Hi everyone and welcome to Beyond the Grid with me, Tom Clarkson. We have an absolute

cracker of a guest view this week. In fact, during these dark days of the coronavirus,

how better to pass the time at home than listening to one of the sport's biggest characters

of the last 30 years? The guy I'm talking about doesn't do introductions, so let's start

the show by guessing who I'm talking about. Here are a few facts. He's Italian and he grew

up in a ski resort 70 miles northeast of Monaco. He started his working life at the Milan

Stock Exchange where he met a fashion icon for whom he'd later work. He's friends with Donald

Trump. He became the commercial boss of the Benetan Formula One team despite having no

experience of Formula One whatsoever. And he quickly became team principal of Benetan

and the rest, as they say, is history. He won world titles with Michael Schumacher in

1994-1995 and several more with the rebranded Renault team and Fernando Alonzo in 2005-06.

I'm talking, of course, about Flavio Breitori. Flavio occasionally comes to races these days,

but we hadn't had a proper chat prior to this podcast since he left Formula One more than

10 years ago. It was great to catch up and on this occasion we met at Flavio's office

in Monaco where he runs his various businesses. You might be familiar with the billionaire

and crazy pizza brands to name but two. The walls of his office are adorned with pictures

of Flavio and Formula One, especially him with Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonzo.

His was an incredible F1 career, but you must remember that Flavio sent ripples through

F1 when he first arrived. The establishment didn't like him. After all, how could an Italian

T-shirt maker beat the might, the Formula One royalty that was Ferrari and Macchiron?

Well, let's find out what happened. Now, those of you who can remember Flavio from his time

in Formula One will know that his English is heavily accented. You have to tune into his

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