Lovecars On the Grid. Global Motorsport Podcast

Welcome to episode 9 of the Lovecars On The Grid Podcast! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back again to give you a roundup of the motorsport events from the past week!  

We of course have to kick off with Formula 1, where we've had testing in Barcelona for the 2022 season. Meanwhile, both Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton have been voicing their opinions over the Michael Masi saga. Hamilton has been voicing his opinions on having non-biased stewards, while Verstappen has been expressing his opinion that race director, Michael Masi has been thrown under the bus!  

In the testing, we saw some good lap times from Ferrari, Mercedes and the other teams, but Alpine didn't seem to set any lap times, with Fernando Alonso even catching fire during testing! There's lots of talk about Nikita Mazepin not being part of the opening Grand Prix, and Pietro Fittipaldi replacing him temporarily. We don't think Russian drivers should be penalised for the horrible events in Ukraine! What would you do with the Mazepin situation? Haas have of course lost their main Russian sponsor already.  

The World Rally Championship was taking place out in Sweden this weekend too. With 21 year old, Kalle Rovanpera winning with his co-driver Jonne Haltunen.  Indycar had an eventful weekend at St. Petersburg. With Kiwi driver, Scott McLaughlin taking the first win of the season.   

Following Tiff's return from Daytona, NASCAR was at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California. We had some spins at 180MPH. With Tiff's favourite, Kyle Larson fighting for 1st place and ended up putting his team mate, Chase Elliot into the wall!   

Coming up, we have NASCAR in Las Vegas! Moto GP is back at the Qatar GP, without Valentino Rossi sadly! We also have GP2 and GP3!

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Welcome to episode 8 of the Lovecars on the Grid podcast! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back with another roundup of motorsport events from the past week!  

One of our presenters is in a slightly different setting this week, as Tiff reports from a sunny Daytona Beach, Florida, with the motorsport passion team! Has Tiff picked the best time to leave the UK weather?  

We kick off with the breaking news from this week! The FIA have finally come to their senses, and following the events at the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Race Director Michael Masi has gone! Finally, the governing body of Formula 1 admitted a mistake, but this won't change the result between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen for the F1 World Championship!  

With Masi out, the FIA have announced that not one, but two directors will replace him! The new race directors will be Eduardo Freitas, who held the same role in the World Endurance Championship (WEC), and Niels Wittich, who was the race director in the German Touring car series, DTM.  With new race directors taking turns to do each race in the 2022 season, who will be the top 3 drivers in this year's season? We have no cars, engine developments and even new drivers, too! It's a shame we can't see what happens in testing this week!  

It would be rude not to talk about the Daytona 500 with NASCAR. There are a few new, younger drivers driving these cars around the oval at 200MPH. There were plenty of crashes in the season opener, including some with the Infinity Series. In the main race, victory was taken by Rookie Austin Cindric, who beat Bubba Wallace in his Ford, after being pushed by team mate Ryan Blaney.  

Extreme E was back in Saudi Arabia, at the desert e-prix. The final race resulted in a red flag after World Rallycross star, Tanner Foust crashed his McLaren into the back of a competitor, with not being able to see with the dust. The race was won by X11, Nico Rosberg's team.  Over in the Middle East, the Formula 4 UAE and Regional European Formulas concluded, with a win for Charlie Wurz, with British driver, Aiden Neate finishing the Championship in 3rd place. In the Regional European Formula, brother of Ferrari Formula 1 driver, Arthur LeClerc Won the championship there.  

Coming up, we have so many exciting events to look forward to, with F1 testing, World Rally Championship in Sweden, Indycar in St. Petersburg and NASCAR in Fontana, California!

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Welcome to episode 7 of the Lovecars On The Grid Podcast! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back for another weekly roundup of the motorsport action from the past week.  

This week, it's a valentines special, although there's no love for FIA's Michael Masi, as the controversy continues over the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.   Yes, the debate over the rulings at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix continue. An audio file has been uncovered showing that both Red Bull and Mercedes were coaching Michael Masi's decisions. Michael could've turned his radio off though, and didn't have to respond to the pressure from the Team Principals! We can't move on until justice is made!   

We can all agree, both Lewis Hamilton fans and Max Verstappen fans, that Michael Masi made a mistake. We just want fair racing! Verstappen deserved to win, but the ultimate race was decided by the fault of the stewards. The excitement continues with Formula 1 though, as we have new 2022 season cars being released this month!  

