Walk through the F1 paddock in 2026 and you will see logos for sleep trackers, hydration drinks and fitness wearables in places once reserved for banks, oil companies and tech giants.
Three teams have signed wellness partners this year. Ferrari opened its commercial calendar in January with WHOOP, the fitness wearable brand's first move into F1, putting its logo on the car and the drivers' kit. Aston Martin added sleep technology firm Eight Sleep, whose branding sits on the car's nose and the drivers' balaclavas, and signed energy drink brand Celsius on a multi-year deal. McLaren followed in April with hydration brand Liquid I.V., announced days before the Miami Grand Prix.
They are buying into a booming market. F1 team sponsorship was worth $2.54 billion in 2025, up 22 per cent on the previous year, according to SponsorUnited. Technology ($769m) and financial services ($456m) still dominate, but the wellness newcomers are well funded. WHOOP was valued at $3.6bn in 2021, Eight Sleep raised $100m last year, and PepsiCo paid $550m for a stake in Celsius in 2022.
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari, Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari, Frederic Vasseur, Ferrari
Photo by: Simon Galloway / LAT Images via Getty Images
Each deal is sold on performance. "In Formula 1, performance is the result of marginal gains accumulated over an entire season," said Aston Martin commercial chief Jefferson Slack when the Eight Sleep partnership was announced, adding that "sleep is a critical performance input". Ferrari's Lorenzo Giorgetti said WHOOP would allow the team "to extend our data-driven approach beyond the car".
There is substance to this while we wade through the marketing speak. The products are aimed as much at mechanics and engineers as at drivers. Ferrari's medical team uses WHOOP data to monitor sleep, stress and recovery across its staff, while Eight Sleep's beds are designed with long-haul travel and time zone changes in mind. The triple-header just completed, from Baku to Sepang to Singapore on consecutive weekends, is exactly the kind of stretch these partnerships are meant to help teams survive.
But the bigger prize sits outside the garage.
Unlike a bank or a cloud computing firm, a wellness brand sells something a fan can buy for themselves, and that is the point. Celsius and Aston Martin have taken their run club to Melbourne, Miami, Montreal and London, where tickets for a 5km (3.1 miles) run through Regent's Park sold out. Liquid I.V. launched its McLaren deal with a fan activation in Miami aimed squarely at North America.
F1 has become a wellness target - one that we can all strive towards by using and embracing the products and tech we see on the sides of the cars.
There are reasons for caution, however. These partnerships can be short-lived. Celsius worked with Ferrari from 2023 to 2025, and sponsored Charles Leclerc personally, before moving to Aston Martin this year. Eight Sleep was a Mercedes supplier in 2022 before resurfacing at Aston Martin. And no team publishes the data that would show whether a better night's sleep is worth a tenth of a second.
I talked to Dr. Kristen Holmes, who leads the performance science collaboration between WHOOP and the Ferrari team. She confirmed to me that the average team performance, rest and stress levels have improved more than ever thanks to the collaboration. While this may not translate immediately to better results on track, you cannot deny a healthier team is one easier to support.
For now, the brands are betting that fans want a piece of the routine as much as the racing. On the evidence of a sold-out run club in London, they may be right.