Whether or not this deal ends up actually happening – and if it does, if it ends up lasting – it’s the latest in a long line of energy drink partners getting involved with F1 teams. In some cases (well, one case) it’s a huge, internationally renowned brand buying not one, but two F1 teams and committing wholesale to them for well over a decade. But in other instances, a brand you’ve never heard of suddenly shows up on a sidepod for a few races and then disappears never to be heard from again. Indeed, if you’ve ever seen a random name on an F1 car and you’re not quite sure what the company does, then chances are, it’s a short-lived energy drink.

It’s unsurprising that the biggest energy drink brand in the world – the one that essentially brought the very concept to Western masses – is also the one with the longest history in F1. Red Bull were far from the massive corporate giant that they are now, however, when they first started sponsoring the Sauber team in 1995. Instead, they were an upstart young brand who were making waves through non-traditional and guerilla marketing efforts – and who saw F1 as a good way to further draw attention to themselves.

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Their first F1 livery is still one of the best they’ve had – a smart dark blue effort that pushed their brand prominently without any real competition. But from 1996 onwards, they were forced to share the limelight at Sauber with Petronas, who brought their distinctive turquoise onto the car. Red Bull remained title sponsor through 2001, but were somewhat overshadowed in terms of identification with the team by Petronas’ badging of Sauber’s Ferrari engine deal from 1997 onwards. So it was perhaps unsurprising that they reduced their involvement with the team from 2002 onwards.

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Not least because they had also moved into individual driver sponsorship, having founded a driver development programme at the turn of the century. Having started to bring drivers up to F1 via their “Red Bull Junior Team” (a rebranding of RSM Marko) in Formula 3000, their branding made it onto the Arrows of Enrique Bernoldi in 2001 and 2002, and Christian Klien’s Jaguar in 2004.

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In 2005, of course, they purchased the latter team – in the process ending their Sauber deal – and the rest is history. Despite initial scepticism over whether or not they would stick it out, they turned the Milton Keynes-based squad into one of the most successful and enduring F1 teams of the modern era, winning consecutive drivers and constructors championship doubles between 2010 and 2013. And they bought the ailing Minardi team at the end of 2005, turning them into their secondary Scuderia Toro Rosso outfit which has similarly endured.

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So it’s perhaps not surprising that other energy drinks brands have looked at Red Bull and decided they might want a piece of F1 themselves. And actually, while Red Bull’s sponsorship of Sauber began at the start of 1995, it was later that same season that another brand began a long association with the sport, in the shape of Hype Energy.

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Hype was launched in 1994 by one of the founders of the Hard Rock Cafe, and made its first appearance on an F1 car in 1995, taking over a significant part of the Arrows (Footwork) car from the Portugese Grand Prix onwards.

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For 1996, however, Hype set their sights further up the grid – and nabbed a smaller, but more prestigious, slot on the barge boards of the then-constructors’ champions, Benetton. And the following year, they sponsored that year’s reigning champions, in exactly the same place on the side of the Williams; and with the same strategy of using a bright fluorescent colour that was totally at odds with the rest of the livery and had the presumably desired effect of making people go “What the hell is this Hype thing?”

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By the end of 1997, however, Hype had left the paddock, concentrating on other areas of motorsport instead. But their association with F1 didn’t end there, as former Jordan driver Bertrand Gachot got involved with their distribution, eventually becoming the company’s CEO. In 2014, he got them back into the sport by way of a deal with Caterham driver Andre Lotterer – and the following year, they began to sponsor Force India, which they continue to do to this day.

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It’s worth noting, incidentally, that Hype only became available to buy here in the UK earlier this year. Indeed, non-availability in many of the countries that watch the sport is often a recurring theme for energy drinks brands that get into F1. Take Power Horse, one of the earliest competitors to Red Bull. They entered F1 during that same mid-90s heyday – in fact, they replaced Hype as a sponsor of the Arrows team in 1996, having debuted earlier that year briefly on the Ligier.

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Arrows had two different liveries in ’96 – they switched to an all over red and blue scheme when TWR took over fully – but although Power Horse were a prominent sponsor, neither livery was based around their silver and red colour scheme. The same was true in 1997, when Arrows switched to a white and blue livery, with Danka as their title sponsor. Power Horse continued to sponsor the team with a prominent rear wing slot – but dropped out partway through the season amid rumours of financial difficulties.

