Ford circles January 15 for season launch as Red Bull-Ford power unit wins Verstappen’s approval
Ford’s 2025 racing launch is locked in for January 15, and the Blue Oval will arrive with plenty to talk about. Deep in Milton Keynes, Red Bull Powertrains’ first in-house Formula 1 engine—developed with Ford—has been busy racking up dyno hours, and Max Verstappen has already had his first listen. The reigning benchmark in F1 left impressed.
This is the unit earmarked for the 2026 reset, when Red Bull and Ford get their joint naming on the cam covers and the grid gets a new rulebook. Smaller, lighter cars and a radically rebalanced hybrid package are coming: roughly a 50/50 split between combustion and electric power, with the internal combustion engine targeted around 400 kW and the MGU-K hiking to about 350 kW—nearly triple the current electrical output. The lot will run on fully sustainable fuel. It’s the most ambitious engine shift since 2014.
For Red Bull, it’s also personal. After years of customer deals and rebadges, this is their first clean-sheet F1 power unit program. The operation is led by technical director Ben Hodgkinson, whose CV includes two decades helping build Mercedes’ era-defining hybrid success. He knows exactly what kind of mountain Red Bull Powertrains is climbing—and who’s standing on the summit.
He admits Mercedes had a head start on the new regs and no shortage of know-how. When you’re designing something with more than 20,000 parts, he points out, “normal” seasons mean a few hundred components change. This time, every single piece is fresh ink. Red Bull began behind, he concedes; now it’s a development race to be ahead by the opening grand prix of 2026.
Hodgkinson won’t sell you bravado. He’ll tell you confidence is a trap in Formula 1. But belief? That he has, in the people and the place Red Bull has built. The Milton Keynes facility is the centerpiece—an engine shop that’s gone from blueprint to live fire in short order. It’s where Verstappen recently dropped in for a tour that included the soundcheck: 2026-spec units humming through simulated laps.
“He was able to hear exactly what it’ll be like behind his head for hours,” Hodgkinson said of Verstappen’s visit, delighted but not surprised that Red Bull’s talisman peppered the room with sharp questions. The Dutchman wasn’t just nodding along—he was drilling into the detail. That’s part of his edge, and it matches the mindset of a group that considers anything short of the front a failure.
Red Bull’s archery analogy underpins the ambition: you aim for the bullseye. Hodgkinson says the team must believe it can be among the frontrunners when the lights go out in 2026. That’s not complacency; it’s a standard. The Red Bull-Ford project is built on that premise, backed by Ford’s resources and a leadership team that knows what it takes to win under new rules.
The competitive picture, of course, is wider than two badges. Mercedes’ institutional experience is an obvious reference point. Ferrari and Audi (via Sauber) won’t be shy in their expectations, either. But the mood in Milton Keynes is one of restless acceleration: the sense they started later, then ramped harder, is palpable. Hodgkinson says the development curve is steep—and currently pointing in the right direction.
Between now and Ford’s January launch, don’t expect leaks worth their weight in speculation. The real noise starts when the 2026 cars arrive, and not before. What’s clear is that Verstappen liked what he saw—and heard. In a sport where drivers mostly meet engines only when they’re bolted to a chassis, that early thumbs-up matters, even if it’s just a first impression listening through a dyno cell window.
For 2025, the driver and team line-ups remain familiar at the sharp end, and Verstappen’s still the lodestar at Red Bull Racing according to the FIA entry list. But all eyes are already drifting to the horizon. The next era will be defined by who best navigates a complex trade: big electrical muscle, smaller cars, a sustainable fuel mandate, and the art of matching a factory engine to a championship chassis.
On January 15, Ford will talk big picture. In 2026, Red Bull-Ford will have to deliver it. Hodgkinson’s verdict, for now: no chest-beating, just urgency. It’s a sprint to race one. And the stopwatch, as always, is the only voice that counts.
