Eagle eyed observers at Audi’s 2026 Formula 1 livery launch in Berlin on Tuesday noticed that two different car versions were on display.
On stage to show off Audi’s colour scheme for the season ahead was a standard 2026 F1 show car – in fact the official version that has been built by Memento Exclusives.
As the image above shows, the base show car that Memento has made available to teams is so in-line with the real thing that it can easily pass off for a genuine 2026 challenger.
However, in the build up to the covers being pulled off that display piece, renders of a different Audi car version briefly appeared on the video screen behind the stage.
Distinguishable primarily because it featured the genuine car race numbers, rather than the R26 of the show car, the design featured some notable differences from the show car.
And the fact that these variations put it more in line with the brief glimpses that we got of the R26 that conducted a shakedown at Barcelona suggests that these glimpses could well be genuine 2026 renders.
The differences
For example, the showcar on stage and used for Audi’s official renders had pullrod front suspension – rather than the pushrod that has already been spotted on the R26 at Barcelona. But the different images that briefly appeared on the stage screen was also pushrod.
The sidepods are also notably different between the stage car and the renders – featuring the overbite and more refined undercut shaping that we saw on track.
The nose is also completely different, with the show car featuring a very rounded profile while the version shown on screen is much flatter – and features the kind of cooling holes that are used in the real thing.
Quite what specification of car that video screen images were of is not known, and Audi has not responded to a request from The Race for more information.
However, it could well be that the images were basic renders of the shakedown spec of the car – so is quite in line with what was seen at the Barcelona run and will be used for the first pre-season test.
Things are likely to change a lot after that as teams are going to rapidly advance their designs for the Australian Grand Prix, so the final versions of what is raced will certainly be different anyway.
