Red Bull team principal Christian Horner is confident the team will be able to solve the latest DRS problem Max Verstappen suffered in the first practice session for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
Verstappen’s DRS flap began vibrating at high speed during the opening hour of practice for this weekend’s race at Baku City Circuit, which features an especially long and bumpy acceleration zone. Red Bull brought his car and that of team mate Sergio Perez into the garage for checks.
“Obviously we’ve seen it, we’ve got the data on it, we’ve got the comparison to Sergio’s wing so I think there’s some modifications that we need to do just to make sure we eradicate that for this afternoon,” Horner told Sky.
Verstappen experienced problems with his DRS during the Spanish Grand Prix, which hindered his efforts to overtake George Russell. Horner indicated a difference between the specification of their two cars may explain the problem Verstappen encountered today.
“Weight is always a critical factor and you’re chasing that, obviously, all over the car,” he said. “There was a difference between the cars so we just need to look at the set-up of it and the rigidity of it and hopefully we can get on top of it for this afternoon.”
Some of Red Bull’s rivals have already raised queries with the FIA about the wing’s behaviour, said Horner, but he denied the flap’s movement improved the car’s performance.
“It’s detrimental to performance,” he said. “It’s not enhancing the performance, but the guys are into it and hopefully we’ll get it resolved for the next session.”
“It always seems to be on Max’s car for some reason,” he added. “So we need to get on top of it. I think we understood the issues from Barcelona and hopefully we can tune this out for the next session.”
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Jim from US (@jimfromus)
10th June 2022, 14:10
Obviously the wingman has a different car technology wise as it doesn’t have any rear wing issues.
Ajaxn
10th June 2022, 14:30
more evidence of contrasting setups between the Redbulls? Why would Verstappen have this problem and not Sergio?
What we need are backward facing cameras trained on the rear wings so we see what else is happening at high speeds.
BasCB (@bascb)
10th June 2022, 21:15
Horner mentions weight saving, which points to it just not being rigid enough
StefMeister (@stefmeister)
10th June 2022, 14:40
Would be nice if we could tune out DRS completely.
NS Biker (@rekibsn)
10th June 2022, 15:05
It appears that the drivers and teams are getting seduced by the DRS concept. It gets used in practice and Qualifying, not with total abandon, but seems to be any place on the track they can use it. Going to be hard to convince both that it needs to go.
An interesting aside, C. Horner is on about weight and the DRS is a contributor … and this is weight that is at the highest part of the car. Wonder what the benefit (or loss) would be for a team to run a rear wing assembly without the DRS and the attendant weight?
Concerning item in the above report, C. Horner said “hopefully” three times in the discussion. This isn’t filling me with confidence, especially as it is a repeat of a problem from 2 races ago.
mantresx (@mantresx)
10th June 2022, 15:30
I think DRS gives around a second of performance, but even if getting rid of it gave better lap times you still want a higher top speed to defend/attack during the race.
RandomMallard
11th June 2022, 8:14
I’ll remind Horner of the situation Mercedes faced in Brazil. If it doesn’t conform to the scrutineering tests/regulations, it doesn’t matter if it enhances performance or is detrimental to performance, it is illegal. Admittedly, it would probably pass all the tests, as it only appears to be a problem at high speed and therefore under very high, complex forces acting on the wing, but if it did fail a test, like the Merc wing in Brazil, I would expect RB to be DSQ’d from the session in question.