EXCLUSIVE: Red Bull tech chief fears they could 'be in trouble' with rivals in heated 2024 title fight
EXCLUSIVE: Red Bull tech chief fears they could 'be in trouble' with rivals in heated 2024 title fight
Red Bull's technical director Pierre Waché expects that the battle for the Formula 1 world title in 2024 will be closer than the current campaign.
According to Waché, Red Bull's domination this year is not so much due to the performance of the RB19, but down to underachievement of rivals.
Red Bull are enjoying an extremely dominant 2023. The Milton Keynes outfit have won all 14 races this year and are well on their way to sealing the constructors' championship relatively early in the season.
Sitting on 583 points they boast a huge lead over second place Mercedes who trail by 310 points. This has led to regular talk in recent weeks about the dominance of the team whose drivers consist of world champion Max Verstappen and Sergio Pérez.
Some fear that the sport may become boring or predictable, while others believe that it is up to the other teams to close the gap.
READ MORE: EXCLUSIVE: Verstappen setup quirk which allows Red Bull to make car even faster
Trouble could be ahead for Red Bull
Speaking in an exclusive interview with GPFans, Waché feared that if other teams start to maximise their potential, the advantage that Red Bull currently have over their rivals could be severely cut.
"I think so," he said. "If you see what McLaren and Williams have achieved in terms of performance... If Mercedes and Ferrari do the same, we are in trouble.
"Then the fight will clearly not be in our favor. We still have to push as much as possible to make it happen, to make sure we are there. The performance is much closer than at the end of last season."
Not up to FIA to end domination
Due to Red Bull's dominance there have been outside calls for the FIA to intervene to try and level the playing field, but Waché believes it's a simple matter of rivals having to play 'catch up'.
"The performance is much closer together than at the end of last season," he said.
"When I see what some teams have done, Aston Martin, McLaren... I think some people have not achieved what they should have achieved. This dominance is not because of us, but because others have not achieved the performance they should have achieved."
Cost-cap fallout
Red Bull are already at a disadvantage to their rivals following last season's cost cap breaches and the punishments from that.
One of those punishments was being able to spend less time in the wind tunnel over the course of 12 months and Waché explained how Red Bull's ability to develop a 2024 challenger has already been hindered.
“Because it [the penalty] lasts until October, it absolutely reduces our capacity to develop the car for next year,” he continued.
"It reduces our research capacity, but fortunately we started the season quite well. The punishment does not slow us down, but only reduces our development capacity. You also see that we have fewer updates than others because we have less research capacity. Next year we have therefore potentially less research than others. That is a risk."
READ MORE: Who is Helmut Marko? The genius behind Red Bull rise to power
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F1 Standings
Drivers
- Oliver Bearman
- Charles Leclerc
- Carlos Sainz
- Lando Norris
- Oscar Piastri
- Pierre Gasly
- Esteban Ocon
- Sergio Pérez
- Max Verstappen
- Alexander Albon
- Logan Sargeant
- Lewis Hamilton
- George Russell
- Nico Hülkenberg
- Kevin Magnussen
- Fernando Alonso
- Lance Stroll
- Valtteri Bottas
- Zhou Guanyu
- Daniel Ricciardo
- Yuki Tsunoda
Races
- Gulf Air Grand Prix of Bahrain 2024
- Saudi Arabian Grand Prix 2024
- Grand Prix of Australia 2024
- MSC Cruises Grand Prix of Japan 2024
- Grand Prix of China 2024
- Miami Grand Prix 2024
- Gran Premio dell'Emilia Romagna 2024
- Grand Prix of Monaco 2024
- Grand Prix du Canada 2024
- Gran Premio de España 2024
- Grand Prix of Austria 2024
- Grand Prix of Great Britain 2024
- Grand Prix of Hungary 2024
- Grand Prix of Belgium 2024
- Heineken Dutch Grand Prix 2024
- Grand Prix of Italy 2024
- Grand Prix of Azerbaijan 2024
- Grand Prix of Singapore 2024
- Grand Prix of the United States 2024
- Gran Premio de la Ciudad de Mexico 2024
- Grande Prêmio de São Paulo 2024
- Heineken Silver Las Vegas Grand Prix 2024
- Qatar Grand Prix 2024
- Grand Prix of Abu Dhabi 2024
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