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Up until the 2026 season, McLaren were the only Formula 1 team on the grid that did not have a title sponsor.
Fans will remember the iconic branding of McLaren’s past title sponsors such as Marlboro, West and Vodafone. The last of those three deals expired in 2013, and the team have not had one since then.
The Woking outfit struggled immensely in the turbo-hybrid era. Their Honda engines were dramatically underperforming and sponsorships had dried up to the point where McLaren’s existence in F1 was under serious threat.
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Fortunately, the team have steered themselves way out of trouble in recent years. Thanks to the leadership of Zak Brown, McLaren rebuilt relationships with sponsors and began fighting at the front again midway through 2023.
They eventually won their first constructors’ championship since 1998 in 2024 and then won the double in 2025, with Lando Norris clinching his maiden F1 title. McLaren are on the rise in F1, and they have taken another step forward in 2026 with Mastercard coming on board as a title sponsor.
Officially known as the McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Team, it marks a new, exciting chapter for the Woking squad. There may also be a slight bit of apprehension, because the last time Mastercard were a title sponsor resulted in one of the most disastrous F1 entries in history.
Mastercard Lola folded after just one race in the 1997 season
Back in the 1990s, Lola wanted to join F1 as their own entry and with their own engine. The problem was they did not have the funding, which is why a potential entry in 1994 and 1995 failed.
At the end of 1995, Lola attracted Mastercard as a title sponsor. The team set the goal of entering F1 in 1998 with an in-house engine, but this did not sit well with their new partners.
As Lola’s team principal, Eric Broadley, later revealed, Mastercard had put pressure on the team to join the grid in 1997. They wanted to push their ‘F1 Club’ initiative to cardholders, which would give them perks from the F1 team, such as factory tours and VIP experiences at races.
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It was also Mastercard’s way of funding Lola, but by pushing them to be ready for 1997, they had just four months to build the car, the engine, and find two drivers. As one might expect, they were unbelievably underprepared.
Lola planned to build an in-house V10 engine, but they did not finish it in time, leaving them with a Ford-Cosworth ECA Zetec-R V8 engine, which was hugely outdated. Furthermore, their two drivers for 1997 were Vincenzo Sospiri, a rookie, and Ricardo Rosset, a pay driver.
Broadley had set the target of beating fellow newcomers Stewart Grand Prix and looked at defending champion Damon Hill, who was at Arrows, as the benchmark. But the results were devastating, as Sospiri and Rosset were 11 and 13 seconds off the pace in Australia, failing to qualify for the race.
Lola took the cars to Silverstone for a test afterwards, and they were still nine seconds down. Subsequently, Mastercard pulled the plug on the sponsorship and by the next race in Sao Paulo, the team had folded altogether.
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What McLaren CEO Zak Brown has said about Mastercard’s partnership in 2026
It has been almost 30 years since Mastercard’s disaster with Lola, so they surely will have learned from it as they enter a new era with McLaren in 2026.
The initiative draws some similarities with the Lola partnership, as Mastercard will have ‘Team Priceless’, which will give McLaren fans huge benefits, such as hot laps and getting to meet Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.
Speaking in a press release, CEO Zak Brown expresses his excitement about the new partnership: ““There is no one more important to us than our awesome fan.
“So I could not be more delighted to enter this next chapter in our partnership with Mastercard with a promise to our Papaya Family around the world: that we will continue to put our fans first, bring them even closer to the team, and offer incredible experiences.
“Mastercard is a fantastic partner who shares our passion and values, so to have them on board as naming partner will offer us the perfect launch pad to keep pushing on and off track – and I cannot wait to see Team Priceless come to life in 2026.”
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