2025 Oracle Red Bull Racing F1 Team

[Cs98]

Gap before Miami, 52 points. Gap at the end of season, 63 points. The cushion didn't matter, driving did.

Take away the 10 points Verstappen earned in Austria by knocking Norris out of the race and you get the real picture.

So the real picture is that Lando didn’t gain a single point back from that cushion despite having 19 races to do so in the best car? My point proven.

A slightly better driver can make up for a slightly worse car. Last year proved it. Let’s see what the margins are this year. Maybe the McLaren is a monster, maybe Norris has improved.

[_cerber1]

So the real picture is that Lando didn’t gain a single point back from that cushion despite having 19 races to do so in the best car? My point proven.

No, this means that it was precisely the good reserve of points that saved Verstappen from defeat in the personal standings. When you have a fifty-point advantage, you can behave on the track as you want, swerve when braking, squeeze your rival off the track, even a mutual retirement would be beneficial. Obviously, with equal cars from the very beginning, Verstappen would not have been able to behave like that, because he would have stupidly lost points with such behavior.

[lio007]

If only the new wind tunnel would be finished in the coming weeks.
We only know it's 3 months ahead of schedule, but if the completion is scheduled anytime in '26 then we have still a long way to go with the old one.
And as we can see with AM, delays can occur unexpectedly.

There's planning information on the Milton Keynes website btw. It looks like they are converting the neighboring Trek warehouse into a windtunnel building. Pictures of the build are impossible to find. Appearently the build is 4-6 months ahead of schedule.

There's also a new building (or conversion) for Visa Cash App RB near by.

Can you share the link to this Milton Keynes website?

It's known for a while that RBR changed plans and aquired the former Trek-building. => viewtopic.php?p=1223196#p1223196

[Cs98]

No, this means that it was precisely the good reserve of points that saved Verstappen from defeat in the personal standings. When you have a fifty-point advantage, you can behave on the track as you want, swerve when braking, squeeze your rival off the track, even a mutual retirement would be beneficial. Obviously, with equal cars from the very beginning, Verstappen would not have been able to behave like that, because he would have stupidly lost points with such behavior.

Fastest car for 3/4 of the season, perfect reliability compared to the main competition who had to take grid penalties. Result, more made up excuses than points gained in the WDC.

Here is the real reason the gap never closed. Imola, Spain, Canada, Britain, Hungary, Spa, Monza, Baku, USGP, Brazil, Qatar. A bunch of races where Lando underperformed and lost points he shouldn't have. How many controversial clashes with Verstappen happened in those races? One (US), because Lando leaves the door open and Max doesn't need a second invitation. And how about Brazil, you start the race on pole and the guy you need to beat starts 17th. You finish 6th whilst the other guys wins. You're not winning anything like this, and Lando knows it. He makes less excuses than you do. Hopefully with that sober mentality he improves and makes the most out of his opportunities this year.

[Seanspeed]

Expecting Mclaren and Lando to have the litany of self-inflicted problems they did last year is probably just wishful thinking, though. Especially when they can lead the championship from early on this time around instead of chasing. Usually once a team develops a true top car, everything else becomes easier. Max is amazing, but if Mclaren has a clear faster car and Max also has to contend with two very strong Ferraris or occasionally Mercedes, his road to the WDC is very very hard.

[Emag]

In literally almost everything, defending is much easier than attacking. This also applies in Formula 1. Defending a position is easier than overtaking (in fact overtaking is almost impossible without some sort of pace advantage). Defending your championship lead against a single driver is much easier than having to overtake a point deficit while fighting multiple drivers. When you’re in a comfortable position, where 9/10 scenarios are advantageous for you, the job becomes rather straightforward.

If you’re forced to attack and take risks, that’s when things become critical and mistakes eek out.

[Cs98]

There is no universal advantage to being the defender. I can think of so many sports and activities where being the attacker is easier than defending, both strategically and mentally. Racing being one of them actually. That feeling of being behind but knowing that you are faster and gaining on the person ahead is an extremely powerful motivator, and very daunting for the person getting caught. Would you rather be the hunter or the hunted? And I think we saw at the end of 2021 that you can absolutely close down a championship gap in just a few races with a better car, even if the guy you are chasing is fighting tooth and nail (sometimes unfairly). But then again, Lewis is a class above Lando. Which is kind of my point. Driving matters! Guys like prime Lewis and Max make a difference, it's not just the car.

