F1 or Mario Kart?
There Formula Mario Kart continues in China too, although between the Sprint and the F1 GP in Shanghai the general feeling is that – thanks to the characteristics of the track – the issue has become somewhat normalized compared to the shock of the debut race in Melbourne. However, this did not stop the protagonists of the category from continuing to joke about the comparison made by Charles Leclerc between the single-seaters of the new regulatory era and the toy cars of one of the most famous and best-selling video games in the world. To the point that the same Ferrari has set on the steering wheel of the SF-26 of the Monegasque a screen on the steering wheel with the image of his “colleague” Super Mariowhile in the press conferences on Thursday Max Verstappen he joked that he trained by playing with the Nintendo Switch rather than, as he usually does, in the simulator.
The Canal+ commercial for Suzuka
It doesn’t end here, because now even the pay-TVs that broadcast F1 races are comparing the sport to Mario Kart. At least, that’s what the French broadcaster did Canal+ to present next weekend to your audience Japanese GP to Suzuka. And therefore, perhaps it will also be the fact that the World Championship stops in the homeland of Super Mario and Nintendo, it will also be that the theme of somewhat artificial races evidently continues to hover in the paddock – even during the GP there was an episode, with Sergio Perez who giggled on the radio asking to have a “mushroom” (an object that allows whoever picks it up to go faster for a limited time) – Canal+ seized the opportunity for another of its memorable television adverts.
Thus the promotional trailer of the TV station becomes a complete reference for Super Mario lovers, between the iconic tunes and the various mushrooms, stars, clouds, colored turtle shells and all the paraphernalia that makes playing the famous Nintendo video game particularly chaotic and fun. The parallel with Mario Kart is not the first comparison of F1 with other phenomena of contemporary pop culture: last year Canal+ had in fact created another popular advertising spot transforming Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri And Max Verstappen in the protagonists of the saga of Star Wars.