In Formula E, we had their round in Mexico at the weekend. The Porsche team appeared to get their strategy right, winning their first race in the sport. Congratulations to Pascal Wehrlein and Andre Lotterer for taking 1st and 2nd in a very entertaining race! Should there be DRS in Formula E?  Over in the Middle East, we had 2x four hour races in Dubai, with some wins for British drivers in the GT racing categories. We also had Formula Regional races, with wins for Charles LeClerc's brother, Arthur.   

Next weekend, Tiff is off to Daytona! One of the jewels in the racing calendar! With new cars, central locking wheels and Kyle Larsson back in action! We also have Extreme E coming back with what sounds like new teams!

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Welcome to Episode 6 of the Lovecars On The Grid Podcast! 

Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back with another roundup of motorsport events from the past week! 

 Firstly, it's a special day for Paul. A very Happy Birthday!   

In Formula 1, Lewis Hamilton has broke his radio silence! Giving us a strong indication that he will be back on the grid this year! Meanwhile, in the FIA, there's no news on Michael Masi as race director. There's a series of meetings taking place at the FIA to determine the result of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix and reshuffle the structure, but why is it taking so long?   

We've had new car launches too, with Haas launching their car for the 2022 season.   

In the Autosport Awards, it was a good night for British motorsport, with awards to Zak O'Sullivan, who has only raced in Britain! Zak will be going into Formula 3 with Carling racing this year! Ash Sutton received the award for National Driver of the Year, too!  This weekend also featured the Race of Champions, won by Sebastian Loeb, who beat Formula 1 driver, Sebastian Vettel to take the win!  

In NASCAR, we had the LA clash, with the 7th generation of cars, with locking wheels and 5-speed sequential gearboxes. The win went to Joey Lagano.  

This weekend, we have the Formula E race in Mexico City, hopefully we'll have some excitement there!

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Welcome to episode 5 of the Lovecars On The Grid Podcast! Our second season is back, with Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman giving you a roundup of the motorsport events from the past week!  

We kick off with the Formula 1 and the FIA! The issue that happened at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix is still ongoing! Why is this report taking so long to come out? How long will this continue? Still, there are no comments from Lewis Hamilton or Max Verstappen on the subject.  

Elsewhere in the FIA, they've crowned the first Winners of the WRC Talent Search, crowning Romet Jurgenson winning a season drive in an M-Sport Rally3 Ford Fiesta. We love to see these academies bringing through the young drivers with talent!   Looking at the teams, Red Bull look to be continuing their relationship with engine manufacturer, Honda. The FIA are making Covid-19 jabs mandatory in Formula 1.   

The Formula E started their 2021/2022 Championship in Diriyah, Saudi Arabia. The Win went to Mercedes with their driver, Nyck de Vries.  

The Daytona 24H took place this weekend too, with lots of cars in different classes to watch, including 30 British drivers on the grid! Helio Castroneves, Tom Blomqvist, Oliver Jarvis and Simon Pagenaud shared the win for Meyer Shank Racing, which was an emotional win, as it's the first win for 10 years! There was also an epic Porsche battle!  

Coming up next week, we still have the younger drivers out in the FormulaE UAE and Formula Region Asia series'. We also have NASCAR kicking off, along with the Autosport Awards, too!  

If you've got any questions you'd like to ask Tiff for next week, make sure you ask them in the comments!

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Welcome to episode 4 of season 2 of the Lovecars On The Grid motorsport podcast! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back with another roundup of motorsport events from the past week!  

This week, we have a huge amount to cover. From the Monte Carlo Rally, to news from Formula 1 and the FIA, plus some pre season testing in Abu Dhabi and in the USA with Daytona!  

Kicking off with news from the FIA. We've been chasing an update since the Formula 1 finale at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in 2021. The whole Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton fiasco, where both drivers have been remarkably quiet about the whole situation. Elsewhere though, fans are threatening to boycott the FIA! Will Hamilton be at the first race of the season? The first change from the FIA is that race fans won't know who the race director is, plus there will be no communication broadcasted between race director and team principals.  

The Monte Carlo Rally was surprisingly dry this year, with some snow and ice for some added excitement! The rally in the French Riviera gave us a battle between the two retired drivers, Sébastien Loeb and Sébastien Ogier. The Win went to Sébastien Loeb and his co-driver, Isabelle Galmiche in their Ford Puma Hybrid for the Ford M Sport team, with team cars also finishing in 3rd and 5th place. Welsh driver, Elfyn Evans was able to win a stage, but a crash prevented him to continuing. Galmiche is the first female in 25 years to Win the Monte Carlo Rally!  

