McLaren – Racing Legends, Now In Sleep Mode

McLaren: fast cars, slow storytelling. Drift off to F1 facts and luxury car lore in this sleepy bedtime story.

Tonight’s episode glides into the world of McLaren—the British automotive brand best known for dominating Formula One, producing wildly impractical supercars, and accidentally making great sleep aids. From its 1963 founding by Bruce McLaren to decades of racing drama and road car innovation, we’ll cruise through the facts… at a sleep-friendly pace. No helmet required.

Transcript

Welcome to the I Can't Sleep Podcast,

Where I bore you to sleep with my soothing voice one fact at a time.

I'm your host,

Benjamin Boster,

And today's episode is about the McLaren F1 Racing Team.

Thanks to Esther Haddock for sponsoring this episode.

McLaren Racing Limited is a British motor racing team based at the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking,

Surrey,

England.

The team is a subsidiary of the McLaren Group,

Which owns a majority of the team.

McLaren is best known as a Formula One chassis constructor,

The second oldest active team and the second most successful Formula One team after Ferrari,

Having won 189 races,

12 Drivers' Championships,

And 9 Constructors' Championships.

McLaren also has a history in American open-wheel racing,

As both an entrant and a chassis constructor,

And has won the Canadian-American Challenge Cup Can-Am Sports Car Racing Championship.

McLaren is one of only three constructors,

And the only team to complete the Triple Crown of motorsport,

Wins at the Indianapolis 500,

24 Hours of Le Mans,

And Monaco Grand Prix.

Founded in 1963 by New Zealander Bruce McLaren,

The team won its first Grand Prix at the 1968 Belgian Grand Prix,

But their greatest initial success was in Can-Am,

Which they dominated from 1967 to 1971.

Further American triumph followed,

With Indianapolis 500 wins in McLaren cars for Mark Donoghue in 1972,

And Johnny Rutherford in 1974 and 1976.

After Bruce McLaren died in a testing accident in 1970,

Teddy Mayer took over and led the their first Formula One Constructors' Championship in 1974,

With Emerson Fittipaldi and James Hunt winning the Drivers' Championship in 1974 and 1976,

Respectively.

In 1981,

McLaren merged with Ron Dennis' Project 4 Racing.

Dennis took over as team principal,

And shortly afterwards organized a buyout of the original McLaren shareholders to take full control of the team.

This began the team's most successful era,

With Porsche and Honda engines,

Nicky Lauda,

Alain Prost,

And Ayrton Senna won seven Drivers' Championships between them,

And the team took six Constructors' Championships.

The combination of Prost and Senna was particularly dominant.

Together they won all but one race in 1988,

But later their rivalry soured and Prost left for Ferrari.

Fellow English team Williams offered the most consistent challenge during this period,

The two winning every Constructors' title between 1984 and 1994.

By the mid-1990s,

Honda had withdrawn from Formula One,

Senna had moved to Williams,

And the team went three seasons without a win.

With Mercedes-Benz engines,

West sponsorship,

And former Williams designer Adrian Newey,

Further championships came in 1998 and 1999 with driver Mika Häkkinen,

And during the 2000s the team were consistent frontrunners,

With Lewis Hamilton taking their latest Drivers' title in 2008.

Ron Dennis retired as McLaren team principal in 2009,

Handing over to long-time McLaren employee Martin Whitmarsh.

At the end of 2013,

After the team's worst season since 2004,

Whitmarsh was ousted.

McLaren announced in 2013 that they would be using Honda engines from 2015 onwards,

Replacing Mercedes-Benz.

The team,

Raced as McLaren-Honda for the first time since 1992,

Had the 2015 Australian Grand Prix.

In September 2017,

McLaren announced they had agreed on an engine supply with Renault from 2018 to 2020.

McLaren is using Mercedes-Benz engines from the 2021 season until at least 2030.

The team's ninth Constructors' Championship,

And first since 1998,

Was won in 2024.

McLaren is the joint second most successful Formula One team of all time,

With nine Constructors' Championships,

A record shared with Williams as of the end of the 2024 season.

After initially returning to the Indianapolis 500 in 2017 as a backer of Andretti Autosport to run Fernando Alonso and then,

In 2019,

As an independent entry,

McLaren announced in August 2019 that they would run in conjunction with Aero Schmidt-Peterson Motorsports,

Starting in 2020,

To run the full IndyCar series,

The combined entry being named Aero-McLaren SP.

Initially having no ownership interest in the team,

McLaren would purchase 75% of the operation in 2021.

