Aston Martin have announced they will run a “special one-off livery” for British Grand Prix as part of a sponsorship deal.
The team presented images of the car it will run at Silverstone this weekend showing slight changes to the branding on its front wing, nose, floor inlets, driver’s head rest and parts of its engine cover, mostly consisting of extra logos.It has agreed a new sponsorship deal with Valvoline which will continue throughout the rest of the season. The company’s products will also be used by the team and Valvoline will supply “bespoke lubricants” from 2026 when Aston Martin switches from customer Mercedes power units to a new works supply deal with Honda.
“From this weekend’s British GP, Valvoline Global will provide race-proven lubricants for our AMR23 to help drive performance,” said Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack. “This long-term partnership with Valvoline Global will also benefit our new works power unit partnership with Honda from 2026 with bespoke lubricants.”
Aston Martin arrive at their home race enjoying by far their best season so far. They lie third in the constructors championship, just three points behind Mercedes, having scored six podium finishes so far, all courtesy of Fernando Alonso.
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Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
5th July 2023, 14:27
Always great to see cars running ads for companies and products actively not run by the team.
Brilliant testimonials, all around.
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
5th July 2023, 15:09
I don’t see any difference other than adding sponsors, which is a normal change, not a special one.
Yellow Baron
5th July 2023, 15:29
I’m also confused. How is this a one off livery if they will be running it the rest of the season. It’s also the same livery with just a few extra stickers of a new sponsor
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
5th July 2023, 19:39
It’s not even a new sponsor, as @gobert rightfully points out below.
Yellow Baron
5th July 2023, 15:31
I appreciate the touches of extra colour though and branding though. Makes it look a little more like a race car livery and gives it some sort of a depth rather than looking like a road car paint job on an f1 car.
A bit like the 2014 force India. Those extra couple coulours it had for the first part of the season really tied up the livery
Joe Pineapples
5th July 2023, 15:32
Woot! [slow clap]
Dan (@gobert)
5th July 2023, 15:47
Is that more money from Aramco to showcase one of their brands or just smaller Aramco stickers to match the Valvoline area? Maybe it attracts less negative attention than the parent company might?
Qeki (@qeki)
5th July 2023, 19:18
If I dye only one of my many hairs can I call it a special color
Nick T.
6th July 2023, 6:35
lol, “See that one pink hair there?! It’s breast cancer awareness day livery!”
I wouldn’t have known it was a “special” livery either if they didn’t tell me. I’m a fan (cause of Fernando), but this is a joke.
Electroball76
6th July 2023, 7:53
Does the mac ‘n’ cheese exhaust pipe improve performance?
PT
8th July 2023, 19:48
What lubricants were they using till now? Was Aramco supplying fuel as well as lubricants? Wouldn’t a sudden change in lubricants cause issues with engine performance? Or is Krack’s statement just a branding exercise?
Pat Pepper
9th July 2023, 11:28
I’m all for genuine one-off liveries such as McLaren’s famous retro Gulf colours at Monaco a few years back, but this trend for announcing everything as such is getting seriously out of hand now.
The addition of a few small Valvoline stickers does *not* amount to new livery and it’s absurd to announce it otherwise.
Since the dawn of sponsorship, F1 teams have been adding extra sponsors and/or technical partners while a season is in progress. In the old days when teams like Tyrrell were existing on a shoestring and changing sponsors from race to race, this *may* have involved a complete change of livery, but even then not always and few people referred to it as such in any case. And ever since title sponsorship deals became more universally settled, secondary partners have continued to be added in-season with the simple application of a sticker or two and no manufactured fuss about non-existent livery changes.
I think in any case the analysis which greets liveries at the start of each season these days is nothing but a poor substitute for the fact that there is so little visible variation in the actual design if the cars now, apart from when there’s a major change in the regs such as last season (with a knock-on into this season as teams which got it wrong initially strive to correct things, but that will all start to settle down before the next big changes in ’26).
Back when the cars were all radically different, no-one looked at the reveal of, say, a Brabham BT48 and said “ooh, I love the way the Parmalat stickers flow more easily along the lines of the cockpit this year”, because the BT48 differed so absolutely from the BT46* that we had all the talking points we needed, from the car itself.
*they never raced a BT47, if you’re wondering, kids.