Blair Loveday
Is there a more iconic brand than LEGO?
I doubt it, and as an adult they are still so much fun to play with. One of the issues is the branded Lego is usually really pricey, even if they look so cool. F1 fans are very lucky with the more reasonably priced LEGO Speed Champions: Formula 1 range.
How do they look?
The cheaper smaller kits always make me nervous as the blockiness can distort the image too much. Well not the case here! These cars may be small, but they are impressively detailed. This is thanks to them consisting of over 250 smaller LEGO pieces. This means they keep their iconic LEGO look, while being impressively detailed.
Each of them also come with a LEGO character in the full driver outfit of the relevant brand, which just adds the touch of awesome to them when they sit on your shelf. Whether they are in the cockpit or standing by the car looking cool, it looks awesome.
What are they like to build?
I played with the BWT Alpine F1 Team A524, the Aston Martin Aramco F1 AMR24, and the KICK Sauber F1 Team C44 play sets. Well, my son and I played with them. The BWT is 258 pieces, the Aston Martin is 269 pieces, and the Sauber is 259 pieces. That’s a lot of pieces in a small car. Despite that, putting them together is fun as ever thanks to the really well designed booklets that come with them.
My 11 year old and I got them built reasonably easily. He only just beat me when we had a little race, but don’t tell him I said that. Like most LEGO sets, it’s really relaxing and cathartic just following the instructions and making them.
The hardest part, as always, is the stickers. God I wish LEGO would just print it on the pieces because I can not get the things straight to save my life. But that’s very much a me issue. If you are a normal human, I’m sure it is piece of cake to build.
One really amazing little detail is the front of the book has a fun fact about the actual car, and they vary from car to car. The Alpine compared the number of parts in the actual car to the models parts. The Sauber mentions the time to build from the car to the model. The Aramco mentions the length of the actual car to the length of the model in studs. It’s just a fun little detail that my son was always super excited to share with me.
Should you pick them up?
Do you like F1? Well, these are super cool collectables to put together.
Are you a LEGO fan? If yes, these are a lot of fun to put together, and look dope as hell.
Or are you just wanting something to get a teenager for a present? With F1’s massive explosion in popularity you really can’t go wrong here. Best of all the kit sets are surprisingly reasonable for a fully licensed property.
