The Lore Files - Fernando Edition

Explanations and evidence below the cut:

Niki both confirming and denying that they shared a one-bedroom flat - in his interview with Graham Bensinger in 2017, Bensinger asked Niki what he remembered from sharing a London flat with James. Niki didn't correct him. The flat share was also mentioned in Gerald Donaldson's biography of James, in a section where he had interviewed Niki following James's death. However, in older interviews Niki had said that they didn't formally share a flat, he just stayed in James's place a few times when he had nowhere else to go.

Their sensitive arses - there is a moment in RUSH where Niki diagnoses all the problems in Marlene's car by, as TV Tropes put it, performing a Sherlock Scan with his butt. IRL, Niki always claimed he had a sensitive ass that helped him win races (he was quoted in Grand Prix International magazine on his comeback, saying he was relieved his ass was still sensitive). And he was asked if James had the same sensitive ass, and said yes.

Requesting adjoining hotel rooms in Watkins Glen - after a lot of team infighting, James and Niki had a clear-the-air dinner together in Watkins Glen in 1976 (second last race of the season) and then requested adjoining hotel rooms. Confirmed by Maurice Hamilton, Niki's biographer and long-time friend. (Also in Tom Rubython's book, proving that even a stopped clock is right twice a day).

James's gf saying she didn't like to think what kind of friends they were in 76 - James's then-GF said in a film called One that a) Niki's crash gave him charisma, and b) that towards the end of the 1976 season, they became very good buddies, and that she didn't like to think of the kind of buddies they became. "Playboys together." See 1 hour and 22 minutes into this video.

Niki spontaneously denying in an interview that they had sex in the shared flat - In the same Bensinger interview in 2017, Niki described his memories of sharing a flat with James as "lots of...how you say it politely, intercourse...not with me, I have to say.

No one asked, bab.

Niki greeting Freddie Hunt saying "I loved your father" - this one can make me cry pretty reliably like six days out of 28. Freddie Hunt said it in the same film, One (about 1 hour 29 minutes in).

The "My Dear" Interview - @aston-axo did an amazing job cleaning up the footage of this and it's gorgeous. Playful 70s boys, and Niki's curls are especially lovely in the cleaned-up version.

James mentioning Niki as often as possible in his Autosport columns - the man was relentless. My favourite:

James being allowed to fly Niki's plane once - I'll let James tell this one in his own words.

James saying he wishes they could have shared the title - James said this at least twice that I'm aware of - one before the final race at Fuji, and once after. Especially after the race, James was so respectful and just gave no space for anyone to question Niki's courage.

brocedes edit with a noah kahan song cause they own the sad and angsty ™ 😀

okay right let’s get something straight about kevin magnussen in the context of sports nepo babies: kevin does not fit the traditional understanding of it at all. the best you can say is that he is the son of another motor racer - but he has very much /not/ had the advantages that other drivers including: lance stroll, mick schumacher, carlos sainz jr and max verstappen have had. here’s why:

- jan magnussen fathered kevin when he was nineteen. kevin was raised by a single mother and self-admittedly did not have a conventional relationship with his father and describes it as “more of a friendship”.

- jan magnussen didn’t have any money to support kevin’s career. in fact in 2008, kevin had to give up racing and take work as a welder. that’s basically the closest thing the grid has to being working class.

so yeah, kevin’s surname opened some doors for him at mclaren, but that is literally it. in fact jan magnussen’s success (like his le mans win) actually came after kevin’s career in f1 had begun. kevin does not have any family wealth backing him, didn’t have anyone giving him helping him to secure seats or sponsors, and his dad’s name carried very limited weight until after he’d already been dropped by mclaren. he was not groomed from birth to be a racer like some and has never had a safety net.

this really puts into context why he’s such a scrappy little bastard as a racer and why he loves his scrappy little bastard team so much. they may have passed over him in favour of money in the form of nikita mazepin but they were very upset about having to do so to stay afloat and got him back as soon as the opportunity was there. that’s loyalty!