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The brand still exists, but is not generally available in the UK. Amusingly, Power Horse also had a corner named after it at the Osterreichring, during the 1996-2003 period when it was known as the A1-Ring. Unsurprisingly, the name did not continue when Red Bull bought the circuit.

1997 seems to have been the peak year for energy drink products appearing on cars – as, along with Red Bull on the Sauber, Hype on the Williams and Power Horse on the Arrows, there was another tie-up – NRG, who had a small sponsorship deal with Tyrrell for that year only. Like Red Bull and Power Horse, NRG hailed from Austria – but they were a much shorter-lived venture and seem to have disappeared by around the turn of the century.

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Meanwhile, maybe there was just something about the Arrows team that made energy drinks want to sponsor them, but there was a fifth such brand that made an appearance on their cars between the mid-1990s and their 2002 demise. This one, however, was a doozy. It all began in 1999, when Nigerian Prince Malik Ado Ibrahim bought a 25% stake in the team. As part of his marketing efforts, he came up with a brand called T-Minus, which was initially trailed mysteriously via a “countdown” on the cars’ sidepods over the course of several races.

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When it was finally unveiled, it transpired that T-Minus was intended as a brand that could be licensed and applied to products by other partners. Whether or not it was actually a viable enterprise, we would never really find out – as Ibrahim, and the brand, had disappeared from F1 before the season was out. In the process, pretty much the only product that had ever made it out into the world with the T-Minus label on it was… you guessed it, an energy drink.

T-Minus wasn’t the only short-lived F1 related energy drink to make it into the world, either. In 2001, Eddie Jordan was emboldened by his team’s successes both on the track and in marketing over the preceding few years, and spun off his brand into a drink named EJ-10 (although curiously, the car of the same name had actually already finished competing, having run in the 2000 season). As with T-Minus, Jordan’s intent was that the name and branding could be applied across a wide range of different products licensed by other partners.

While it was initially successful, however, the drink’s launch coincided with a downturn in Jordan’s fortunes both on and off the track. They lost their famous Benson & Hedges title sponsorship (although the brand would still appear on the car in reduced form for a few more seasons), and were embroiled in a court case with Vodafone over a deal that was purportedly designed to replace it. Suddenly, having a vanity brand on the car looked less like the work of a team on the up, and more like one desperately filling space. In 2003 and 2004, the cars carried the branding of the spinoff drink V-10 (essentially an EJ-10 and vodka cocktail) but the writing was on the wall.

EJ-10’s failure didn’t put off other teams from trying to launch their own brands, though: and when Tony Fernandes’ newly-founded Lotus team pitched up in 2010, they quickly tried to branch out into the energy drink field as well. LR8 was the name of their “all natural” energy drink (named for “Lotus Racing” and the eight ingredients, apparently). Despite sharing a can design with one of my favourite ever car liveries, however, the brand quickly hit a snag, thanks to the dispute over the use of the name “Lotus”.

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While the team were still called Lotus in 2011, Fernandes moved quickly to rebrand the energy drink, with his team’s cars carrying the new brand EQ8 (no, I don’t know what it stands for either) for the next two seasons. EQ8 actually proved quite successful, making it onto UK high street shelves – but as Caterham began to struggle financially in late 2013 and 2014, the brand seemed to gradually disappear. It had a small presence on the first iteration of the 2014 Caterham livery, and also served as naming sponsor for Caterham’s GP2 outfit; but was nowhere to be seen once Fernandes sold the team later in the year.

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A rather more successful drinks brand, Lucozade, had a brief flirtation with F1 in the early 2010s, sponsoring McLaren between late 2011 and 2013. Their logo alternated rear wing space with the team’s title sponsors Vodafone, and given that it came so soon after Red Bull won their first title, it’s hard not to see the linkup as a deliberate bit of spoiling. Unfortunately for Lucozade, though, the sponsorship coincided with a significant dip in McLaren’s form, and when the team launched their Vodafone-less silver and black livery at the start of 2014, Lucozade were similarly nowhere to be seen.

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Of the various energy drink brands that have proven consistent competitors to Red Bull rather than flash in the pans in recent years, Monster Energy are perhaps the most prominent, with a marketing portfolio across a variety of different sports. They began sponsoring Mercedes in 2010, but stepped up their involvement once Lewis Hamilton joined the team.