McLaren entered the electric off-road racing series Extreme E in 2022,

And also joined Formula E in the 2022-23 season.

Bruce McLaren Motor Racing was founded in 1963 by New Zealander Bruce McLaren.

Bruce was a works driver for the British Formula One team Cooper,

With whom he had won three Grand Prix and come second in the 1960 World Championship.

Wanting to compete in the Australasian-Tasman series,

Bruce approached his employers,

But when team owner Charles Cooper insisted on using 1.

5-litre Formula One specification engines instead of the 2.

5-litre motors permitted by the Tasman rules,

Bruce decided to set up his own team to run him and his prospective Formula One team mate Timmy Mayer with custom built Cooper cars.

Bruce won the 1964 series,

But Mayer was killed in practice for the final race at the Longford Circuit in Tasmania.

When Bruce McLaren approached Teddy Mayer to help him with the purchase of the Zerich sports car from Roger Penske,

Teddy Mayer and Bruce McLaren began discussing a business partnership,

Resulting in Teddy Mayer buying into Bruce McLaren Motor Racing Limited,

BMMR,

And ultimately becoming its largest shareholder.

The team,

Competing under a British racing license,

Was based in Feltham,

England from 1963 to 1964,

And in Colnbrook,

England from 1965 until 1981,

And has been based in Woking,

England since 1981.

Despite this,

Bruce never used the traditional British racing green on his cars.

Instead he used colour schemes that were not based on national principles,

E.

G.

His first Formula One car,

The McLaren M2B car,

Raced at the 1966 Monaco Grand Prix,

Was painted with a green stripe to represent a fictional Yamaha team,

And John Frankenheimer's film Grand Prix.

During this period,

Bruce drove for his team in sports car races in the United Kingdom and North America,

And also under the 1965 Tasman Series with Phil Hill,

But did not win it.

He continued to drive in Grands Prix for Cooper,

But judging the team's form to be waning,

Decided to race his own cars in 1966.

Bruce McLaren made the team's Grand Prix debut at the 1966 Monaco race of the current Formula One teams,

Only Ferraris older.

His race ended after nine laps due to a terminal oil leak.

The 1966 car was the M2B designed by Robin Hurd,

But the program was hampered by a poor choice of engines.

A 3.

0 litre version of Ford's Indianapolis 500 engine and a Serenissima V8 were used,

The latter scoring the team's first point in Britain,

But both were underpowered and unreliable.

For 1967,

Bruce decided to use a British Racing Motors BRM V12 engine,

But due to delays with the engine was forced initially to use a modified Formula Two car called the M4B,

Powered by a 2.

1 litre BRM V8,

Later building a similar but slightly larger car called the M5A for the V12.

Neither car brought great success,

The best result being a fourth at Monaco.

For 1968,

After driving McLaren's sole entry for the previous two years,

Bruce was joined by 1967 champion and fellow New Zealander Denny Holm,

Who was already racing for McLaren in Can-Am.

That year's new M7A car,

Hurd's final design for the team,

Was powered by Cosworth's new and soon-to-be ubiquitous DFV engine.

The DFV would go on to be used by McLaren until 1983,

And with it a major upturn in form proceeded.

Bruce won the race of champions at the Brands Hatch circuit,

And Holm won the international trophy at Silverstone,

Both non-championship races,

Before Bruce took the team's first championship win at the Belgian Grand Prix.

Holm also won the Italian and Canadian Grands Prix later in the year,

Helping the team to second in the Constructors' Championship.

Using an updated C version on the M7,

A further three podium finishes followed for Bruce in 1969,

But the team's fifth win had to wait until the last race of the 1969 championship when Holm won the Mexican Grand Prix.

That year McLaren experimented with four-wheel drive in the M9A,

But the car had only a single outing driven by Derek Bell at the British Grand Prix.

Bruce described driving it as like trying to write your signature with somebody jogging your elbow.

The year 1970 started with a second place each for Holm and Bruce in the first two Grands Prix,

But in June Bruce was killed in a crash at Goodwood while testing the new M8D Can-Am car.

After his death Teddy Mayer took over effective control of the team.

Holm continued with Dan Gurney and Peter Gesson partnering him.

Gurney won the first two Can-Am events at Mosport and St.

Jovide and placed 9th and 3rd,

But left the team mid-season,

And Gesson took over from there.

While 1971 began promisingly when Holm led the opening round in South Africa before retiring with broken suspension,

Ultimately Holm,

Gesson,

Who left for BRM mid-season,

And Jackie Oliver again failed to score a win.

