2023 Oracle Red Bull Racing F1 Team

[Bill]

| LAP 35/72

GP - "We are fuel safe so you can reduce lift off if you feel it is beneficial to front tyre temps"

| LAP 43/72

GP - "You can start to use the tyres a bit more Max"

courtesy of rbbulletin twitter.

The only thing that's going to stop Max this year is bad luck.

Meanwhile at Mercedes they think they were faster than Max.... So puzzled why Lewis was making those statements. They did the same last year.

lewis was not even faster than yuki or norris to be fair.merc is usually faster at end of a race.

[chrisc90]

They said the theoretical best lap I believe. Pointless nit picking at mini sector times to build your best lap when you cant even string a lap together behind the leader without being at least 1second slower.

I bet you could stick the laps of Lewis and Max together and work out the average over stints. Dare bet itll be closer to 2 seconds.... (but then someone will come round and say traffic vs open air and its a unfair analysis to make.

[organic]

They said the theoretical best lap I believe. Pointless nit picking at mini sector times to build your best lap when you cant even string a lap together behind the leader without being at least 1second slower.

I bet you could stick the laps of Lewis and Max together and work out the average over stints. Dare bet itll be closer to 2 seconds.... (but then someone will come round and say traffic vs open air and its a unfair analysis to make.

Max said in his social media posts that the car was a rocketship, and he said in post-race conference that the car was extremely quick in all conditions. I believe he was not near the limit of the car at any point in the race. Why would he be? Driving at 90% still gets him to P1 easily and avoids unnecessary risk. As if to confirm this, he also spoke in press conference about risk management and how his driving approach in races like this is completely different to in the past.

I remember many weekends when AMR/Merc/Ferrari say that they were as quick as RB but then never do we see them fight for P1. Funny that

[chrisc90]

Totally agree Organic.

I dont think we have seen Max push the car since probably mid 2022 when the Spa TD039 kicked in, which somehow nerfed Ferrari from just the plank alone.

[TNTHead]

Totally agree Organic.

I dont think we have seen Max push the car since probably mid 2022 when the Spa TD039 kicked in, which somehow nerfed Ferrari from just the plank alone.

Well I think there were moments where he was obviously pushing, Miami race comes to mind for instance. But that was the driver with the material given to him. If they are running a bit detuned engine and are delaying updates... may be they have over a second in the bag. Like Merc did have for years.

[Paa]

Max said in his social media posts that the car was a rocketship, and he said in post-race conference that the car was extremely quick in all conditions. I believe he was not near the limit of the car at any point in the race. Why would he be? Driving at 90% still gets him to P1 easily and avoids unnecessary risk. As if to confirm this, he also spoke in press conference about risk management and how his driving approach in races like this is completely different to in the past.

He probably properly pushed for a few laps, chasing Perez at the beginning.

[Chuckjr]

Is the RB is over Checo’s head? The car is to good for him, it seems. It’s too pointy to drive for a guy of his skill level, so I don’t think he’s going to magically find confidence or speed. He had every opportunity to really shine and take a strong second last weekend, and yet he continued to make mistakes. Furthermore, he seems to think he is somehow going to challenge Max (lol), and this clearly renders that not only the car, but the entire situation is completely over his head. He needs to learn his place. He’s not as fast, is defacto number 2, and is there to score consistent points. The end. Just concentrate on doing the job, and not getting distracted worrying if the team is giving equal opportunity as Max. He’s not good enough to think about those things while driving anyway. Furthermore, of course RB aren’t! Why should they?!? Checo can’t be trusted to stay mentally focused enough to secure second place, yet alone beat Max! He’s therefore fundamentally unreliable at the most basic level of his job — securing points. They should replace him at the end of the year.

[organic]

Perez said he likes the car and that it's suited to both drivers. The car is neutral but can be set up with ballast either over or understeering. All of this has been spoken about by max, Perez, Marko at the beginning of the season. All on the same page.

If you think this RB is all "on the nose" or oversteering like crazy then I would suggest watching the onboards more of each driver because it is not really like that at all.

Perez has driven pointier cars in the previous regulations. In fact most of the cars in the previous regs were far pointier than any of the cars on the grid now - the way the downforce is generated with the floor has shifted the centre of pressure rearwards considerably

Perez was almost at Max's level or thereabouts at the beginning of the year. A couple of tenths between them. Then in Baku he spent the race testing different things and learnt about the car, discovered how to eek out more performance with setup, settings. His post-race interviews at Baku, his comments about his race at Baku in subsequent race press conferences. The difference in performance between max/Checo pre- and post-baku all point to Max simply getting to grips with the car and delivering to the fullest now.

Max can drive tricky/difficult cars very quickly. We've seen it numerous times. It allows him to fully exploit setup options available while retaining confidence in the car. That's something Checo can never do as someone who can't even adapt to a slight loss of understeer (see 2022)

But Checo has been a serviceable driver. Excellent at times such as early this season, at key moments in 2021. He's won 5 races in 2.5 seasons whilst Bottas won 10 races in 5 seasons at Merc - the same rate. Perez is unfortunately just too inconsistent and not adaptable enough to be in a RB car that cannot always be perfect. Whilst his direct comparison is extremely consistent and adaptable.

