Keeping it clean and simple: Juan Manuel Correa on his F2 helmet design

11 September 2023

Juan Manuel Correa has kept his helmet design pretty consistent for a number of years but the latest version he’s run in 2023 might just be his best yet.

Taking the bold lines and combining it with the intricate detailing you might only see up close, the Van Amersfoort Racing driver has come up with a very recognisable design. He talks us through his latest version.

“My very first painted helmet, I remember it was it was a Bell helmet, I was in karting so it must have been 2011. It was it was very colourful. I went with blue, yellow and red, which are the Ecuadorian colours, but the painter didn't check the actual Ecuadorian flag because they're a dull, blue, yellow and red, but he went with fluorescent colours. So the thing looked very cartoony, but it was nice. The base was like a fluorescent yellow then some blue and some red accents. I still have it at home. It's not my nicest helmet but I loved it the back then because it was the first painted helmet. I think I had that one for about one year.

“So, this is my base. You see this ‘JM’ over here and the basic design has stayed the same for about six, seven years now. But usually, I was adding more details around, making it a bit more detail oriented. And then for this year, I decided to do something very clean. I asked the designer to take away a lot of the lines keep it just three colours. The base is white, then you have the carbon black in the middle and then just to separate those you have the Van Amersfoort orange. I honestly quite like it. I think it looks clean, from far away it's easy to distinguish. One thing that's important for me is I like to have helmets that are not the same colour as the car I'm driving. I like something that sticks out a little bit. I think this one sticks out because my car is mainly black and orange and this is mainly white, especially on the top, so it sticks out from the outside and I like that.

“I quite like this area with the ‘JM’ in the black because you can see if you look closely that it’s done in carbon, it's not painted black, and I really like that. I liked the front as well. I mean the carbon there, but my favourite is this area. I think it looks really clean and I liked having exposed carbon.

“I have the little ‘AH’ star. That's still a detail that I kept there. Before I had it on top and bigger but I thought now it's been a while, I want to keep the detail but I don't want to base my whole top of the helmet around that. But that’s going to stay there.

“I have a few new sponsors, I have my own logo on the back and that's mainly for my own enjoyment, because nobody really sees the back of it.

“When I came up with the design, I told them I want the ‘JM’ on the side. We bounced a few ideas around because initially, it's quite difficult to distinguish. If I didn’t tell you it's a ‘JM’ maybe you wouldn't notice. But I don't mind that. I kind of like it. I know what it means and then the design in general just looks nice. The designer came up with this like seven years ago. I liked it. I liked it and then we've kept that base, but we've changed a little bit of the other details depending on how many colours I want to use. Usually if you ask the designer to use more colours, he will automatically put more details in that he could fill in with other colours. This I think is one of the simpler ones.

“I did do a special one for Monaco, a collaboration with LeftyOutThere, an artist from L.A. He basically took his signature pattern, which looks similar to how bacteria look inside the microscope with all the wiggly lines, that's sort of his pattern. It's really colourful, not something that I would normally wear or design, I like more simple stuff, but he made it look awesome and I wore it for Monaco. We actually sold it for charity for about €5500. That was for Forever Warriors, which is a charity that is funded by Step One Automotive Group. They help veterans transition into normal life and helps veteran’s families.

“My designer is MDM Designs. Miles does a lot of helmets. I know a lot of guys in F1 use him, he's great. I would like to give a shout out to Bell too because they give me a lot of helmets and they've been supporting me for a long time. I honestly love the helmet. I think helmets are one of those things that if you're used to one brand, it's very difficult for you to change after a while. But I don't think I would go anywhere else and they treat me really well. So I'm happy.”