(L to R): Nico Hulkenberg, Haas; Max Verstappen, Red Bull, Miami International Autodrome, 2023

Steiner confident “another team will win” and break Red Bull’s 2023 dominance

RaceFans Round-up

Posted on

| Written by

In the round-up: Haas team principal Gunther Steiner believes Red Bull will be beaten before 2023 is over.

Show which drivers and teams you are supporting

Which F1 drivers and teams are you supporting this season? Here's how you can show your support for your favourite on the grid on RaceFans:

  • Log in with your RaceFans account (sign up here if you don't have one)
  • Select Edit My Profile from the top-right menu
  • Select F1 Teams and Drivers
  • Make your selections then click Save Changes

In brief

Steiner believes Red Bull will be challenged in 2023

Red Bull have won all five of the grands prix held so far this year, finishing one-two in four of those, but Haas team principal Gunther Steiner believes Formula 1’s current dominant force will not finish 2023 undefeated.

Steiner denied the current season has been “boring” but admitted some rounds, such as the sprint race weekend in Azerbaijan, had fallen short.

“Obviously Baku was not the most exciting race we’ve had this year, but there was a lot of races that were exciting,” he said. “You maybe see that the Red Bulls are strong, but there’s a lot of other things going on as well, you never have to forget about that.

“I am a believer that at some stage somebody will catch up with Red Bull, and there will be a fight or something. It’s not over. We always jump to conclusion after a few races: ‘oh, it’s all over now’. No, I would be a little bit more patient.”

While Red Bull have won 15 of the last 16 grands prix stretching back into last season, Steiner said he thinks “another team will win this year.”

McLaren’s Kanaan gets emotional on final IndyCar outing

Tony Kanaan his adamant that his 25-year IndyCar career will come to an end with the waving of the chequered flag at this weekend’s Indianapolis 500, and he’s already getting emotional at his farewell event.

Kanaan has competed part-time since 2020, with the Indy 500 his focus. He finished third in the race last year, and joined McLaren for this year’s event. After qualifying ninth, he admitted: “I knew going in that it was going to be hard.

“But you never really grasp [it] until you actually hear and fans are telling you ‘don’t do this [retire]’ or ‘what a cool story’, or they hand you something that meant a lot to them throughout my career and they say ‘my daughter one time you gave the hat off your head’, and his daughter was three and now she’s right beside him and like she’s six feet tall. I try to spend as much time as I can with my fans.

Tony Kanaan, McLaren, Indianapolis, 2023
Tony Kanaan, McLaren, Indianapolis, 2023
“I mean, it was a roller-coaster of emotion. It was one of my best qualifying efforts on Saturday, which is amazing, coincidence and all, save the best for last. We were out all day long, and I said: I’m not happy. I’ve got to give these people some excitement. I said ‘we’re either going to make it or we’re going to not come back on four wheels’. And we did.

“The way the crowd reacted, it was unbelievable. Living a dream right now.”

Pedersen impresses as Indy 500 rookie

Benjamin Pedersen will start on the row behind Kanaan. The Foyt driver set the fastest ever Indy 500 qualifying lap for a rookie at an average of 233.297mph (375.455kph).

The 11th place is Pedersen’s best qualifying result yet in IndyCar and makes him the highest placed rookie on this year’s Indy 500 grid, which impressed his four-time Indy 500-winning team boss AJ Foyt.

“AJ is so happy for the whole team. Just really cool to see his eyes light up. Such a special time for him to be able to see that, and it’s just very special to be a part of,” said Pedersen, who has never previously raced on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway oval. “When I joined Indy Nxt two years ago, that was the first year they stopped coming here for the Freedom 100 [support race], so just didn’t have the opportunity to run here in anything, only the road course,” he added.

Benjamin Pedersen, Foyt, Indianapolis, 2023
Pedersen surprised in qualifying
“It’s pretty surreal coming here as a rookie and have the month that we’ve had so far. As a team, that aside, just huge accomplishment with what we have as a goal.”

FE debut beckons for Beckmann

Autosport have made the long-awaited announcement that their Formula E reserve driver David Beckmann will make his series debut at next weekend’s Jakarta E-Prix. It has been known for several months that the team’s regular driver Andre Lotterer would not be available to race due to clashing Le Mans 24 Hours test commitments, and the 23-year-old Beckmann had long been sounded out as his stand-in.

Beckmann is a race-winner in Formula 3 and has made the podium in Formula 2, where he raced for the last two years. He is also Porsche’s FE reserve driver, and has stayed active this year by making two World Endurance Championship outings. He won the LMP2 class on his debut in the Sebring 1000 Miles.

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

Social media

Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:

Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free

Comment of the day

This week the RaceFans team discussed the evolution of the debate about F1 engine noise since 1.6-litre turbocharged V6 engines were introduced in 2014 to complaints from fans and paddock figures about the lack of phonic thrill they stirred up compared to the 2.4-litre V8s previously used.

