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Our reaction to the Red Bull & VCARB F1 car launches
Our reaction to the Red Bull & VCARB F1 car launches
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About this episode
The P1 Podcast dives into the recent car launches for Red Bull and VCARB, discussing the unique approach of pre-recording the event while marketing it as live. Matt and Tommy express their mixed feelings about the production quality and timing, especially given the early hour for viewers in the UK. They analyze the effectiveness of the launch format, the importance of maintaining excitement through staggered reveals, and the innovative yet somewhat clunky use of VR technology during the presentation. The episode captures the essence of F1's car launch season and the fans' reactions.
Brush down the red carpet and roll the definitely-not-pre-recorded tape, because car launch season is here!
First up, an absolute stunner from Red Bull and then something decidedly less stunning from their junior team, VCARB.
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Concept
F1
"Because I've been to, say for example, an F1 team before and they make you put a little sticker on the back of your phone to stop you from recording."
F1 stands for Formula 1, which is a type of car racing that involves fast cars racing on special tracks. It's known for its exciting races and advanced technology used in the cars.
F1, or Formula 1, is the highest class of single-seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). It features a series of races known as Grands Prix, held on various circuits around the world, showcasing cutting-edge technology and engineering in motorsport.
Brand
Ford
"...you've brought Ford in, they're of course going to go along with you. They're going to have to mention it. Is that their launch? Really, it's as much as Ford's launch as Red Bull."
Ford is a well-known car company that makes many types of vehicles, like trucks and cars. They have been around for a long time and are famous for their role in racing and car technology.
Ford is an American multinational automaker known for producing a wide range of vehicles, including cars, trucks, and SUVs. The brand has a rich history in motorsports and automotive innovation.
Brand
Red Bull
"...as much as Ford's launch as Red Bull. Because it's new to them. They need to introduce themselves to the world..."
Red Bull is a brand that makes energy drinks, but they are also famous for sponsoring sports, especially car racing. They own a racing team that competes in Formula 1.
Red Bull is an energy drink company that is also heavily involved in motorsports, particularly Formula 1, where they own and operate the Red Bull Racing team. They are known for their innovative marketing and sponsorship strategies.
Concept
Formula 1
"Well, that was a special anniversary, wasn't it? For the 75th anniversary of F1."
Formula 1 is a popular type of car racing where specially designed cars compete in races on different tracks. It's known for its fast cars and exciting events.
Formula 1 (F1) is the highest class of single-seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). It features a series of races known as Grands Prix, held on various circuits around the world, and is known for its high-speed competition and advanced technology.
Brand
Honda
"...and Honda is the perfect example, like you said. You know, if you'd have said when Honda were in the back of that McLaren..."
Honda is a car company from Japan that makes many popular vehicles. They are also involved in racing and have a reputation for building reliable cars.
Honda is a well-known Japanese automotive manufacturer, recognized for its reliable cars and innovative engineering. The brand has a strong presence in motorsports, particularly in Formula 1 and MotoGP.
Term
GP2 engine
"...when Honda were in the back of that McLaren and we were having GP2 engine..."
A GP2 engine is a type of engine used in a racing series called GP2, which helps young drivers prepare for Formula 1. These engines are built for speed and performance.
The GP2 engine refers to the power unit used in the GP2 Series, a former racing series that served as a feeder to Formula 1. These engines are designed for high performance and are typically based on existing Formula 1 technology.
Car
Dodge Charger
"...the story of how you found it. Like this 1973 Dodge Charger on eBay,"
The Dodge Charger is a famous car from the 1970s that many people love for its speed and cool looks. The 1973 version is part of a series of Chargers that were popular for their powerful engines and sporty design.
The Dodge Charger is a classic American muscle car known for its powerful engines and distinctive styling. The 1973 model is part of the second generation of Chargers, which were produced from 1971 to 1974, and features a more rounded design compared to earlier models.
Car
Pontiac Grand Prix SJ
"...from rare finds like the Pontiac Grand Prix SJ, to unique builds and your next daily driver."
The Pontiac Grand Prix SJ is a type of car that was made by Pontiac. It's known for being sporty and stylish, and it was popular in the past.
