HYPERCARS PRESENT AND FUTURE
Newey describes the partnership between Red Bull and Aston Martin to build the Valkyrie hypercar as “quite a bumpy road”, although he refuses to blame either camp for the relationship breaking down. However, he recalls fellow legendary Formula 1 engineer Gordon Murray’s comments from when the Mercedes-benz SLR Mclaren was under development about how difficult it was for race teams to work with car makers, saying he understands them better than he did at the time.
Despite it all, though, Newey is happy with the association.
“The weight is a bit higher than we had hoped and there’s a cabin noise issue that could have been better sorted,” he says. “With more budget and development, we would have done things a bit differently. But I’m still proud of the result.”
Newey has only driven a Valkyrie on the track so far, but Red Bull’s contract with Aston says they will get five cars, one of them for Newey, so road driving should be possible soon.
Meanwhile, Red Bull’s RB17 track hypercar project continues apace, although Newey admits to hold-ups, because an initial co-operative deal with Porsche isn’t continuing.
The power unit (he carefully uses that term, rather than ‘engine’) is now being developed by a dedicated team at Red Bull Advanced Technologies, and the car’s outline and detail spec will be revealed “this summer”. Newey says that if the expressions of customer interest that Red Bull has collected are fulfilled, the RB17 business case will be “very strong”, although he mysteriously adds that the plan doesn’t include making profits.
“This will be a halo car for things we might do in the future,” he says.
Might it lead to a Red Bull car for the road, I ask. “That,” grins Newey, “is a question I can’t answer.”