Back at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi, we had the Formula 4 UAE, where the younger drivers are getting experience for their cars in the other series. Drivers are able to test for four weekends in the UAE for the Winter Season. Should Winter testing be banned? We have three British drivers out of the 27 drivers in total. The other season at Yas Marina was Formula Regional Asian, that has a similar format, allowing testing. Amongst drivers are Charles Leclerc's brother and Juan Pablo Montoya's son! There was some questionable, track limits driving, with driver's receiving 10 second penalties for exceeding track limits. We like Tiff's idea of reducing the car's power automatically for exceeding track limits though! What would your solution be?  

Over the pond in the USA, we had the road before the 24 race at Daytona, as we build up to the Daytona 24H this weekend. Ricky Taylor took pole, with Will Stevens as his co-driver. Kamui Kobayashi took second place, ahead of next weekend.  

Next weekend, Formula E returns, with a very snazzy advertisement. Make sure you check it out! This season is the last one with the Gen 2 car. There's a new qualifying format, with a knockout system. Audi have now taken their team out of Formula E, but Maserati are joining Formula E from the 2022/2023 season.

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Welcome to episode 3 of the 2022 season of Lovecars On The Grid! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back for another roundup of this weeks motorsport!  

This week, we have more Formula 1 news and the FIA! There's also the Dakar rally, and more to look forward to in the coming weeks!  

We kick off with the Le Mans 24H virtual race! Formula 1 Champion, Max Verstappen was favourite to win, but after leading and being too heavy on the curbs, the Red Bull driver lost out to British racing driver, Oliver Rowland.  

In Formula 1, we've had an announcement from the FIA that Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff is in meetings to discuss the race in Abu Dhabi that ended the season in 2021. There's also been Zoom meetings taking place at the FIA to discuss Michael Masi's place in the sport. Mistakes took place in other races too, at Brazil and at Silverstone, not just in Abu Dhabi! Should Masi be outed from the FIA? Is there someone who can replace him?  The final decision following the enquiry into the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix will be announced on 18th March, four months after the race took place! Elsewhere, Aston Martin have appointed Mike Crack as the Team Principal for the 2022 season.  

The Dakar Rally ended last week, after a spectacular few days in the desert in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Nasser Al-Attiyah won the race for the cars in his Toyota, having competed 18 times in the Dakar. On the motorbikes, Sam Sunderland won it for the British! In the trucks, the Kamaz team were leading all the way through!   

We of course had the Dubai 24 hour race at the Dubai Autodrome this weekend. With Audi taking the 1st and 2nd place spots. Out of the 320 drivers, there were only 7 British drivers!  

Coming up, we have the 90th Monte Carlo rally taking place next week, with drivers such as Sebastien Loeb, Oliver Solberg and Toyota driver, Elfyn Evans all taking part. We of course have the hybrid cars in this season, offering an extra 100HP.

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Welcome to the second episode of the new season of Lovecars On The Grid! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are back with another podcast, bringing you a roundup of the latest motorsport updates from around the World! 

This week, we look at a positive decision from the FIA for a change at Dakar, plus some news from Formula 1!  

Kicking off at Dakar, the FIA actually got a decision right for a change! Jutta Kleinschmidt is the new President of the Cross Country Rally Commission and coincidentally was the first Woman to win the Paris-Dakar rally in 2001. We heard at the start of this year's Dakar rally that Audi Sport and their driver, Carlos Sainz were unhappy about the sport being unbalanced towards their EV car entrant, the RS Q e-tron.   Kleinschmidt quite rightly responded to this, completely denying that their is a disadvantage for the EV team, and urged the rally to continue as normal. Some common sense from the FIA for a change!  

Should we get a former Formula 1 Champion to head the FIA Formula 1 division!  Elsewhere at the Dakar, we've had 2 stages cancelled due to the weather and visibility, but overall been run incredibly well by the FIA under Kleinschmidt mastery. Ironically, Sainz and the Audi have now actually won three stages, too!   

Just four stages to go before the finish on Friday! Come on the British that are taking part!  

In Formula 1, we have news! Otmar Szafnauer, Team Principal for Aston Martin F1 team has left the team. There were rumours about him moving to Alpine, but nothing has been confirmed yet. 

In other news, Australian Racing Driver, Renee Gracie has announced that she's looking to restart her racing career and trying to get into NASCAR! The driver has had 3 years out in the adult entertainment business. Good luck to her!   

Elsewhere in British F4, Matias Zagazeta, who came second in F4 this year, is hoping for a seat in the higher racing divisions too!  

The GT cars kick off their season with the Gulf 12 hour race, with our friend, Oli Webb achieving 1st place in his GT4 class and 11th place overall!

Next weekend, the GT3 cars move to the Dubai 24H race, with 87 cars taking part! Then, at the end of the month we have the Daytona 24H race and the Monte Carlo rally to look forward to!  