Also, it's not like we start the races in championship order and you have to make it past your competition every time. We have a qualifying system. If you have the fastest car you don't need the permission or cooperation of anyone to beat them, just put the car where it belongs and drive away. But that would require you to "do your job" as Roy Keane would say

[venkyhere]

Pardon me for saying this, but I feel that there is huge amount of 'over analysis without enough data' before the first race. The kind of analysis and "this season's pecking order" publication that should happen after atleast 3-4 races, is happening even before the first race. I am seeing this not just in our forum, but in typical F1 media as well.
I agree that being the last season on current regs, the cars are closest to each other w.r.t performance, but that doesn't mean that without data , anything can be really said. Probably the 'pressure to say something' is highest on all kinds of media, in this peak era of social media.

[Emag]

There is no universal advantage to being the defender. I can think of so many sports and activities where being the attacker is easier than defending, both strategically and mentally. Racing being one of them actually. That feeling of being behind but knowing that you are faster and gaining on the person ahead is an extremely powerful motivator, and very daunting for the person getting caught. Would you rather be the hunter or the hunted? And I think we saw at the end of 2021 that you can absolutely close down a championship gap in just a few races with a better car, even if the guy you are chasing is fighting tooth and nail (sometimes unfairly). But then again, Lewis is a class above Lando. Which is kind of my point. Driving matters! Guys like prime Lewis and Max make a difference, it's not just the car.

Also, it's not like we start the races in championship order and you have to make it past your competition every time. We have a qualifying system. If you have the fastest car you don't need the permission or cooperation of anyone to beat them, just put the car where it belongs and drive away. But that would require you to "do your job" as Roy Keane would say

That's why I said *almost* everything. And yes, if I had to choose between having track position or having to do an overtake in almost equal cars, I would never choose overtaking. Actually I doubt any racing driver wouldn't go for track position on a critical situation. Different story if you have a significant pace advantage, because at that point it doesn't really matter anymore. You can be whatever and you will still win. Your "hunter vs hunted" analogy assumes you were being caught at a rapid rate while ahead, which implies the car behind has a significant pace advantage over you. Try having 1 or 2 tenths of extra pace in hand at most and see how wonderful it is to try and overtake the car in front : )

And please, don't bring up 2021 as an example. Mercedes closed down the gap with their power unit upgrade to the point where RedBull wasn't able to challenge them anymore. The moment Max saw his car didn't have the pace, Max had no intention of actually racing Lewis, just like had no intention on racing Lando towards the end of last year too.

Anyway, there is a significant difference between 2021 and last year. In 2021, the battle was entirely between Lewis and Max. Not a single other driver was in the battle for wins except those two. For them, it was enough to just beat each-other. Less competition makes it much simpler. Lewis didn't have to contend against other drivers, except for Max, when he had to close down the deficit. By the way, a deficit which was only 32 points at most, half of what Lando had to make up last year.

But also, having no other competition means that all the sh*t Max pulled against Lewis like in Saudi and Brazil (+ the Perez holdup in Abu Dhabi, but better not bring Abu Dhabi into this at all), wasn't as effective as when he did it against Lando last year, because there was nobody else to take advantage of the embarrassing excuse of "racecraft" happening on track.

[Emag]

Pardon me for saying this, but I feel that there is huge amount of 'over analysis without enough data' before the first race. The kind of analysis and "this season's pecking order" publication that should happen after atleast 3-4 races, is happening even before the first race. I am seeing this not just in our forum, but in typical F1 media as well.
I agree that being the last season on current regs, the cars are closest to each other w.r.t performance, but that doesn't mean that without data , anything can be really said. Probably the 'pressure to say something' is highest on all kinds of media, in this peak era of social media.

I agree. People are taking it for granted that McLaren will have an advantage, but I am personally not very convinced with the weird weather we had in Bahrain this time for the test. If they have any advantage at all, it would be really surprising if it's anything different from what we had last year (i.e really track-dependent, with multiple cars being able to win on different tracks).

[pantherxxx]

People are writing off Red Bull based on Waché's statement that they haven’t improved as much as they should have. However, Waché also mentioned that he expects a very close fight between the top four teams and that Red Bull has ideas on how to address their issues. And Verstappen's statement was simply referring to the first race, based on the last test, and he is usually pessimistic. For example, Verstappen only said after the 2023 winter test that "the car is ok", while it was the most dominant Red Bull season ever.

Looking at the last four races of last season, Verstappen outscored Norris—not just because of the rain in Interlagos. In fact, Verstappen was the fastest in the dry sprint race in Interlagos. He was also quicker than Norris in Qatar and Las Vegas, with McLaren only having the edge in Abu Dhabi. This suggests that Red Bull had already corrected the biggest weaknesses in their car by the end of last season. So I see no reason why they can't be good this year.

[zeroday]

Looking at the last four races of last season, Verstappen outscored Norris—not just because of the rain in Interlagos. In fact, Verstappen was the fastest in the dry sprint race in Interlagos. He was also quicker than Norris in Qatar and Las Vegas, with McLaren only having the edge in Abu Dhabi. This suggests that Red Bull had already corrected the biggest weaknesses in their car by the end of last season. So I see no reason why they can't be good this year.

