Mark Rushbrook on Ford Racing's Return to Formula 1

Welcome to the Gas, the official podcast of American Cars and Racing, in AmericanCarsandRacing.com.

I'm Gary Gastelew.

This episode is brought to you by Carbotech Performance Break Pads.

Made in the USA and conquered North Carolina, Carbotech offers competition-proven performance

for your daily driven cars, trucks, and even SUVs.

It's ctbrakes.com or call 877-899-5024 for more information about Carbotech brakes.

Brakes are very important, but here we like to keep our foot on the gas, because this

is the Gary and Alex show.

And with me again, Alex Nunez, my co-host.

I know I always give you the warmest welcome to the show.

I feel so happy and welcomed every time you introduce me, Gary.

So thank you so much.

I appreciate the warm.

We needed an A. Adam and Alan didn't pick up the day we were casting for the show.

So just take the win, okay?

I'm happy to fill a role, Gary, anytime.

So gas pedal, brake pedal, clutch pedal, I'm not a very good, I can drive a stick.

One thing I've never been good at is the heel-toe braking, blipping the throttle.

Is that something you could do?

I feel like a chump, especially on the track.

I've never really gotten the knack for that.

I have never myself gotten quite the knack for it either.

I have tried and I have managed to not break anything in the trying, but there are many

others who are better at it than I.

Fortunately for us, many of the few remaining cars you can buy with a manual transmission

have the new rev-match feature where you just move the stick and it automatically blips.

It's kind of like cheating, but I'm amazed at how well that works.

Have you driven a car with that?

I have.

And it's kind of neat, like you said.

Your Mustang does not have it.

The current Mustangs do.

And in fact, I didn't even realize this.

The competition Mustang Dark Horse R has it, the one they use in the Mustang Challenge

series.

So I might want to check out that racing series one of these days, because I'm a pretty

good driver when I got the paddle shifters or the automatic, I'm just not good with

the shifted.

But you can buy your way in, Gary, that's the nice thing about that series.

In fact, this reminds me.

Did I ever tell you about the time I drove a Formula One car?

I don't believe that you have.

Here to say the coolest thing I've ever gotten to do in my career, at least.

It was 1997 Arrows.

It was Damon Hill's car.

Some rich guy owned it.

I guess he rented it out to people to get the thrill of driving a Formula One car.

I don't remember the details.

One thing I do remember, though, is that while that competed with the Yamaha V10,

this guy was smart enough to swap in a Ford Cosworth DFV V8 because he knew it would

be a lot easier to get parts and maintenance for that motor.

The Cosworth DFV course, a stalwart of Formula One in the 60s, 70s and 80s.

Ford continuing into the 1990s, Michael Schumacher got his first championship driving a Ford powered

car, then a transition to the Jaguar branding and in 2004 left the series.

But as you know, Alex, what's happened the next year?

Ford is back in Formula One.

Back in Formula One in a new collaboration with Red Bull to develop the Red Bull Ford

powertrains.

And with us now to talk about that and everything else Ford's got going on and it's got a lot

going on next year is the global director of Ford Racing himself, Mark Rushbrook, who

I give a very warm welcome to the show.

How you doing, Mark?

I'm doing great, guys.

Thanks for having me.

Busiest time you've ever had in your career right now, especially with Formula One

on top of NASCAR and NHRA and IMSIN, everything else you guys do?

It is.

It always seems like it's pretty busy around here, but it is busier than ever with Formula

One, a hypercar program, off-road racing, backyard, king of the hammers, Baja.

There's a lot of things going on with our racing, but our performance cars as well.

You just changed the name of your group from Ford Performance to Ford Racing.

Why exactly did you do that?

Yeah, I mean, it's not just the name change.

Yes, we did change our name, but it's really to signal though how we have refocused

on racing as part of the fabric of our company, leaning into it more than we have

ever before.

Ford Racing goes back 125 years to October 10, 1901 with Henry Ford winning a race

in Sweetstakes that led to the formation of this company.

