Driver61 Podcast

This podcast is a conversation with Willem Toet, Head of Aerodynamics at the Benetton team in 1994.

I wanted to talk with Willem to understand exactly what was going on in the team at the time, whether the allegations of cheating with traction control and launch control were true, and what was really going on underneath Benetton’s engine cover.

This podcast is a conversation with Dominic Hale, project lead at Alpine, where we talk about Fernando Alonso driving a Formula One car at Le Mans in 2021. 

I wanted to know if Fernando Alonso was really pushing, how they adapted the car for such an unusually long and fast circuit, and what was the lap time—would it be quicker than LMP1s or Hypercars? The team also shared the lap time data with me - and it’s fascinating. The team were very well prepared - they’d run many simulations and had engineered the car to be as fast as possible on this incredible circuit.

This podcast is a conversation with Ralph Hogenbirk, Dutch Drone Gods, where we talk about how Red Bull recently raced a Formula 1 car against a drone - and it wasn’t just in a straight line, it was around the Silverstone circuit - one of the fastest tracks, with the fastest corners on F1’s calendar.

It’s a circuit where Formula 1 cars are very much at home, a track where they’re 42 seconds a lap faster than a McLaren Senna. 

But, in this race, the drone was WAY faster.

This podcast is a conversation with Stephen Mitas (Technical Project Lead) to understand exactly HOW the Porsche was faster than F1, and smashed a 35-year-old Nurburgring lap record.

It’s crazy stuff, they took their already, extremely fast LMP1 car, and made it over 12 seconds faster at Spa -- that’s 11%, a huge amount in motorsport.

This podcast is a conversation with Rosco McGlashan who is trying to break 1,000 miles per hour on land. He has so much passion and grit for motorsport and engineering, that I think he might just do it. 

I spoke to him to understand how he has gone from a rocket-powered, 250 mph go-kart to designing a 200,000 horsepower vehicle with the potential to break 1,000 mph - and the engineering behind it.