Red Bull’s 2024 car raised multiple eyebrows when the Austrian team launched it on February 15. The RB20 has a stark similarity to that of the Mercedes W-13 from 2022. Many were puzzled to see the match and questioned Adrian Newey’s motive behind this. Max Verstappen, the star driver of the team, however, did not doubt the caliber or intention of his team.
Speaking about this, Verstappen said after the pre-season test,
“Honestly, I trust everyone in the team that they know what they are doing. So I don’t care how they design the car as long as it’s faster. I mean, of course, it’s quite interesting about what they come up with every single time and it looks nice and for the rest, I’m not an engineer, I’m here to do my job in the car and they are here to do their job, building the car.”
Day 3 ✅ The falls on Testing with Max completing 66 laps and setting a best time of 1:30.755 ⏱️#F1Testing || #F1 pic.twitter.com/Xl9jcPLTAm
— Oracle Red Bull Racing (@redbullracing) February 23, 2024
Red Bull’s sidepod looks strikingly similar to Mercedes and many failed to understand why Newey went down that way even though he did not need to. He had a hugely successful RB19 at his disposal, which was miles ahead of its rivals. Therefore, a radical change seemed unnecessary. Furthermore, the sidepod concept that Newey adopted from Mercedes, was scrapped by the Silver Arrows after just one season.
Newey, however, made some adjustments to the sidepod. The British veteran engineer enabled the RB20 to have two slits along the sidepod for superior airflow along with a reverse spoon inlet by the side. This was added with two ducts on either side of the driver’s head.
In pre-season testing, Red Bull and Verstappen seemed like the strongest team once again. Hence, it’s safe to say that Newey’s gamble worked out, and Verstappen didn’t doubt him for a reason.
How did rivals react to Red Bull’s design?
Mercedes thought of dominating back in 2022 when they brought in the so-called zero sidepod design, which Red Bull copied now. The Brackley-based outfit even won a race in Brazil that year, but overall, the design lacked consistency.
The early statistics in 2023 showed no signs of improvement. In the end, Toto Wolff’s team chose to scrap the sidepod and build one similar to Red Bull. As Red Bull has done something similar to their zero sidepod in 2024, Wolff could not help but take note.
Mercedes have captured the attention up and down the pit-lane at the final Bahrain F1 test with a a bold new ‘no sidepod’ design on a radically different W13 car pic.twitter.com/RDSlUtPlxp
— Sky Sports F1 (@SkySportsF1) March 10, 2022
The Austrian boss stated that every team has its own development path including Red Bull. He is not concerned about the defending champions’ taking their route as he believes it has got nothing to do with them. Red Bull’s concept might work for them, whereas Mercedes’ sidepod did not and that’s why they moved to a more conservative solution.
Nevertheless, Red Bull seems to be strong ahead of the 2024 season. McLaren and Ferrari also showed signs of improvement. Mercedes on the other hand, look like they have a lot of work to do.
