Red Bull and Verstappen kick-off F1 launch season - but what did we learn?
The Race F1 Podcast
The Race Media Ltd
4.5 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 16 January 2026
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Red Bull kicked off F1’s launch season with a flashy event in Detroit, revealing a glossy revised livery and giving us some hints about expectations for 2026. But what did we learn about the hopes for its new power unit and how big Ford’s involvement really is? And did Max Verstappen give anything away about how he's feeling heading into what's likely to be a crucial year for his future?
Edd Straw is joined by Jon Noble to discuss all of this and more, plus reflect on the much more low-key launch of Racing Bulls' 2026 season. With the junior team given less than 15 minutes in the spotlight during the launch event, is it a case of 'Scuderia Afterthought', or will the Italian-based outfit kick-on and become more than a 'talent incubator' for the main squad?
Get your 7-day free trial to The Race Members' Club on Patreon today and enjoy bonus F1 podcasts and ad-free listening.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The Athletic |
| 0:02.7 | The Races |
| 0:02.7 | The race is on, and Red Bull kicked off F1's launch season with a flashy event in |
| 0:16.3 | Detroit, revealing a glossy revised livery and giving us some hints about expectations |
| 0:20.1 | for 2026. So what do we |
| 0:22.1 | learn about the hopes for the new power unit, Max Verstappen's ambitions, and how big is Ford's |
| 0:27.1 | involvement really? I'm Ed's draw and joining me for our first bite of the new season is John Noble. |
| 0:33.3 | Well, John, many of those listening, particularly in Europe, won't have been watching the event when it was actually put out on YouTube in the middle of the night. |
| 0:40.4 | So what did you make of it? |
| 0:42.0 | Well, I actually must confess to kind of joining them because we obviously, because of the timing of it, |
| 0:47.3 | I think the livery reveals at 3.45am. |
| 0:50.2 | We obviously had to do a bit of a split shift yesterday. |
| 0:53.0 | So I did a bit of work yesterday |
| 0:55.1 | evening, went to sleep and got up super early to kind of pick up. I think when you went to bed |
| 0:59.9 | about four o'clock this morning. So I watched it delayed. So I watched it a bit afterwards. |
| 1:04.8 | But I think it was even delayed for you, wasn't it? Wasn't it not actually live? Is that correct? |
| 1:09.3 | Exactly. Yeah. It was maybe three hours delayed or |
| 1:11.8 | something like that. So they did it kind of as live, but obviously photos from the event had leaked |
| 1:17.0 | and that kind of thing. And I think the Red Bull Power Trains boss, Ben Hodgkinson, mentioned that it |
| 1:23.4 | was around midnight, which didn't align with the times in the UK. He was there via video linkups. So, yeah, everybody was experiencing it in different time zone. So no matter what |
| 1:32.5 | you did, unless you were actually there, you weren't experiencing it fully in real time. But |
| 1:38.5 | I tip my hat to any F1 fans and Red Bull fans in Europe who did get up and watch it at 3 or 4am. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Race Media Ltd, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Race Media Ltd and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.