The Pontiac Grand Prix SJ is a variant of the Grand Prix, known for its sporty performance and features. It was popular in the 1980s and 1990s, often recognized for its distinctive styling and powerful engine options.
Term
daily driver
"...unique builds and your next daily driver. And now a new seamless way to buy them."
A daily driver is a car that you use every day to go places like work or school. It's usually a reliable car that you can count on for your daily needs.
A 'daily driver' refers to a vehicle that is used regularly for everyday transportation. These cars are typically reliable, practical, and comfortable for commuting or running errands.
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Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the P1 Podcast with Matt and Tommy.
2026 feels weird to say that we're now in the swing of things when it's like just under two months until it lights out in Australia.
But this is the beauty of a new regulation set.
The car launches, delivery launches, whatever you want to call them have been pushed forward.
We've got testing at the end of January and Red Bull, they decided to kick things off first.
Didn't they, Tommy? How are we feeling?
A very unsociable hour to kick 2026 off.
I'm feeling tired, but I'm feeling like F1 is well and truly back.
They did a proper car launch, which is always a risk, isn't it?
And I'm sure we'll dive into this of the balance of show the car
or just doing a picture online and F1 fans are never happy either way.
But yeah, they did a long, pre-recorded car launch.
Oh, well, let's get straight into it, shall we?
That is the topic of the first question, elephant in the room.
Let's talk about it.
P1 Patriot member Steelhead, why on earth would they pre-record it?
And then behave as if it was live?
That one is a little bit strange.
The title of the YouTube video says at the end, live.
The whole, I guess, marketing of it was that it was going to be a live car launch.
And yet there were pictures of the car circulating social media before the launch had even begun.
Now, I reckon from a Red Bull standpoint, they did not want leaks to happen.
Why would they put so much effort into a launch?
Do it in Detroit?
Not sure why they did it at 10 p.m. local time in Detroit, which is like 3 a.m.
where we were for the actual car launch, but whatever, right?
But the fact that they then basically the car, I don't know if the V-car was leaked before the launch started.
From the sound of our chat, the team posted it before we saw it in the pre-record.
I am go post. I am done.
Someone in fianza and V-car base just was like, now I'm done with this.
But it was slightly frustrating.
I avoided it massively.
I did not want to even go on social media.
As soon as I saw people in chat going, oh, it's on.
I'm like, no, the live streams or pre-recorded streams, whatever they are, car launches, I want to experience them.
I want to see what the effort that the teams have put into their little production.
But it is annoying that, of course, it was pre-recorded and everybody had kind of seen it,
or at least the people that searched for it had seen it.
Because it takes away the whole point of an event and then you're questioning why have they not...
Because I've been to, say for example, an F1 team before and they make you put a little sticker on the back of your phone to stop you from recording.
Or lock them away or anything.
Yeah, there was none of that. They were like, yeah.
Just don't post it.
I reckon they promised it.
Can we trust you all in the room to not post it?
Yeah, how bad can we make the Wi-Fi or signal in this room to make sure people don't do it?
But then it seems like it was quite a long pre-record.
So yeah, I assume that Red Bull weren't that naive in thinking that everyone would obey these rules
and no one would want to be that person to post the car with this DNA.
Yeah, exactly. It's just impossible.
You see, as soon as Max and Isaac came out on stage, all the phones came up.
Everyone's going to have their phone out filming this and them taking the covers off.
So yeah, very weird that it was having that kind of pre-record.
So then everyone's already kind of...
People have posted it on social media already.
And as you say, you don't want to see it because it can change your perception of the car launch or also the liver itself.
I don't want to see a low quality picture of something.
You want to see how it's intended to be.
So I appreciate all the people that joined us on the live stream and got to see it as it was launched.
Yes, and with the whole production as well, they would have filmed it as live.
Of course, it didn't go out live.
The one rule in filming as live is to not say what the time is during the car launch.
They kept mentioning it.
They basically were like, I was 1am in the UK or whatever.
They even said or something.
They were like, I'm not sure when this is going out or something.
I'm sure this is something along those lines.
And then a really hard cut as well at one point where you're just like...
There was a couple of hard cuts.
One where the initial host got yeeted and there was a new one.
Just immediately like, we've got a new host now for VCarb.