Interestingly, Monster don’t position themselves so much as a sponsor of the Mercedes team, as they do of the drivers individually – Hamilton prominently, and Bottas almost kind of by extension/default – and they don’t brand on the cars themselves, only on the drivers’ helmets and uniforms. They’re a popular brand for fan livery designers to base cars on, though, and we wouldn’t be completely surprised if they stepped up their involvement to become a major title sponsor – if not of Mercedes then potentially elsewhere – in future years.

It’s clear, then, that Rich Energy are looking to improve their standing in a crowded market, by getting visibility in an area where two of the biggest players are (in one case extremely) prominent. Will they be another Red Bull, or another T-Minus? Haas obviously believe in them, having elected to give up title sponsorship of the team for the first time, but scepticism over their role in the Force India saga remains. Either way, we’ll find out next year…

The post Energy Drinks and F1: A Chequered History appeared first on F1 Colours.

At this point I’ll direct you to what I said about this in our What to Expect in 2018 piece:

While the colours used are not without their charm – putting us in mind of the unused Force India test car – the application itself is (in true Sauber fashion) a bit bland and flat, especially after the delight that was their 2017 car. So here’s hoping when the car actually comes to rolling out, it’s had a bit more work done to the paint job. Of course, this is Sauber, so chances are this is exactly what we’ll see.

And sure enough, there we have it. There are differences between this version and the December version, but they really just amount to a couple of additional new sponsors here and there. It’s also worth noting that this one doesn’t have the race number on it, but the launch version was actually the first car to show the new “rear of the engine cover” placement that really does seem to have become standard this year (as demonstrated by Renault, more of whom later), so we’d be amazed if the actual race version of the Sauber doesn’t have it too.

But yes. I’m torn on this one, because I really like about half of it – specifically, the metallic red half. But the white and blue area is just back to Boring Old Sauber, and takes up far too much of the car – and given what a fantastic livery they had last year, it’s a shame that they’ve regressed a bit here. It also means that with Williams and Hass already having unveiled predominantly white cars, already 30% of the grid will be that main colour – which is all starting to feel a bit 2008-ish.

One utterly terrific thing about Sauber this year, however, is the new helmet design for Marcus Ericsson:

Here it is! My first ever F1 Helmet for @Ericsson_Marcus ! clean, retro and minimal, with a great nod to Ronnie Peterson!

what do you think?

great job by @mikovicdesigns on the painting!#sauberc37 #ME9 #ericsson #f1 #f12018 #sauberalfaromeo pic.twitter.com/YkhDLUfimx

— Sean Bull Design (@seanbulldesign) February 20, 2018

… which comes from one Sean Bull, a designer well-known to us for his fantastic fan-livery creations. Like many of his fellow fan designers, Sean has in recent years begun actually creating liveries for professional teams and drivers, and we’re hugely pleased to see him make the step up into F1. Given how good his work here is – demonstrating how solid colour-block helmets really are better than modern ones – we can’t wait to see more of this sort of thing in the future. Maybe Sauber could start by getting Sean to spice up the car a bit?

The post Sauber Unveil Previously-Unveiled Livery appeared first on F1 Colours.

F1 launch patterns have shifted quite a bit in the past few years – when we first launched this site in 2007, it wasn’t unusual to get several launches in January, but nowadays it’s not considered likely to see anyone’s new car or livery until close to the first days of testing in February.

But to get everyone in the mood, and based on admittedly somewhat limited information, we thought we’d take a run through what we reckon we can expect from the various teams this year.

For 2018, there are a few major sponsor changes already announced – and possibly more still to come – and of course teams will also have to take into consideration such factors as the new Halo head protection and (with a full season to plan for it) the number and name display regulations.

With the caveat that it’s always possible for someone to spring a surprise (as multiple teams delightfully did last year, then, here are some team-by-team thoughts.

Sauber

Sauber stole a march on everyone by suddenly announcing at the beginning of December not only their tie-up with Alfa Romeo, not only their 2018 driver line-up, but also a revised livery. While the colours used are not without their charm – putting us in mind of the unused Force India test car – the application itself is (in true Sauber fashion) a bit bland and flat, especially after the delight that was their 2017 car. So here’s hoping when the car actually comes to rolling out, it’s had a bit more work done to the paint job. Of course, this is Sauber, so chances are this is exactly what we’ll see.