But now as we lean so heavily into racing, but inside of our team here in Ford Racing,

it is a combined engineering team that works on all the racing, but also works

on all of our Ford Racing Performance vehicles for the street, for customers

to drive down the road, park in their garage, park in their driveway, all of our

Raptors, all of our high performance Mustangs that we have as well.

So it's all one team doing all of that work.

You've got a big season kickoff event planned for Detroit, January 15,

day after my birthday, by the way.

You've done this event the last couple of years in Charlotte.

Why are you bringing it to Detroit?

Why the homecoming for this year?

Yeah, I mean, it's exciting what we've done with that launch.

It's gotten bigger each year and now coming into our third year,

we really wanted to bring it to our hometown.

We are America's race team.

We want to bring it here, celebrate with our local dealers, with our Ford employees.

But especially in partnership with Red Bull, as we reenter Formula One together

with them, it was important for them to be in this market.

And we just wanted to bring everything to home, really shine the spotlight

on Ford Motor Company here in front of our neighbors and our employees.

You announced this collaboration with Red Bull back in 2023,

a total coincidence that they are, in fact, the company that bought Jaguar Racing

from Ford back in 2004, right?

That's right. In fact, it's the same buildings over there.

It's the Stewart Building that used to be when it was Stewart Grand Prix

and then Jaguar Racing and ultimately now Red Bull Racing, Oracle Red Bull Racing.

But it's a great partnership.

And like a lot of people are saying, we're coming back to Formula One in 2026.

I actually believe that we came back to Formula One in 2023

when we signed that agreement, because we've been working very hard

for these last three years with Red Bull on the new power unit,

the hybrid powertrain that will be in the race car starting next year.

So I feel like we've been back in for three years already,

but anxious to get on the track in 2026 with Red Bull as our partner.

First of all, next year, all new power units.

It's going to be 50-50 split between the internal combustion engine

and the electric drive.

Sound like originally you were more focused on the electric side of things

and ECU, but your roles expanded since then, I think.

Yeah, very, very much so.

So the 2026 regulations in total were very good for us in terms of

the increased emphasis on the electrification of the V6 Turbo

hybrid power unit, all new cars taking weight out of the cars

and the commitment of the sport to go to net zero for carbon by 2030 as well.

So it made a lot of sense to come in.

We looked at all the different ways of getting into Formula One.

Partnering with Red Bull made the most sense for us,

where we knew we could bring expertise to impact the performance on the track,

but where we could also learn that initial emphasis,

exactly like you said, was on the electric side of the powertrain,

the motor, the inverter, the battery cell chemistry,

the battery pack itself, the software, the calibration of all of that.

But as we started into this technical partnership with Red Bull,

we found there were so many more areas where we could contribute and learn.

And it's only expanded from there.

We're making a lot of parts through advanced manufacturing facilities

that we have here in Southeast Michigan to make parts every day

that are being shipped over to Milton Keynes for the development

and testing, but also will be in the race cars for the racing.

You'll also be supplying the RB racing team.

You know, a lot of people say Formula One is really engineers battling each other.

Would you say this is the biggest engineering challenge you've been involved with?

Perhaps. I mean, they're all big and different and well,

they've all got unique challenges, but the intensity of Formula One,

the pace of all motorsports moves very quickly.

But the pace at which Formula One moves is faster than any other racing series

that we're in the number of iterations that we've gone through

with different designs on the parts is more than we go through on any other series.

So it's always fast paced, but this is at another level.

New power unit, new chassis next year as well.

You don't really have a benchmark.

If you dropped into the middle of a formula, you'd at least know what the bar was.

You've got the rulebook.

You don't know what your competitors are working on.

Is it as blind as that?

Like you're really not going to know how you stand to get to that first test in February.

You don't know until everybody hits the racetrack.

Now, we we have a sense for it because, like you said,

every team has a brand new car, every power unit manufacturer.

It's a brand new power unit.

So everybody started with a clean sheet of paper.

Now, many of the people had previous designs,

but because this was the first time that Red Bull Ford have done our own power unit

of anything close to this configuration, we were truly started with a clean sheet of paper.