It was the hardest cut ever.
But look, these are small things that you notice even at the horrible time in the morning that we were watching.
But apart from that, of course, the launch itself, I will say right now, of course,
we're going to be slightly grumpy at the fact we're up early watching a car launch.
Had this been at midday, I'd have gone probably perfect level of launch.
A nice bit of preamble, bit of chat.
Not sure why Stephane Domenicali just popped up and started telling us that DRS wasn't a thing anymore.
Because you would expect the people that are watching live would know these things.
But overall, I think it was a pretty good car launch.
As car launches go, I'm thinking of the ranking system.
This is quite high.
The low one has to be Alpine from a few years ago,
where they literally just hosted it in a conference room, spoke for...
Oh, they went for ages.
This was quite long.
I remember looking at how long it took.
It was about 40 minutes, I think, before they revealed the car, which is quite a long time.
I remember Williams one year.
We praised them, didn't we?
I think it maybe was even...
Oh, no, not last year, because that was the launch where they all did it together.
But the year before, where we were like, that's the perfect launch.
Because they got the drivers out straight away,
revealed the car within maybe 10 minutes.
So it felt like a car launch.
Because as we mentioned, we kind of still complain if it's just...
Everyone's saying they want to see the car.
If you see the car, it's underwhelming for them just to stick a picture
on Twitter or Instagram or whatever.
So yeah, it was quite a long process.
But I appreciate them doing a car launch.
Because I personally like the fact that it's car launch season.
I like having lots of different ones, personally.
Yeah, it's part of the circus of Formula One, isn't it?
20 minutes is the perfect spot.
But when you're a big team or have a lot of sponsor obligations
or you've brought Ford in, they're of course going to go along with you.
They're going to have to mention it.
Is that their launch?
Really, it's as much as Ford's launch as Red Bull.
Because it's new to them.
They need to introduce themselves to the world,
even though we all know who Ford is.
But from their side, this is their big moment to basically show
all the cool stuff they do,
speak to the people in the engine department.
Because it's all new for Red Bull and Ford and the partnership.
Exactly. And that's when the most viewers are.
You see on YouTube, there was 150k watching Red Bull.
As soon as they launched the car,
or at least when V-Car but launched their car,
the views went down by over half.
Everybody just turned it off.
So they have to get their messaging across.
And I understand that to some degree.
But yeah, maybe a slightly bit long, but overall, not too bad.
Question from Master KB7.
Why no live event with all the liveries together,
just like how they did last year?
Well, that was a special anniversary, wasn't it?
For the 75th anniversary of F1.
That's why they did that big event.
I liked the event that they did.
But I think I remember saying at the time
that I don't want this to be every year.
In my opinion, excuse me, it's very early.
You get emotional. You love Jack.
You just wish that it was there.
My opinion is still the same.
I don't want it to be every year
where they reveal them all at the same time.
I like the fact that we're going to have like a week,
maybe like a couple of weeks,
actually a bit longer potentially,
because of how staggered the car launches
and how it's a bit weird with the deregulations.
I'm going to see, you know,
it's part of that fun of having different launches
on different days and you can get excited
and everyone's a little bit different.
I prefer that personally.
It gives a lot of excitement to the season
and feels like a proper thing,
whereas I did enjoy what they did with the F175 last year,
but I would rather that just be a special event
where it's just like one time,
let's reveal them all together.
I didn't come away from the F175 thing going,
they should do that all the time personally.
I can see why some people would like it,
but not for me.
I completely agree that that was a special event.
If you had that every year,
people would just be,
here we go again, another one.
It was different.
You had the drivers being put under
Jack Whitehall comedy,
which is something I don't think any of us expected.
That was cool because it was a landmark season for F1.
It wouldn't be the same if it's F176.
It just doesn't hit the same.
Maybe F180, that's when they'll next do it.
It's not a yearly thing.
I like the fact that the teams can have their own
bit of time in the sun
and they can do their own little bit of production.
Also, it means we get more things to watch
over the course of the next couple of weeks
rather than just one show.
I'm a fan of that.
Before we get into the thoughts,
I feel like we're doing our own preamble here.
It's like the 30 minutes
before we actually get into what we think of the deliveries.
