2026 Oracle Red Bull Racing F1 Team

[SchuMassa]

Local (CEE region) F1 journalists claim - based on their sources in the paddock - that RBPT has a decent engine and the mood is positive in the team.

[AR3-GP]

Local (CEE region) F1 journalists claim - based on their sources in the paddock - that RBPT has a decent engine and the mood is positive in the team.

Every team is "positive" until Q3 in melbourne.

[Sergej]

Not a big hit

the car is not in good shape unfortunately


also

[SB15]

Not a big hit

The front suspension and rear is gone. That's a massive crash

[AR3-GP]

Not a big hit

The front suspension and rear is gone. That's a massive crash

Losing it at T14 in the dry would have been a complete car write off. Track was wet, speed was much lower, and only the rear has been damaged.

[Seanspeed]

Losing it at T14 in the dry would have been a complete car write off. Track was wet, speed was much lower, and only the rear has been damaged.

Much easier to not lose it in the dry, though. lol

That rear is obviously pretty cooked, and that's a very hard part of the car to rebuild with lots of things that can be damaged. The team themselves seem unsure whether they can even do it this week.

It was certainly a big enough hit.

[dialtone]

Losing it at T14 in the dry would have been a complete car write off. Track was wet, speed was much lower, and only the rear has been damaged.

Much easier to not lose it in the dry, though. lol

That rear is obviously pretty cooked, and that's a very hard part of the car to rebuild with lots of things that can be damaged. The team themselves seem unsure whether they can even do it this week.

It was certainly a big enough hit.

Gearbox is an easy write off there as well, rear is kinda done. Would need to check the engine there probably just to be safe or at least prepare a 2nd one just in case the first breaks.

They’re probably skipping the next 2 days anyway and going for Friday.

The only reason why i think they wouldn’t be ready is that this isn’t their melbourne spec, it’s not like they have 10 of this configuration of spares, and they can’t have mixed parts on to make sense of the world.

Edit: if the engine is really done that kind of resets the mileage test on it, so they probably really need to hope nothing is wrong with it.

[Sergej]

[Valeo]

https://i.ibb.co/LXFD4XSx/rb22.png

Oh boy.
Why

[Badger]

That's a two hour job if you have the spares. If you don't it becomes a bit harder, or impossible.

Hadjar needs to smarten up though, there's a time to push and there's a time to gather data. When you're in pre-pre-season testing with little or no spares one is more important than the other

[AR3-GP]

Lap count:

Hadjar: 158
Verstappen: 27

[PlatinumZealot]

That's a two hour job if you have the spares. If you don't it becomes a bit harder, or impossible.

Hadjar needs to smarten up though, there's a time to push and there's a time to gather data. When you're in pre-pre-season testing with little or no spares one is more important than the other

The moveable aero throws more variables into crashing though. He learned something the hard way for sure.

[Badger]

What is it with Red Bull second drivers and getting a sniff of fresh parts?

[organic]

Denied? Meaning they haven't done it? Only Merc?

They say they don't have it, is the correct translation!

Red bull have denied using a trick.

But perhaps that's because they don't even acknowledge that it is a trick to try to improve compression ratio beyond 16:1, given it wasn't prohibited in the regs for 2026

[Paa]

https://x.com/ErikvHaren/status/2016213 ... 36066?s=20

27 laps for Verstappen and a crash from Hadjar: why a positive feeling still prevails at Red Bull in Barcelona so far.

- Verstappen still has a full day of running

- Use of Red Bull’s ‘compression trick’ is denied and updates in Melbourne

Why is it positive missing the compression trick? I think it is a negative, unless the trick would be banned, in which case it would be indeed positive.



Regarding the positive mood within the team, it can be just relief, seeing that the engine works without big major hiccups. There must have been at least some concerns about that. I don't think it is a suggestion to actual performance just yet, at this stage.