Red Bull, the team arguably replaced Mercedes from the throne of Formula One within the span of two years. In 2022, Red Bull claimed 17 wins and both championships. This was statistically the best season in the entire history of the racing team’s career. But, unfortunately, in terms of reputation and dignity, 2022 was the worst year for Red Bull.
Along with the celebration of Max Verstappen‘s second championship win, the team had to face the insult of the cost cap fiasco. The team was first alleged of breaching the budget limit of 2021. Then the rumors stepped in, claiming that Red Bull exceeded the budget by $7 million. As a result, all the rival teams started criticizing Christian Horner. Especially, Mercedes, Ferrari, and MacLaren came out to ask for strict sanctions for the crime Red Bull committed against them.
The Cost Cap Breach Investigation Done By FIA Proved Christian Horner WRONG
Initially, Horner denied all the allegations and claimed that FIA would give them a clean sheet. But his reputation was lost when FIA found the team guilty of breaching the budget of $145 million in 2021. In the final investigation, FIA found that Red Bull failed to submit the tax credits. And so, only a minor amount of $0.5 million was counted as breaching. The rest was justified as a tax.
However, it still proved Horner’s claim wrong. Therefore, FIA penalized Red Bull with a $7 million fine and a 10% deduction in the Wind Tunnel and computational fluid dynamics. This penalty was considered too soft by the rivals, who demanded lot more strict sanctions. Something like Max Verstappen’s title execution. But for the Milton-Keynes-Based team, the 10% less allowance in aerodynamics for 12 months is “draconian.” Horner believes that this is something that may prevent the team from clinching the 2023 championship.
Red Bull Facing Difficulties Caused By The Cost Cap Penalty, Yet Supporting The Rule
According to the Red Bull boss, they are probably 25% of the way through that penalty which is affecting them in every possible way. Recently in an interview with the RACER, Christian Horner was asked about how Red Bull is dealing with the strict penalty they have been slapped with. He said, “The number of runs the team can do in our wind tunnel over each quarter is getting limited significantly.”
However, Horner thinks that the team is there to adapt to those changes. All that Red Bull needs to do at present is to be a bit more focused and more disciplined in the testing process. He believes that the tunnel or the simulation tools can help them overcome the impact of the draconian penalty.
In addition, Christian Horner stated, “we have another challenge [this time]. And it is a handicap [for Red Bull] for sure. But the team has very capable people who are looking to obviously extract the best that they possibly can and apply themselves in the most efficient and effective way.”
Among all the above issues that come with the coast cap regulation, Red Bull should get frustrated about the rule, right? But instead, Christian Horner believes, “the principle of it is great and driven efficiency.” FIA launched the cost budget with the aim of achieving financial stability in Formula One. And, by no means is Christain Horner going against such a target of FIA. He supports the rule as he himself noticed that the business now is ending up with a lot of stock of spare parts that were brand new. The teams are using the never used parts because of the low budget. So, it is a good thing, yeah.