Mercedes

There’s no reason to expect a change in approach from Mercedes this year – the car will likely be silver, black and turquoise yet again. They do mix it up slightly each year, but we’d be amazed if there were any major alterations this time around. Hopefully they keep the different-coloured race numbers for Hamilton and Bottas, as that was a nice touch.

Ferrari

Ferrari have lost the sponsorship of Santander, which may mean a significant reduction in the amount of white on the car – although they are still technically supported by Marlboro so don’t expect to see it disappear entirely, nor for the shade of red to go back to a darker one. But if we got back black wings? We’d be happy with that.

Incidentally, Ferrari are the only team so far to announce a launch date for their 2018 car: they’ll do so on 22nd February.

Red Bull

Excitingly, Red Bull have got a new title sponsor in the shape of Aston Martin – although it’s somewhat confusing that the team that’s named after a drinks company now has a car company as a non-technical sponsor. The big question is whether RBR will simply work the Aston logo into their existing blue colour scheme, or if they’ll do something dramatic and pick from one of Aston’s classic sets of racing colours. Despite the fact that we like the matt blue job they’ve had for the past couple of years, we’d very much like to see them do the latter, especially if it involves green.

Toro Rosso

Worryingly, Toro Rosso have officially added “Red Bull” as a sponsor name on the entry list this year – which may mean that the company will be compensating for the presence of Aston Martin over at the other team by increasing their branding on the junior squad. Given that the 2017 Toro Rosso was one of the most beautiful cars of the modern era, it would be a real shame if they went back to traditional Red Bull blue, red and yellow. Fingers crossed it’s just about the name and we basically get the same car again this year.

Force India

The pink BWT car was fantastic in theory but slightly disappointing in execution – maybe due to the rushed way in which it came out. Hopefully this time around we’ll see something that’s had a bit more time spent on it, and a bolder shade of pink. There could possibly be more blue involved this year, too. Either way, the main hope is that they sort out doing the race numbers properly this time…

McLaren

McLaren delighted us by going orange last year – but it wasn’t enough for some fans, who wanted a more traditional shade and scheme, a feeling that was only enhanced by the classic look of Fernando Alonso’s Indy 500 entry. The good news is that the team have hinted that they could shift to the “papaya” orange for 2018, with Zak Brown – a man who really does seem actually interested in liveries and what people think of them – saying “I think the fans want us to go to papaya orange. When we did the IndyCar we had an overwhelming amount of ‘please make your F1 car like that’, so we are waiting on a few sponsor decisions which can also dictate what a car looks like.”

But is it too much to hope that Alonso switches to using that wonderful retro helmet design, too…?

Williams

Until we hear otherwise, it looks like Williams are sticking with their Martini deal for at least another year – so Williams being Williams, expect the car to look extremely similar again.

Renault

Having landed on a pretty strong and “Renault-ish” livery for 2017, it would be surprising if the team moved heavily away from it this year – they probably have other things on their mind, to be honest. We’d love to see white introduced as a third main colour to take them properly back to their 1980s roots, but otherwise we have no real complaints with how the car looks these days.

Haas

Anyone’s guess, really, given that the team decided to change their 2017 livery partway through the season to something bland and grey and white. Maybe we’ll get something more exciting this year – they pretty much have a blank canvas to do what they want, given the lack of sponsor pressures – but I’d be wary of making any serious predictions.

Those are our thoughts – what do you reckon? Anything you particularly want to see on the grid this year, or any developments we’ve missed? Let us know!

The post What to Expect in 2018 appeared first on F1 Colours.

In the past we’ve done roundups of fan-created livery designs looking to the next year, but this time around, rather than gathering the work of several different artists on the same teams, we’re looking at just one artist who’s gone particularly above and beyond in terms of visualising the 2018 season.

Daniel Crossman is one of our favourite up-and-coming designers (we hesitate to say “fan designer” or “amateur designer” about the likes of Daniel and Sean Bull, because that overlooks the fact that they do actually do professional design work within motorsport) and he’s one of several who are turning out designs that are more immediately fan-pleasing than the ones that we often see on actual cars.

(Incidentally, we know that fantasy designers are, of course, not subject to the same design considerations as the designers of actual working team liveries – so when we say a design looks “better” than the one on an actual car, we say it with the knowledge that there might be reasons why this the case beyond simple aesthetic decisions. We also say it, in this particular instance, in the knowledge that 2017 was a vintage year for excellent F1 liveries almost entirely across the board.)

