McLaren will finally answer the prayers of their fans by bringing back the classic chrome livery for the Formula 1 British Grand Prix.
Most notably driven to world championships by Mika Hakkinen and Lewis Hamilton, the silver/chrome look was a staple of the F1 grid during the late 1990s and 2000s, often going up against the red of Ferrari.
In a one-off livery, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri will show off their chrome liveries thanks to a partnership with Google and the company’s CEO Zak Brown is delighted to be able to show off the design to the world.
“It’s no secret that motorsport fans love McLaren’s classic chrome livery,” Brown said. “Google Chrome wanted to bring back elements of this iconic livery to celebrate our team’s history at the British Grand Prix.”
Everyone should do it
It’s not often F1 could learn a thing or two from NASCAR but this is one thing they really need to bring over from the States.
Every single year without fail, NASCAR runs a “throwback weekend” where drivers and teams are encouraged to bring back classic liveries from the history of the sport with fan favourites including Dale Earnhardt’s black number 3 and even Ricky Bobby’s ‘ME’ livery from the movie Talladega Nights.
There are 10 F1 teams who could all either choose an old livery from their own past, like McLaren have done here, or even that of a defunct team such as Lotus, Maserati or Benetton in a celebration of the sport’s rich heritage.
Sure, the same sponsors won’t be making a comeback for the most part, especially those promoting cigarettes or alcohol, but the current sponsors can be integrated fairly easily. The fans would fall in love with this idea unquestionably and the revenue the teams and F1 could make from merchandise sales would be astronomical.
Maybe some teams saw Mercedes‘ horror show at the 2019 German GP and thought ‘forget that’ but if F1 were to mandate it, everyone would have a blast reminiscing on old times.
Alpine in the famous yellow and blue of Fernando Alonso’s heyday, Williams in prime Nigel Mansell blue and white, Mercedes back in Brawn white and fluorescent yellow. The opportunities are endless.
Where is the next F1 2023 race?
With the F1 circus finished in Austria, we move on to the 2023 British Grand Prix which will be held at Silverstone in Northamptonshire, England over the weekend of July 7-9.