The 1972 season saw improvements though.

Holm won the team's first Grand Prix for two and a half years in South Africa,

And he and Peter Revson scored 10 other podiums,

The team finishing 3rd in the Constructors' Championship.

McLaren gave Jody Schechter his Formula One debut at the final race at Watkins Glen.

All McLaren drivers used the Ford Cosworth engines,

Except for Andrea De Adamage and Nani Ghali,

Who used engines from Alfa Romeo in 1970.

The McLaren M23 designed by Gordon Coppock was the team's new car for the 1973 season.

Sharing parts of the design of both McLaren's Formula One M19 and Indianapolis M16 cars,

Itself inspired by Lotus' 72,

It was a mainstay for four years.

Holm won with it in Sweden,

And Revson took the only Grand Prix wins of his career in Britain and Canada.

In 1974,

Emerson Fittipaldi,

World champion with Lotus two years earlier,

Joined McLaren.

Holm,

In his final Formula One campaign,

Won the Argentinian season opener.

Fittipaldi,

With wins in Brazil,

Belgium,

And Canada,

Took the Drivers' Championship.

It was a close fight for Fittipaldi,

Who secured the title with a fourth at the season-ending United States Grand Prix,

Putting him three points ahead of Ferrari's Cleo Regazzoni.

With Holm and multiple motorcycle world champion Mike Hailwood,

He also sealed McLaren's first Constructors' Championship.

The year 1975 was less successful for the team.

Fittipaldi was second in the championship,

Behind Nicky Lauda.

Holm's replacement,

Jochen Maas,

Took his sole GP win in Spain.

At the end of 1975,

Fittipaldi left to join his brother's Fittipaldi co-pursuer car team.

With the top drivers already signed to other teams,

Mayer turned to James Hunt,

A driver on whom biographer Gerald Donaldson reflected as having a dubious reputation.

In 1976,

Lauda was again strong in his Ferrari.

At mid-season,

He led the championship with 56 points,

While Hunt had only 26,

Despite wins in Spain,

A race from which he was initially disqualified,

And France.

At the German Grand Prix,

Though,

Lauda crashed heavily and was nearly killed,

And missed the next two races.

Hunt capitalized by winning four more Grands Prix,

Giving him a three-point deficit going into the finale in Japan.

Here it rained torrentially,

Lauda retired because of safety concerns,

And Hunt sealed the drivers' championship by finishing third.

McLaren,

Though,

Lost the constructors' championship to Ferrari.

In 1977,

The M23 was gradually replaced with the M26,

The M23's final works outing being Gilles Verneuve's Formula One debut,

With the team in a one-off appearance at the British Grand Prix.

Hunt won on three occasions that year,

But the Lauda and Ferrari combination proved too strong,

Hunt and McLaren managing just fifth and third in the respective championships.

From there,

Results continued to worsen.

Lotus and Mario Andretti took the 1978 titles with their 78 and 79 Ground Effect cars,

And neither Hunt nor Masa's replacement,

Patrick Tambay,

Were able to seriously challenge the non-Ground Effect M26.

Hunt was dropped at the end of 1978 in favor of Lotus's Ronnie Peterson,

But when Peterson was killed by a crash at the Italian Grand Prix,

John Watson was signed instead.

No improvement occurred in 1979.

Coppec's M28 design was described by Mayer as ghastly,

A disaster,

And quite diabolical,

And the M29 did little to change the situation.

Tambay scored no points,

And Watson only 15,

To place the team 8th at the end of the year.

The 1980s started much as the 1970s had ended.

Alain Prost took over from Tambay,

But Watson and he rarely scored points.

Under increasing pressure since the previous year from principal sponsor Philip Morris and their executive John Hogan,

Mayer was coerced into merging McLaren with Ron Dennis' Project 4 Formula 2 team,

Also sponsored by Philip Morris.

Dennis and designer John Barnard,

Who,

Inspired by the carbon fiber rear wings of the BMW M1 race cars that Project 4 was preparing,

Had ideas for an innovative Formula 1 chassis constructed from carbon fiber instead of conventional aluminum alloy.

On their own,

They lacked the money to build it,

But with the investment that came with the merger,

It became the McLaren MP4,

Later called MP4-1 of 1981,

Driven by Watson and Andrea De Cesaris.

In the MP4,

Watson won the British Grand Prix and had three other podium finishes.