Anyway, Daniel has not just done a few different concepts for the 2018 season – he’s worked out multiple possible designs for every team on the grid. Some of these are based on rumours about new sponsorship linkups are rebrand, and others are from the realm of pure fantasy – but what they all are is excellent. So we’ve decided to go through each team that he’s done a portfolio for, and pick out our favourite – to make a complete Fantasy 2018 Grid designed entirely by him. And we’ve even included one of his designs for a non-existent “returning” team, just to add an eleventh car to the grid.

Note that some of these designs don’t take into account driver and engine changes that have happened since they were done!

MERCEDES

Keeping it simple, what’s good about this Mercedes design is that it strips back the amount of black that has crept onto the car in recent years. It’s understandable that the Petronas turquoise needs to be on there, but the original “Silver Arrows” identity has been somewhat lost of late, and restricting the black area to the shark fin is a good way of dealing with it.

FERRARI

Like us, Daniel clearly hankers after the days when the secondary colour on a (darker red) Ferrari was black, rather than white. The team may not have been massively successful in the early ’90s, but the cars were at their best-looking ever, and we’d love to see a Scuderia livery that homages that.

RED BULL

Well, this is a biggie. It’s not considered all that likely that Red Bull will actually completely change their colour scheme to match the new Aston Martin title sponsorship – but as this design shows, it would be absolutely flipping amazing if they did. I’m not generally a fan of fluorescent colours on F1 cars, but I do like this Brawn-style yellow, and it goes so well with the black and classic racing green.

FORCE INDIA

The bold and striking pink BWT livery got Force India a lot of headlines in 2017, and I hope they stick with the concept going forward. But equally, it was a bit of a rush job, and it would be nice to see it evolved into something a bit more deeply thought-out this time – and to go for a richer shade of pink than the slightly washed-out look of the 2017 car. Daniel’s other Force India concepts made use of black as a secondary colour, but I really like the bold step of mixing blue in with this one.

WILLIAMS

Gasp! It’s not Martini! That’s because, as we’ll see later, I’ve constructed this grid on the premise of Williams losing their prestige sponsor at the end of this year. Largely because, while it’s still a lovely livery, it would just be nice to see something done a bit different – both with Martini, and with Williams. A red Williams (calling back to 1998) would be fantastic, but I doubt that’ll happen – so let’s instead have them look to their glory years with a terrific blue and yellow ’80s/early ’90s inspired design.

TORO ROSSO

Let’s face it, there’s not very much that needs to be improved upon with this livery. Daniel has another concept that sees white introduced as a major colour, but I prefer sticking with the Prost-style metallic blue and red, and just shuffling the pattern of the colours around a bit. It looks fundamentally the same, but I really like the idea of splitting the colours behind the bull on the engine cover.

RENAULT

Renault have got the colours right these days, but could possibly stand to apply them in a more interesting way. Taking inspiration from the fantastic striped 2010 car – with more than a bit of Buzzin’ Hornets Jordan in the mix too – this one does the job just fine.

HAAS

It’s not that a grey and white car is inherently a bad idea, it’s just that the 2017 Haas was so dull with it. This is an improvement not just by shifting more towards silver – brightening the whole thing up generally – but also giving a bit more of an American identity with the subtle stars and stripes.

McLAREN

I love that McLaren actually went orange for 2017 so much that I don’t even mind that they didn’t go the whole hog with it. But it’s hard to deny that the fully orange IndyCar that Alonso raced was far more striking than the F1 team’s livery. Daniel hasn’t designed a fully orange McLaren – maybe because it’s not that much of an artistic exercise! – so of his concepts, I’ve picked the one that’s closest to that. Really, though, I’d be happy with one that left out the black almost entirely, and had the logos and race numbers in blue, to give a truly 1960s Bruce McLaren feel (such as with this one of Sean Bull’s).

SAUBER

We’d be more than happy for Sauber to keep their fantastic 2017 livery, but on the other hand… well, just look at what Daniel’s done here. It’s a bit of a leap based on the possibility of Alfa Romeo becoming involved with the team – he also did some white, Alitalia-sponsored designs that are well worth a look – and thus tempting over Martini to recreate a truly classic late 1970s look. Well, wouldn’t you want to see this on the grid?

