11:00-12:00 | Conference Room

Riccardo Patrese returns to tell the story of motorsport and Formula 1, with one eye on the past and the other on the future.

What did it mean to race when you didn’t know if you would survive the next event? And what does it mean to race today, in an era where technology increasingly tends to conceal—far more than before—the drivers’ talent?

Seventeen years in Formula 1, 256 Grands Prix contested, duels with the greatest drivers of the era—an era when you raced with your instincts even before your mind, when talent was felt in your hands and your back, and risk was part of the job. Those were years when the paddock was practically open access; people smoked and played football between free practice sessions, yet on track you risked your life every other day. In these pages, Riccardo Patrese—who, beyond his firsthand experience with Williams, Brabham, and Arrows, has maintained a privileged and close-up perspective on the sport by following his son Lorenzo’s racing career—shares his view of Formula 1 then and now, without blind nostalgia or indulgence.

He speaks of the driver’s solitude, the political correctness of today’s paddock, the fierce talent of Max Verstappen, the fragility of Lando Norris, and the difference between racing to win and racing for enjoyment. He also discusses Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari, the growing presence of women in Formula 1, and the exorbitant costs faced by newcomers. And further, how the daily lives of drivers and team personnel have changed, as well as the design of circuits and cars, competitiveness, communication, the composition of the audience, and the overall atmosphere—on and off the track.

So many changes, so many questions, but one certainty remains: the thrill a driver feels at the wheel of a single-seater, launched at top speed, is an almost mystical bliss—as Ayrton Senna once said—that no technological innovation or media demand will ever diminish.