Nico Hülkenberg as the wolf

hello i saw in your tags that you don't think people on here get casey stoner and as someone relatively new into the sport i would love to hear your thoughts <3

(context here) okay first of all, this post will be framed as ‘things I wish people talked about more with regards to casey stoner’, rather than arguing against what I think people think

I've tried to come up with a concise response to this ask but kept heading into thesis-length territory. so I decided to write a bullet point list and it’s still… yeah… but well it could be worse. if you, dear anon, wish to read thousands of words of casey stoner lore then please let me know. otherwise, here are just a few things I find interesting about this bloke:

casey has a very complex relationship with the concept of confidence, both in other riders and himself, in the sense that he KNOWS how important it is but also believes/wishes that he specifically is kinda above all that

this feeds into how he wishes that racing were Just Racing and not all this other stuff… not his brain not his body not other racers being assholes on/off track not talking to journalists or doing photoshoots not having to deal with politics etc etc - central underlying tension of his career

he has openly spoken about not ever really enjoying race day, saying the only thing he's missed after retiring is qualifying. very perfectionist, the anxiety, the over-thinking, craving control… all key casey traits

(which also ties in with the valentino rivalry, because valentino obviously adores racing (in particular wheel-to-wheel battle) but he’s also great at all that other off-track stuff)

some very rigid ideas of How The Sport Should Look, which you can see in everything from how he talks about racing standards to the introduction of CRT riders (he had it OUT for them, head hot every time aleix espargaro shows up in parc fermé) to valentino’s influence on ducati and the importance of the colour red

let him have his mean streak! the grim satisfaction in discussing jorge’s 2008 injuries after his early-season arrogance towards casey, the dismissiveness towards dani, some of the wilder valentino remarks (this isn’t a criticism to be clear, alien-on-alien violence is part of the natural order of things)

casey is a classic case of ‘just because you’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they aren’t after you’. definitely a suspicious guy and perpetual underdog 'me against the world' mindset. not to get too psychoanalytic-y, but I reckon this was partly born out of how he had to leave australia as a teenager (with his family completely dependent on him succeeding) because of how the racing establishment down under fucked him over

they definitely were out to get him a lot of the time, cf yamaha and then ducati drama plus the slander from some of the greats of the sport, fellow riders, the media etc etc (particularly egregious in 2009 when he was dealing with his mystery illness and a lot of people said some pretty unpleasant stuff in his absence - here is just one example)

his struggles were constantly downplayed. the chronic fatigue misdiagnosed as lactose intolerance led to people calling him weak-minded, broken, running away from the sport (part of why he was so allergic to the idea his results might in any way be connected to what was going on in his head). add in the undiagnosed anxiety and you have all this invisible strife people wouldn't even take seriously

that being said, he definitely did have a propensity for jumping to the worst possible conclusions

two specific examples: firstly from his autobiography, where he makes the claim that valentino may have been sabotaged in the 2006 title decider and was deliberately given a rubbish tyre to make him lose the championship - to which casey’s response was: “welcome to my world, mate”. he does have a tendency to believe he’s being sabotaged, and is constantly on the look out for conspiracies even when they are… unlikely

the other example is mat oxley talking about his issues with casey in his stint working for ducati, partly based on a misunderstanding:

something allegedly written about him in 2001!

let’s just say he can definitely hold a grudge

the moaner stoner stuff was definitely nasty, calling him mopey and whiny and all of that, but he also has never shied away from some good old-fashioned complaining (some of this was a bit of a spiral - complaining for good reason worsening public perception of him leading to more reasons to complain)

see also the lingering marc grudge, who probably did play a significant part in getting casey kicked out of honda (as casey has accused him of). whether marquez prevented stoner from racing in 2015 is more of an open question. casey still speaks about how honda made a mistake by only listening to marc (which, again, does have some truth to it)

casey was always very quick to shut down the idea that momentum, motivation, confidence etc could affect his results (unlike that of his competitors) because he argues he was always very rational & clear-sighted about when things were his fault & when things could be blamed on the bike + extraneous factors. he really goes into detail about this when discussing 2008 laguna seca in his autobiography, which he argues had no effect on him psychologically (but was followed by him crashing out of the lead of the next two races)

has definitely spoken more about his rivalry with valentino than valentino has, which probably has also helped shape perception of it over time