Soon after the merger,

McLaren moved from Colnbrook to a new base in Woking,

And Dennis and Mayer initially shared the managing directorship of the company.

By 1982,

Mayer had departed and Tyler Alexander's and his shareholdings had been bought by the new owners.

In the early 1980s,

Teams like Renault,

Ferrari,

And Brabham were using 1.

5 liter turbo charged engines,

In favor of the 3.

0 liter naturally aspirated engines that had been standard since 1966.

Having seen in 1982 the need for a turbo engine of their own,

Dennis had convinced Williams Backer Techniques d'Avantgarde,

TAG,

To fund Porsche-built,

TAG-branded turbo engines made to Barnard's specifications.

TAG's founder,

Mansour Ojeh,

Would later become a McLaren shareholder.

In the meantime,

They continued with Cosworth engines as old rival Lauda came out of retirement in 1982 to drive alongside Watson in that year's 1B development of the MP4.

They each won two races,

Watson notably from 17th place on the grid in Detroit,

And at one stage of the season McLaren were second in the Constructors' Championship.

As part of a dispute with FISA,

They boycotted the San Marino Grand Prix.

Although 1983 was not so fruitful,

Watson did win again in the United States,

This time from 22nd on the grid at Long Beach.

Having been fired by Renault,

Prost returned to McLaren once again in 1984.

Now using the TAG engines,

The team dominated,

Scoring 12 wins and two and a half times as many Constructors' points as nearest rival Ferrari.

In the Drivers' Championship,

Lauda prevailed over Prost by half a point,

The narrowest margin ever.

The McLaren TAGs were again strong in 1985.

A third Constructors' Championship came their way,

While this time Prost won the Drivers' Championship.

In 1986,

The Williams team were resurgent with their Honda engine and drivers Nigel Mansell and Nelson Piquet,

While McLaren Lauda's replacement,

1982 champion Keke Roseberg,

Could not gel with the car.

Williams took the Constructors' Championship,

But for Prost,

Wins in San Marino,

Monaco and Austria,

Combined with the fact that the Williams drivers were taking points from each other,

Meant that he retained a chance going into the last race,

The Australian Grand Prix.

There,

A puncture from Mansell and a precautionary pit stop for Piquet gave Prost the race win and his second title,

Making him the first driver to win back-to-back championships since Jack Brabham in 1959 and 1960.

In 1987,

Barnard departed for Ferrari to be replaced by Steve Nichols,

Who himself joined Ferrari in 1989.

In the hands of Prost and Stefan Johansson,

Though,

Nichols' MP4-3 and the TAG engine could not match the Williams Honda.

For 1988,

Honda switched their supply to McLaren and encouraged,

By Prost,

Dennis Sine Ayrton Senna to drive.

Despite regulations reducing the boost pressure and fuel capacity and therefore power of the turbo cars,

Honda persisted with a turbocharged engine.

In the MP4-4,

Senna and Prost engaged in a season-long battle,

Winning 15 of the 16 races.

At the other race,

At Monza,

Senna had been leading comfortably but collided with black marker Jean-Louis Schlesser.

At the Portuguese Grand Prix,

Their relationship soured when Senna squeezed Prost against the pit wall.

Prost won,

But afterwards said it was dangerous.

If he wants the world championship that badly,

He can have it.

Prost scored more points that year,

But because only the best 11 results counted,

Senna took the title at the penultimate race in Japan.

The next year,

With turbos banned,

Honda supplied a new 3.

5-liter naturally aspirated V10 engine and McLaren again won both titles with the MP4-5.

Their driver's relationship continued to deteriorate though,

Especially when,

At the San Marino Grand Prix,

Prost felt that Senna had reneged on an agreement not to pass each other at the first corner.

Believing that Honda and Dennis were favoring Senna,

Prost announced mid-season that he would leave to drive a Ferrari the following year.

For the second year in succession,

The driver's championship was decided at the Japanese Grand Prix,

This time in Prost's favor after Senna had collided.

Senna initially recovered and won the race,

But was later disqualified.

With former McLaren men Nichols and Prost,

Barnard had moved to the Benetton team.

Ferrari pushed the British team more closely in 1990.

McLaren in turn brought in Ferrari's Gerhard Berger,

But like the two seasons before,

The driver's championship was led by Prost and Senna,

And settled at the penultimate race in Japan.

Here,

Senna collided with Prost at the first corner,

Forcing both to retire,

But this time Senna escaped punishment and took the title.

McLaren also won the constructor's championship.

