2min chapter

F1 Explains cover image

Why do F1 pit stops take teamwork?

F1 Explains

CHAPTER

The Importance of Flexibility in Pit Stop Crews

You're not making pit crew members out of a test tube, says Gemma. And that's why you have to be versatile to adapt to each individual person. We would treat any previous and existing injuries, but also look at their biomechanics. So it's perhaps to be proactive and preventative as well on the treatment side of things. You are tasked with creating an elite crew that can perform under pressure.

00:00
Speaker 2
And then expected to form like an elite athlete for a very small percentage of their time, but a very critical amount of time during a race. And barriers, ages, backgrounds, experiences, they might have already had hip placements, knee replacements. They might have been doing the job for so many years that they've obviously picked up a few injuries along the way. So there was definitely a lot of priming to be done to sort of optimize every individual that we're there. In other motorsport, you'll have ex-American football players that are kind of drafted into purely for pit stops. So this
Speaker 1
was a very different challenge. And that's why you have to be versatile to adapt to each individual person. So sometimes it's making them fitter. Sometimes it's making them more agile, depending on your sort of taking individual pitstop crew member and working how you can get the best of them is what it sounds like to me. Absolutely, 100%. Because you're
Speaker 2
not making pit crew members out of a test tube. You're presented with a team of people that are already there because of their high skill set on the mechanic and the engineering side of things. And then you are tasked with creating an elite crew that can perform under pressure, that can do their job in a split second, consistently can perform no matter what. We would treat any previous and existing injuries, but also look at them, look at their biomechanics, look at where they're likely to incur injuries, where they're likely to have problems further down the line if we don't address this at this point. So it's perhaps to be proactive and preventative as well on a treatment side of things, looking at anything that they're doing with their diet that might be pro-inflammatory that might not be helping them, helping them with jet lag strategies, helping them with even cognitive performance and looking at brain training, looking at hand-eye coordination, eye tracking, looking at every single aspect that that person needs in order to do that
Speaker 1
job in that pit stop that's so crucial. You've mentioned that you came into the Williams team in the early 2010s and made these changes. I've heard from other people in Formula One that other teams spotted these changes and wanted to duplicate that. And I know you then worked with other teams like Alpha and Mayo, for example, and making changes. If I can make a bold statement, sounds to me, Gemma, like you were one of the very key people behind sort of transforming Formula One pit stops into the modern age.

Get the Snipd
podcast app

Unlock the knowledge in podcasts with the podcast player of the future.
App store bannerPlay store banner

AI-powered
podcast player

Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features

AI-powered
podcast player

Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features

Discover
highlights

Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode

Discover
highlights

Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode

Save any
moment

Hear something you like? Tap your headphones to save it with AI-generated key takeaways

Save any
moment

Hear something you like? Tap your headphones to save it with AI-generated key takeaways

Share
& Export

Send highlights to Twitter, WhatsApp or export them to Notion, Readwise & more

Share
& Export

Send highlights to Twitter, WhatsApp or export them to Notion, Readwise & more

AI-powered
podcast player

Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features

AI-powered
podcast player

Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features

Discover
highlights

Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode

Discover
highlights

Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode