Visa Cash App… What? Toro Rosso is the name and it’s back in F1! While the Faenza-based team may have rebranded itself as the Visa Cash App RB F1 team (colloquially V-CARB), fans may look to call it Toro Rosso again. And why not? As the team unveiled its car in Las Vegas, it brought back nostalgic memories of the good old days, especially of the team’s Toro Rosso avatar. A bright glossy blue car with silver and red accents on it. Fans are ecstatic to see the callbacks to the classic Toro Rosso livery on Red Bull’s sister team’s 2024 car.
As Red Bull had teased a rebranding of its sister team, they also spoke about a new philosophy to make the Italian outfit more competitive. The stable formerly known as AlphaTauri is looking to do this by maximizing the usage of transferrable components from Red Bull.
The Milton Keynes-based team acts as the main parent team for AlphaTauri (now V-CARB). Before 2020, they often used to supply a lot of parts from the previous year’s car for the Faenza team’s use. During its AlphaTauri days, this collaboration decreased a bit. However, as the team has fallen in performance, Red Bull aims to resume and increase this association again.
However, not everyone is happy with this association. McLaren CEO Zak Brown cited that teams in F1 can be truly “independent” besides the engine and gearbox reliance of supplier teams.
Often, teams rely on better and bigger stables for exchange of resources. Williams and Mercedes work closely together, same as Haas and Ferrari. However, the difference here lies in the fact that V-CARB and Red Bull have the same owner.
For now, the focus is on the livery, and talks about their performance will only be rampant when the season gets underway. Majority of fans and experts are liking the close resemblance of RB F1’s identity to being the Red Bull sister team aka Toro Rosso.
Fans and Experts appreciate Visa Cash App RB for bringing the Toro Rosso avatar back
The VCARB-01 livery is not an exact replication of the 2019 Toro Rosso. Still, it is a great attempt to bring those colors back. F1 podcaster and YouTuber Matt Gallagher described the livery as “naughty” while writing on Twitter (now X), “This car is NAUGHTY Toro Rosso vibes… I. LOVE. IT. 10/10”
Even his fellow YouTuber Tommo somewhat agreed to this sentiment but only from the slanting left angle. He stated, “For me, this is THE angle. Front on not so nice, but I’ll take this any day of the week. 8/10”
And yes the front-on angle of the livery doesn’t look great. Some white color areas stand out as a sore thumb and break the blue color’s beauty.
Regardless, F1 presenter Will Buxton is happy to see a car with paint on it, as we have seen many carbon fiber liveries so far.
Precisely the livery is bringing a lot of nostalgia for fans who always loved the Toro Rosso colors. If one ignores the sponsorship-based rebrand, it is a good change of identity for the Faenza outfit.
This Toro Rosso nod was a huge plus point after what has been a series of rather underwhelming reveals. V-CARB will be hoping that once the season gets underway, their performance on the track will be worth talking about too.
