We're back after a couple of weeks away, and Miami gave us enough chaos to fill three episodes. Kimi Antonelli just won his third consecutive Grand Prix — surviving another terrible start from pole, a three-way scrap with Verstappen and Leclerc into Turn 1, and sustained pressure from Lando Norris — to extend his championship lead. At 19 years old, this kid is making history look routine.

The drama didn't stop at the checkered flag. Leclerc spun on the final lap, hit the wall, and then got slapped with a 20-second post-race penalty for leaving the track repeatedly — dropping him from sixth to eighth. Verstappen spun at the start, recovered to fifth, but picked up his own five-second penalty for crossing the pit exit line. Russell collected fourth after collisions with both Leclerc and Verstappen that sent multiple drivers to the stewards. It was the kind of race where the post-race document pile was thicker than the race itself.

Then there's the off-track drama that might be even juicier. Red Bull boss Laurent Mekies told Sky Sports that Gianpiero Lambiase — Verstappen's longtime race engineer — is leaving to become McLaren's team principal. McLaren CEO Zak Brown immediately fired back: "He knows something I don't, apparently." The two camps met in Miami to clear the air, but the implication is clear — Red Bull is either telling the truth or deliberately trying to destabilize McLaren from the inside. Either way, it's incredible paddock theater.

We'll break down all of it — the race, the penalties, the regulation tweaks in action, the Lambiase chess match, and whether Antonelli is genuinely running away with this championship or if McLaren is about to close the gap. Welcome back to The Fast Ones.

The break between races hasn't exactly been quiet. The FIA just confirmed a sweeping package of regulation changes for the Miami Grand Prix — super clipping adjustments, qualifying energy limits slashed, a new race start safety system, and wet weather tweaks — all aimed at making these cars less about management and more about racing. We'll break down what's actually changing, what it means for the grid, and whether it's enough to quiet the growing chorus of criticism.

We'll also dig into who Jonathan Wheatley actually is — from Benetton mechanic in the '90s to the voice in Michael Masi's ear during Abu Dhabi 2021 — and what his move to Aston Martin means for both Audi and the wider paddock. Kimi Antonelli enters Miami as the youngest championship leader in F1 history, holding that title through the entire calendar break because George Russell couldn't do anything about it from his couch.

And we'll take a moment to remember Juha Miettinen, a 66-year-old Finnish privateer who lost his life in a seven-car crash during the Nürburgring 24 Hours qualifying race this weekend. A man who raced a BMW 325i around the Nordschleife for nearly a decade, won class championships, and loved that track more than most. Motorsport reminds us sometimes that the risks are real at every level.

Racing comes back in two weeks. There's a lot to process before it does.

F1 is on a break, so we're taking the scenic route. This week we're wandering into NASCAR territory to talk about how Michael Jordan's 23XI Racing team is absolutely cooking right now, what that means for the sport, and why their momentum is one of the most entertaining storylines in American motorsport.

Then we get into the rumor mill: is NASCAR actually trying to recruit Daniel Ricciardo? The idea alone is enough to send our group chat into overdrive, and we've got thoughts on whether the Honey Badger would thrive in stock cars, whether it makes any kind of business sense, and what his NASCAR livery would absolutely have to look like.

And because it wouldn't be a Fast Ones episode without it, we're circling back to our favorite pastime — dunking on George Russell. There's always something. There will always be something.

No lights out this week, just good vibes, side tangents, and the kind of off-week hangout that reminds you why you subscribed in the first place.

Suzuka delivered a race that felt like a coronation — and it may have been exactly that. Kimi Antonelli became the youngest championship leader in Formula 1 history with his second consecutive win, backing up his Shanghai breakthrough with a commanding drive in Japan. Oscar Piastri finally finished a race in 2026 and walked away with a podium, Ferrari's Leclerc and Hamilton went wheel-to-wheel for the final step, and George Russell had the kind of weekend where even the software betrayed him.

But the bigger story might be what's happening off track. Ollie Bearman's huge crash at Spoon — caused by a 45 km/h speed differential from energy deployment timing — has reignited the debate over whether these 2026 cars are actually safe. Damon Hill called them "highly dangerous." And then there's Max Verstappen, who told BBC at Suzuka that he's genuinely considering quitting Formula 1 at the end of the season, calling the new regulations "anti-driving" and saying he'd rather be home with his family than race in what he's described as "Formula E on steroids."

He's not alone. Norris called the cars the worst F1 has ever produced. Alonso dubbed it "the battery world championship." Leclerc said qualifying is "a f---ing joke." Martin Brundle told Max to either leave or stop talking. And behind the scenes, F1 is already discussing 2031 engine regulations with V8 turbos on the table. Could Max take a three-year sabbatical and come back when the sport returns to what he loves?