But he was still much slower than both Merc boys and Ferrari boys.

[ringo]

No, this means that it was precisely the good reserve of points that saved Verstappen from defeat in the personal standings. When you have a fifty-point advantage, you can behave on the track as you want, swerve when braking, squeeze your rival off the track, even a mutual retirement would be beneficial. Obviously, with equal cars from the very beginning, Verstappen would not have been able to behave like that, because he would have stupidly lost points with such behavior.

Fastest car for 3/4 of the season, perfect reliability compared to the main competition who had to take grid penalties. Result, more made up excuses than points gained in the WDC.

Here is the real reason the gap never closed. Imola, Spain, Canada, Britain, Hungary, Spa, Monza, Baku, USGP, Brazil, Qatar. A bunch of races where Lando underperformed and lost points he shouldn't have. How many controversial clashes with Verstappen happened in those races? One (US), because Lando leaves the door open and Max doesn't need a second invitation. And how about Brazil, you start the race on pole and the guy you need to beat starts 17th. You finish 6th whilst the other guys wins. You're not winning anything like this, and Lando knows it. He makes less excuses than you do. Hopefully with that sober mentality he improves and makes the most out of his opportunities this year.

All likely true points made. But do we expect Lando to be equally silly this year?
The final race last year gave a glimpse of a new Lando. Under severe pressure needing to win to take home to constructors.
2025 can be more straight forward than 2024, which means more predictable and simpler for Mclaren.
Piastri may be a bigger problem for Lando than Max is and conversely Piastri is also a problem for Max as Oscar has the knife between the teeth more than Lando and is willing to wrestle on track.
Should be an exciting season!

[Cs98]

That's why I said *almost* everything. And yes, if I had to choose between having track position or having to do an overtake in almost equal cars, I would never choose overtaking. Actually I doubt any racing driver wouldn't go for track position on a critical situation. Different story if you have a significant pace advantage, because at that point it doesn't really matter anymore. You can be whatever and you will still win. Your "hunter vs hunted" analogy assumes you were being caught at a rapid rate while ahead, which implies the car behind has a significant pace advantage over you. Try having 1 or 2 tenths of extra pace in hand at most and see how wonderful it is to try and overtake the car in front : )

And please, don't bring up 2021 as an example. Mercedes closed down the gap with their power unit upgrade to the point where RedBull wasn't able to challenge them anymore. The moment Max saw his car didn't have the pace, Max had no intention of actually racing Lewis, just like had no intention on racing Lando towards the end of last year too.

Might as well have said "almost nothing", it would have been equally true (or untrue to be more accurate).

2021 is a relevant example, it has the same elements you complained about with one major difference, the driver. All time great driver in the best car, the gap gets closed. Good driver in the best car for a much longer part of the season, the gap gets... bigger? That doesn't reflect well on the second driver, they clearly didn't use the full potential of the car otherwise they would have gotten closer. Ten million excuses won't change that.

[Cs98]

No, this means that it was precisely the good reserve of points that saved Verstappen from defeat in the personal standings. When you have a fifty-point advantage, you can behave on the track as you want, swerve when braking, squeeze your rival off the track, even a mutual retirement would be beneficial. Obviously, with equal cars from the very beginning, Verstappen would not have been able to behave like that, because he would have stupidly lost points with such behavior.

Fastest car for 3/4 of the season, perfect reliability compared to the main competition who had to take grid penalties. Result, more made up excuses than points gained in the WDC.

Here is the real reason the gap never closed. Imola, Spain, Canada, Britain, Hungary, Spa, Monza, Baku, USGP, Brazil, Qatar. A bunch of races where Lando underperformed and lost points he shouldn't have. How many controversial clashes with Verstappen happened in those races? One (US), because Lando leaves the door open and Max doesn't need a second invitation. And how about Brazil, you start the race on pole and the guy you need to beat starts 17th. You finish 6th whilst the other guys wins. You're not winning anything like this, and Lando knows it. He makes less excuses than you do. Hopefully with that sober mentality he improves and makes the most out of his opportunities this year.

All likely true points made. But do we expect Lando to be equally silly this year?
The final race last year gave a glimpse of a new Lando. Under severe pressure needing to win to take home to constructors.
2025 can be more straight forward than 2024, which means more predictable and simpler for Mclaren.
Piastri may be a bigger problem for Lando than Max is and conversely Piastri is also a problem for Max as Oscar has the knife between the teeth more than Lando and is willing to wrestle on track.
Should be an exciting season!

I don't, I think he will improve. But if it gets close, if it becomes a dogfight, I do expect him to make more mistakes under pressure than the experienced all time greats like Max and Lewis. Anyways, I've made my point enough now.