The one thing I want to do
just before we get into the Red Bull car launch
is pull down our VR headsets, Tommy,
and really get into...
If we zoom in here,
let's talk about that because that was
an interesting feature, wasn't it,
of the Red Bull side of the car launch.
In the actual premise of it,
I like the thinking behind it.
There must be some sort of sponsorship
that I've not seen or whatever
that is to do with Apple and the US, et cetera, et cetera.
I like the idea of it.
It was kind of laggy, a little bit.
Not really sure what was going on.
I think they could have shown us more.
Had it been actually about the engine itself,
they could have done a much sort of cooler asset
to just show on screen, right?
But they did something a little bit different.
I thought Callum was great.
I thought he hosted very well,
considering that's not obviously
what he used to be an engineer and things like that.
But overall, it was a little bit janky.
But I like the fact they tried something different
because it definitely made us go,
why have they all got headsets on?
I actually quite liked the fact that
they tried something a bit different.
It's one of those things where
had they done that near the start
and not after 20 minutes of talking
to all the kind of engine people anyway,
and everyone's already sort of in that kind of like,
I want to see the car,
maybe that's why a lot of people were kind of like,
what on earth is this?
But I do like the fact that in a car launch
they need to do something fun and different.
And it's a new engine formula.
We mentioned about the fact that
a lot of people are going to know this and know that.
But I think in terms of explaining the engine
a little bit more on a very surface level
I think is quite important for fans
because even the hard cause, like us, you know,
technical knowledge is very limited.
So it's nice to see it from that.
What do you mean, Tommy?
Go back to the 2026 season predictions.
You're telling us about compression rates.
I know.
It's the new Tom Bellingham for 2026.
Compression ratio, I think.
Oh, get in the bin.
It's starting to do with engines.
I think it's 4am.
But you're not going to mention it again.
I'm going to slap you silly.
Right, let's get into Red Bull racing livery, shall we?
Thoughts on the new-ish look?
Stone Cold Banger.
Absolutely beautiful.
They changed the hex code by one.
I don't really know how Photoshop works,
but I know that it's hex codes that, like, colours work in.
And there are many, many shades of a colour
and I feel like they've made it slightly lighter
and everyone...
Well, maybe not everyone.
I mean, there's always some people
that complain about everything.
But for me, I saw it.
I went, wow, that looks awesome.
They're not just the render,
but the car actually in person as well.
I don't know if it's the lights
that were the way they were shining on it.
It looked a little bit sort of like night sky vibes.
It's got gloss, hasn't it?
Yeah, the gloss obviously is a massive, massive win.
So yeah, I am a huge fan of this Red Bull racing livery.
Considering they've not changed the actual premise of it,
changed a little bit of the colour,
and boom, it's popping.
Exactly.
I mean, the Red Bull is always going to be essentially blue
with the Red Bull logo on the engine cover and the nose.
Like, that is what Red Bull has always done
with their race cars, you know, their single-seater cars.
So it's always going to be that.
So there's very limited stuff they can do.
And it's funny how them going back
to just the white outline of the Red Bull
that we saw kind of in that Vettel era,
going back to that after 10 years of the same livery,
it makes it hit like it's this crazy different livery
just because we've had 10 years of it being such a meme
about the fact that the Red Bull is always the same.
It looks the same.
But it is different enough as much as they can do.
And I expected them to do this
with the way they teased the logo and stuff.
They were going to go back to this more
kind of old-school approach to the Red Bull logo and stuff.
I did not expect them to go like really glossy paint again,
which is cool because I thought those days were gone
just because, you know, with weight-saving and all that,
you can tell Adrian Newie's gone.
And yeah, the fact that how good it will look on TV
will wait to find out.
But it's really cool because, yeah,
looking at the renders and what we saw online,
it's kind of like light blue and dark blue
and there's lots of like little glitch effects
and the Red Bull logo within the paint and stuff.
So yeah, really cool, nice little change,
but not changing too much.
It looks really, really nice. I really like it.
Next question from people on Patreon.
Remember, Edith is my middle name.
How much carbon do you think will cover up the beautiful car?
Well, not a lot because they're not allowed to.
