Away We Go Podcast

Show notes: The British Grand Prix delivered wheel-to-wheel battles, a championship leader fighting a broken car, and a finish that left almost every fan deflated. Charles Leclerc took Ferrari's 250th Formula 1 win at Silverstone, but it came under a safety car after Max Verstappen's late DNF, which is exactly as unsatisfying as it sounds. Dianne Bortoletto and Ciara Gillan, motorsport journalist...

Ferrari arrived in Austria with a big upgrade package and left with Lewis Hamilton fifth and Charles Leclerc eighth. George Russell inherited pole position beating a split-second yellow flag, then he led every lap, and won. Dianne Bortoletto and Ciara Gillan break down the race, the qualifying controversy, Kimi Antonelli's chaotic opening laps, and why the Red Bull Ring broadcast left viewers feel...

Most Formula 1 fans file Monaco under one day, one budget you don't have: yacht money, championship-week crowds, a Sunday grandstand seat that costs more than the flights. Motorsport historian Colin Johnston has spent years doing it the other way. This week Colin joins Dianne Bortoletto to show how to experience Monaco, Goodwood and the great old European circuits as an independent traveller, with...

Dianne is wearing every piece of Ferrari merch she owns, because Ferrari are finally back. After a 595-day drought, Lewis Hamilton took his first race win in red at the Barcelona Catalunya Grand Prix. It came almost to the day, 30 years after Michael Schumacher won his own first race for Ferrari at the very same track, and Hamilton now has seven wins in Barcelona, one more than Schumacher ever man...

Monaco is the race everyone loves to call boring, and this year it was anything but. Nineteen-year-old Kimi Antonelli took pole, led every lap, and won, becoming the youngest winner in the history of the Monaco Grand Prix and stretching his championship lead to 66 points after just six rounds. It is the kind of statistic that stops you in your tracks. Behind him, the race fell apart. Max Verstappe...

Emily Selleck walked into her first Formula 1 paddock at the Australian Grand Prix and had an interview with Max Verstappen within five minutes. Five years later, she is one of the most well-connected Australians in the sport, having covered races across the calendar while building a distinctive perspective at the intersection of motorsport, culture, and commercial strategy. In this episode, host...

The 2026 Canadian Grand Prix delivered one of the most action-packed races of the season so far, and Dianne Bortoletto and Ciara Gillan have plenty to say about it. Kimi Antonelli claimed his fourth consecutive Formula 1 win in Montreal, becoming the only driver in history to win his first four races back to back. It should have been a George Russell weekend, and for the sprint it was, but a power...

Stewart Bell has been covering Formula 1 from the inside for more than 20 years. He's had a front-row seat for some of the sport's biggest moments, from being the only media in the garage for Daniel Ricciardo's first Albert Park run, to interviewing Ayrton Senna's press officer about the day he died at Imola. Now he's turned two decades of paddock access into a book, published by Penguin. In this...

What if your frequent flyer points could get you driven through the gates at Albert Park, into the McLaren suite, and down to the team garage after qualifying? In this episode, Dianne Bortoletto sits down with Chris Chamberlin, freelance travel journalist and frequent flyer points expert, whose work appears in the Australian Financial Review, Business Traveller and Traveller. Chris breaks down how...

After a five-week break, Formula 1 returned with an action-packed sprint weekend in Miami, and it delivered chaos on lap one, big performances up and down the grid, and plenty to unpack (including another round of Ferrari frustration). Host Dianne Bortoletto is joined by Ciara Gillan from Formula Live Pulse to break down the Miami Grand Prix feature race and sprint, key moments, strategy calls, pe...

After a five-week break, Formula 1 is back and Miami is a sprint weekend. In Ep69 of Away We Go Podcast, Di is joined by Ciara Gillan (Formula Live Pulse) to unpack what’s changed off-track, what matters heading into the Miami Grand Prix, and the biggest rumours swirling through the paddock. This episode covers Ferrari’s latest speculation, Red Bull’s long-lead departure news, and why super-clippi...

Sky Sports F1 broadcaster and author Rachel Brookes joins Away We Go Podcast for a wide-ranging chat that moves from the chaos (and thrill) of live TV to what it really takes to build a career in elite sports broadcasting. Rachel shares unforgettable paddock moments (including an early run-in with Bernie Ecclestone), how Drive to Survive and Liberty Media changed Formula 1’s reach, and why she wro...

What do you do when you photograph one of Formula 1's most compelling personalities, pitch the story to every major magazine, and get knocked back by all of them? If you're Esme Buxton, you build your own magazine. Esme is a fashion photographer and the founder and editor of The Paddock Journal, a Formula 1 fashion and lifestyle publication that launched just over a year ago and has already become...

