When the grid forms for this weekend's Las Vegas Grand Prix keep an eye out for the crews around the two Red Bull cars. The No 1 mechanic position on each car is occupied by identical twin brothers, Matt and Jon Caller. Two parallel, key roles in each garage held at the same time, in the same team by the pair who previously worked on the world champion Max Verstappen's car together.
Brothers working in Formula One is not unusual, but identical twins ending up in identical positions across the garage from one another would not have been on anyone's bingo card. Now 34, Matt was born 30 minutes before Jon. Matt is No 1 mechanic on Verstappen's car as the Dutchman attempts to seal his fourth consecutive title in Nevada and Jon on Sergio Perez's.
"We never dreamed this could happen, even to the point we started working in the same team together," says Matt. "That in itself was a novelty. We were on Max's car together, both on the back-end, I was rear-end mechanic and Jon was the gearbox man. Then fast forward to now and we are both No 1s on our respective cars. I don't think anyone could have written that."
"We are both gunmen [operating the wheel gun during tire changes] as well, so even in the pit crew we do the same job," adds Jon, with a laugh they immediately share.
"I don't know if it's just written that way, we just don't seem to be able to stay apart."
This story is from the November 22, 2024 edition of The Guardian.
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This story is from the November 22, 2024 edition of The Guardian.
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