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Red Bull

Irresistible and uncatchable - Red Bull 2023 season analysis so far

The reigning champions have shown no signs of letting up on their dominance

Joe Ellis

Tuesday 25 April 2023 17:57

It's not come as any surprise to see Red Bull at the top of the tree, but the huge gap between themselves and the chasing pack is certainly alarming.

Nobody has been able to get close to the incredible performance of the RB19 so far, and that has seen every race won comfortably by either Max Verstappen or Sergio Perez.

The Mexican scored the only non top-two finish for the team in Australia, but he did have to start from pit lane to score his 10 points for fifth.

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Adrian Newey has once again created a masterpiece and, with Verstappen in particular behind the wheel, they can almost taste the championship already.

Max Verstappen has been in a different league all season

Best in the world

The reigning double-world champion is already stamping his authority on the competition, and he's hardly broken a sweat yet.

Verstappen was in cruise control in Bahrain, taking victory by more than 10 seconds over Perez, and was similarly relaxed in Australia until the final restart - which he nailed.

His only failure to win came in Jeddah, where a mechanical fault saw him start 15th and soar through the pack to second, just missing out on victory as Perez claimed the win.

In truth, Verstappen could have gone and challenged for the win of that race as well, but he seemed to choose to settle for second towards the end, and secured the fastest lap instead.

If there was any debate as to who the best driver in the world was before this season, then that debate has been resolved now.

Sergio Perez is Verstappen's only viable title challenger

Checo's chance

Perez has not had a one-on-one title battle with Verstappen yet, but with nobody seemingly close enough to challenge Red Bull, this could be his year.

The Mexican is supremely consistent and rarely makes big errors leading to crashes, which means any Verstappen failures could be very costly.

In terms of pure speed, Verstappen is streets ahead of his team-mate, but over the course of the season, the mature head could be in with a shout if the exuberant Dutchman gets caught up in incidents.

Wrap it up early

The lack of wind tunnel time as a result of their cost cap breach in 2021 will hurt Red Bull's ability to develop no end.

Therefore, the importance of putting the constructors' title to bed before anyone gets near is enormous, and the drivers can then battle it out themselves, one-on-one.