Red Bull has dominated the F1 tracks since the introduction of the ground effect regulation. While they won 17 of the 22 races in 2022, their dominance reached an all-time high in 2023. Nevertheless, Red Bull’s technical director, Pierre Wache, recently revealed a significant shortcoming of the team, indicating that the team is still far from perfect this year.
Speaking exclusively to racingnews365.com, Wache said that while he is unaware of the level of competition, he and the team continue to put a lot of effort into discovering everything. The French engineer claims that even though Max Verstappen claimed three pole positions this year, the team is not the best in qualifying.
“You can see that in qualifying, for example, where we are not the best team. Sometimes, we pay the price for that by not understanding something,” said Wache.
Wache, however, eventually disclosed the true cause of Red Bull’s inability to control the course throughout qualifying and the race. The technical director claimed that current-generation cars, besides the tires, are crucial in determining the balance between the setups for the race and qualifying.
For instance, the rear tires are now considerably broader, which, combined with the current generation of ‘ground effect’ cars, makes driving with both low and high fuel more challenging since the car handles surfaces extremely differently.
Why did Red Bull opt for a different concept this year?
The way Red Bull dominated the track last year has made it seem like the team is stringing together all simple victories, but that is not true. Despite winning the season’s first two races with a significant margin, the Austrian team appeared to be having difficulty finding the proper setup at the Melbourne race. Verstappen was nevertheless able to secure his third straight pole position of the season.
As a result, if we just consider the outcomes, we will see that RB20 and RB19 are similar. However, Wache has recently disclosed that the truth is something different. According to the technical director, Red Bull decided to go with a significantly different concept for their 2024 model. This raises the question of why, given their 2023 success, the team chose to make this change.
Wache explained that the team has developed the new car so that they have more freedom to develop the current car within the current concept. As a result, they don’t consider the current concept the ultimate version of their car; instead, they have created further development possibilities.
Wache went on to say that it’s encouraging to see their new idea succeed in every way. However, the Frenchman notes that this does not imply that the squad will operate differently the following year. The technical director indicated that everything will depend on what the research team discovers during the development phase of the new car. Hence, if they perceive that another idea will provide them an advantage, the Milton-Keynes-based team won’t waste any time moving in that direction.
