PUMPED UP BRICKS

How Lego developed 10 car-sized F1 builds... to be raced around the Miami GP circuit by the world's best drivers

- By Spencer Hart

Ahead of this year's Miami Grand Prix, Formula 1 drivers swapped the usual parade truck for something far more blocky and brilliant: fully drivable, life-sized Lego F1 cars. Each team had its own custom-built model in team colours and livery. All 20 drivers took to the 5.4km track in these rolling tributes to brick-based engineering.

The Lego x F1 parade was the result of nearly a year of work by a team of 26 designers, engineers and master builders based at Lego's Kladno factory in Czechia – the place where the firm constructs all its large-scale models for parks, stores... and now the F1 grid.

Each car is based on Lego's Speed Champions line, scaled up to match the proportions of a real F1 car: 5.5m long and almost indistinguishable from the real thing when viewed from a distance. Except, of course, each one is made up of almost 400,000 Lego bricks, weighing in at 1500kg.