So if you missed it, there's now,
which I'm convinced that we said it.
Yeah, we said it.
We said they need to regulate some kind of paint.
I think the straw that broke the camel's back
was that Alpine reveal, wasn't it?
When we'd already had a few and then Alpine launched that car
that was, we know Alpine for being bright pink and blue
and wanted to see a lot of color
and then it was like the carbon
and we were just like broke at that point
that something needs, they need to put in some kind of regulation
and they have.
So basically it is 55% of the car's surface
viewed from the side and top
must be painted and stickered.
So they can't do what they did back in
2023 or 24, I'm trying to remember which year it was now,
where all the cars were like so heavily weight-saved
and it was just like crazy.
So they can't do it.
I will say though, 55% is not actually that much
and it's not what we were sort of calling for
which maybe would have been 80%.
If you actually look at the side angle,
there's a lot of black and carbon on that car.
I think it's just that we're seeing the popping of the red bull.
I wouldn't say it's a massive revolutionary change
this 55% role if we're looking at that livery.
I think we're just seeing the amazing parts of it
because if you look further down after the blue
it's all black.
Yeah, because they always, I guess that's how they do it
is they're always going to use the carbon for the bottom
so they couldn't do 100%
because you're not going to be painting the kind of
barge boards and the floor and everything like that.
It just, hopefully, the 55% is enough
to put that identity to stop these teams doing it.
And we saw last year that teams are starting
to bring more colour back.
You wonder anyway if it was more of the backlash
but then this maybe just adds even more
the fact that they can do it.
So, yeah, fingers crossed.
OK, next question from Pugh on Patreon member Justin.
Will Ford back out of the partnership
if the car isn't at the front competing?
I think that's very knee jerk, I would say Justin
to expect Ford to just bounce
if things aren't going well.
Look back Honda at McLaren.
That's a good sort of, I would say reference
of how terrible it was when their first,
when their partnership sort of last kicked off
before obviously all their success that they've had.
So, yeah, it can change.
Yes, sometimes Honda got such a bad rep
back in what was it 2014?
15 when they came in and we're just useless, yeah.
Thanks, Tommy, the Oracle of all knowledge
and years and thanks.
And look, you know, now.
So, I wouldn't say that just because Ford have joined
that if it's terrible this year, they'll bounce.
They've committed to a long-term plan.
They'll have to, in my opinion, last
until the regulations change again in 2031
if I'm not mistaken.
So, yeah, this is a long-term partnership.
It's not just going to be a case of,
ah, rebel or rubbish.
Tommy's predicted the ninth in the championship.
Max is going to win a race.
Actually, we regret everything.
They're not going to bounce.
They alluded in their kind of video
and all the, you know, if anyone was actually listening
to the corporate spiel that they were actually saying
in the car launch and not just send out.
They did mention, you know, hard type,
like, we know it's not going to be easy
and things like that.
So, you know, they're not expecting to go in
and just be like absolutely amazing straight away.
Like, they kind of almost joked the fact that,
you know, why would you build your own engine
and, you know, it puts you on the back foot.
They kind of alluded to that.
So, they know it's going to be tough
and Honda is the perfect example, like you said.
You know, if you'd have said
when Honda were in the back of that McLaren
and we were having GP2 engine
and all that kind of stuff,
that you'd have said that within the hybrid era
they would be winning the World Championship
with Red Bull.
You wouldn't have believed it
because they were so far off.
It was so bad they were breaking down all the time.
And that's just, you know, it's teething issues
and we'll find out how well Red Bull will do soon enough,
maybe even the first test from what we can find out
with it all being secret and all that.
And yes, obviously I was referring to Honda's
success with Red Bull
and how they turned around that whole development programme.
It was quite remarkable considering the memes
that were tied to them.
And finally, how do we think they will do in 2026?
Red Bull Racing.
I don't think they're going to be anywhere near as bad
as what Tommy thinks they're going to be.
I don't think they're going to win the World Championship.
But this is purely based on vibes.
A lot of people, you know, they came into our predictions
and went, this is far too early.
Well, look, that is the whole point of those predictions
is that before testing, we just want to just see
how the wind is basically going.
And I don't think they're going to be a disaster.
