Comments from both Ford, powertrain partners with Red Bull Racing, and GM, who race under the Cadillac brand and will supply F1's newest team with their own engines in the future, come as the sport weighs up the return of the V8, last seen in F1 from 2004 to 2013. In Miami, FIA President Mohammed Ben Sulayem claimed the "V8 is coming" potentially as soon as 2030, while Mercedes and Red Bull have both backed the idea.

Although wary of "looking ridiculous" in 2031, Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff told media, including GPblog, to "count us in to come back with a real racing engine," while Red Bull's Laurent Mekies teased "an early start" given Ford's powertrain partnership with the Milton Keynes team.

Speaking to The Detroit News in Miami about the possible V8 comeback in F1, Ford's Racing Chief Mark Rushbrook said: “It's great to see the FIA and Formula One already talking about what is the next set of regulations.

Meanwhile, GM President Mark Reuss, while slightly more cautious to fully back the plan as F1's latest entrant, said Cadillac would be ready to run V8s should any plan be approved by F1 and the FIA. He too told The Detroit News: “I love V8s and ... the way they sound.

One man who is not so supportive of F1's potential plan to bring back V8s is former driver Juan Pablo Montoya, who warned against nostalgia for the engine on the BBC's Chequered Flag Podcast: "People say, ‘Oh, your time was so good,’ I say, ‘Watch a race, it’s so boring. Even for us. It was sometimes like a short test session.’"

GPblog readers, however, have disagreed with the Colombian on a recent poll, with 83% of voters saying V8 engines would definitely improve racing. Some did agree with the former Williams man though, with one reader saying: "The reality is that people want V8's back in because of the noise. That's it. If today's engines screamed like the V8's or the V10's, there'd be less call for it."