Latest news with #McLarenF1
Mint
3 days ago
- Automotive
- Mint
The Elon Musk you did not know: From Tony Stark connection to launching a perfume
The world's richest man, Elon Musk, is well known as the owner of Tesla, the electric car maker, and SpaceX, his private space company. He also took over the social media platform Twitter, renaming it X. Until recently, Musk worked within the US government as head of the Department of Government Efficiency - known as DOGE - which was part of Donald Trump's dispensation. After nearly 130 days in the role, Musk announced his departure from the department. His time there and his close ties with Trump kept him in the headlines more than ever. But there are many lesser-known facts about the billionaire entrepreneur, according to a report by Sky news. At just 12 years old in the early 1980s, Musk created a video game called Blastar. Using coding skills he had learned from the age of nine, Musk designed a game where players used their keyboard to shoot alien spaceships. By 1984, the game was sold to PC and Office Technology magazine for $500 (£371) and appeared in their December issue. Read | Elon Musk 'willingly accepted outrageous abuse because…': Donald Trump bids DOGE head farewell | Top 10 points Musk's talent for business showed early. In 1995, at 24, he and his brother Kimbal started their first company, Zip2, which developed online city guides for newspapers. The business began with just $28,000 (£20,000) but was sold for nearly $300 million (£222 million) in 1999. Before the sale, Musk and his brother were almost broke and slept on their office floor—something Musk later repeated in Tesla's early days. He earned $22 million from the sale and bought a McLaren F1 sports car. He told CNN, 'Just three years ago I was sleeping on the office floor, and now I've got a million-dollar car.' Not all Musk's ventures have been long-lasting. In 2022, he launched a perfume called Burnt Hair, described on The Boring Company's website as 'the essence of repugnant desire.' The scent was priced at $100 (£74) a bottle and sold 10,000 bottles within hours, earning Musk a million dollars. He joked, 'With a name like mine, getting into the fragrance business was inevitable - why did I even fight it for so long!?' The perfume is no longer available on the company's website. Besides perfume, Tesla released tequila in 2020 and Musk even sold limited edition Tesla short shorts as a playful challenge to investors betting against the company. Read | Black spot near Elon Musk's eye raises speculations amid reports of drug use Before Twitter became X, Musk founded an online banking and financial service company. The platform merged in 2000 with Confinity, which was co-founded by Peter Thiel and Max Levchin, and was later renamed PayPal. Musk served as PayPal's CEO but was ousted after disputes over the company's direction. eBay bought PayPal in 2002 for $1.5 billion (£1.4 billion). In 2017, eBay sold the domain back to Musk. Read | 'Did Elon Musk get punched?' His bruised eye at Oval Office baffles netizens Musk's life inspired Hollywood. The screenwriter of Iron Man, Mark Fergus, said the character Tony Stark was partly based on Musk, alongside Donald Trump and Apple's Steve Jobs. 'Musk took the brilliance of Jobs with the showmanship of Trump. He was the only one who had the fun factor and the celebrity vibe and actual business substance,' Fergus told New York Magazine. Musk even made a cameo appearance in Iron Man 2 in 2010. Despite popular belief, Musk did not start Tesla. The company was founded in 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. Musk was an early investor and became Tesla's fourth CEO in 2008, shortly after the first Tesla Roadster was launched. He is credited with taking Tesla onto the global stage. After buying Twitter for $44 billion in 2022 and renaming it X, Musk has been working to create an 'everything app.' He wants X to be like WeChat in China, offering messaging, payments, social media, business services and more. X's chief executive Linda Yaccarino said 2025 would be the year X 'connect [s] you in ways never thought possible,' with features like X TV, X Money, and Grok. In January, Musk announced a partnership with Visa to allow users to move money between traditional banks and an X digital wallet, making payments to friends easier.