STEWART

Because, well, why not? And because with the Martini Williams gone, we don’t have a white car within this set. Stewart’s first couple of liveries were a bit muggy, with a cream shade of white and slightly boring application of the tartan, but they switched to a much sharper and brighter look for 1999. I was never really disappointed that we didn’t see it after that season because it was immediately replaced by the green Jaguar – but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be nice to see it make a comeback. Question is, would they factory-share with Red Bull, or what…?

Check out more of Daniel’s work on Behance, and keep an eye on our Twitter for more of our favourite fantasy designs!

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We expected that they might have to change things this year, due to losing Felipe Nasr’s Banco do Brasil sponsorship – but honestly, the expectation around here was that they would just go back to a boring white, grey or black car. Instead, they’ve come up with a completely new livery to celebrate their 25th year in the sport – and what that’s meant is changing the blue to a proper metallic blue (just like we told them they should!), the yellow to gold, and increasing the volume of white.

What’s interesting about this is that it gives the car a quite retro look, without actually being based on any piece of Sauber’s own previous history. But there’s something about it that calls to mind classic, tobacco-based liveries of the 1980s and 1990s – it’s a little Silk Cut here, a little Embassy Regal there.

It’s also a really good way of covering up the fact that they don’t really have any sponsors aside from Silanna any more – because rather than just leaving the car plain, there are actually design elements on it, from the “25 Years” logo to the stripes that run from the side and on to the rear wing endplates. And kudos, too, for painting that horrible returning shark fin (something that looks worryingly like it’s going to be a recurring feature of 2017’s aerodynamics) black to try and hide it, rather than blue to stand out.

All in all: a bloody good effort from Sauber. Who’d have thunk it? 2017 is already off to a very strong start, and if previous rumours about McLaren and Toro Rosso end up coming true… well, the “who’s got the best livery” order is getting a right old shakeup.

The post Sauber Get 2017 Off To A Great Start appeared first on F1 Colours.

However, we still quite like this livery – even though the blue looks a bit too plasticy rather than metallic – so this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Also, there’s something quite early ’90s about having a white rear wing endplate on which you can put all your differently-coloured minor sponsor logos rather than slapping them onto the main colour scheme (as Sauber have done quite badly in the recent past).

So yes, we didn’t expect anything different from them, but this time around we don’t really mind.

The post The New Sauber Is Basically The Same As The Old Sauber But With A Few More Sponsors appeared first on F1 Colours.

   

If the team were so keen to include this purple on behalf of Infiniti – and I’ve no problem with the colour in its own right, I loved the mid-90s Simteks and it would have been great if F1’s tobacco-sponsor heyday had ever included a Silk Cut car – then you wonder why they desperately needed to keep the blue, red and yellow. I know those are Red Bull’s corporate colours, but it’s not as if anyone’s in danger of not associating the team with that brand, now, is it? As it is, this car is just a cluttered, ugly mess – nothing about it works, with the possible exception of the “Red Bull” wording alongside the monocoque. And it yet doesn’t feel like it would take too much – just a smarter distribution of the chosen colours – to make it work.

Elsewhere in livery news, both Sauber and Force India revealed minor tweaks in testing to the liveries that they’d initially launched. Force India have added a small green stripe to the lower half of the car, which better strengthens the application of their original branding but also slightly throws off the smart look of the orange/silver/black combo. And Sauber have made a couple of changes to fend off the accusation that their new blue-and-yellow job was a little dull to begin with – a new yellow stripe on the nose (which does well to break up the otherwise plain block), and massive race numbers on the side of the monocoque. Regular readers will know just how much we like massive race numbers, so yeah.

And finally, there has of course been confirmation by the FIA that they’re banning drivers from changing their helmet designs over the course of a season. We’re slightly conflicted by this: on the one hand, it was kind of annoying to see Vettel rock up with a different design for every single race. But on the other, as a rule it’s just absolutely bloody mental. It does nothing to help the sport to introduce it, and while it’s a shame that the classic days of immediately distinctive driver lids are (mostly) gone, an artificial rule like this isn’t going to change that (the designs themselves will still be as they currently are – often quite detailed and intricate compared with the block-colour jobs of old, and in some cases very heavily influenced by sponsors).

Indeed, the question is raised of just how strongly the FIA will enforce this: if a driver is at (say) Ferrari, but then moves to Red Bull mid-season, would they have to keep the Marlboro badges and not add Red Bull logos? And if not, then will we see drivers claim that in fact their designs are entirely sponsor-based, to give them the freedom to change them?

