Ex-Mercedes Aerodynamicist Doubts if Adrian Newey and Red Bull’s Tall Claims on RB17 Are Entirely True

The Goodwood Festival of Speed on Friday saw Red Bull unveil its much anticipated RB17 hypercar. Being the brainchild of one of the greatest F1 car designers of all time, Adrian Newey, the RB17 has a lot of promise. Red Bull even claimed that it is capable of doing similar lap times as a Formula 1 car around certain circuits.

However, former Mercedes aerodynamicist Kyle Forster has some reservations regarding this claim. He believes the car has a lesser downforce-to-weight ratio compared to a modern F1 car. Coupled with pretty much the same top speed as an F1 car, Kyle doubts that the RB17 can clock similar lap times as Formula 1 cars.

In an analysis of the RB17 on his YouTube channel, Forster said, “What’s interesting to me is that with a 900 kg car and these downforce numbers (1,700 kilos of downforce at 240 km/ hour which equates to an SCx of about 6.1), they are claiming that this car can lap similar to a modern F1 car.”

“Now that’s with considerably less downforce to weight than a modern F1 car.”, he added. Forster mentioned how the car’s efficiency is better but its power-to-weight ratio is not higher than that of an F1 car. Meanwhile, its top speed is also quite similar.

Thus, he concluded, “So in terms of where they’re generating their extra lap time from I’m not exactly sure.”

However, Kyle also mentioned that the car we saw was not the final product but only an earlier development model. He believes that Red Bull might make some changes to the specifications of the final version of RB17 to get the car closer to what they claimed on Friday. And with Newey being the brains behind the car, they might just be able to do that.

Newey enjoys working on projects outside of Formula 1

Newey is one of the most successful car designers in the history of Formula 1 with 25 championships to his name. Thus, after deciding to leave Red Bull, he may easily hang up his drawing boards to leave a peaceful life of retirement.

However, he has said on multiple occasions that he loves working on projects outside of Formula 1. It’s working on cars like the RB17 that keeps him fresh and enthusiastic.

“There’s a number of years I’ve been in F1 that to keep myself fresh and avoid going stale, I feel sometimes I need other projects to kind of give inspiration and so forth so that when I’m in F1, I’m not feeling as if I’m always doing the same thing,” Formula1.com quoted Newey following the launch of the RB17.

Another major non-F1 project of Newey’s was the collaboration between Red Bull and Aston Martin to build a track-specific hypercar, the Aston Martin Valkyrie. Now, time will tell whether the 65-year-old takes more such projects after his Red Bull exit or joins another F1 team to take up a new challenge.