Rhyl Journal
4 days ago
- Automotive
- Rhyl Journal
Lando Norris insists McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri is not his only title rival
Norris reignited his stuttering bid to land a first championship by winning from pole position in Monaco to reduce the deficit to Piastri to just three points. Piastri has four victories to Norris' two, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen the only driver outside of McLaren to win a grand prix this season. All eyes on Barcelona #McLaren | #M7AReborn | #SpanishGP 🇪🇸 — McLaren (@McLarenF1) May 29, 2025 Verstappen is now 25 points behind Piastri – with fourth-placed Mercedes driver George Russell 62 points adrift – but speaking ahead of the ninth round of the season in Spain, Norris said: 'Mathematically I feel like probably the whole grid can win the championship at the minute so if you think it is just out of me and Oscar then you are a bit silly. 'There are plenty of opportunities. I expect Ferrari will get better as the season goes on. 'And Max can still win. Come on! We are racing Max every weekend. He's been on the podium several times, he has won races, he beat us in Imola fair and square because he was quicker. 'I don't know what possibly makes you think that it's only between the McLaren drivers.' Norris, 25, will regain the lead of the championship he lost after last month's Saudi Arabia Grand Prix if he follows up his win in Monte Carlo with another triumph on Sunday. 'It's a great feeling to be in the lead of the championship, and to have more points than everyone, but again it is not something I look at and it is not something that changes anything I do day to day,' he continued. 'It doesn't change how hard I work or what I try to achieve. I will try to win this weekend and I'll try and win in Montreal, and I'll try and win in Austria. And it's got nothing to do with what position I am (in the championship).' A new technical directive will be introduced at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya to clamp down on flexible front wings which some believe has contributed towards McLaren's dramatic rise. The British team won the constructors' championship last season and have claimed six out of the eight wins so far in 2025. However, when asked if he was concerned McLaren will be affected by the rule change, Norris said: 'No, not at all. There are tweaks here and there, but nothing that will change how we have to do it.' Williams' Carlos Sainz continued: 'There has been a lot of talk regarding this technical directive but I don't think it will affect teams as much as people think. I wouldn't expect more than a one-tenth swing up and down the field.'
Leader Live
4 days ago
- Automotive
- Leader Live
Lando Norris insists McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri is not his only title rival
Norris reignited his stuttering bid to land a first championship by winning from pole position in Monaco to reduce the deficit to Piastri to just three points. Piastri has four victories to Norris' two, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen the only driver outside of McLaren to win a grand prix this season. All eyes on Barcelona #McLaren | #M7AReborn | #SpanishGP 🇪🇸 — McLaren (@McLarenF1) May 29, 2025 Verstappen is now 25 points behind Piastri – with fourth-placed Mercedes driver George Russell 62 points adrift – but speaking ahead of the ninth round of the season in Spain, Norris said: 'Mathematically I feel like probably the whole grid can win the championship at the minute so if you think it is just out of me and Oscar then you are a bit silly. 'There are plenty of opportunities. I expect Ferrari will get better as the season goes on. 'And Max can still win. Come on! We are racing Max every weekend. He's been on the podium several times, he has won races, he beat us in Imola fair and square because he was quicker. 'I don't know what possibly makes you think that it's only between the McLaren drivers.' Norris, 25, will regain the lead of the championship he lost after last month's Saudi Arabia Grand Prix if he follows up his win in Monte Carlo with another triumph on Sunday. 'It's a great feeling to be in the lead of the championship, and to have more points than everyone, but again it is not something I look at and it is not something that changes anything I do day to day,' he continued. 'It doesn't change how hard I work or what I try to achieve. I will try to win this weekend and I'll try and win in Montreal, and I'll try and win in Austria. And it's got nothing to do with what position I am (in the championship).' A new technical directive will be introduced at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya to clamp down on flexible front wings which some believe has contributed towards McLaren's dramatic rise. The British team won the constructors' championship last season and have claimed six out of the eight wins so far in 2025. However, when asked if he was concerned McLaren will be affected by the rule change, Norris said: 'No, not at all. There are tweaks here and there, but nothing that will change how we have to do it.' Williams' Carlos Sainz continued: 'There has been a lot of talk regarding this technical directive but I don't think it will affect teams as much as people think. I wouldn't expect more than a one-tenth swing up and down the field.'
