart being touched as you know a lot. - Yes. - Yeah. Me too, I think that's more, that's definitely more likely than sadness, like if something's just like so overwhelmingly like sweet or beautiful, like life is beautiful, I cry at life is beautiful. - Oh, that's good. - Not the movie you've never seen it, but-- - Oh, just the beauty of life. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Like sports moment. The last phase I think for me to be a complete cryer is I have had two or three different moments in the last couple of years where I was so frustrated that I did have the feeling in my body of like, oh, if I could just ball right now, I would feel so much better at the end of this. Or sometimes there's like, there'll be the occasion where, again, in my mind, whether this is happening or not doesn't matter, I feel like all three of them are coming at me. And I am biting my tongue, yeah, overwhelmed, and maybe ganged up on, and I'm biting my tongues, I don't wanna make anything worse. And I do reach a point when I'm biting my tongue or I can feel my eyes are gonna betray me. Like I'm gonna start crying out of my anger and frustration. - You should let yourself, you should let yourself, because then everyone will stop being mean to you. - If you're like, oh, maybe we should. - Yeah, oh no, he's like crying. - What's so funny is I think half the time they'd have no idea, 'cause they don't know necessarily when I'm like fighting my hardest not to get involved or to say something, that's really hard for me. - Do you ever just decide to walk away? Like I am meant to. - Oh God, yeah. I go upstairs, I go upstairs for something, fucking all the time. - Yeah, yeah. - And I think it's a real patented dad. - Yeah, it's good to go upstairs, says a dad. - I go out to the garage. I always have to go out to the garage and just do one thing and then I get like a return. - Yeah, as long as you need a minute. - I like how generic I am. Some part of me I like that I'm like doing what all dads do. And then I, you know, makes me feel like I grew up. - Was you like quintessential image of a dad? - Well, that's what I was gonna say. I've never seen, I never saw my father parent in a relationship. - Mm-hmm. - I only saw him operate as a lone wolf in my mom. And then my step-dads, they didn't hold their tongue. You know, they yelled all the time and screamed and swore and said really nasty character assassinations of us a lot. But I've never seen the healthy version where it's like, oh yeah, dad's going up to the garage to check on, you know, a blank. - Right. - And now he's back and he's, now he's calm. You know, like, I don't know. - Interesting. I guess I've seen it in movies and in TV shows and I've seen it maybe in other people's family. And I just know I'm a part of like a great tradition. - When I think of dads, the first image I think of is in a store, a dad just sitting in whatever seat there is. Make shift seat. There's always a dad sitting. - I'll sit on the floor. - Yeah. - I mean, just sitting there waiting for everyone else to be the mom and the daughter to be done shopping. I mean, when we would all go to the outlet mom. - How could he do it? - I can't even do it. - He would, he wants to do it too. And then he's not going, most of the time he's not even going in any store. - Yeah. - She's just waiting outside the store while we go in store after the store. - 'Cause shopping is miserable. - But then why does he want to go? - I don't know. To be a good dad. - To spend time. - To spend time. - That's right. Sitting and getting exhausted in stores. - It's kind of so hot. - And watching the saved money disappear. - He's exactly, he's just sweating out there. It's like actually so sweet that he's just like going. - Real mench, yeah. - Just going to these stores for no reason. - Give it through it. - And even, he's never like, let's go. Like he never says, let's go. - And he's thinking it over and over again. And he's resisting. I wonder if he's ever had a solemn tear you missed. Like, and he's sitting in that chair. - I know. - It's just like, he wants to go like, oh God, no, like, let's leave, please let's leave. But then he doesn't, he already feels that complete angst of means stalk somewhere. - Does it? That's the thing about him. He's really strange. - Well, he's a better man than I am. - Yeah. - Well, maybe it's his Indianness. I don't know, but like, it's pretty wild. He just like, really. - He'll spend seven hours out with the guys. - Yeah. - And he doesn't buy one thing, right? And he doesn't pick anything, fuck that. - That's like being in an eight hour long, fucking cricket match, nothing's happening. - He likes cricket. - Maybe that's what that's, maybe that's what. - Well, he played. - Formatted him to be