Christian Horner, Team Principal Red Bull Formula 1 team, expressed his “brutally frustrating” emotions on the loss of the team in Bahrain Grand Prix.
Red Bull’s Great Pace
Red Bull showed a great pace at the start of race showing capability to compete head to head with Ferrari and Mercedes.
Horner said, “Ifs, buts and maybes, but we could see throughout the weekend our pace was good, and it was stronger in the race than it was in qualifying.
“Daniel commented that even in the two laps that he was able to do, he was able to close pretty comfortably on Kimi.
“And Max, the feeling he was getting from the car, the fact that he was on the same tire he used to line up and pass Lewis, showed that the potential was really there.”
A brutally frustrating Race
Red Bull’s start portrayed a strong feeling of joining the high club of Ferrari and Mercedes, but Verstappen car crash in qualifying session forced him to start the race at 15th position. He made his way up and competed with Lewis Hamilton for 10th position.
At the beginning of second lap, he collided with Mercedes, which punctured the rear tyre and forced him to pit.
Ricciarcdo – who was running fourth – had to drop out from the race because of power failure.
Horner said, “A brutally frustrating race for us because we had again another very competitive race car. So to lose Daniel with what looks like a sudden power loss to the car, which looks like a failure within the energy store, on lap two when he was already catching Kimi [Raikkonen] and looking in good shape, was extremely frustrating.
“A few corners prior to that we lost Max, effectively – he had a fantastic first lap, as usual with him some aggressive moves. He then managed to get on to the gearbox of Lewis, got a great exit onto the straight at the start of the second lap, and got a good tow, went for the inside line – also had Fernando [Alonso] there to deal with as well – made the corner but unfortunately there was contact on the exit of Turn 1 and that resulted in an immediate puncture.
“Had it not happened in Turn 1, and he hadn’t had to drive the car back as a three-wheeler, that is ultimately what damaged the gearbox. And therefore, we decided to retire the car because we were losing hydraulic pressure rapidly. To have both cars retired within two laps is hugely frustrating.”
