Red Bull Racing to use Tag Heuer-badged Renault powerplants for 2016

Australian Formula One driver Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull Racing shown during the third practice session last Saturday at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Srdjan Suki / EPA / November 28, 2015

Berlin // Red Bull will use Renault-Tag Heuer engines to compete in the 2016 Formula One season, the Austrian owned but British-based racing team said on Friday.

The announcement ends months of speculation surrounding their future in Formula One and which engines they would compete with.

“TAG Heuer is a Formula One icon and we are very happy to work with them,” Red Bull team boss Christian Horner said of the company that helped McLaren pilots Niki Lauda and Alain Prost in the 1980’s.

“And we are deeply satisfied with Renault’s decision to stick with us and F1,” said the boss of the team launched in 2007 and who clinched the world title four times between 2010-2013.

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After Sebastian Vettel’s four-year domination in the Red Bull, Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes have been a class apart the last two years.

Red Bull has had a strained relationship with engine supplier Renault, who themselves have announced that they will now return to the sport as a full constructor in 2016 after their takeover at Lotus.

Swiss watchmaker TAG Heuer will take the naming rights of the Renault V6 engine within the Red Bull team, and as such, next year’s car will be called the Bull Racing-TAG Heuer RB12.

Renault’s other team Lotus, whom they bought back recently, will also use the V6 engine, although mechanics at the various racing teams work on those engines in their own way.

Formula One has been trying to introduce measures to make cars and engines cheaper for ‘client teams’, ones that don’t have their own major motor company and use Renault, Mercedes or Ferrari engines for example.

Red Bull’s top driver Australia’s Daniel Riccardo came eighth in the final standings in the Formula One 2015 championship while the constructor itself came fourth from nine.

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