They've got Max Verstappen.
They've got Hajira, I believe he's going to do much better.
They'll be a top four team.
Will they be the fastest?
We will see.
Yeah, it's so hard to know at this stage.
Obviously, I'm not filled with confidence
since my Max prediction, which I know is like
shocked so many people.
But, you know, my argument here is not that,
I think it's quite obvious that I think Max is a great driver
and one of the best we've ever seen.
It's nothing on him.
I'm not filled with confidence of a new regulation
and the fact that Red Bull are building their own engine
and particularly of the things that you're hearing about
Mercedes and potentially having this advantage.
You know, you look at, say Mercedes do have this trick
and it is like the absolute...
That was reported to be Red Bull as well now.
Is that now not the case?
It's now heavily rumoured that they know how to do it
but they don't have it.
We'll find out, obviously.
It's all a load of rubbish.
All of this rumour stuff can just get in the bin
as far as I'm concerned.
Well, exactly.
So we don't know.
But my logic is that if Mercedes do have this
golden bullet engine, you know,
Mercedes are going to be quick,
McLaren are going to be quick,
Williams are going to be quick
and Alpinx have all got the engine.
So that's the top four in the constructors.
And then, you know, Aston Martin have got Newey and...
And then Ferrari.
Well, yeah, we'll find out.
I might start a rumour that they've actually got
a 1 in 22 conversion right now.
Yeah, they fare.
But this is the thing.
Like, you know, everyone...
And it could age badly and Max might win the first race
and I'll go, I'm glad I'm wrong.
I'll take it every day of the week.
That's so annoying.
Like, when you...
Like, it's an insurance prediction.
Yeah, it's an insurance prediction.
Yeah, it's so...
Because I want to bask in the glory of you being wrong,
but it means Max has won.
And I'm like, well, have I really won anything?
Yeah, I just don't...
I just think it's going to be tough for him
and that's why I predicted it because, you know,
I do think we've seen dominance.
Like, I don't...
I'm surprised at just how...
Like, crazy people think that.
I understand, like, it's crazy.
Like, because it is.
Because Max is...
Yeah, Max won't win a race.
Yeah.
But that's the whole...
The thinking is literally...
It's because I think, you know,
there's going to be teams and certain teams, you know,
completely dominating and it might be hard for others
to get a look at that.
That's the form we've seen in engine regulations
and regulation changes before, so...
That's my crazy prediction.
I said that Alonso would retire at the end of the year
and the Aston Martin would be terrible.
That's not on Alonso.
That's on the fact that Aston Martin
is going to be a rubbish car
and he can't do anything.
And he's like, you know what?
I'm going to bounce.
Yeah, very fair indeed.
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Let's move on to VCarb,
where they also, of course, released their car livery
in the same event with a different host
and a nice large cut in between the two.
And went straight in with the kind of...
Here are the drivers.
They did not bring nicotine back on.
They knew the retention once the Red Bull had been launched
was going down.
They needed to launch the car.
First thoughts on the look.
I like it.
I like it.
It's not massively different to last year's.
There's a little bit more funky stuff going on at the back,
integrating the Ford Racing logo.
I'm looking at it right now.
I think it's...
From the side-angle render, I think it looks pretty nice.
I don't really understand.
I feel like it's a bit of a Marmite livery
from what I've seen, the initial reaction on social media.
To be honest,
it might be even on a par with last year.
It's not that radically different.
It's more blue at the back
and they've integrated the white wheel rims,
which I enjoy.
So, yeah, I think it's a very solid livery.
Yeah, they've done something different, haven't they?
They've tried to...
They even said this in the launch
that they got such a positive reception
for doing something different last year
and it kind of very much was
majority of people's favorite livery,
which is crazy and shows kind of
how much we were all bored of carbon
that painting the whole car white was just...
Everyone was like, oh my God, this is amazing.
I don't like it as much as last year.
I think, ironically,
this kind of looks like they have gone.
Oh, it's only 55% needed.
Let's stick some carbon on there again.
And look, they've mixed it up.
I see why people like it.
I see why people don't like it.
I'm not as big of a fan of it as before.
One thing I really would...
