“It’s been a real challenge”– Why are Red Bull suddenly quicker against Mercedes at COTA?

Red Bull has been working hard to find more pace in their car. The high temperatures in Austin, which is 30C, is working in their favour.

The 30C temperature in Austin is warmer than it has ever been for the race, which is always held in October or November. Combining those with a mordant circuit is grinding the tyres to such an extent that it looks like the teams will need two pit stops to make it through the race.

Mercedes typically struggles more than Red Bull as the ambient temperature rises. “Part of it is probably overheating of the tyres which is affecting everyone, but it’s been a real challenge,” said Mercedes lead driver Lewis Hamilton.

Red Bull has been putting in a lot of effort to find more pace. Especially after the Turkey GP, where Max Verstappen was out-paced Mercedes’ Valterri Bottas.

It was a bit of a wake-up call for the team as the race was being held in wet conditions in which the Dutchman excels. The Dutch driver said, “In Turkey, we weren’t entirely happy with the performance, but it’s quite a different track.”

“But also the tyres are the things touching the ground and if you can find a bit more they can make a difference. It had been an unexpected result.”

Furthermore, he said, “maybe a tiny bit surprised, but you can see it swinging a bit through the season. I’m happy to see it’s still doing that, [but] the race will be a different story.”

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Mercedes did not meet the expectations; Red Bull claws back

The soft tyres are pretty much useless for a long run restated Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz, who will start with soft tyres in fifth place after a Ferrari ruse backfired.

Sainz, jokingly, reiterated that he would benefit from its initial grip. “For about 10 metres. After one corner you want to be on the medium.” Even the medium tyres are having a hard time due to the bumps and demanding corners at COTA.

The hard tyre has barely been used by anyone so far – but only because it is expected to feature heavily in the race. Mercedes F1 boss Toto Wolff said that the team had not yet worked out why they had lost pace from Friday to Saturday.

However, they admitted that they had not met the expectations. Moreover, the Austrian threw in another issue – the severe bumps on the tracks. Before qualifying, Red Bull had to fix Verstappen’s rear wing caused by the bumps.

Wolff said Mercedes, too, had to make adjustments and that these had affected performance. “The car was bottoming out quite heavily, and that breaks the car and we took some mitigating steps to not massacre it that hard to survive the race.”

“Definitely a compromise for going fast around the track, but maybe a necessity to finish, ” he added.

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