Red Bull Admits They Copied Williams to Boost RB-19’s Superiority

In 2023, Red Bull is the car to beat. So, there is no doubt other top teams are looking at the Milton-Keynes outfit to know what they did differently to gain a significant advantage over others. But in one of the most surprising revelations, Red Bull sought inspiration from Williams in one of the designs that boosted their performance.

Williams is surely the weakest side under the new regulations and would be the last team that would trigger excitement among their competitors for their engineering lately. However, ahead of the Spanish Grand Prix, Red Bull explicitly mentioned that they had taken inspiration from a competitor’s design.

Actually, Red Bull apparently ‘copied’ the top corner designs of the diffuser by Williams, which allowed a slight increase in the downforce. And as per Red Bull, while it didn’t make a considerable difference, it was still impactful enough to improve RB-19 on the track.

Red Bull credits Williams for the design

While Red Bull and Williams aren’t the only teams that got this design, the same curve on the diffusor’s top corner was spotted in Ferrari’s 2023 car. So, how is Williama getting the credits? Simply because Red Bull admitted that the Grove-based team did it first.

“That piece of the floor design was out in early 2022. I recall Williams had i quite early on,” said Red Bull’s chief engineer Paul Monaghan, as per the Race. To give a date, when did Williams bring this design to F1? The lowest-finishing team from 2022 had the same design during last year’s pre-season testing in Bahrain.

Monaghan further adds that before incorporating the design, his team looked at it a couple of times before giving the green light. But he admits his team didn’t gain much pace from the change and made only a marginal difference in their performance.

Why can’t other teams then copy the best team?

Well, there are multiple reasons for that. Firstly, the designs being incorporated must suit the fundamentals of the car. While the current world champions took Williams’ design to add it to its rear, Williams also tried to copy Red Bull’s floor design.

Williams’ floor was exposed after it was lifted during the Spanish Grand Prix’s FP3, and the stark similarity of its new design to the Milton-Keynes-based team was observable. However, it hardly improved them, as probably it wasn’t integrating with the overall requirement of the car.

Secondly, copying a car isn’t that simple. It takes several weeks before understanding and then incorporating a particular design in the car. And by that time, the side with the edge might have moved ahead and kept its advantage over others.

Also, the cost cap has further complicated the process. Nowadays, copying the whole car after rejecting your designs could exceed the team’s budget. That’s why Red Bull boss Christian Horner even accused Mercedes of exceeding the cap when the Silver Arrows brought a new chassis to Spain.