{"id":402367,"date":"2026-01-09T16:56:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T16:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/402367\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T16:56:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T16:56:07","slug":"f1-2026-up-and-running-audi-complete-first-laps-in-new-car","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/402367\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 2026 up and running! Audi complete first laps in new car"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Audi has completed the first laps of its all-new Formula 1 project at Spain&#8217;s Circuit de Catalunya.<\/p>\n<p>Audi completed its takeover of the Sauber project coming into 2026 and is racing this year as a fully-fledged manufacturer team, meaning it will build its own car and engines.<\/p>\n<p>Drivers <a data-player-guid=\"f6c03f13-47eb-f2a9-6d51-d3acff13722c\" href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/rpm\/driver?seriesId=6&amp;driverId=4396\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Nico H\u00fclkenberg<\/a> and <a data-player-guid=\"b559483d-5edd-3276-8ca5-65ea04dc60a8\" href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/rpm\/driver?seriesId=6&amp;driverId=5835\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Gabriel Bortoleto<\/a> both drove laps of the new car on Friday at the circuit as Audi utilised one of the two 100km filming days allocated to every team under the regulations.<\/p>\n<p>The Barcelona circuit will host an unofficial week of testing, arranged by the 11 teams, at the end of January, before F1&#8217;s two official preseason tests in Bahrain in February.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"it\" dir=\"ltr\">La prima monoposto 2026 e&#8217; Audi che sta girando al Montmelo&#8217;. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/F1?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#F1<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/AudiF1?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#AudiF1<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/ShakeDown?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#ShakeDown<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/5sNcSE2Bx9\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/5sNcSE2Bx9<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 RobertoF1 (@robertofunoat) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/robertofunoat\/status\/2009602247320305855?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">January 9, 2026<\/a><br \/>\nEditor&#8217;s Picks<\/p>\n<p>2 Related<\/p>\n<p>Despite a long and storied history in motor racing, which includes 13 Le Mans 24 Hours triumphs and four World Rally Championships, 2026 is Audi&#8217;s first foray into Formula 1 in any capacity since the championship started in 1950.<\/p>\n<p>The company inherited Sauber&#8217;s Swiss headquarters in Hinwil, which will continue to operate as its car-building hub, while its engine programme is located out of a facility in Neuburg an der Donau, Germany.<\/p>\n<p>Audi&#8217;s F1 team is led by former Red Bull sporting director Jonathan Wheatley, while ex-Ferrari team boss Mattia Binotto is CEO of the wider project.<\/p>\n<p>Audi is one of two new engine projects on the grid this season &#8212; Red Bull is building its own engines this year in conjunction with Ford &#8212; and one of two new teams, with American outfit Cadillac also set to debut, albeit as a brand new entity built from the ground up.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Audi has completed the first laps of its all-new Formula 1 project at Spain&#8217;s Circuit de Catalunya. Audi&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402368,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-402367","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-formula-1","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-f1","11":"tag-formula-1","12":"tag-formula1","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}