I would agree that replacing him is best. But RB are not in the sport to make it better for viewing, or to make their two drivers closer together in performance. They'll only change things if they think that the change will be beneficial

[Wouter]

After his victory at the Zandvoort circuit, Verstappen indicates how important the Azerbaijani Grand Prix was to him.
Speaking to the international media, he says: "I learned a lot from that race in Baku when you look at what I can do with the car
and how I can adjust it. I didn't win that race, but in that race I've tried many different things and used many different tools."

Verstappen has reaped the benefits of the Azerbaijani Grand Prix. The Red Bull driver is remarkably talkative about it,
but he won't say what exactly he learned: "It explains why I was maybe a bit erratic during that particular race, but at some point
I got into a good rhythm with what I had found in the car. Unfortunately I asked a little too much of the tyres,
but I knew it was interesting for the next races. In the end it just comes down to applying that in the races after that."

[organic]

AMuS journalist Peter Schmidt on the Dutch GP

"In Zandvoort the Red Bull is 1-2 tenths faster(than other teams), the rest is Max Verstappen."

[Just_a_fan]

AMuS journalist Peter Schmidt on the Dutch GP

"In Zandvoort the Red Bull is 1-2 tenths faster(than other teams), the rest is Max Verstappen."

No driver is capable of lapping faster than the car is capable of lapping. Doesn't matter who it is, it's physically not possible. Fangio, Senna, Michael, Fernando, Max, whomever, can't make a car can't go faster than it's capable of going.

[organic]

AMuS journalist Peter Schmidt on the Dutch GP

"In Zandvoort the Red Bull is 1-2 tenths faster(than other teams), the rest is Max Verstappen."

No driver is capable of lapping faster than the car is capable of lapping. Doesn't matter who it is, it's physically not possible. Fangio, Senna, Michael, Fernando, Max, whomever, can't make a car can't go faster than it's capable of going.

I think the implication is that the car performance between the teams is similar, but that max extracted closer to the maximum of what is available at Netherlands than other teams' drivers. Nobody's suggesting he's outdriving the car or whatever as that, everyone agrees I think, is not possible

Lewis himself said he thinks that the car was capable of at least being close to challenging max. But over the weekend things didn't go right on both team side and driver side that made it impossible to fully show this, for instance.

[rbirules]

AMuS journalist Peter Schmidt on the Dutch GP

"In Zandvoort the Red Bull is 1-2 tenths faster(than other teams), the rest is Max Verstappen."

No driver is capable of lapping faster than the car is capable of lapping. Doesn't matter who it is, it's physically not possible. Fangio, Senna, Michael, Fernando, Max, whomever, can't make a car can't go faster than it's capable of going.

Nor is the quoted author suggesting that. The author is suggesting only 1-2 tenths of the gap between car/driver combos was due to the RB19 the rest of the difference was due to Max driving better (closer to the theoretical limit that his car was capable of compared to other drivers).

[Just_a_fan]

AMuS journalist Peter Schmidt on the Dutch GP

No driver is capable of lapping faster than the car is capable of lapping. Doesn't matter who it is, it's physically not possible. Fangio, Senna, Michael, Fernando, Max, whomever, can't make a car can't go faster than it's capable of going.

I think the implication is that the car performance between the teams is similar, but that max extracted closer to the maximum of what is available at Netherlands than other teams' drivers. Nobody's suggesting he's outdriving the car or whatever as that, everyone agrees I think, is not possible

Lewis himself said he thinks that the car was capable of at least being close to challenging max. But over the weekend things didn't go right on both team side and driver side that made it impossible to fully show this, for instance.

Well in terms of personal fastest laps, Fernando (lap 56) was quicker than Max (lap 58) by 0.052s and Lewis (lap 58) was slower than Max by 0.015s. Max was faster than Perez (lap59) by 0.342s (all within a lap or three of each other) but Fernando and Lewis were 1.3-1.2s faster than their respective team mates. So the guys getting more out of their cars appear to be "not Max", frankly, at least in comparison to their team mates.
https://www.formula1.com/en/results.htm ... -laps.html

So, to say that the car is 0.1-0.2s faster than the cars and Max was doing the rest would suggest that Max actually didn't do that good a job after all because his own fastest lap wasn't actually anything special compared to others in less good cars.

Of course, there are many factors at play and Max usually goes for his "hah, catch this you suckers!" fastest lap right at the end when, unfortunately, the track was not conducive to that in Holland. But these throw away lines by journalists don't do anyone any favours - other than garner clicks for their employer.

[organic]

He didn't say that in an article, nor has the quote been published as a headline. it's not to gather clicks. Schmidt always does a "formula Schmidt" video after a race weekend where he summarises his thoughts/feelings and is generally fair in his assessment. Assuming you're not familiar.

Schmidt/AMuS have no reason to talk up RB/max. In fact they have been rather negative about the team since 2022 as a result of a fallout around the publishing of cost cap breaking news.

Perez was 1.3s in qualifying off max in the same conditions. Whilst Hamilton failed to qualify for q3. Meanwhile in the race, Stroll and Russell were not on comparable strategies to their teammates (driving on mediums/hards for the phase of the race when their teammates set fastest laps) whilst Perez was on the exact same strategy as his teammate. So that comparison doesn't make any sense. Additionally using individual data points - fastest laps - is an extremely lazy approach and lacks nuance. You must know that - It's clear you're really reaching to make a point

And for the record, I don't think RB was within 1-2 tenths of other teams. I disagree with the quote