[Editor’s Note: Today we have a very special article from our own Ticker Assistant, Jamie Rathjen. It’s also Jamie’s birthday today. Interestingly, Jamie covered the Iron Dames on his special day last year, as well. Enjoy! — PH]
The Iron Dames endurance racing team has carved out a visual niche for itself — well, besides having a bright pink car — by creating one-off designs for big 24-hour races, specifically Le Mans upcoming and Daytona in January. These designs have always been grounded in the idea of dreams and have come off as pretty creative, the most recent being the Daytona design with the car covered in “sticky notes” with messages from fans.
But this year’s Le Mans design is, well, not those. Not even close. It’s primarily white instead of pink, with a pink spoiler, and has phrases of “Total _______” splashed all over in a different font each time. There are five such phrases in total: “commitment,” “determination,” “passion,” “discipline,” and “energy.”
Wait, “total” and “energy?” That’s convenient. Because look which company now has its (not huge, but still) logo on the hood right below the “Total Energy” text.
That’s right, it’s the French energy company TotalEnergies, whose ad the team announced to begin the run-up to revealing this design. It does seem like a big coup; one of the largest companies in the world wants to advertise on the only all-woman Le Mans entry, and it’s the first time the team has had a significant ad presence (read: one you can see from a distance) on its car. They’re well within their rights to be hyped about it. But instead of the other designs’ charm and creativity, this one fairly obviously feels like a vehicle for the ad and that’s disappointing. The only real reference to dreams is some groovy-looking text saying “Powering Your Dreams” on the roof, but again, you can even trace that phrasing back to an energy company.
From an aesthetic point of view, I do appreciate that a white car will probably be easy to spot at night. (I always think a pink car will be and then it looks too much like the red ones.) Another change that the team has made for all World Endurance Championship races for this season is that the number is shown in the handwriting-like font the team uses for a lot of different purposes, instead of a generic sans-serif font.
Yes, the number panel is green and that’s a clash, but it has to be because that’s the color the WEC uses for the LMGT3 class. It doesn’t bother me. Next to it is the display that shows the position in class and times pit stops, which wasn’t on for these pictures.
Read more from the team here.
I think your disappointment in this design being driven by the sponsor is a Total Overreaction. It is certainly less craven than what we will see on the court for the next week between the Love’s and the Motorolas.