on ‘ambition outweighed talent’ - I feel like people almost understate just what a (hilariously) out of pocket remark it was in context. it was rossi’s second ever race at ducati (and the start of his season was impacted by his shoulder issues) - and the rain meant he had a ~win it or bin it~ approach because he knew it was as good a chance as he might get for some time (despite starting from 12th). the move on stoner for second place was at best optimistic, most definitely impatient and at worst foolish - but sort of understandable in that situation, rossi was definitely rapid, and this stuff can happen in the wet. in that sense, it was obviously more a reaction to the manner of the apology (and his frustration with the stewards) than to what casey himself described as a racing incident

stoner made a remark in his autobiography about how rossi had stolen 25 points in a title battle he was never going to be a part of (oof). whether you're obligated to race title contenders differently is already a bit sketch but certainly should not be a consideration for anybody in round TWO

he was forced to publicly retract the remarks, though he doubled down on them to a deeply funny extent in his autobiography by suggesting they were true of valentino’s entire career and that he’d just benefited from a weak era. rossi mostly took it on the chin especially when interviewed about it for documentaries, probably because with something like that you do just need to take the L

it's understandable how it’s become such a defining image of their rivalry (along with laguna seca), not least because of how evocative the whole thing is - rossi showing up still wearing his helmet, trying to make a PR apology stick while he’s been eating nauseating amounts of humble pie at ducati; stoner casual as you like, pissed off about the points loss while still indulging in schadenfreude about how the Great Big Ducati Adventure is working out for rossi

but again, I think it’s funnier because of just HOW over the top an insult it was in that situation (and more broadly how it does have a different vibe to their interactions when they were meaningfully competing, aka 2007-2008)

in conclusion: casey has his doubts and his insecurities and his obsessions and his foibles… a complicated guy in his own right

and a big thing I’d like to stress here is that the rivalry with valentino does benefit from treating them both as somewhat unreliable narrators

I just think he's neat

been loving the recent posts about chase because bro is so insane as a character

- dead mother, abusive czech dad who visits him while dying of lung cancer and doesn’t say anything

- goes to seminary, tries become a priest but gets axed after sleeping with the groundskeeper’s wife

- ends up becoming a doctor like his dad after all

- is australian

- has an ambiguous background in bdsm

- falls in love with his coworker after hearing her mention sex one singular time

- has internalised fatphobia

- is friends with nuns

- sleeps with his coworker (who’s stolen meth from a patient after possibly getting hiv from said patient)

- has sex with his coworker in a patient’s house, and in the hospital’s sleep lab, and in a storage closet

- kisses a 9 year old with terminal cancer after she begs him to

- gets fired and proceeds get a different job on a different floor of the same hospital

- hypnotises his boss (who has just gotten his skull cracked open)

- goes into anaphylactic shock after doing body shots off a stripper at his bachelor’s party (planned by his ex-boss, who’s subconscious (in the form of a hallucination of ex-boss’s best friend’s dead girlfriend) tries to murder chase by deliberately hiring a stripper who uses strawberry lotion that chase is allergic to)

- marries his coworker on the day their ex-boss gets committed to a psychiatric hospital

- murders an african dictator

- nearly gets caught for murdering the dude, has to be covered by his ex-ex-boss and coworker

- goes into a spiral which convinces his coworker-wife that he’s cheating on her 2 months into their marriage

- confesses to murdering the dictator to his wife, who leaves him

- sleeps with his ex-wife/ex-coworker in an exam room while the hospital is on emergency lockdown

- gets his only new haircut in the entire show after his divorce

- pretends to be a dumb, misogynistic, unemployed american while speed dating to prove that his looks don’t matter as much as his personality. even while pretending to be a loser, he still gets a bunch of women’s numbers

- sleeps with a woman at the wedding of some important hospital person, gets photographed nude, and is then made fun of by all his coworkers for having a tiny dick

- gets stabbed

- has a sex dream about his coworker who he is very much not into after the coworker confesses to having a sex dream about him

- takes over the diagnostics department after his boss and boss’s boybestfriend run away for their gay death pact

photos by x

popping in to spread a little love<3 you are loved. you are wanted. you belong here.

Nico Rosberg as the swan

HEYY I was thinking if you do commissions still? I was thinking if you can do an angst edit with Lawhan, with “Emails I can’t send.” By Sabrina Carpenter in the background?

If not than that’s on still love you tho 🩷🫂

pspspspsspspsppspss