so tolerant of boredom. - I think they are just, I think Indian, well, I shouldn't say. I don't know. - I don't know. - I just think, well, maybe Indian med from Kerala, they just like know to go along with the women. - Yeah. - And they're like, it's fine. Like, it's fine. Just let them do. - I guess my question is, why would, why, yes, why doesn't, why would any of the women want us there? - I think he wants to be nearby. - 'Cause he only sees you on the weekends. And you guys want to spend the whole weekend shot? - Yeah. - Yeah. - Although now when I go home, he doesn't really come with us. Like if we go to TJ Maxx, he doesn't come. - Yeah, good. - He just meets us at dinner whenever. - Yes. - It's better, it's better. - Do the lunches drive to cars. He can't stop at home deep. - It's better. - But, yeah. - Can you imagine going to home deep all with him for seven hours? - No, I just, I would never do that. - Yeah. - And think about how much pain. - I mean, I did have to do that as a kid. It felt like seven hours, probably 20 minutes. - Yeah, 20 minutes. 'Cause that's how guys shout. They like already know what they want before they walk in. - I hated it. - I hated it. - No, imagine like really put yourself in a situation where you were at home deep for seven hours, three and a half movies. - Well, he must not hate it or he wouldn't come. - Or he's just like, he's like a monk. He can like just ignore the pain. - He can, I do think like really just like, he just like doesn't complain about anything. - Yeah, so nice. - It's pretty wild. - Yeah, it's hot, it's attractive. - I guess like, that's what you should be as a guy. - Yeah. - No complaining. - That's right, my therapist said to me, you should never say what about me. That's not your domain. - Well, I mean. - And I like, that's right. - Well, no, you're such a person. But he doesn't, I've never heard him say that before. - Yeah, it's not, you can do that. You are free to do that. - Yeah. - And then there are certain outcomes of that. And that's not, I don't want that outcome. - Yeah, but you also don't want resentment, you don't. - Well, I'm not going to get resentment as well. - But some people could, no, no, no. You could build a resentment like nobody's thinking about me. No one's even noticing me. No one cares what I think. - Well, you're not allowed to do that either because that's not grown up behavior either. - Right, that's going to be hard for some people. - Yeah, but like in pursuit of being a man, the definition my therapist and I have for me as a man. - Yeah. - Includes shutting the fuck up. No resentments, no pity party. - No, what about me? That's the strength that you're supposed to exude as a man. You're supposed to bring strength to this. And that's, we think that's just screaming and shoving other men. No, no, the strength is the restraint. - Yeah, well, this is good because it's, oh my gosh, it's a father's day. - Is it this Sunday? - Yeah. - Oh my God. - Rob, are you being spoiled? You're traveling too. - Yeah. - Why don't you feel like traveling nullifies the event? - Yeah, my birthday always is right on it too, right by it. - Oh, so you get triple screwed. Have Saturday, Sunday. - Okay. - What would you want to do this year? - Well, I don't know if it was last year of the year before, but I hosted a father's day party and it was tournaments. It was a volleyball tournament, a pickleball tournament and sideline shoulder massages. - That's nice. - In food and it was really quite fun. - Yeah. - I didn't know about sidelines. - You didn't know about the food. - I was curious to say. - Yeah, when you weren't playing pickleball, you were getting a shoulder massages. - That's cool. - Right? - I want one. - Because for a mother's day bringing all these people. - You do, yes. - And so we're not going to get pedicures and manicures, although we could in their fun. - Mm-hmm, they're fun. - I did them. - And you kind of need one. - I need one. - Well, you're always complaining about your toes. You're always complaining about them. - I don't even know if I would be in good conscious. Let someone touch my toes. - They probably want to. They're like, you know what? This is like Everest. You know, like they really, they want at them and they want to see what they can do. - Remember I spoke about, we could look this up now. - Uh-huh. - Rob, do you, can you control the TV? - Yep. - Chirkin. - Will you look like Malala and Zarna Garg? - Oh, Zarna, she's very funny. Do you know her? Remember I was telling you about the video? - Yeah. - Well, someone was nice enough to tell me what video I was watching. - Oh, yeah. - Yeah. - That's cool. Yeah, she's very funny. She's, people really love her. - We might be able to connect it to Dex's Mac studio. - I don't