But you look at what the rules allow and you can estimate what is theoretically

possible in terms of power from the combustion engine,

from the combination of the electric and that combustion.

So we think we know it's possible.

We know where we are.

We don't truly know where the competitors are.

And the way the rules are written,

none of the teams can go on the track with the 26 car or the 26 power unit

until January 26 at Barcelona.

So there's a lot, a lot of focus on that event,

making sure we've got everything ready for that.

But that's when we will start to see where everybody is.

But it doesn't end there, right?

Because there's that test January 26 for the full week.

And then in February, there are the second test and the third test in Bahrain.

And then a few weeks after that is the first race in Melbourne.

So it's going to be where, how does everybody get the track in Barcelona?

But then how quickly do you react to what you learn

and continue to iterate your design as you go to racing just just a month and a half later?

Your friends at Cadillac also getting into Formula One next year.

They're built in their own chassis and for the first couple of years

going to be Ferrari, powertrain, power unit customers.

No one expects them to be good next year because they're all new.

They do. I don't think anybody else does.

They probably have a lot less pressure than some other teams do.

You're joining one of the most successful Formula One operations ever.

Does that bring you more confidence or put more pressure on Ford

because you're the new guy?

And if they don't do well next year, everybody's going to blame you.

Yeah, I think it's both, to be honest.

Right? Like we, for all the different racing series that we participate,

we always look to partner with the best racing teams,

organizations that are like-minded, similar to us with a focus on technical

strength, but the commitment to do whatever it takes to have a winning

program to be able to win races and win championships.

So as we came into Formula One, we knew that Red Bull was that right

partner as soon as we sat down for the very first discussion.

So absolutely, it's an opportunity to partner with somebody like that.

But it's also pressure that together Red Bull and Ford need to deliver

on the track as well. We know it's an enormous challenge.

We're not taking that lightly.

We don't expect that we will automatically be at the front of the grid.

But that's what we're committed to continue to work, to make sure that

we're there in contention to win races and championships.

You mentioned the hypercar program that still kind of under wraps.

That's for 2027. You'll be at Le Mans with that.

Compare that to F1, though.

Those things are kind of science projects as well.

But are they as challenging as a Formula One car?

It's a different challenge. It's a different pace.

The approach that we're taking with hypercar is the LMDH formula,

which allows us to work with one of the approved chassis suppliers.

In this case, we're working with Orca.

So the spine of the vehicle is already designed,

but we are certainly working on the combustion engine

to make that is going to be designed fully in-house at Ford,

built in-house at Ford, all of our testing here inside of Ford.

And then the body we're doing ourselves in terms of the aerodynamics work on it

and the design studio styling that goes into it.

So there's a lot of work that goes into it.

Every detail matters.

We'll homologate the car next year, be racing in 2027

and cannot wait to be on the grid for the overall win,

competing for the overall win at Le Mans and through the full season to WECC.

You guys are testing the the Evo of the Mustang GT3 at Daytona this weekend.

Anything that you wanted to or are able to share about the changes to that car

as it takes the track for the first time in this weekend's testing.

Yeah, we love our Mustang GT3.

We've been racing the current version for two years through 2024-2025.

We've had some great success with it, including the class win

at the 24 hours of Daytona in January earlier this year,

but also campaigned successfully throughout Europe by HRT

and many different series participating in WECC as well.

So we've had a lot of success with that car.

But as with any race car, the more miles,

the more laps you complete with it,

there are things that we look at and say,

well, we could have done that a little bit better.

So in the Evo, it is an Evo.

So it's not a major overall of the car,

but it is continuing throughout many areas of the cars

to make small incremental improvements,

but they all light up to make the car in total quite a bit better

for not just a factory team in IMSA,

but also our customer race teams around the world.

Very different from all this.

You mentioned your off-road programs.

You're going to be the Baja 1000 this weekend,

the car next year, trucks obviously big at Ford.

And I'm thinking back to 2010 when the Ford Raptor showed up

and really reinvented,

created the high performance off-road truck segment.

Now you've got the F-150 Raptor, the Ranger Raptor,

the Bronco Raptor, I'm sure there's more in the works.

