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Red Bull Racing will wear white at this weekend’s Turkish Grand Prix

As a fitting farewell to its power-unit supplier, Honda

It's sad that the special livery won't be racing at Honda's home country. PHOTO FROM RED BULL

One-off liveries aren’t a new thing in Formula 1. We’ve seen them commemorate the launches of movies, celebrate racing milestones, and even mourn the devastating loss of life like the plain Ferrari color scheme that was shown off at the 2001 Italian Grand Prix a few days after the 9/11 tragedy.

Earlier this year, during the Monaco Grand Prix, we were treated to two McLaren cars sporting blue-and-orange Gulf Oil liveries. While an absolutely gorgeous throwback, Red Bull on the other hand is sending off its power-unit supplier Honda in style with a special white paint job.

The Red Bull and Honda partnership has produced 35 podium finishes and 11 pole positions to date. PHOTOS FROM RED BULL

This livery was supposed to make an appearance at the Japanese Grand Prix, Honda’s final home race in F1. But because COVID-19 threw a wrench at this year’s season, there will be no race in Suzuka. The Turkish Grand Prix has replaced it, and that is where the special paint job will be debuting.

Sporting a predominantly white body with a red rising sun on the nose (where the driver number is located), it’s inspired by the legendary Honda RA272 which Ritchie Ginther drove to score the automaker’s maiden F1 win in the 1965 Mexican Grand Prix. The word arigato (thank you) written in Japanese characters can be seen on the engine covers and the rear wings of the two RB16B machines. The pair of AlphaTauri AT02 cars will also feature the word on their rear wings.

There are rumors that Red Bull will be forming its own engine division with Honda personnel. PHOTOS FROM RED BULL

This isn’t the first time Red Bull will run a white car. The team made a special one-off color scheme for David Coulthard’s final race. It was seen at the 2008 Brazilian Grand Prix briefly before colliding with the Williams of Kazuki Nakajima on the first lap.

We hope that the specially painted Red Bulls will perform favorably at this weekend’s race.



Sam Surla

Sam used to be the youngest member of our editorial team when he was our managing editor. He specialized in photography and videography, but he also happened to like writing about cars a lot.



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