The 1991 year was another for McLaren and Senna,

With the ascendant Reynold Power Williams team their closest challengers.

By 1992,

Williams,

With their advanced FW14B car,

Had overtaken McLaren,

Breaking their four-year run as champions,

Despite the latter winning five races that year.

As Honda withdrew from the sport at the end of 1992,

McLaren sought a new engine supplier.

A deal to secure Reynold engines fell through.

Subsequently,

McLaren switched to customer Ford engines for the 1993 season.

Senna,

Who initially agreed only to a race-by-race contract before later signing for the whole year,

Won five races,

Including a record-breaking sixth victory at Monaco and a win at the European Grand Prix,

Where he went from fifth to first on the opening lap.

His teammate,

1991 kart champion Michael Andretti,

Fared much worse.

He scored only seven points and was replaced by test driver Mika Häkkinen for the final three rounds of the season.

Williams ultimately won both titles,

And Senna,

Who had flirted with moving there for 1993,

Signed with them for the 1994 season.

During the 1993 season,

McLaren took part in a seven-part BBC television documentary called A Season with McLaren.

McLaren tested a Lamborghini V12 engine ahead of the 1994 season,

As part of a potential deal with the then-Lamborghini owner Chrysler,

Before eventually deciding to use Peugeot engines.

With Peugeot power,

The MP4-9 was driven by Häkkinen and Martin Brundle.

Despite achieving eight podiums over the season,

No wins were achieved.

Peugeot was dropped after a single year due to multiple engine failures and unreliability,

Which cost McLaren potential race victories,

And they switched to a Mercedes-Benz-branded,

Ilmore-designed engine.

For the 1995 season onwards,

McLaren ended their engine deal with Peugeot Sport and started an engine full-works partnership with Mercedes-Benz high-performance engines for the first time,

After the German manufacturer spent one year in partnership with the Sauber team.

The partnership included free engines for Mercedes-Benz that built and assembled by Ilmore Engineering.

Mercedes-Benz official team vehicles,

Financial support,

Also earned full factory support from Daimler AG and Mercedes-Benz,

And also Mercedes-Benz and Ilmore staff would work with the team at their woking base.

McLaren's Formula One car for the 1995 season,

The MP4-10,

Was not a frontrunner and Brundle's replacement,

Former champion Nigel Mansell,

Was unable to fit into the car at first,

And departed after just two races,

With Mark Blundell taking his place.

While Williams dominated in 1996,

McLaren now with David Colthard,

Alongside Hackenhen,

Won a third successive season without a win.

In 1997,

However,

Colthard broke his run by winning the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

Hackenhen and he would each win another race before the end of the season,

And highly-rated designer Adrian Newey joined the team from Williams in August that year.

Despite the car's improved pace,

Unreliability proved costly throughout the season,

With retirements at the British and Luxembourg Grands Prix occurring whilst Hackenhen was in the lead.

With Newey able to take advantage of new technical regulations for 1998,

And with Williams losing their work's Renault engines following Renault's temporary withdrawal from the sport,

McLaren were once again able to challenge for the championship.

Hackenhen and Colthard won five of the first six races,

Despite the banning of the team's brake-steer system,

Which allowed the rear brakes to be operated individually to reduce understeer,

After a protest by Ferrari at the second race in Brazil.

Schumacher and Ferrari provided the greatest competition.

The former levelled on points,

With Hackenhen with two races to go,

But wins to Hackenhen at the Luxembourg and Japanese Grands gave both him the Drivers' Championship,

And McLaren the Constructors' Championship.

Hackenhen won his second Drivers' Championship the following season,

But due to a combination of driver errors and mechanical failures,

The team lost the Constructors' title to Ferrari.

In 2000,

McLaren won seven races in a close fight with Ferrari,

But ultimately Ferrari and Schumacher prevailed in both competitions.

This marked the start of a decline in form,

As Ferrari cemented their dominance of Formula One,

And also beryllium engine material banned in Formula One that affected Mercedes' engine performance.

In 2001,

Hackenhen was outscored by Coulthard for the first time since 1997,

And retired,

Ending Formula One's longest-ever driver partnership.

His place taken by Kimi Räikkönen,

Then in 2002,

Coulthard took their solitary win at Monaco,

While Ferrari repeated McLaren's 1988 feat of 15 wins in a season.

The year 2003 started promisingly,

With one win each for Coulthard and Räikkönen at the first two Grands Prix.

