"Lightning McQueen slapped" - Logan Sargeant

Team Torque Episode 5 dropped on Thursday, and it’s safe to say that you loved it. Though, that’s hardly surprising!

You had been crying out for Oscar Piastri to join Alex Albon and Logan Sargeant behind the microphone since Albono decided to throw the Aussie’s padel ability into question in Episode 1.

And, ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix, we were happy to make it happen with a little help from our friends at McLaren.

Now, if you haven’t watched the latest episode yet… where have you been?! This article will contain spoilers, so watch it below before reading on.

Right, where were we? Ah, yes. Oscar’s padel ability. It took Alex less time than a lap of the Shanghai International Circuit to backtrack on his remarks earlier in the season.

We learned that 022381/Loscarlex/Sargebonastri aren’t actually that bad (according to themselves), but they’ve humbly placed themselves a tier below the Spanish duo of Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz.

To be fair, padel is HUGE in Spain, with over 6,000,000 players and 14,000 courts in España. Unfortunately for those behind the mics, none of those courts have found their way to Shanghai, with the trio waiting until Miami for another game.

We were then guided through Logan and Oscar’s rise through the feeder series together, where they had been teammates on multiple occasions.

Alex also admitted to binge-watching British Formula 4 on his work computer. Let’s hope the boss didn’t catch that!

Moving swiftly on, Oscar divulged that not only was he on the same flight as Logan, but they were in the same row too! Truly an unbreakable bond.

In true Team Torque fashion, the conversation went from golf to discussing who would survive a zombie apocalypse the longest in a matter of seconds.

Some confusion over Will Smith’s filmography followed shortly after before Alex decided to call it and declare that he would be the one who survived, using his contacts and getting straight to a desert island, hoping that zombies couldn’t swim.

Oscar’s claims fell short as, according to Logan, he wouldn’t be able to hit them with his padel racquet.

Now, if you’ve been a Team Torque fan from the start, you will know movies aren’t necessarily the panel’s strong point. But a question regarding what surprising movies they like did take an interesting turn.

We learned that Alex spotted an engineer, who shall remain nameless, watching Love Actually, a Christmas rom-com, on the flight home from the Japanese Grand Prix the other week.

Naturally, these three young racing drivers got onto the topic of Pixar’s smash hit, Cars.

After getting over the pain of learning it was released in 2006, Logan proudly declared that “Lightning McQueen SLAPPED,” before Oscar went all-in discussing his love for the franchise.

Then, another turn... “Did you guys have a crush on the blue Porsche?” Alex asked. Maybe this was a moment of realisation for Albono, given his adoration for the car in real life.

Moving the conversation on, our No23 then decided it was time to anger the entire nation of Australia with his feelings for their beloved TimTam biscuit.

They wrapped up the chat by confirming the McLaren vs Williams Racing padel match is still on, with a forfeit for the losing side yet to be confirmed.

However, they quickly agreed that an off-track forfeit might be slightly safer than an on-track alternative.

“Is this how these Team Torques usually go?!” - Yes Oscar, yes it is, and we’ll be back for Episode 6 in Miami! See you then.