2019 Aston Martin Red Bull Racing - Honda F1 Team

[SF Engineer]

Okay, let's go through it one more time.

This season is the first the RB is fitted with a Honda engine. Yes they have the information and benefit from the 2018 Toro Rosso pack, and been preparing more or less to have this year's car carrying a Honda engine, BUT the fact remains that originally, when development started on this car, which is an evolution of the 2018 car and arguably the 2017 car, then you realise that was in mind with the Renault powerplant and all that accompanied that.
It is therefor an 'altered' design/concept. It also, very much, remains a 'development' or 'adjustment' year of fusing RB with Honda and its philosophy, whilst Honda is evolving engines.In other words this year first of all is a compromise.
It is also a 'testbed' of sorts, so there are compromises there too.They're above all focusing on 2020, which has been mentioned that Verstappen, RBR and Honda have a rather positive view of.

If you concider that they already have 2 wins under their belt despite the compromised setting, and are very much competitive just slightly off the full pace of Merc/Fer then that's pretty impressive.I also have noticed a very distinctive sound the Honda engine produces when off-throttle (some here have mentioned it sounds like blown diffuser sounds) which the other teams lack, meaning they are not just copying eachother but have their own philosophy going on.

In the end, verdict then must be that 2019 isn't bad at all of RBR and actually pretty impressive. They're not where they wanted to be, fair, but they'll get there.

2020 will be much more of a season to reasonably judge RBR-Honda. All the more interesting to concider that Honda has not decided on post-2020 engine programme, so i'm inclined to believe/expect that Honda's F1 engine department is going to go all out on the 2020 spec engine, as will RBR, to have success in 2020 and as such give Honda no choice but to stay in F1.

Worth keeping this framed and put it on wall, so that I can look at this after every race next year.

You make it sound as though he is being overly zealous regarding the teams chances next year. In fact he is just stating what should be obvious. Considering the large scale of change that has been brought about by Incorporating a new power unit and a completely new partner into the fold, the result for 2019 has been on par with expectations. Next year is the year in which a much more fair comparison can be made. That does not mean that next year Red Bull will be more competitive or less competitive, only that they can be judged more rationally.

[diffuser]

Yeah, I don't think it is a failed concept. Think it's a very good chassis.

if you implying the PU is the problem you must be blind they qualified 1 tenth off in Silverstone AND their race pace nothing short of Mercs and Ferrari i think during summer break Ferrari and Mercs weren't napping while RBR were.

I think Merc and Ferrari have an edge but I can't proove it. Silverstone has plenty of opportunity of where corner speed can overcome a PU deficiancy. Unlike Suzuka where S3 is a real oportunity for the PU to shine. The uphill with no DRS on a fairly long track is a real battle for the PUs

[Manoah2u]

Okay, let's go through it one more time.

This season is the first the RB is fitted with a Honda engine. Yes they have the information and benefit from the 2018 Toro Rosso pack, and been preparing more or less to have this year's car carrying a Honda engine, BUT the fact remains that originally, when development started on this car, which is an evolution of the 2018 car and arguably the 2017 car, then you realise that was in mind with the Renault powerplant and all that accompanied that.
It is therefor an 'altered' design/concept. It also, very much, remains a 'development' or 'adjustment' year of fusing RB with Honda and its philosophy, whilst Honda is evolving engines.In other words this year first of all is a compromise.
It is also a 'testbed' of sorts, so there are compromises there too.They're above all focusing on 2020, which has been mentioned that Verstappen, RBR and Honda have a rather positive view of.

If you concider that they already have 2 wins under their belt despite the compromised setting, and are very much competitive just slightly off the full pace of Merc/Fer then that's pretty impressive.I also have noticed a very distinctive sound the Honda engine produces when off-throttle (some here have mentioned it sounds like blown diffuser sounds) which the other teams lack, meaning they are not just copying eachother but have their own philosophy going on.

In the end, verdict then must be that 2019 isn't bad at all of RBR and actually pretty impressive. They're not where they wanted to be, fair, but they'll get there.

2020 will be much more of a season to reasonably judge RBR-Honda. All the more interesting to concider that Honda has not decided on post-2020 engine programme, so i'm inclined to believe/expect that Honda's F1 engine department is going to go all out on the 2020 spec engine, as will RBR, to have success in 2020 and as such give Honda no choice but to stay in F1.

Worth keeping this framed and put it on wall, so that I can look at this after every race next year.

You make it sound as though he is being overly zealous regarding the teams chances next year. In fact he is just stating what should be obvious. Considering the large scale of change that has been brought about by Incorporating a new power unit and a completely new partner into the fold, the result for 2019 has been on par with expectations. Next year is the year in which a much more fair comparison can be made. That does not mean that next year Red Bull will be more competitive or less competitive, only that they can be judged more rationally.

I know where it's coming from.
Assuming he keeps word and prints this out and frame it to the wall, i wonder how he will cope if Max turns out to beat Hamilton to the championship and make it a Max WDC and RedBull WCC. Not saying that'll happen, but replies like his make me wonder how he'll cope with that.

