End of Red Bull Racing's dominance?

RB10 being towed away at Jerez

The barrage of rule changes for the 2014 Formula 1 season has claimed its first high profile victim in Red Bull Racing. Ever since testing began in Jerez, Red Bull has been continuously facing one problem or another. We have seen the RB10 covered in tarpaulin more times than running flat out on a race track.

It all began with the drivetrain package offered by Renault, which had severe overheating issues. The teams powered by Renault couldn’t get any decent running time throughout the first test held in Jerez. The Red Bull duo of Sebastian Vettel and Daniel Ricciardo could just manage 21 laps in the 4 days of pre-season testing at Jerez. The situation was so worse that Red Bull had to open up some extra vents in the side pods, hoping that it could somehow bring down the problem of overheating. Adding salt to the wound was Renault’s admission that it was facing certain software glitches too. Somehow, the genius of Adrian Newey couldn’t quite create a package which could blend itself with the drivetrain package offered by Renault.

Sebastian Vettel helping the marshals to bring back RB10 to the pits

The second leg of testing which took place in Bahrain wasn’t any different either. The RB10 couldn’t go any further than four corners with Sebastian Vettel behind the wheel. The Red Bull team then worked on the car and sent it out again, but the RB10 could only make it till the end of the pit lane. Red Bull Racing Team Principle Christian Horner finally conceded that they were indeed way behind the playing field. “This is the 10th day of testing and we are about 10 days behind I reckon,” said Horner. However, the final day of testing brought some hope as Vettel was able to complete 78 laps, but Red Bull ran the power unit at a decreased power to collect some much needed data.

Vettel’s time during this session was over four seconds slower than Lewis Hamilton‘s best. Vettel has himself admitted that it is impossible for him to have any kind of expectations of a fifth drivers title this upcoming season.

“Too many things are breaking down, we’re not running enough. But in two weeks’ time we are in Melbourne, so we are looking forward to that and looking forward to getting more running there once we get new parts. But it’s impossible to predict at this stage”, said Vettel.

While all the other Formula 1 teams leave Bahrain on Monday morning, Red Bull will stay back to conduct “filming day”. What is a filming day, one might ask? Under the rules, all the teams competing in Formula 1 are allowed two days of on-track running with a maximum cap of 100 km in order to gather video footage for promotional purposes. The filming day is strictly monitored by a member of the governing body i.e. FIA. Also, the teams must use the promotional tyres supplied by Pirelli, which are different from what teams use during testing and a certain speed limit is also imposed during the filming day.

With so many restrictions, teams primarily conduct filming day to collect certain crucial data which could help in solving certain issues which is plaguing them, in this case Red Bull’s reliability issues. A number of teams take advantage of filming day strategically to gather data as much as possible. Even Mercedes, who have one of the best packages to win the title this upcoming season conducted their filming day at Silverstone. This proves how crucial a part data gathering plays in Formula 1.

All in all, we won’t see a complete Red Bull dominance as we have for the past four seasons. Even if Red Bull pull a trick out of their hat, it will be too late as time plays an important role in Formula 1. If Red Bull get from A to B, their competitors would have already reached C from B. Playing catch up in Formula 1 is almost impossible, especially from a position where Red Bull find themselves in now.

Reiterating the above, Dr. Helmut Marko, who is an adviser to the Red Bull team has said, “The season opener is coming at least two months too early for us”. Further adding, “At the moment we do not know what [time] period we will need to catch up, or whether we will at all”.

However, it will be interesting to see how Vettel handles the situation. Since coming to Red Bull, Vettel has had a dream run with a championship winning car each season. This will be the ultimate challenge for Vettel, as some in the Formula 1 circle have raised a question mark on his performance in a weaker car.

Daniel Ricciardo headed the Sergio Perez way?

Another interesting aspect to look forward to would be how Red Bull is going to assess Daniel Ricciardo’s performance. Surely, Red Bull won’t be winning races or perhaps even be present on the podium by what we have seen until now. So naturally, Red Bull will concentrate more on Vettel as he has more experience and four world titles behind him, whereas Ricciardo is still unproven. If in case Ricciardo doesn’t perform well, it will be interesting to see if Red Bull retain him for another season or follow what McLaren did with Sergio Perez and drop Ricciardo. Surely, there are a lot of things that Red Bull have to ponder over.