I guess it was never going to happen,
particularly with the Ford partnership now
and I guess teams want to have an identity,
but I would love to see VCarb
just be crazy every year
and do something different every year.
They could so easily be that team
that you look forward to and know
it's going to be different every year
because Red Bull, obviously,
they have all those special edition cans
where it's purple, yellow, orange, whatever.
Imagine going into each launch
and not knowing even what the color
of the car is going to be like.
That would be cool.
Brand identity, Tommy.
Brand identity.
Well, Visa Cash App,
as they are, of course, are.
Cash App, Bright Green.
Where's all the green?
Where's the Stake F1 team?
What's the grid now?
They could have taken it.
Could have gone for the green.
In an ideal world,
absolutely sign me up, let's have a new livery every year.
Don't see it happening.
If we see the F1 world as it is.
That would be very exciting.
That's his marketing right there, isn't it really?
Yes, exactly.
Come on, marketing.
A bit more fun.
But now I think it's a different enough livery
that it's intrigued the mind
of the V2 in 2026.
I believe that's a lot of chatter
that they might not be that great.
I mean, if Red Bull
aren't great,
VCar most likely are not going to be very good.
They could well be
one of the slowest cars on the grid,
which is crazy to think.
But that's sort of just general consensus
and then we get to the first race of the season
and they qualify in fourth and you're like,
oh, wow, we were so off with this.
But it's purely Vibes.
Vibes car, apparently.
Yeah, that's what we're going off
and I think they will be one of the slower ones
just from general
feeling, but that's it.
Yeah, I think from Vibes
if I had to predict, I'd say it's going to be
between them
and Cadillac maybe
for the kind of bottom places.
But I do wonder,
I thought that last year
I think even after testing
I said that Hadja was going to be
18th in the championship or something
and then they got into that first race.
Yuki Sonoda put it fifth in
qualifying and
even testing after we had testing
VCar would just
like, oh, they're not that great.
They're probably going to be like
bottom of the pack.
And then we saw,
imagine saying at that point
that we'd get four races in
and everyone's going, Max get in the VCar
but it's quicker,
which is crazy. So
I thought that last year maybe they'll
perform miracles, but as with Red Bull
it's a huge ask to have
they're essentially
going to be in that same boat as Red Bull with a new engine
but of course
everything's put into
the big team
and Max Verstappen's team.
So of course they're going to be on the back foot.
But they are a separate entity, Tommy.
They are a separate team.
Doesn't matter about Max.
They have their own resource
still
into this day.
Launching at the same time doesn't matter
on the Red Bull Racing YouTube channel
really doesn't help.
Good stuff.
Right, thank you everybody for tuning in
to this, I guess, first
proper podcast about
the season ahead.
Excited to see the rest of the car launches
for sure, livery launches.
If I see deep
drives into the aerodynamics of the cars
that are shown today, I will be
deleting that from my brain. Do not take anything
that people say
about the aero or the
innovative designs that the
teams have been putting out because
with new regulations they will be showing
as little as possible
and the cars will look probably
rather radically different
from Australia.
That's one thing to mention actually is
years gone by
because of a big regulation change
I remember
in particular the first year
when they
changed the cars to give them
the skinny wings and then they went back to
the wider cars and it was
such a shock.
I don't know about you but
it doesn't seem to have
obviously they are different cars
maybe I've just seen
the renders of the new car
so much and also the fact that
they look like the cars from the
2000s.
It's a weird thing to say but
normally when we get a new regulation
I go oh that's going to take some
getting used to this. I'm already looking at it going
that looks really nice.
And obviously not
massively different to what we've been used to
which I don't know if that rings alarm
bells that I don't go wow
that does look really different and therefore
we're going to get lots of different racing
but
it's a good look
as you say it kind of has a more
old-school approach to it
so I'm a fan of that for sure
and honestly I don't care what they
look like as long as they can overtake and follow closely
so fingers crossed
that will be the case. Thank you everybody
we'll see you very soon lots of love take care
have your sweet dreams I will be having some
goodbye
that was kind of your final
thoughts but I don't know if you have anything else to say
my final thoughts are
remember
when you're complaining about how long that car launch
takes when Haas launch
a picture online
and you're going where's the car launch
yeah come on
bye
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