Retired F1 driver Jacques Villeneuve turns 53 tomorrow (April 9), and it appears a birthday present to himself is this highly unique Audi exclusive RS 6 Avant sourced from Audi Zentrum Varese in Italy. The obviously pink paint is only the beginning of its special elements though, as the 1997 F1 champion and his partner-in-crime Audi Sport Manager Mirko Monteforte worked to include further colors from the design of Villeneuve’s unique helmet worn throughout his career.
In an interview with Audi Forum Varese, Jacques Villeneuve shared what drew him to an RS 6 Avant, stating, “I’ve had many cars in my life, surely the most beautiful ones were on the track. So, on the road it’s a bit different. However, since the first RS 4 years ago, I liked them because they were cars, a bit sporty but also quite safe.”
It’s believed that the RS 4 Villeneuve is referencing is a Goodwood Green example seen here at the 2016 Legend of the Autobahn event put on by Audi Club with the clubs for Mercedes-Benz and BMW. the event is part of Monterey Car Week, where NorCal Audi enthusiast institution 2Bennett Audimotive is a regular presence. That year, they brought this customer car that was said to be a former personal car of Jacques Villenueve. That now seems consistent with what Villeneuve says here.
In a video released by Audi Forum Varese (above), Mirko Monteforte explains more about the car. “When we met at Audi Zentrum Varese, inside our Cpl, there were two Jacques Villenueuve. The Formula One world champion, the Formula One legend we all know, and the customer who wanted to make the car of his dreams. Jacques had a clear idea of what he wanted to create. He wanted to bring back all the colors of his helmet into his car so the blue and pink, yellow, green, and red, and of course, the body color had to be the most difficult, unthinkable color: pink. The pink is not available in Neckarsulm so the first obstacle was to obtain approval to paint the body in that color. Despite a series of difficulties in getting the okay, it eventually came through, and I immediately called Jacques. I said, “Jacques”, they’re going to paint it pink,” and he was absolutely delighted, and of course, we were all thrilled.
“I think at fifty years old it was time to have some fun and especially to be able to do it as I wanted to customize,” says Villenueve, then continues, “I’d like to tell you that there’s a deep meaning behind it, but there isn’t. So, the story is a bit less exciting. No, I was 16 or 17 years old, and I had a helmet. I was about to start my career, so it was important to me because I had a memory of my father who had designed his helmet. At the time, it was an important moment; it was the image of the driver, the driver’s business card. At that time, it was the helmet you used throughout your entire career. So, I took a piece of paper, some colors, and I drew a design. But there wasn’t a strategy in the drawing, no special reason. I just liked the colors.
“Pink has always been a strong color. The true color of men. I read that in the past, girls were blue and boys pink many years ago. So, I liked this idea. Besides, it’s a color I really enjoy. It’s calm, fun and very discreet. It’s not true, so it all started with making the car pink.
“Above all, it’s not a small car, it’s a tough car. It was nice, that exchange between the strong car and this slightly lighter color. And from there, the idea came to put all the other colors into the car.”
Monteforte takes over, describing the specific elements of the car. “Once we found the pink Jacques liked, we had to complete the exterior with finishes, so we undoubtedly chose to finish the car with black look details. Therefore, we chose the black optics package. On all the trims, including the exhaust tips and of course, the glossy black wheels, also selected by Jacques. On the calipers, neither I nor he had any doubts. The color of the calipers had to be blue.
“Now we had to do the interior, so we had to bring back the missing colors inside the cabin. So, the red, green, blue, and yellow, and here too Jacques had clear ideas. Thanks to a program provided by Audi to create renderings of the interiors. Together with Jacques, we worked to create the interior of this Audi Sport.
“There were four colors left that we had to bring inside the car’s cabin, and the most important part was choosing which elements to match these colros with. Jacques wanted the seat to be blue and white, so there was a lot of research into where to color and how to color the seat part. It took a really long time, and we also realized that yellow had to be the color of the stitching.
So, two colors were missing, red and green. And here, regarding the red, I gave Jacques a suggestion which we welcomed and fully accepted: in Audi, the belts often have to be crimson red, so we decided they had to be this color.
So, the missing color was the green, which made us a bit desperate because we didn’t really know where to insert it. And here came Jacques’ stroke of genius again, which actually put us in difficulty because he wanted the RS logo, the embossing on the seat, to be green, iguana green.
After our meetings, after our hours spent figuring out how to build this Audi Sport model, we were starting to feel that the dream was coming true. Jacques was satisfied, I was satisfied, everyone was satisfied. So, we perceived, we understood that the dream was something unique, it was coming true. We realized that the work was finished, and we were absolutely satisfied.
After a few days, the factory contacted me to propose, to suggest to Jacques, the idea of consecrating this unique and authentic car with the inscription “Custom Built for Jacques Villeneuve”.The work was finished. We were aware that we had started something unique, exceptional, something that will last forever. Thank you, Audi. Thank you, Jacques.
Since then, the F1 legend has shared his own video introducing the car. We’ve also embedded that above. In it he shared, “It’s been a long road, well over two years actually. But, she’s finally here. She made it, and I’m talking about my dream car. It’s been my dream car since it first came out in 2002 and I took my time.