Does that almost play into your customer base

more than the street racing does?

Just you sell a lot of trucks.

Yeah, we absolutely sell a lot of trucks,

F-150s, F-series in total, super duties,

and all around the world with Ranger as well.

The different series serve different purposes.

Like Formula One is great for overall Ford

in terms of the brand and who we are as a company,

our products, our people,

and it really allows us to speak

to the Formula One fan base

in a way that we can show who we are authentic to racing.

But we sell a lot of Raptors

and they're a very profitable brand for us.

But we make the Raptors better

based upon what we do in the off-road racing.

So we've got four Raptors

that are gonna start the Baja 1000

and looking forward to seeing how they do.

In order to earn the right to use a name Raptor,

you've got to be able to finish and win at Baja.

And that's what we're going there again to do.

So we get so much learning from competing in those races

that we're able to make the products every generation.

Raptor is better than the previous one

based upon everything that we learned in racing.

The big step that we took earlier this year

was when we entered with a Raptor T1 Plus at Dakar,

which is the biggest off-road race globally

in terms of the length of it, the intensity of it,

what is required from the vehicles,

but also the people, the drivers, the co-drivers,

the mechanics that are working straight for 15 or 16 days

as those vehicles race across Saudi Arabia.

But that has continued to elevate our global off-road racing

and the Raptor brand.

Have you thought about doing your own off-road racing series

like the Mustang Challenge, but with Raptor products?

We have certainly thought about it, yes.

It is a different customer base to race in off-road racing.

We love our customer racing in sports car

with Dark Horse R, the Mustang Challenge series,

the Mustang Cup series, selling Mustang GT4,

selling Mustang GT3s.

As you look in the off-road racing space,

absolutely there are customers there racing,

but we've got to find what is the right product

to bring there that customers will want to race

and that will keep racing.

And it could be a customer truck,

maybe not a spec series.

You mentioned at the Ford Racing kickoff event,

we're gonna be getting a sneak peek

at a new Ford Racing production car.

I know we'll have to wait until then

to find out exactly what that is,

but is this a version of something we're already familiar with

or you've blown us away with something from left field?

Well, you tell me once you see it on January 15th,

but that is, that's why we existed.

Yes, we're here to race,

but we've got to make sure

that it makes sense as a business,

that we're making our products better.

That's what we intend to show on January 15th

as a product that's been made better

by the racing that we do.

So that it's directly seen, felt, experienced

by the customers in terms of what they buy

and take home and put in their driveway and garage.

All right, well, Mark, I really appreciate

your fitness in, don't know how you did

because you're definitely one of the busiest people

in the automotive industry and in the racing scene.

Thanks for joining us today.

Looking forward to what's going on next year.

Yeah, we're excited too.

Can't wait, thank you.

Alex, how exciting is this Ford and Cadillac in Formula One?

Ford and Cadillac at Le Mans the year after that.

I mean, this is just an American racing fans dream.

It's super cool.

We'll start with the Formula One piece.

The Formula One piece is exciting

because it's always exciting

when you're going with a clean sheet.

Despite differences in resources and what have you,

there is a level of excitement there

that comes with the level playing field

because even sophisticated and experienced teams

are going to be going in with a bunch of brand new stuff.

And as we know with brand new stuff,

sometimes it doesn't work, sometimes it breaks.

So I think what we're looking at next year

is a potentially very exciting,

at least the front half of the season.

And then things tend to shake out.

I mean, you can think it's a fair expectation

that McLaren's going to come in real hot.

They have a ton of resources in their own wind tunnel.

They have all of that good stuff,

you know, things that work in their favor.

But Espen Marn has Adrian Newey.

Yes, and Ford Performance or Ford Racing,

working with Red Bull, it's not like,

it's not amateur hour at any of these places.

Even Cadillac is throwing tons of resources,

a ton of experienced people at it.

GM is one of the biggest engineering outfits

in the world of all time.

I mean, they're good at engineering.

It's hard to imagine they're not going to show up

with something solid.

They'll show up with something solid.

