You know the names Niki Lauda and Mario Andretti for sure, even if you don’t normally follow Formula 1 racing. You might know the names Clay Regazzoni, or Gilles Villeneuve if you do follow Formula 1. But do you know the man who works with the drivers? That man was Antonio Tomaini, and in the 1970s, he was the wrangler of drivers for Ferrari. He was the front line between the racing names everybody knew, loved and came to see and, effectively, everything else. He saw Lauda’s no-nonsense and clinical dissection of the cars, pointing out everything with a black-and-white viewpoint (and colorful language when he wasn’t liking what he saw or felt). He has stories of Reggazzoni taking him for one hell of a ride in a Ferrari Daytona. He was there when Lauda left Ferrari and Gilles Villeneuve took the driver’s spot, and of course he worked under the legend that is Enzo Ferrari. The things that he saw and experienced easily trump the traditional legend and lore that most fans can recite verbatim. Tomaini had to get to know the drivers in order to work with them and to get them to perform as they should. In this interview with Davide Cironi, he tells the stories that only he can tell.

Be sure to have closed-captioning turned on when you play the video, as everything spoken is in Italian.