know if porn just popped up. - Oh, I love it. A man and a horse. - What's your thing these days? - That's my thing, yeah. I'm watching exclusively men and horses, but only kissing. - Oh, you draw the line. - Oh wow. - You gotta figure out how to get this audio to go through there though. - Oh boy. This is hard. - What happens if you hit play? - Just find out. - Yeah, no audio. - No audio. - Yeah. - All right, never mind. - Yeah, we're not as techy as we appear to be. - I guess I could have just looked it up on my phone. It would have been a lot easier. So Malana, I'm the world's leading almost therapist. Whatever your problem is, I can solve it. Just tell me what it is, let's go. - When I was 15, I was shot by the Taliban in Pakistan. - Okay, that happens. - And then, I'm in a different country in Italy for my surgeries. - Okay, that's all it's fun. - That's all it's fun, okay. - Yeah, new culture, new environment. I joined the school, but I couldn't make any friends I was really lonely. - Oh, because you were the problem. - So by the end of my school time, I had only made one friend. - You one friend, that's sad. - Sad for the friend who was stuck with you. And I was running on college at Oxford. - I said, I'm gonna make as many friends as possible. - Oh, Oxford, you went to Oxford? - See, yeah. - So what happened? - You didn't get into Cambridge? - It was hard for me to go to, I didn't see it. Right there, we just identified the first problem. You have dreams. Right? You know, I'm really sorry to just bring this up, but you suddenly you complain a lot. You're coming across a little whiny about the old girls. You need to be this in that situation. I think you've got shot once, you're fine. The other side of your face looking great. So as I can tell, everything is fine, you're welcome. - The other side of your face. - You're fine, thank you, you're welcome. So you got shot in the face. - Oh, yeah. - I love that accent. It's so pleasing. - Do you like it or it isn't making nervous? - I mean, it makes me nervous, obviously. It makes me nervous when you listen to it. - It does. - That means you won't be able to help yourself. - To do it. There's something so pleasing and melodic about it. - I mean, it's very. - Malala. - Dick. - It is melodic, it's sing songy. That's the, I think is maybe a pejorative way of saying it. Maybe. - No, but it is. - But it's sing songy, it has a real. - That's as close, that's like as safe as I can. - You want me to, it's Father's Day, you want me to let you do it. Go ahead. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's how my Father's Day wish. - What is? - Horse born. - Great. - Kiss me. - We can make that happen. - Really passionate kissing between a man and a horse. - Oh my God, all right, let's do some facts. - Stay tuned for more armchair expert. If you dare. (upbeat music) - To Zee-Wol. - What a stud, what a gorgeous. - He got it. - Awesome. - Good job, Toto. - They're such a cool couple. - They are. - You see them in the 300-Selmer Sadies that old-ass Mercedes. - The one that he said he would take me in? - Yeah, they drive around Monaco in it. They're always dressed to the nine. - What color is it? - Silver. - The one we saw on Instagram, that time was green. - Yeah, that was like a. I don't want to bore you a rest on mod version of home. So they were free to make it any color. 'Cause they already altered it. - Now they can't. - Well, no, if you have a mint condition unaltered, you don't want to change the paint color. - Oh. - You would be degrading the value. - So now you're ever made green originally. - Correct, that was, and nor they had put like a cool engine in it and bigger, you know, they did what I do to cars. - Right. - So am I supposed to want an original or a souped up one? - It's a tricky one 'cause those cars, I'm ballparking, but I think a goal-wing 300, that's got to be like a three to five million dollar car. I think, and if you chopped it all up and put all this school stuff in it, it would probably be worth like 800,000. So you would be losing two and a half million dollars of the value to have the car you wanted. - Yeah. - Like if I take my Lincoln, it wasn't worth a lot of money before I did all that shit to it. - Yeah. - None of my car. - But now it's worth more, it feels like. Oh, you're saying because it wasn't worth a lot. - Exactly, 'cause you're not getting it to be completely pristine and original. - Well, this is interesting because I've never been in this position normal. I'm normally on the other side of this, where I don't care about the value. I want to like what I'm driving in and what it looks like. - That's how I feel. Yeah. - That's why I don't get those kind of cars. - All right. - I would never want to get a kind of car that I'm