Situation

Michelob ULTRA’s brand platform, “It’s Only Worth It If You Enjoy It,” has made unparalleled impacts in the world of sports over the last few years, addressing issues such as burnout, fans being shut out of games during COVID lockdowns, accessibility, and more. Our cultural relevance in sports has helped us become the #1-selling beer in the U.S.

But competition never ends in the beer category. To keep your sales up, you need to keep being culturally relevant.

Objectives

So, to continue growing our sales, we set out to inject Michelob ULTRA with a new burst of cultural relevance.

Brief

We set out to remind everyone who loves the world’s fastest-growing sport — F1 racing — that joy is an essential component of the sport, and an active lifestyle in general.

We designed Lap of Legends, the first-ever real-vs.-virtual F1 race, to remind the world of a crucial truth: the intensity of racing should be enjoyable, not overpowering.

We put Logan Sargeant, a Williams Racing driver, in a real car on a real track against virtual avatars of the F1 legends who inspired his love of racing. These retired racers’ joy served as an inspiring counterbalance to the hyper-competitive, pressure of F1 today.

And we did it all through AR, AI machine learning, and telemetry, using tech to quite literally change the game of F1 racing and create the first sporting event that spanned different dimensions of reality.

By changing the game itself, we changed the way everyone enjoys the game.

It became clear that the world of F1 had lost its sense of perspective about racing. The lighthearted racing eras of drivers like Mario Andretti had taken a backseat to this new pressure-packed era.

Qualitative and ethnographic data proved that F1 had taken a serious turn from a joyous sport to a pressure-packed one. Interviews with drivers like Lewis Hamilton, Logan Sargeant, and Lando Norris showed that the pressure to win had reached a fever pitch, Not to mention, the proliferation of shows like Drive to Survive has also reinforced the notion in culture that F1 should be high-octane and cutthroat all the time.

So, we used our F1 partnership with Williams Racing to reframe the way in which the world thinks about the joy of an active lifestyle.

A Made-for-TV Story with Extensive Promo: This unprecedented F1 race materialized as an unprecedented television program. Fans first caught a glimpse of it at the United States Grand Prix in October 2023, and at premiere events in New York and Miami in early 2024. Then, the full program aired on AMC and BBC America in spring 2024, interspersed with stories of Logan’s journey as a driver, adding a level of personal narrative that no other race has offered. Soon, the full program featuring the race and the human story behind it will also be available to stream on-demand via AMC, BBC America, and Roku.

A Feat of Boundary-Breaking Technology: With the help of real-time data, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, machine learning, and telemetry, Logan raced in his car on a track — like he normally would — at Silverstone, home of the British Grand Prix. But his digitized opponents appeared as augmented reality avatars in his racing helmet, responding to his driving motions in real time with the help of machine learning, which processed real-time data from multi-constellation race-grade GPS systems to understand Logan’s motions, getting his location down to the centimeter. This technology is so precise and true to racing physics that F1 teams have started using it themselves to model and test new racing strategies.

Lap of Legends is still in its promotional phase. But the success of the promo shows another cultural relevance juggernaut in the making:

4.5 billion impressions and 19 million viewers across platforms

+1650% month-over-month growth in organic search for Michelob ULTRA

+23% month-over-month growth in social reach for Michelob ULTRA

100% positive/neutral press coverage

And we’re making a lasting impact beyond the race.

The tech behind Lap of Legends makes AR devices more accurate and functional in fast-moving vehicles. This will make a crucial difference for ambulances during medical emergencies, disaster response teams during extreme weather events, and more.

Not to mention, we pioneered a new entertainment media format. Rather than advertising alongside sports, we created the sports event ourselves and other brands advertised alongside our event.

From live events to impossible technology, we continue to change the world with the joy of sports.