Japan Grand Prix trip planning starts here, this is a Suzuka special for those thinking of going to the Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix. In this episode, Di chats with Japan travel expert Tess Moone from Tessomewhere.com to help you plan a proper Japan trip, not just fly in, see the race, and fly out. We cover where to base yourself (Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, or Nagoya), how to get around Japan using IC...

Kimi Antonelli won back-to-back races at Suzuka to become the youngest championship leader in Formula One history, and he did it while sipping sparkling rose water on the podium — because at 19, Japan's legal drinking age of 20 means he wasn't allowed champagne. Oscar Piastri returned from his race absence to lead for 15 laps and finish second, and the result raised a lot of questions about what b...

F1 journalist Reilly Sullivan left Sydney, moved to Beijing, and came straight out of the Shanghai paddock to talk to us. This episode is part race review, part travel guide, and part honest conversation about what it is actually like to pack up your life and move to China. Reilly covers his first Chinese Grand Prix from inside the media centre, one of the most impressive press facilities on the c...

Shanghai delivered one for the history books. Di and Ciara break down the Formula 1 Chinese Grand Prix, a race that had it all, DNSs, DNFs, a teenage winner, Ferrari back on the podium, and both McLarens failing to even start. Italian driver for Mercedes Kimi Antonelli becomes the youngest ever F1 pole sitter and converts it to his maiden race win in only the second race of the year, and the secon...

The 2026 Formula 1 season opened in Melbourne with a dramatic Australian Grand Prix. Mercedes locked out the front row, Ferrari launched brilliantly at the start, and Max Verstappen charged through the field after starting from the back. I’m joined by Simone Scanu , co-founder of Formula Live Pulse , to break down everything that happened at Albert Park — from strategy calls to rookie performances...

Episode Overview The 2026 Formula One season brings the biggest rules overhaul in over a decade — and we have the perfect guest to break it all down. Host Diane Bortoletto is joined by Simone Scanu , co-founder of real-time F1 data and telemetry app Formula Live Pulse , and co-host Ciara Gillan for a deep-dive pre-season debrief covering Bahrain testing, Ferrari's jaw-dropping engineering innovati...

This week on Away We Go Podcast , Di sits down with Ciara Gillan — co-founder of Formula Live Pulse and now a regular voice on the show for the 2026 season. You’ve heard Ciara on race recaps. You’ve heard her talk strategy, telemetry and team politics. But this episode is about her. From asking “too many questions” during races (Simone’s words) to co-building one of the most data-rich second-scree...

This week, Away We Go Podcast sits down with Luke West, editor of the brand-new Pole Position magazine - a 2026 grand prix season and Australian Grand Prix preview. We talk about Luke’s career and how he came to be the editor a new print Formula 1 magazine in Australia. He also shares how he witnessed history watching Ayrton Senna win a rain-washed Adelaide Grand Prix, how he was a proud member of...

Inside the F1 Exhibition, Dianne Bortoletto chats with Nicole Piastri, Oscar Piastri's former high performance coach Kim Keedle, F1 Academy Drivers Avia Anagnostiadis and Joanne Cicconte, and the producer of the F1 Exhibition. The F1 Exhibition is held at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre until April. https://f1exhibition.com Download my free Melbourne Grand Prix Travel Guide here Includes insider t...

Formula 1 and motorsport journalist and podcaster Matt Clayton has worked in F1 for close to 30 years. He pioneered Formula 1 podcasting back in 2010 before, erm, everyone became a podcaster. Matt sits down with Di and his thoughts about the 2025 F1 season, McLaren’s papaya rules, Max Verstappen, Lewis Hamilton, Lando Norris and of course Oscar Piastri. He also shares stories of Bernie Ecclestone’...

No yellow flags, no safety cars and no contact. The final race of the 2025 Formula 1 season was tense, because of what was at stake, but also quite boring as far as race action goes. With Australian Oscar Piastri trailing championship leader by 16 points, his McLaren team mate Lando Norris, cinching the title was going to take more than pure race craft. Oscar needed a miracle, “a Bradbury”, especi...

Late braking, fastest laps, pole positions and a sprint win at the Qatar Grand Prix saw a welcome return to Oscar Piastri’s top form. However, in the main race, McLaren failed to pit both drivers on lap 7 of 57 when a safety car was deployed, when every other car on the grid did pit. To add complexity to race strategies, it was mandated that the maximum a tyre could be used for was 25 laps, making...