making less valuable by making it better. - Uh-huh, uh-huh, all right. - I'd rather just buy. - So if like Toto and Susie buy me one. - Uh-huh. - And then I have you super up. - Uh-huh. - It'll probably be mad about that. They will be bummed. Yeah, that you can make a couple million dollars disappear. - Okay, well, I'm in a pickle, okay. Anyway, she was amazing. - She was, she was amazing. - Sounds like a fun family too. - I know. - And remember she was talking to Isle of Man TT? - Yes. - That started last weekend. - Did you watch any? - And Brad was there and Channing, and they were filming. - No. - Yeah. - For their new thing. - I think they're making a movie about, I don't know if it's both of them, but I think Channing was filming something for a movie about Isle of Man. - Oh my God, I wonder if it's a dog or a. - Oh wow. - I doubt it'd be a dog with Channing in it, or it would be the point, right? - Oh, he was starring. I thought he meant like, he was like directing it. - No, he was on a motorcycle in Leather's. - Oh. - I'm presuming filming him, yeah. - Wow. - Yeah. - Cool. Okay, some facts. The Topo Chico shortage. - Mm-hmm. Yikes. - Crisis. - Yeah. Okay, a nationwide shortage of Topo Chico, original mineral water is affecting store shelves and bars in the U.S. Coca-Cola suspended production of its flagship sparkling water at its Monterey, Mexico facility to perform well stabilization and facility upgrades. Supplies are expected to remain extremely limited through late 2026. - Yeah, this is a big boy. I feel like the well went dry. You're not telling us. - I know. CNN said America's running out of Topo Chico mineral water. - Well, we love Topo Chico. - I know. - We have bottles in that fridge just accruing value. - What are we gonna do when they're, I know. - We're gonna auction them. Remember people paid it in sane amount of money for original Coke? - Oh, yeah. - When they switched to new Coke, people were spending like preposterous amounts of money on a 12 pack. - This is just like Liberty. - It is. - Oh my gosh. - And we're sitting on a stop aisle. - How many do we have? - At least six or eight. - Okay, two. - And we're down to two. - Oh no, not even one for each of us. Fuck. - No, no, no. - This is horrible news. - Okay, um, oh, if you drink sparkling water, do you not have to pee as much? - Sure. - That was Topo's theory. It actually says fizzier sparkling water contains dissolved carbon dioxide. This results in an acidic solution that may increase urinary urgency. Irritate your bladder. - Irritate your bladder. - Are advices to one of your intake of one of these to one glass a day? - Oh, wow. I think, well, Topo's only drinking bubbly water. But look, do I believe that what you just read or just looking at the man? Whatever he's doing. - Uh, it's true, but we don't know about his peeing. - Prove is in the pudding. - That is true. - Do you have any sparkling water? I don't want to wake up every night to put pee and wake up. And then I can't concentrate on the team. I'm the cutest little boy ever made. Watch me jump, watch me play. - Oh. - Do you think he ever said that stuff? - It sounds so different. - Oh, okay. I said something out of school. I left it in, and I want people to know. I know it was wrong. - What did you leave in? - So her grandfather was paralyzed, remember? From the waist down. And then he got in an accident, broke his ankle or something. - Okay. - He said like, "Oh, I mean, it doesn't matter or something." But it does. Then I looked it up, like if you're paralyzed and you break your leg, do you still have to do anything and you do? Still requires medical treatment. I just was like, maybe if there's no pain, you could just heal on its own. - That's definitely the silver lining of getting a broken leg in your paralyzed. - Right. - But it's not nothing. - It's not nothing. But it's definitely less than if you're fully able-bodied. - Yeah. The current F1 car you said weighs about 980 kilograms. A current Formula One car has a minimum weight limit of 768 kilograms. Dislimate applies to the car and driver combination, but excludes fuel. 2026 reset. The current generation of cars is noticeably lighter than the previous era, dropping 32 kilograms from 800 kilograms minimum seen in 2025. - That's getting how many kilograms of fuel they carry. I think they have like a hundred kilos of fuel. - The fuel does an F1 car. - I think filled up there in the 900s. - Okay. It carries a maximum of 110 kilograms of fuel. - Okay. - Because mid-race refueling is banned this maximum amount must last the entire race taking the cars about 300 kilograms. - Did my Botox guys say I have a thick neck? I don't think he used the word thick like I did, but he did come, he basically was like, it's the acutally