This sentence, the bosses of the Formula 1 team Haas are probably not very proud after the fact: “We have two morons who drive for us.
It will change.
One of the two "morons" is Romain Grosjean, hero of the last season of Formula 1. The Franco-Swiss champion came out miraculously unharmed, except for serious burns to a hand, of a terrible accident at the Bahrain Grand Prix on November 29, where his car was cut in two by a safety strip crossed at 241 km / h before catching fire.
But there you have it: in the previous seasons of 'Formula 1 Drive to Survive', the hit Netflix behind the scenes F1 series whose sequel has just been released, Grosjean, a brilliant but slightly crazy driver was the one of the recurring characters, scapegoat and sometimes the pain-reliever of his own boss who is quick to winnow him or even humiliate him in public with a smile.
The wheel spins.
So goes the race.
The context of this truly insane accident, with an infernal and miraculous dimension, is not the only event of this season 3 that takes you in the guts from the start.
Or the false start.
Because it is the Covid season.
It begins with the laughter of Renault driver Daniel Ricciardo when his mother asks him on the phone if he wears a mask during meetings.
Of course not.
The First Grand Prix of the season takes place in Australia on March 12, 2020, but if the coronavirus, as they say in the paddock, is on everyone's lips, it's more like a topic of conversation.
And exasperation for the fans when a champion turns away a spectator who wants an autograph of "I cannot touch a pen that is not mine".
"We are different, we are crazy"
“Formula 1 Drive to Survive”, which follows the races and the teams as closely as possible, really puts the viewer at the heart of the circuit.
Fascinating, for example, to discover the first recognition of turns and straight lines with the pilots… on foot, like a hike.
To discover the ego wars between two riders from the same team.
At Mercedes, which reigns over the championship, the undisputed prince remains Lewis Hamilton, who will win his seventh world title.
But his teammate, the Finnish Valtteri Bottas, can't stand it anymore.
Surprising, finally, this impression of being in the cockpit of a car, with a Max Verstappen, Red Bull driver, one of the top names on the circuit, his voice distressed when he launched in the middle of a straight line “I stalled, talk to me ”to his running coach.
"We are different, we are crazy", summarizes the Mexican Sergio Perez, after the accident of Romain Grosjean, and his own victory, the first after 190 races, the same week.
The undercover backstage games
Not all teams like Netflix which, season after season, seeps more into their behind-the-scenes games.
We share many more moments this time with Lewis Hamilton, whose independence we discover at the same time - "money is king", he blurted, furious at a race initially maintained despite the pandemic - , aggressiveness, despondency also when he waits to know if Grosjean has been able to get out of his car on fire.
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Champagne removed from the Formula 1 podiums
Some sentences are cold in the back: “The pedal does not work any more.
There are no more brakes ”, loose in the middle of the race Sebastian Vettel, quadruple world champion, who is seen as in a video game crossing several obstacles intended to slow down his race when he can no longer turn or brake.
Or Charles Leclerc, Ferrari driver, who whispers: "I'm in trouble" just before a crash.
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We have never understood the extent to which an exit from the road is an endangerment but also points in the championship which vanish and millions of euros reduced to smoke in this sport with technological and industrial stakes. capital, it is the case to say it.
Breaking a tennis racket costs nothing.
Sending a car into the background does not always make a driver a victim, but sometimes a culprit, in the eyes of his employer, in this ruthless world where people praise as quickly as they terminate a contract.
Season 3 of “Formula 1 Drive to Survive” on Netflix looks back on the 2020 season marked by the Covid-19./Netflix
This Covid season, which will ultimately lead to the cancellation of the first part of the races, also affects its small sides that the layman ignores: the struggle of the many precarious of the circuit who are never sure of being renewed the following season .
Rich but not famous and often double or nothing.
And even mocked by the technicians: "It looks like a return from vacation", mocks the preparer of a large team because his foal is slowed down by a traffic jam of latecomers.
Yet who drive all the fastest cars in the world.
"Formula 1 Drive to Survive" makes you dizzy, with the panache of this timeless world, if not that of pure speed, and its total lack of pity, except when death seems to invite itself in the place of honor.
Only a blaze from which a man tries to extract himself seems to finally bring everyone back to pure attention to the other, to prayer, to the feeling of forming not only a paddock, but a kind of family, rival and sometimes united.
EDITOR'S RATING: 4.5 / 5
“Formula 1 Drive to Survive”,
season 3. Ten episodes of approximately 40 minutes available on Netflix (2021).
