Williams has just unveiled the livery for their 2023 F1 car, called the FW45, and it offers a familiar take on their new color scheme introduced last year.
Typically, these launches just show off the livery for the upcoming year, as revealing bodywork secrets this early on could afford the competition with an advantage, and this one appears no different. While the car wearing this livery isn’t the generic model vehicle, it does appear to be last year’s FW44 rather than this year’s actual FW45.
Read More: Ford Officially Returns To F1 As Red Bull Powertrain Provider
New for this year is the British team’s partnership with Gulf, but unfortunately for those expecting the famous pale blue and orange to show up on the livery, Williams decided to stick with the same red and blue color scheme from last year, just with some minor tweaks to make it a bit fresher and more aesthetically pleasing.
As disappointed as we are, we’d imagine it’s to keep them from being mixed up with McLaren, whose team colors have been orange and blue since 2018 (though we don’t actually know what their car for this year will look like yet). That being said, the livery did keep one of the best bits of branding we’ve seen in years — the airbox that’s painted to look like a Duracell battery.
See Also: First Glance At The 2023 F1 Grid: Haas Unveils VF-23 Livery
While the car’s color scheme hasn’t changed much, 2023 will be a year of change for Williams in terms of their personnel. Partnering Alex Albon behind the wheel will no longer be Nicholas Latifi, but instead Logan Sargeant, the first American to race in Formula 1 since 2015. The team also has a new principal, James Vowles, who was formerly the chief strategist at Mercedes.
There are still seven teams who have yet to reveal their car/livery, and the order of their launch dates is as follows:
Alfa Romeo – February 7
AlphaTauri – February 11
Aston Martin – February 13
McLaren – February 13
Ferrari – February 14
Mercedes – February 15
Alpine – February 16