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Red Bull team boss Christian Horner recently clarified that new technical directives imposed by the FIA for the 2023 F1 Singapore GP had nothing to do with his team's poor performance on Sunday. Sergio Perez, and more surprisingly, Max Verstappen, did not even bag a podium in Singapore.
While people might think that the new parts that comply with the new technical directive must have played a part in the team's decline, Horner has confirmed that it was not the case at all.
Speaking to Motorsport.com, the Red Bull team boss explained how it was more of an engineering issue in the RB19, because of which the team struggled. He clarified that they did not change a single component of the car because of the technical directive.
He said:
“It's all engineering stuff. There's no silver bullets in this business. I know all of you would love to blame the TD, but unfortunately we can't even blame that, because it's not changed a single component on our car.”
Horner singled out not being in the right operating window for the car as the main issue that his team faced during the Singapore GP. Furthermore, the reigning world champions were already expecting strong competition on the Marina Bay circuit, he admitted.
He said:
“We knew coming here it would be expected to have closer competition. But I think it took us a bit by surprise, just how far out we were on Friday. I think that we were just not in the right operating window for the car, particularly over a single lap. And when you're not there, then the tyres feel horrible. Everything just doesn't work.”
Increased ride height caused Red Bull to struggle at the 2023 Singapore GP, feels F1 pundit
Renowned F1 pundit Mark Hughes recently speculated that Red Bull could be struggling due to their high ride height, which caused them to face aerodynamic issues. As per The Race, he said:
"Red Bull has had to run the car much higher than usual to keep the car legal here – and unlike many of its rivals, its aerodynamics have not been optimized around such a ride height."
The F1 pundit further explained that the Austrian-British team tried to turn the problem around at Singapore's qualifying session by stiffening the suspension even more to control the fluctuating aero balance and plank wear.
He said:
"Into Saturday, the car was run with stiffer suspension in an effort to tame the wildly fluctuating underbody aero balance and the potential plank wear problem. This just moved the problem around. It became more predictable, but its deficit of rear grip was, if anything, even worse."
Max Verstappen's and Red Bull's unprecedented run of race wins finally came to a halt as Carlos Sainz of Ferrari clinched his first victory of the 2023 F1 season.