Let's just put out that before 2014's Merc winning streak, in other words, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, they were in a worse position RBR found itself in despite having the same engine since 2009 which gave them a WDC in the form of BrawnGP. And that's without mentioning what happened with 'his mighty hamilton' during the latter Mclaren years.

In other words, RB is getting cr*p for nothing.

It's unfortunate Helmut had to open his mouth and throw seeing a 5 race win for this season, as it's really too high to aim for. Offcourse you're always needing to aim high, so in the end, you gotta set a goal.

[GPR-A]

Worth keeping this framed and put it on wall, so that I can look at this after every race next year.

You make it sound as though he is being overly zealous regarding the teams chances next year. In fact he is just stating what should be obvious. Considering the large scale of change that has been brought about by Incorporating a new power unit and a completely new partner into the fold, the result for 2019 has been on par with expectations. Next year is the year in which a much more fair comparison can be made. That does not mean that next year Red Bull will be more competitive or less competitive, only that they can be judged more rationally.

I know where it's coming from.
Assuming he keeps word and prints this out and frame it to the wall, i wonder how he will cope if Max turns out to beat Hamilton to the championship and make it a Max WDC and RedBull WCC. Not saying that'll happen, but replies like his make me wonder how he'll cope with that. [/quote]I don't have a problem in enjoying an explosive talent beating a proven talent (of course on track and not a verbal war like Max of late has been doing), which is a course of life. We have witnessed that with Senna in late 80s, Michael in the mid 90s and Fernando in mid 2000s. But I would like to call out soothsayers and naysayers when they are wrong, especially blinded by over optimism and constantly under estimating the might of those who have been champions for a reason. Every time it was a change of course on F1, that stopped the domination of a team.

Mercedes has conquered 3 major rule changes, starting with 2014. They are the only team to have a championship across two distinct set of regulations. With 2020 being just an evolution, expecting either Mercedes or Ferrari lose the current advantage and the pace of development, is nothing but poor optimism. But even if that happens, I wouldn't be too disappointed, but I wouldn't bet my house on that, looking at how difficult it is to bring major performance advantage over rivals in the stable set of regulations.

Horner and Marko got ahead of themselves at the conclusion of winter testing that they are ahead of Mercedes. Then it was about Spec 2 Honda and how RBR would bring fast upgrades after learning that Honda has more power than what RBR that. Then it was Spec 3 and then Spec 4 and then Spec 5 and a new fuel. It's season over and RBR still stands quite far back in terms of challenging the top two. Horner kept claiming that, they have a much better race car than qualifying and as the season is getting over, that isn't the case either now. What is evoking optimism here?

While that was the story from team personnel, all through this season, this team thread was full of blind optimism about how RBR can beat Mercedes as Mercs were "only a few tenths away". Well, that didn't happen and never really looked like happening with the pace at which Merc and Ferrari brought upgrades and increased the performance gap.

RBR's over reliance on Newey, who increasingly is giving a feeling that he is a spent force, isn't helping them. Unfortunately, they get even worse when he is not there. F1 has fast moved beyond the sheer brilliance of an individual and technology has started outsmarting individuals and in that regard, Ferrari and Mercedes have been excelling without any star individuals designing and developing their cars. Unless there is some kind of earth shattering miracle, it is practically difficult to expect RBR Honda churning out a championship winning campaign next year. So, I would DEFINITELY frame your previous post.

[GPR-A]

You make it sound as though he is being overly zealous regarding the teams chances next year. In fact he is just stating what should be obvious. Considering the large scale of change that has been brought about by Incorporating a new power unit and a completely new partner into the fold, the result for 2019 has been on par with expectations. Next year is the year in which a much more fair comparison can be made. That does not mean that next year Red Bull will be more competitive or less competitive, only that they can be judged more rationally.

I know where it's coming from.
Assuming he keeps word and prints this out and frame it to the wall, i wonder how he will cope if Max turns out to beat Hamilton to the championship and make it a Max WDC and RedBull WCC. Not saying that'll happen, but replies like his make me wonder how he'll cope with that.

I don't have a problem in enjoying an explosive talent beating a proven talent (of course on track and not a verbal war like Max of late has been doing), which is a course of life. We have witnessed that with Senna in late 80s, Michael in the mid 90s and Fernando in mid 2000s. But I would like to call out soothsayers and naysayers when they are wrong, especially blinded by over optimism and constantly under estimating the might of those who have been champions for a reason. Every time it was a change of course on F1, that stopped the domination of a team.

Mercedes has conquered 3 major rule changes, starting with 2014. They are the only team to have won a championship across two distinct set of regulations. With 2020 being just an evolution, expecting either Mercedes or Ferrari lose the current advantage and the pace of development, is nothing but poor optimism. But even if that happens, I wouldn't be too disappointed, but I wouldn't bet my house on that, looking at how difficult it is to bring major performance advantage over rivals in the stable set of regulations.

