Gabriel Bortoleto: “Then all the drivers would end up in hospital”

Last year, the GP stars took part in a very special ‘race before the race’ in Miami: instead of the traditional drivers’ parade, there was a short race in cars built from Lego bricks. To take part, team-mates had to team up and share a car.

This year, Silverstone is hosting a repeat of this fun race – and this time, every driver gets to pilot a mini Lego GP racer. Each car consists of 28,000 bricks, which a team of 20 designers, engineers and Lego specialists assembled over 6,400 working hours at the Czech Lego factory in Kladno.

Not all drivers are looking forward to this fun event. When asked whether the race was causing a stir, the notoriously grumpy Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll replied: “I don’t care; I won’t lose any sleep over it. And I won’t be waking up super-early on Sunday morning because I’m so excited. It’s just one of many drivers’ parades.”

World Champion Lando Norris, who had to turn up at the FIA press conference alongside Stroll and Gabriel Bortoleto, joked in the Canadian’s monotone: “I feel the same way.” Only to correct himself straight away: “No, actually, I’m quite excited.”

“If these cars had 600 PS more, we’d all be more excited,” Stroll then explained. “Then it would be more interesting.” To which Norris retorted: “You wrecked all the cars last year.” Stroll wouldn’t let that stand as an argument. He insisted: “Yes, but if we had 600 or 800 PS, then everyone would be even happier.” Bortoleto then piped up: “Then all the drivers would end up in hospital.” Both Norris and Bortoleto finally insisted that they were looking forward to the race. “Everyone had fun last year, I think. And I don’t see any reason why it should be any different this year.”

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