Bayer and Mekis defend their team’s strange name

As soon as the motorsport world heard that the team that was born as Minardi, then became Toro Rosso and then AlphaTauri, would henceforth be called Visa Cash App RB, it caused a whole storm of emotions, even complete rejection.

However, Peter Bayer, the director of the team from Faenza, is not prepared to accept these accusations and cited a number of arguments that forced him to make such a choice.

“We are actually quite satisfied,” he told Austrian publication Motorsport Magazin. – Visa and Red Bull wanted to support us and help the team reach the next level. When you see a car on the track you see how it is designed, everything together creates a certain complex image. The reality is that we just need sponsors to make this whole project work really effectively.

So far we have only received money from shareholders and prize money from Formula 1. But this is not enough to meet the budget limit set by the regulations, which in turn determines the degree of our competitiveness. How to close the gap with the leaders? To do this we have to sell ourselves.

Maybe we made a controversial decision, because being called Ferrari is of course easier than Visa Cash App RB. But we believe that with our new identity we will be able to make quite noticeable progress in the medium term.

The process of choosing a team name can be compared to choosing a child’s name. Some people can always say, “Oh my goodness, how could something like that come into your head?” And others will think: “What a beautiful name!” Overall, we plan to enhance the atmosphere of Red Bull’s original spirit, and now there will be even more music!

Laurent Mekies, the new team manager, also gave his arguments in defense of this position: “A few years ago we could only dream of such sponsors in Formula 1. And now they have not only chosen us, but they also want to participate form our identity. . Having such a problem is a luxury! But it also gives us a lot of responsibility, and the challenge is that we now have to sort everything out.”