strong muscles, but he was saying that because the neck was thick. - So he said you have really strong muscles and you heard my neck, do you think? - Well, no, 'cause we're trying to make it smaller. The whole point of the Botox was to make-- - I'm trying to imagine if you succeed at giving yourself a pencil neck, how wild that'll be. - Well, it's more, it's not really about the neck so much as it is like this in here. Yeah, exactly, but this is like very strong. - Wow. - That's it, your elite muscle mass is all in your neck. - My neck, exactly. He grabs it, he grabs it and says that. - All you need me to handle is you. - I gave him permission, I like him a lot. - He processes you like a chicken. - Yeah, he does, and I appreciate it. Okay, was she two tenths or one tenth away when she finished that practice session? You said to it, yeah, point two. - Okay, two tenths. - That's what I see as well. - Kimmy and Max's qualifying lap at Monaco, second to last, qualifying lap, 0.003. - No. - 3,000-- - That can't even-- - No. - 3,000 of a second. - How can they even measure that? - I know. - That is so-- - I mean, losing pull. - No, that makes me want to die, actually. - By something that's way less than a blink of an eye. - Exactly. - Way, way less. - You can't even do it, we can't even like-- - You initiate the blink of an eye and you're at 0.003. - Whoa. - That's the margin, man. It blows my mind. You have two different teams. Each team has 1,000 employees. The cars are completely one-offs. They're not the original part. Everything's original for each team. All these variables-- - I know. - And they land 0.003 often. - That is so crazy. - That doesn't feel real. - I know. - Okay. - Oh. - Okay, those are the facts. - Yeah, those are the facts we have a story. - Yeah, we have a little bit of a story about Susie, which is when we walked her out. Lincoln was hiding in the bushes. She knew Susie was here and she wanted to meet her. - Yeah. - She's a super enough one now, which I thought was so adorable. - Yes. - So she comes out and she meets Susie and they're chatting and Susie says, like, who's your favorite driver? And she says, Kimmy, of course, Kimmy Antonelli. And for people who aren't following enough one, there's the cutest human being on planet Earth is currently destroying. He's 19 years old, Kimmy Antonelli. He's Italian. He lives with his family at home in San Marino. - Oh, my God. - And he's a little boy. - Yeah. - And he's dominating. And he's so cute and friendly. - So I mean, Lincoln says Kimmy and Kimmy drives from Mercedes. - Right. - Which total is the team principal of? - Yes. - And Susie said, oh, well, we're in town because we have a Mercedes event tomorrow. Would you wanna meet Kimmy? - Yeah. - And Lincoln immediately started crying. - Wow. It's a powerful one. - Who is like, I love, her response was just to start crying. - Yeah, it's like an overwhelming offer. - Yes. - Yeah. - So we went, so then we were gonna go to the event. And then the next day you and I were recording all day long. So it's like I wasn't able to connect with Susie, but all these flurry of texts I had missed, I now see, by the way, they all do WhatsApp, right? - Oh, yeah, true. - Which I forget to tag, check. So anyways, Susie's like, okay, bad news. The event's 21 and over. So Lincoln can't really come to the event. But we're gonna be hanging in this hotel room for an hour before the event. You wanna come by the hotel room. And I'm like, well, this is so much better. - Yeah. - I've been like being at a big noisy event and staying around awkwardly. And so I go, yeah, absolutely. I would tell me what time it's like at five. And I'm like, perfect, I'll be there, it's downtown. So then they come in and I tell Lincoln like, okay. So this is a situation. It's not the event, but we're gonna go hang. And she goes, I know. - Yeah. - No, I can't. - That's too much. - It was too stressful for her. And I'm like, listen, love. I don't really push you to do much, but you're gonna, we're going to meet coming out tonight. - Yeah. - This is this opportunity coming in and covering up. There's so much funny stuff. We ride down there on the motorcycle 'cause traffic's fucking horrendous and we gotta go downtown. So it's like, we're gonna take the motorcycle. We get to the event. It's at the Soho House warehouse, which I didn't even know they had. It's so cool. - Oh. - There's a really cool warehouse downtown that the Soho House has. So we park the motorcycle. It's a pain in the ass to try to get two helmets in the back bag, the top box on the motorcycle. So of course, I'm just gonna carry them. And Lincoln's like, no, no, put the helmets away. And I go, wait, watch. I don't want to, I don't want us to have helmets. You know, like the stakes