James Allen On F1 59: Inside the mental battle as F1 2025 reaches crunch point
Nov 26, 2025
35:37
This week we go inside the minds of the competitors for the F1 World Championship.
We explain some of the things that happened during an intense Las Vegas GP weekend – including the dramatic double disqualification of the McLaren cars that sets up an incredibly tense final two rounds for the World Championship
And we look ahead in depth to what happens next. We focus particularly on two areas: which teams will have the best car for the Qatar and Abu Dhabi circuits? And with so much pressure riding on it, what is the mental game here? How do the drivers and their trainers cope with the 11 hour time difference from Vegas to Qatar so they can maintain peak performance? How do they cope with the stress and the pressure? And with McLaren making such a costly mistake in Vegas, how do the leaders make sure the team doesn’t lose confidence?
With James Allen in the studio to discuss this we have two real subject matter experts. Nick Harris, who trained and mentored many great drivers in the past 20 years from Mark Webber, David Coulthard and Eddie Irvine to Fernando Alonso and Nico Hulkenberg. And Autosport’s F1 writer who can demystify the technical side, Jake Boxhall Legge.
Send your comments or questions to: @jamesallenonf1 on X or jamesallenonf1@autosport.com.
A Motorsport Studios production for Autosport
We explain some of the things that happened during an intense Las Vegas GP weekend – including the dramatic double disqualification of the McLaren cars that sets up an incredibly tense final two rounds for the World Championship
And we look ahead in depth to what happens next. We focus particularly on two areas: which teams will have the best car for the Qatar and Abu Dhabi circuits? And with so much pressure riding on it, what is the mental game here? How do the drivers and their trainers cope with the 11 hour time difference from Vegas to Qatar so they can maintain peak performance? How do they cope with the stress and the pressure? And with McLaren making such a costly mistake in Vegas, how do the leaders make sure the team doesn’t lose confidence?
With James Allen in the studio to discuss this we have two real subject matter experts. Nick Harris, who trained and mentored many great drivers in the past 20 years from Mark Webber, David Coulthard and Eddie Irvine to Fernando Alonso and Nico Hulkenberg. And Autosport’s F1 writer who can demystify the technical side, Jake Boxhall Legge.
Send your comments or questions to: @jamesallenonf1 on X or jamesallenonf1@autosport.com.
A Motorsport Studios production for Autosport