It should be a driver’s prerogative to wear whatever design he wants on his race helmet, and if Vettel’s decision is to change it every race, then (annoying as that is) he should be allowed. To completely take away the possibility of fun one-off single-race designs, as had become something of a trend in recent years, feels like an incredibly dog-in-the-manger move by the FIA; and it’s a case of inventing a problem then pretending to solve it, rather than dealing with any number of the real and serious problems that currently threaten the credibility and integrity of F1.

The post Red Bull’s New Livery Isn’t Great, But Is Better Than The Helmet Change Ban appeared first on F1 Colours.

Which – hey! – it is.

Although we could do without the Chelsea badge.

The post Quite Nice, Quite Boring Sauber Livery Characterises Team appeared first on F1 Colours.

In some cases, there’s a desire to genuinely predict how things like the McLaren Honda might look – but in others, it’s simply a case of mixing up the established designs to come up with something fresh. Either way, two designers in particular have given us a deluge of absolutely gorgeous possible or alternate designs in recent weeks, so naturally we thought we’d take a look at them all.

First up we have Tim Holmes, who’s been posting his designs on his Facebook page, and has recently been spotlighted by the top blog WTF1. Tim has, like many people, been speculating on the 2015 McLaren, and his three designs are significantly different from one-another. They all include silver, but one (comfortably my favourite) is an obvious Marlboro homage, another makes use of classic McLaren orange, and the third is a somewhat more out-there heavily blue effort:

    

 

It’s the first time I’ve seen an alternative Red Bull design that I love that isn’t based on the colours of the can. Somehow, it manages to be based on the existing styling of the car, but just… absolutely loads better (with absolutely no spray paint in sight). Superb work.

Check out more of Tim and Camille’s terrific work at their websites. And if you’ve seen any other fantasy 2015 liveries (or indeed made any yourself) that you think we should feature, get in touch!

The post Fantasy 2015 Liveries Are A Big Thing Right Now And We Love Them appeared first on F1 Colours.

Red Bull

Perhaps the most interesting element of the liveries this year is how the various teams have chosen to try and mask the appallingly ugly front ends with a carefully-applied paint job. Some, like McLaren, haven’t bothered in the slightest – but Red Bull and sister team Toro Rosso have both decided to paint out the very tip, in the hope that at speed and a fair distance, the car will look more aesthetically pleasing.

Aside from that, it’s pretty much business as usual for Red Bull, with just a few tweaks to the Infinity scheme of last year. The purple paint looks a bit less messily applied this time out, and former Williams title sponsor AT&T also join the team with a tiny decal on the sidepod.

Toro Rosso

Similarly, there’s little in the way of changes on the STR – Falcon Private Bank have gone, so the front wing endplate has gone blue instead of gold, and there’s a little bit of a red and gold swoosh on the side of the nose cone (not entirely dissimilar to Lotus, as it goes), but otherwise, this is an STR that looks exactly as you’d expect an STR to. Despite being a bit sick of that painted bull, I still quite like this car.

Mercedes

 

The biggest change, though, is the black area on the engine cover. I’m not entirely sure what the reason for it is, but it works quite well – although like the turquoise bits, it feels like there’s not quite enough of it to impose its presence. Nevertheless, this is probably the best-looking car on the 2014 grid so far.

Ferrari

No major changes for Ferrari – and let’s just ignore the vaccum-cleaner nose altogether, shall we? – with the only real difference from last year being that the black section now sweeps up over the exhaust and rear engine cover. I actually quite like increasing the amount of black on the car, although it’s unusual for modern-era Ferrari – but I think it’d look even better if the wings were black, too. Then again, as a fan of late 80s/early 90s Ferraris, I would say that…

Lotus

What I really like, though, are the red/gold stripes on the side of the nose – it’s about the only place where the two colours are used harmoniously together, and it’s only a shame that motif doesn’t spread to the rest of the car, as it’s a distinctive look.

Sauber

I can’t see any changes on this from last year’s, except for Telcel no longer being on the rear wing endplate. So far, so Sauber.

Force India

So that’s now eight out of the ten teams who’ve revealed their liveries (although I’m still expecting McLaren will unveil a tweaked version with a new title sponsor before the season kicks off… I say “expecting”, I mean “hoping”), with just Caterham and Williams to come. Once again, it’s been a bit of an anti-climactic year so far for new designs, but kudos to Force India and Mercedes for trying to keep things a bit interesting…

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