were so high. - But that's cool. - I told her that. I go, what are you talking about? It's so much cooler to walk in. We're both holding helmets. - Oh, yeah. - You ride motorcycles and you're like, no. And here's where as a dad, you just gotta go like, okay. - That's what she wants. - Yeah, this is great lesson she's teaching. - Yeah. - She's wrong? - Right. - I know she's wrong. - Yeah. - And who cares is how she wants to do it. - Yeah. - So we put the helmets away when I'm gonna talk about the fact that we ride. When we can't talk about the fact that we're. (laughing) - Oh my God. - We go into this room. And I'm also, look, I hope I'm really conscious of the fact that like, I don't want to bump a famous person out. I don't want to complicate his downtime before he has to do this event with me and my kid. - Yeah. - And so I'm planning on being like, whatever man. We'll talk to Toto and Susie or whatever. But we walk in, he immediately comes up and introduces himself. He's so likable and outgoing and kind. He engages Lincoln right away in conversation. And they sit on a couch and just chat. He's showing her pictures on the phone. He's talking about how to race cars. And I'm just hearing little glimpses. And it's just so cute to hear my little girl like, oh, I know, you're up so hot. You know, just how she's just responding. And so then Toto is videoing them. - Yeah, secretly. - Secretly. - Yeah. - And he's like, shut up, shut up because I'm talking to the other guy from Austria. And he's like, shut up, shut up. He was, we're gonna show them this video at their wedding and embarrass them. (laughing) - So, in that moment I was like, oh my God, what if Lincoln married Kimmie Antonelli? And then he is thought, oh my God, what if my son-in-law is an everyone? - I know. - One driver that fucking fun will have. - And not only just an F1 driver like in a incredible life. - That'd be a legend, soon to be a legend F1 driver. - Oh, I really hope she marries him. - I was starting to lock into how these kings felt and friends were like, you're gonna pair up your kid with something that you're gonna love this family. - I know, see? It's easy to do. - It's slippery slow. - Yeah. - It's easy to arrange marriage to all that thing. That's so cute. - It was the sweetest night. And I just, I want to scream from the rooftops, this generosity that this young man showed to my daughter. I am so grateful for. He's such a little gentleman, he's so kind, in sweet. And it just was a real fucking. - It's incredible. - Gift of all gifts. - Thank you, Susie, for the invite, what an incredible. - Oh, then one more talk, funny total thing. So then they had to go do stop. They're in and out of the room, right? - Yeah. - Was all the Kimmy stuff happened before Susie ever arrived? So then soon as Kimmy had to leave, he was like, "Oh, let's go, let's go." Basically like, we got the yes. You know, like, it was a success. Let's get out of here before I inverse myself kind of thing. - Right, right, which is wise. - Yeah, I understand this right. So then we, Lincoln and I are leaving, we're departing. And we're getting on the elevator and he goes, "Where are you going?" We have the event. And I go, "Oh, no, it's 21 and over." And he goes, "No, no, no, you're staying." Come here, everyone out. Come on, what are you staying? And we go, "No, we don't, we don't want the rules broken." - Yeah. - And also he's got homework. He's like, "No, no, he does aren't the rules." He got into total mode. Like, you're coming to this event. - Oh my God. - We did not, we went home. Do you know who's at the event? - Brad. - Brad. - And that's why Kim Kardashian. - KK. - Have you ever heard of Kardashian? - Not like that. - He too, 'cause she's dating Louis Hampton. He's at Ferrari. - Oh yeah. - But she was at the Merced Sad House. - You know what? It might have been a different car. - No. - No. - I'm not sure it was Kim or-- - Chloe, or Candle, or-- - Don't say that 'cause we want all of them on the show. - Okay, for niece. - Okay, well, that sucks. You didn't get to hang out with Brad. - That's fine. - And probably the moment he was gonna ask you to be in his movie. - He's like, "Hey, are you busy next week?" And I'm going to my auntie to shoot this movie. I need you, but I was there. But it was great, 'cause the whole night was for Lincoln. You know what I'm gonna bring? - That's great. You know what I'm saying? We took a cab here. - Yeah. - You wanna get out of here, okay? - Wow. Well, what a good time. - I love her. I love her so much. - We love her. - We love her. - Yeah. - We absolutely love her. And I hope Lincoln and Kimmy get married. I'm putting up there. - Yeah, I know. - I don't mind. I'm signing off. - Yeah. All right. - Love you. - Love you. (dramatic music)