Those complaints aren’t heard as much anymore, and RaceFans readers shared their thoughts about how the experience of watching F1 has changed with the current engine formula.

Actually on-track impression is really enjoyable. One can go watch a race and actually be able to exchange with friends in the race while having beautiful roaring engines instead of having to yell very simple sentences with gestures so the sound was loud before. I think the issue some people may feel is mainly a TV-related problem.

Actually now the Porsche support race is much louder now but I don’t think it makes it particularly more impressive either. I was at Spa almost in front of the start line and a full field of Porsches about to start was just an unpleasant deafening sound experience, even with ear protections. Found it unnecessary loud, and still does.

In the meantime TV sound did look miserable in 2014. They did improve though and now I find it pretty nice. To me it looks like a bit of a past debate but I can understand people missing the sound. I prefer it this way though, not having to sit in a bubble with ear protections for 3 days when attending a race.
Spoutnik

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Driftin and Mallesh Magdum!

On this day in motorsport

  • 25 years ago today Eddie Cheever won the Indianapolis 500

Author information

Ida Wood
Often found in junior single-seater paddocks around Europe doing journalism and television commentary, or dabbling in teaching photography back in the UK. Currently based...

Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.

10 comments on “Steiner confident “another team will win” and break Red Bull’s 2023 dominance”

  1. Is it just me or Grosjean’s accent has changed significantly since being in F1. Seems like a mix of French, American and Australian to me.

    1. Probably just you because, to me, he doesn’t sound any different than pre-2021.
      @Sumedh

    2. Hah! As non-native speakers of any language, we are always fluctuating in our accents. And this happens to Grosjean in the most hilarious way:
      https://www.youtube.com/shorts/_4NhygVnR0w

    3. Can’t say I’ve noticed a difference with Grosjean, but it does happen. I remember Pippa Mann really picked up a local accent when she started racing in the USA.

  2. My last live GP was in 2013 and back then even with the V8s, Porsche SC were or felt louder. It was like the whole ground was shaking and I was in the shopping area. Of course V8 had more sound but it was more pleasant. I don’t know what do they put in those porsches..

  3. More likely next season since the wind tunnel-CFD handicap will have a greater impact on next season’s preparations.

    I wonder what does Pourchaire mean by home race.
    I doubt he’d live in Monaco because French nationals don’t have the tax-freedom right as other expats do.

    I predominantly share COTD’s view. From the four GPs I’ve attended, I had to use earplugs for the first two that occurred in the V8 era (2010 Italian & 2012 Hungarian GPs), but not for the other two, that are 2016 Abu Dhabi & 2019 Russian GPs.

    1. @jerejj Lol i still need earplugs as they are still ear damaging loud (They don’t scream anymore that is correct but still it can damage your ears) and as a sonar operator i always ned to protect my ears….
      Walkmans always volume to minimum and that was still to loud for me………..

  4. Jonathan Parkin
    24th May 2023, 8:00

    I am slightly conflicted about Red Bull having an undefeated season. On the one hand, it would be nice to happen because it never has happened but on the other we need it not to happen because it would get boring

    However where does the Sprint Sessions fit into this. If Red Bull win all the races but lost a SS would this still count as an undefeated season

    1. I guess Sunday raceday winners are the actual ‘race winners’. I don’t think Red Bull have an undefeated season.. just because there are always crazy races with changing conditions and SC periods, as well as, unexpected DNFs. Its highly unlikely that Red Bull will make every strategic call right and that they will have bullet proof reliability for the net 17 races. Heck, even Mercedes in 2014 didn’t win every race, and they were more dominant than red Bull is this season.

      I disagree with Gunther’s assumption that another team will catch up though… that isn’t going to be the reason another race winner emerges this season.

  5. “While Red Bull have won 15 of the last 16 grands prix stretching back into last season, Steiner said he thinks “another team will win this year.””

    Seems cherry picking to randomly use “last 16 grands prix because” to emphasize, if he picked last 18 grands prix it still would be 15 wins for Red Bull.

    Using a more standardized approach looking at most wins over a 20 race period Red Bull is indeed on their best streak with 17 wins in 20 races yet Ferrari managed 18 out of 20 and Mercedes even managed to win 19 out of 20.

    Given that a season now has more than 20 races, using the last 50 races would even better demonstrate “dominance”.
    Red Bull 34 wins out of 50
    Ferrari 38 wins out of 50
    Mercedes 43 wins out of 50

    Or looking at approx 5 seasons, use last 100 races:
    Current Red Bull 40 wins
    Record Red Bull 49 wins
    Ferrari 63 wins
    Current Mercedes 46 wins (so over last 100 races Mercedes did better than Red Bull by 6 wins)
    Record Mercedes 75 wins

Comments are closed.