“It was strange,” Christian Horner opines on Max Verstappen’s tyre degradation issue during the Austrian GP
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Christian Horner
Christian Horner was surprised by the degradation Max Verstappen had over the course of 71 laps in the Austrian Grand Prix. Max finished a P2 in the Red Bull Ring but looked quite off on the pace as compared to the Ferrari’s. Horner says it’s quite unusual to have such high degradation after the tyres were good a day before after the Sprint race.
Charles Leclerc won the Austrian GP he overtook Max three times for the lead and marked his dominance clearly over him. But things were still not on his hands after he lost to Max in the Sprint race. The regaining World champion was gifted P2 position after the engine of Carlos Sainz blew up just on the line when he was going to overtake the Red Bull for the second position.
“Just one week ago at Silverstone, we looked pretty decent on deg. I think the problem is these tyres are quite sensitive and, if you’re not in the right window with them, then you can pay a penalty in terms of degradation, which a lot of teams did, ” explained Christian Horner.
“When you look at the sprint race, we pushed a bit harder at the beginning, paid a little bit at the end, but over the whole stint on our analysis, we were identical to that of Ferrari. The only thing that’s changed overnight is the rain, the temperature slightly and of course, the fuel loads, ” analysed Christian Horner.
Mattia Binotto gives a similar take as Christian Horner on the Red Bull pace loss
Mattia Binotto was happy after the tensed last few laps in Austria, but he found things to be a clear part of tyre degradation that took win from the Red Bull’s hand. He confirmed to pace to be similar on both the events of the weekend.
“I don’t think there is much pace difference between the two cars if any, ” said Mattia.
Binotto went on the explain the plan over Max’s pace over the weekend. Things came down to the best tyre management a team did that ultimately took the win, Ferrari in the end.
“In terms of tyre degradation, I read into it that in the sprint I think we had a bit more advantage on tyres deg, which we transformed even more [in the grand prix] because we start putting pressure on Max since the very start,” explained Mattia.
Ferrari is catching back the momentum to get behind Red Bull after two consecutive wins. Points difference is now 56 as things stand Ferrari still has a chance to win both the championships if things go perfectly their way.
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Soham Raj Jain
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