And I think that a lot of it is going to be

a lot of learnings, a Ferrari Power Unit customer team

in the beginning.

We all know that GM can build race engines

quite effectively.

So when they come with their own Power Unit,

that's going to be interesting too.

You know, we're a few years off from that,

you know, from where we sit today.

But like I said, super cool, really exciting.

I'm looking forward to it.

I'm looking forward to all these reveals,

too, of all these new cars.

Another twist next year.

F1's moving to Apple for its US broadcast.

Really hard to say how that's going to shake out

as far as the audience is concerned.

But aside from the performance side of things,

do you think Ford and Cadillac have an opportunity

to take over the fans in Formula One?

I know it's a completely different situation,

but the Garage 56 car going over to Le Mans.

I just remember people losing their minds with that.

And I mean, this isn't that,

but do you think they have a good opportunity

to actually compete with Mercedes and McLaren

and Ferrari on that level to win the hearts

and minds of these F1 fans?

Absolutely they do.

I know Cadillac, and I forget the guy's name,

who they hired, that's basically

in a spearhead marketing there.

But he is super creator focused.

So there is, I think, they're going to go in,

and it's not just Cadillac, I mean,

the other established teams do this,

but I think there's going to be a really

sophisticated approach to using every available platform

to reach fans and talk to them

and sort of bring them in-house for the journey,

especially with Cadillac.

Cadillac is doing it all, everything in-house from scratch.

So there's a lot of exciting storytelling,

and I think that that is a sort of thing

that just resonates with fans in general.

Plus whatever you get from the TV coverage,

I'm not worried about that part of it at all.

I mean, the Backmarker teams all have fans too.

Formula One is a very technology-focused series

obviously, but the personalities mean a lot.

And speaking of Cadillac, Valtteri is very funny.

Like that guy is always very funny.

So with him and Checo, you have established fans anyway,

and I think that Cadillac racing is going to be,

and Cadillac F1 is going to be really sophisticated

in terms of how they reach out to fans.

Do you think this sells cars?

And I know it's not different

because Cadillac's a luxury brand

for a mainstream brand.

I think that the halo effect of Formula One is real.

I think that Cadillac benefits and Ford benefits

from being in it.

The same way, I mean, it's funny,

we talk about Cadillac, Cadillac gets talked about a lot.

Ford, obviously we're talking about a lot today,

just having Mark on.

You almost forget that Audi is also

the other newcomer coming into this party.

So like I said, a lot of exciting stuff,

like interesting storytelling, you know,

I'm a comms guy, so I live for that stuff.

I think it's gonna be cool.

I think the racing's gonna be good.

I'm excited for this more compact car.

It's gonna be, I think it'll be great.

I'm really looking forward to seeing all of this stuff

once this season is in the books.

If nothing else, the merch should be off the hook.

I was looking on the Adidas website today

and they have a new Bad Bunny with Adidas

with Mercedes F1 collection.

You wanna talk about a crossover right there.

A collab within a collab, right?

Yeah, no, it's not gonna stop.

It's just gonna get wilder.

Just so happens the last couple of weeks,

I've been testing a couple of products from these brands.

I have the Cadillac Escalade V

and I have the Lincoln Navigator Black Label.

Lincoln's certainly not a performance brand these days,

but that's gonna be competing more against Cadillac.

And I did find this interesting.

Lincoln is doing the quiet flight thing

all about pure luxury,

whereas Cadillac's got the V-Series

in everything it makes now.

Even the electric cars are getting the V-Series.

They really are hot on that

and they do the luxury cars as well.

But these weren't interesting contrasts.

I thought Navigator Black Label,

the one I had $130,000,

we'll try it off the bat for Lincoln is pretty wild.

I would not have seen that coming

five years ago, let alone with an SUV.

But this thing, 440 horsepower, temperature charge V6.

Probably the most interesting feature in this

is that has a built-in spa experience.

It's got the 48 inch digital display across the dashboard

and you hit a button, reclines the seats,

turns the massage on, starts playing music.

And then there's a person coaching you

through a meditation session.