We're going to switch it up next week and bring on ex-BBC Top Gear Stig, Ben Collins to the podcast! 

Make sure you tune in next week to hear Tiff Needell discuss with Ben Collins!

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Welcome to the Lovecars On The Grid Podcast! Happy New Year from Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman, and welcome to Season 2 of our podcast! It's technically episode 42, but with a New Year, we're starting a new Season! Thank you for all of your support on our podcast so far, we really do appreciate it!  

In this week's motorsport roundup, the guys cover the Dakar Rally, Formula 1, BTCC and more!  

It wouldn't be our podcast without kicking off with Formula 1, where we have yet more controversy in the sport! Back at Spa in Belgium in 2021, we had a 3 lap procession, which was then called off, due to the weather. 70,000 fans were left disappointed after waiting in the rain, and unfortunately won't be getting any refund as a result! This is as a result of a decision by Liberty Media, who instead are offering a prize draw to win 1 of 170 seats at next year's Grand Prix. Poor show from Liberty Media!  

The Dakar rally is kicking off in Saudi Arabia, with some action before the race even started, with a service crew car involved in an explosion, with members airlifted to hospital. Officials haven't ruled out criminal activity yet, we wish a speedy recovery to all of those involved. Carlos Sainz is in his electric powered, Audi RSQ E-Tron, the first of it's class in the Dakar Rally with some disagreements between Audi and the race officials over the rules of the rally. Sainz actually got lost looking for a weigh station, and is currently 2 hours behind, in 48th place! He wasn't the only driver to get lost though, as teams aren't allowed to use satellite navigation systems, relying only on maps in their given road book that day.   

If you're a fan of this kind of motorsport, we plan to cover some grass roots motorsport events in our upcoming TV show, so keep your eyes peeled for that! Should we put Tiff into an endurance race? What do you think? Let us know too, if you have access into anything interesting for us! 

  It's an interesting time of the year for Formula 1, as young drivers start signing up for Formula 2 and Formula 3, could these be the future F1 stars? We can of course look at the Autosport Awards for future talent too, with George Russell and Lando Norris winning awards in the past, before they became stars in Formula 1. Names such as Jonny Edgar, Zak O'Sullivan, Louis Foster and Oli Webb are all nominated for the driver of the year awards, so these could be our future stars!  

In Touring Cars, Jake Hill has signed up to West Surrey Racing team, who are powered by ROKiT and partnered with the new NAPA sponsor.

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Welcome to Episode 41 of the Lovecars On The Grid podcast! Tiff Needell and Paul Woodman are here with another episode, with a motorsport roundup of events from the past week!  

It's been Christmas week, so very quiet from a motorsport front, but still lots to talk about from the FIA with Formula 1 and other sports, too. The FIA seems to be going through an interesting period, after Frenchman, Jean Todt moved on from being in charge of the FIA for 12 years, bringing in Mohammed Ben Sulayem as the new FIA President. Then of course we had the controversy between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen in the last race of the season at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Furthermore, both Ross Braun and Pat Symonds are leaving Formula 1, who were two figures behind the new, 2022 car. In addition to this, Belgian FIA Rally Director, Yves Matton also quits!  

What also doesn't help, is that a petition has been launched on Twitter to get Michael Masi out of the FIA, following his decisions at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Should he stay? What do you think? To make matters even worse, Nicolas Latifi, who was the driver that crashed, causing the safety car at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, has been receiving death threats for what happened to Lewis Hamilton following the incident! Of course, Latifi didn't intend to crash!  Paul then gives us some stats on Formula 1 for our Christmas Quiz! Comparing Max Verstappen beating Lewis Hamilton to Fernando Alonso beating Michael Schumacher in 2005. Did you also know that Nikita Mazepin received 234 blue flags in the 2021 season!   

World Rally Championship is back on 23rd January, with French Rally driver Sebastian Loeb driving for Ford in the new Puma rally cars. The cars this season will be hybrid for the first time, too, which will make for an interesting season for WRC with 100HP boosts from the hybrid system.   

In the British Touring Cars Championship, NAPA Auto Parts are using BTCC as a launch platform for their business in the UK market, which will give BTCC a real boost, allowing drivers to be paid to be full time BTCC drivers, as opposed to drivers using their own sponsors.   

As January approaches, we of course look forward to the Dakar rally, that starts on 1st January. With nearly 500 different vehicles taking part, from buggies, motorbikes, trucks and cars, with just 1000 people taking part and just 10 British people taking part!   

That's it for our podcasts for this year! Thank you to everyone who has supported us and may we wish you a very Happy New Year!

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