However,

They were hampered when the MP4-18 car designed for that year suffered crash tests and reliability problems,

Forcing them to continue using a de-development of the year-old MP4-17 for longer than they had initially planned.

Despite this,

Räikkönen scored points consistently,

And challenged for the championship up to the final race,

Eventually losing by two points.

The team began 2004 with the MP4-19,

Which technical director Adrian Newey described as a debugged version of the MP4-18.

It was not a success,

Though,

And was replaced mid-season by the MP4-19B.

With this,

Räikkönen scored the team's,

And his only win of the year,

At the Belgian Grand Prix,

As McLaren finished fifth in the Constructors' Championship,

Their worst ranking since 1983.

Coulthard left for Red Bull Racing in 2005,

To be replaced by former kart champion Juan Pablo Montoya,

For what was McLaren's most successful season in several years,

As he and Räikkönen won 10 races.

However,

Both the team not being able to work out why the car could not heat its tires properly in the early stages of the season,

And the overall unreliability of the MP4-20,

Cost several race victories when Räikkönen had been leading or in contention to win,

And also costing him grid positions in some qualifying sessions,

Which allowed Renault and their driver Fernando Alonso to capitalize and win both titles.

In 2006,

The superior reliability and speed of the Ferraris and Renaults prevented the team from gaining any victories for the first time in a decade.

Montoya parted company acrimoniously with the team to race in NASCAR after the United States Grand Prix,

Where he crashed into Räikkönen at the start.

Test driver Pedro de la Rosa deputized for the remainder of the season.

The team also lost Räikkönen to Ferrari at the end of the year.

Steve Matchett argued that the poor reliability of McLaren in 2006 and recent previous years was due to a lack of team continuity and stability.

His cited examples of instability are logistical challenges related to the move to the McLaren Technology Center,

Adrian Nui's aborted move to Jaguar and later move to Red Bull,

The subsequent move of Nui's deputy to Red Bull,

And personnel changes at Ilmore.

After scoring no victories in 2006,

The team returned to competitive status in 2007.

That year saw Fernando Alonso race alongside Formula One debutant and long-time McLaren protégé Lewis Hamilton.

The pair scored four wins each and led the Drivers' Championship for much of the year.

But tensions arose within the team.

BBC Sport claimed that Alonso was unable to cope with Hamilton's competitiveness.

At the Hungarian Grand Prix,

Alonso was judged to have deliberately impeded the teammate during qualifying,

So the team were not allowed to score constructors' points at the event.

An internal agreement within the McLaren team stated that drivers would alternatively have an extra lap for qualifying.

However,

Lewis Hamilton refused to accept for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Subsequently,

The McLaren team was investigated by the FIA for having proprietary technical blueprints of Ferrari's car,

The so-called Spygate controversy.

At the first hearing,

McLaren management consistently denied all knowledge,

Blaming a single rogue engineer.

However,

In the final hearing,

McLaren was found guilty,

And the team was excluded from the Constructors' Championship and fined $100 million.

The drivers were allowed to continue without penalty,

And while Hamilton led the Drivers' Championship heading into the final race in Brazil,

Raikkonen and the Ferrari won the race and the Drivers' Championship,

A single point ahead of both McLaren drivers.

In November,

Alonso and McLaren agreed to terminate their contract by mutual consent.

In 2008,

A close fight ensued between Hamilton and the Ferrari of Felipe Massa and Raikkonen.

Hamilton won five times,

And despite also crossing the finish line first at the Belgian Grand Prix,

He was deemed to have gained an illegal advantage by cutting a chicane during an overtake and was controversially demoted a third.

Going into the final race in Brazil,

Hamilton had a seven-point lead over Massa.

Massa won there,

But Hamilton dramatically clinched his first Drivers' Championship by moving into the necessary fifth position at the final corner of the final lap of the race.

Despite winning his first Grand Prix in Hungary,

Kovalainen finished the season only seventh in the overall standings,

Allowing Ferrari to take the Constructors' title.

Before the start of the 2009 season,

Dennis retired as team principal,

Handing responsibility to Martin Whitmarsh.

But the year started badly.

The MP424 car was off the pace,

And the team was given a three-race suspended ban for misleading stewards of the Australian and Malaysian Grands Prix.

Despite these early problems,

A late revival had Hamilton win at the Hungarian and Singapore Grands Prix.

Reviews

Well that was kind of interesting and I’m not even into racing! Still not riveting enough to make it to the end though. 😂😂😂

Love your podcasts and adore F1! Lots of cool content to work with too! Best one yet.