North Wales Chronicle
4 days ago
- Automotive
- North Wales Chronicle
Lando Norris insists McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri is not his only title rival
Norris reignited his stuttering bid to land a first championship by winning from pole position in Monaco to reduce the deficit to Piastri to just three points. Piastri has four victories to Norris' two, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen the only driver outside of McLaren to win a grand prix this season. All eyes on Barcelona #McLaren | #M7AReborn | #SpanishGP 🇪🇸 — McLaren (@McLarenF1) May 29, 2025 Verstappen is now 25 points behind Piastri – with fourth-placed Mercedes driver George Russell 62 points adrift – but speaking ahead of the ninth round of the season in Spain, Norris said: 'Mathematically I feel like probably the whole grid can win the championship at the minute so if you think it is just out of me and Oscar then you are a bit silly. 'There are plenty of opportunities. I expect Ferrari will get better as the season goes on. 'And Max can still win. Come on! We are racing Max every weekend. He's been on the podium several times, he has won races, he beat us in Imola fair and square because he was quicker. 'I don't know what possibly makes you think that it's only between the McLaren drivers.' Norris, 25, will regain the lead of the championship he lost after last month's Saudi Arabia Grand Prix if he follows up his win in Monte Carlo with another triumph on Sunday. 'It's a great feeling to be in the lead of the championship, and to have more points than everyone, but again it is not something I look at and it is not something that changes anything I do day to day,' he continued. 'It doesn't change how hard I work or what I try to achieve. I will try to win this weekend and I'll try and win in Montreal, and I'll try and win in Austria. And it's got nothing to do with what position I am (in the championship).' A new technical directive will be introduced at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya to clamp down on flexible front wings which some believe has contributed towards McLaren's dramatic rise. The British team won the constructors' championship last season and have claimed six out of the eight wins so far in 2025. However, when asked if he was concerned McLaren will be affected by the rule change, Norris said: 'No, not at all. There are tweaks here and there, but nothing that will change how we have to do it.' Williams' Carlos Sainz continued: 'There has been a lot of talk regarding this technical directive but I don't think it will affect teams as much as people think. I wouldn't expect more than a one-tenth swing up and down the field.'
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Lando Norris insists McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri is not his only title rival
Lando Norris insisted he is not in a world championship shootout with McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri – and claimed the entire grid is still in title contention. Norris reignited his stuttering bid to land a first championship by winning from pole position in Monaco to reduce the deficit to Piastri to just three points. Piastri has four victories to Norris' two, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen the only driver outside of McLaren to win a grand prix this season. All eyes on Barcelona #McLaren | #M7AReborn | #SpanishGP 🇪🇸 — McLaren (@McLarenF1) May 29, 2025 Verstappen is now 25 points behind Piastri – with fourth-placed Mercedes driver George Russell 62 points adrift – but speaking ahead of the ninth round of the season in Spain, Norris said: 'Mathematically I feel like probably the whole grid can win the championship at the minute so if you think it is just out of me and Oscar then you are a bit silly. 'There are plenty of opportunities. I expect Ferrari will get better as the season goes on. 'And Max can still win. Come on! We are racing Max every weekend. He's been on the podium several times, he has won races, he beat us in Imola fair and square because he was quicker. 'I don't know what possibly makes you think that it's only between the McLaren drivers.' Norris, 25, will regain the lead of the championship he lost after last month's Saudi Arabia Grand Prix if he follows up his win in Monte Carlo with another triumph on Sunday. 'It's a great feeling to be in the lead of the championship, and to have more points than everyone, but again it is not something I look at and it is not something that changes anything I do day to day,' he continued. 'It doesn't change how hard I work or what I try to achieve. I will try to win this weekend and I'll try and win in Montreal, and I'll try and win in Austria. And it's got nothing to do with what position I am (in the championship).' A new technical directive will be introduced at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya to clamp down on flexible front wings which some believe has contributed towards McLaren's dramatic rise. The British team won the constructors' championship last season and have claimed six out of the eight wins so far in 2025. However, when asked if he was concerned McLaren will be affected by the rule change, Norris said: 'No, not at all. There are tweaks here and there, but nothing that will change how we have to do it.' Williams' Carlos Sainz continued: 'There has been a lot of talk regarding this technical directive but I don't think it will affect teams as much as people think. I wouldn't expect more than a one-tenth swing up and down the field.'