We're breaking all of it down — the Suzuka race, the championship shakeup, the safety debate, the quit threats, the rules revolt, and what it all means heading into the Miami Grand Prix at the end of April.

One race, a hundred storylines.

Jonathan Wheatley is gone from Audi after just two races, Mattia Binotto is back in the team principal seat (cue the Ferrari PTSD), and Aston Martin's Honda nightmare is getting worse by the weekend. Could Wheatley's move to Silverstone signal something bigger brewing behind the scenes? Mike has a theory, and it involves a power unit swap nobody's talking about yet.

Meanwhile, Max Verstappen dominated a four-hour race at the Nürburgring in a Mercedes GT3 — only to get disqualified two hours later because his team used seven sets of tyres instead of six. McLaren's title defense hit rock bottom in China with a double DNS after both cars suffered electrical failures, Pérez somehow made his Cadillac debut even worse by spinning into his own teammate on lap one, and the calendar just lost Bahrain and Saudi Arabia to geopolitics.

Then we look ahead to the race every driver dreams about. Suzuka — the figure-of-eight, the S-curves, 130R at 300 km/h, and the most passionate fans in motorsport. Vettel said it was designed by the gods. Hamilton says every lap feels like driving through history. And for one episode, we're going to tell you why it's the greatest circuit on the Formula 1 calendar and why this Japanese Grand Prix might be where the 2026 season truly reveals itself.

It's race week, zero filter, all the chaos.

Grande Kimi. That's the headline, and it deserves to be said twice. Kimi Antonelli just won his first Formula 1 Grand Prix in Shanghai, becoming the second youngest race winner in the sport's history — and doing it with the kind of composure that had the entire paddock on its feet. We'll talk about the commentator accidentally calling him Kimi Räikkönen (honestly, fair enough), how he handled the pressure of leading from the front after that near heart-attack moment at Turn 14, and why this kid already feels like something special.

But Shanghai wasn't just the Kimi show. The Ferraris put on an absolute spectacle — Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc went wheel to wheel for lap after lap in a battle that was fierce, fair, and genuinely thrilling to watch. We'll break down how that fight played out and what it says about the dynamic inside the Scuderia right now.

Then there's the sprint race: Russell extending his perfect start to 2026, Hamilton charging from fourth to lead, and the chaos of trying to set up these brand new cars on a sprint weekend with barely any practice. Ollie Bearman drove the wheels off the Haas for a stunning P5 in the race, Carlos Sainz dragged the Williams into the points, and Pierre Gasly continues his quietly excellent form at Alpine.

And yes — we have to talk about McLaren. Both cars failed to even start the race after separate electrical failures on the Mercedes power units. Piastri hasn't started a Grand Prix in 2026. That's a crisis. We'll cover it.

Two races in, and this season is already delivering drama we didn't expect this early. Let's get into it.

The 2026 era of Formula 1 is officially here — and it arrived with heartbreak, controversy, and Ferrari doing Ferrari things.

The Australian Grand Prix delivered unbelievable wheel-to-wheel racing in its opening weekend under the new regulations, but the strategy calls from the pit wall in Maranello proved once again that the boys in red have a gift for turning good days into painful ones. We'll break down the full race from start to finish, including the home race curse that continues to haunt Australian drivers and the tension between George Russell and Charles Leclerc that's already bubbling over before we've even left Melbourne.

Then there's the elephant on the grid: Max Verstappen has been vocal about his frustrations with the new regulations, and he's no longer singing solo. A growing chorus of drivers are joining him in questioning whether this rule set is actually delivering what it promised. Is the criticism fair this early, or are they just adjusting to a car they haven't figured out yet? We'll talk about it.

First race in the books, plenty already on fire. Welcome to 2026.

The wait is over. Formula 1 is back, the regulations are new, and we have absolutely no idea what's going to happen — which is exactly how we like it.

This week we're kicking off the 2026 season with everything that's been swirling around the paddock heading into Melbourne. Charles Leclerc got married, and we have thoughts. Drive to Survive dropped its eighth season, and the internet is split on whether the show still matters or whether it's run its course — we're breaking that debate down with our most reliable chat regulars. Then we get into the racing: Aston Martin swears they've turned a corner, Mercedes has been suspiciously quiet in a way that either means they're cooking or they've burned the kitchen down, and Max Verstappen's already told us the Red Bull will show up with the same colors and not much else.

What can we actually expect when these brand new cars hit Albert Park for real? We'll speculate, we'll overreact, and we'll probably lose focus at least twice. Welcome to 2026.