Sounds like Miss Casey from Severance.

I'm not sure, like that's the sort of thing

I'm gonna be using all of the time.

But I guess they look at the technology

they have available and say,

well, let's try this, maybe not.

Yeah, maybe somebody would think this is cool

when they buy the car.

I don't know if they're gonna use it every week.

That's not my thing.

I'm more about the visceral experience

that the Escalade V provides.

I will be directly upfront.

I shamelessly love that car.

That is one of my favorite cars, period.

I was very fortunate to be working with Cadillac

when they launched it.

This current version, the refreshed version,

is even cooler.

It's got a lot of tech that's, you know,

frankly trickled down from Escalade IQ.

I mean, if you ever needed proof

that Escalade IQ is considered that flagship, you know,

there, it's, you see it in these updated Escalades

where a lot of the stuff is really from there

from the interior experience

to the 24-inch wheels that you get on it.

But it is insane that a Cadillac Escalade

is able to move the way that the Escalade V does.

It is a testament to that engineering team.

That car is incredible,

and it's not just the standard length one.

The ESV is just as nuts.

682 horsepower, supercharged V8, 0-to-64.4 seconds.

This is a 6,500-pound full-size truck,

but they also packed all the lugs around there.

You mentioned the IQ stuff.

It's got the 55-inch digital display across the dashboard.

Four power doors.

You swipe the control screen on the center console,

and you can open and close all of the doors.

And it works pretty well, and you get used to it,

and you miss it when you give the car back.

Yes, and you talked about the Lincoln's price point.

The Escalade V is, well, yours was as tested 180.

170, well, as tested probably closer to 180.

And should mention that when it launched in 2023,

this was $150,000 vehicle.

Now the base is 170, which tells me

they sell a lot of these.

They sell a ton of Escalade in general.

I mean, average transaction price

of the Escalade family is very high,

just as a baseline thing.

The Escalade V, if anything,

they could charge more for it, in my opinion.

It's that good.

It's so much fun.

It's ridiculous.

It makes no sense for that car in that size class

to be as fun as it is.

Yet, here we are.

It is.

Gonna be interesting to see if they do any F1

Escalade V crossover models.

Because they did do the LeMolstra LeMol version

of the CT5-V sports sedan,

which is also as powerful as this and a lot of fun.

But it'd be interesting to see if they leverage

the F1 stuff into the SUV segment.

I would expect them to leverage the F1 stuff

into every single thing that it can be leveraged into.

I mean, this is a level of investment

that is not insignificant to put it mildly.

Committing to F1 means a lot.

And when you make that commitment,

you're gonna try and, you need to apply that.

That halo effect only works if you apply it

and Escalade is, you know, to me,

still the halo vehicle for that whole brand.

And so I wouldn't be surprised to see stuff

trickling down there.

I think what's great right now is that

while this is a car show,

we do talk so much about racing.

Not because we have to, but because there is so much

American racing stuff going on.

The Ram trucks in the Escar, Ford and Cadillac and F1.

Can it get any better?

I don't know.

No, it can't.

There's a lot going on.

It's easy to find somebody to root for,

especially if you are a fan of the domestic automakers.

You're not gonna be able to throw a rock

without hitting some series that is going to have

something that's right up your alley.

So, I mean, it's great.

And as Mark said, we're gonna see that branding

and everything is gonna be represented

in their street vehicles.

And I think racing is great for everybody.

It's great marketing for the brands,

but a lot of times, you know, when they're racing,

there is a lot of incentive to create

enthusiast vehicles.

So that's great for everybody.

Next season can't get here soon enough.

Next week can't either.

Our next episode, looking forward to that.

As always, Alex, thanks for joining me.

And thanks again to Mark Rushbrook

for taking time out of his globe trotting

to be on the show.

The Gas is a production of ACAR Media

and American Cars and Reason.com.

Mark Rushbrook on Ford Racing's Return to Formula 1

Ford Mustang

Escort Ford Cosworth

Ford Raptor

Ford Ranger

Ford Bronco

Cadillac Escalade V

Lincoln Navigator

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