Horner and Marko got ahead of themselves at the conclusion of winter testing that they are ahead of Mercedes. Then it was about Spec 2 Honda and how RBR would bring fast upgrades after learning that Honda has more power than what RBR that. Then it was Spec 3 and then Spec 4 and then Spec 5 and a new fuel. It's season over and RBR still stands quite far back in terms of challenging the top two. Horner kept claiming that, they have a much better race car than qualifying and as the season is getting over, that isn't the case either now. What is evoking optimism here?

While that was the story from team personnel, all through this season, this team thread was full of blind optimism about how RBR can beat Mercedes as Mercs were "only a few tenths away". Well, that didn't happen and never really looked like happening with the pace at which Merc and Ferrari brought upgrades and increased the performance gap.

RBR's over reliance on Newey, who increasingly is giving a feeling that he is a spent force, isn't helping them. Unfortunately, they get even worse without him as 2017 proved. F1 has fast moved beyond the sheer brilliance of an individual and technology has started outsmarting individuals and in that regard, Ferrari and Mercedes have been excelling without any star individuals designing and developing their cars. Unless there is some kind of earth shattering miracle, it is practically difficult to expect RBR Honda churning out a championship winning campaign next year. So, I would DEFINITELY frame your previous post.

[Bill]

"technology has started outsmarting individuals and in that regard"? Mercedes according to Marko has 175 more aerodynamicist than Rbr therefore they can process more data faster. Redbull has not brought any upgrades to speak of since Austria only minor twicks so most energy is being spent on next and some investment and hiring has being going on so we just has to wait and see.last year Redbull had a genuine good race car so is not like they are lacking in design depart

[godlameroso]

It's still a matter of money in the end.

In any case, COTA is not particularly challenging when it comes to energy management. I think RB will do well, the layout is similar to Austria, albeit a bit longer.

[McMika98]

Mercedes according to Marko has 175 more aerodynamicist than Rbr therefore they can process more data faster. Redbull has not brought any upgrades to speak of since Austria only minor twicks so most energy is being spent on next and some investment and hiring has being going on so we just has to wait and see.last year Redbull had a genuine good race car so is not like they are lacking in design depart

Do you realise that 2020 is the same regs as this year so any updates this year will go towards next year. They cant go from extreme to another in terms of wing philosphy and expect to excel the setup. If they cant close the gap now expect the gap to be even bigger next year. As for hiring, new faces will only make it worse as they wont appreciate the direction taken and difficulties.
The team needs to close the season with confidence of future direction and not speculating about why one team is faster on straights and the other in corners.

[Bill]

Can we honestly say we know what the car is capable of since summer break.Max is either crashing into someone or being crashed into or starting from the back or racing at ridiculously slow pace like in Singapore even though Redbull can't match the qualifying pace of Ferrari in the race practice sessions they were a match for Bottas in Suzuka who went on to win a race p2 was possible . As for Honda they can match Mercedes in the race a championship winning pu.Rbr started with a car that was 1 second slower than merc then close the gap then fell away again even though is not exactly clear by how much

[hasika]

I would like to say the first half of the season was great,i never expected RB can be so strong in RedBullRing,Silverstone and Hockenheim.Last year they were far behind in those tracks.
Things were not good after summer break and only 4 races left.Not interested in talking about chassis/engine problem,just hope RB honda can build a better package next year.

[Hkbruin2]

https://www.motorsport.com/imsa/news/ac ... s/4559417/

Though this article isn’t directly related to The RBR team or Honda F1, it does show Honda/Acura’s motorsport prowess and their ability to win championships in numerous categories. Perhaps RBR’s first year with Honda is much like Penske’s team in 2018 with Acura. Now, achieving the championship in year 2 might seem far fetched, but perhaps the 2nd year of their relationship will nurture the synergies and significant progress can be made? I really hope Honda and RBR stretch the limits of the regulations like how Ferrari does. I want them to take those risks.

[Bill]

Still we don't know what spec 4 can do if fully unleashed in the hands of a good driver over a race distance because that's were the development of fuel and combustion chamber when into ,it will take until Brazil to get an idea because Mexico is high altitude and may not even use it.

[GhostF1]

Onboard stills of Q3 fastest laps and position on track where top speed was achieved just before 130R from all 4 PU's. Again, I'm aware there are many factors involved here, but it shows some interesting things.
Ferrari were the only ones accelerating right up until turn in, significant advantage here. Honda and Mercedes are evenly matched speed wise around the track, here they both hit 314 and hold for a bit before turn in (Honda 2-3kph up on Mercedes on the DRS straight), Renault holding at 308 for a fair amount of time before 130R, looks to be lacking that last push.

[Jaisonas]

Onboard stills of Q3 fastest laps and position on track where top speed was achieved just before 130R from all 4 PU's. Again, I'm aware there are many factors involved here, but it shows some interesting things.
Ferrari were the only ones accelerating right up until turn in, significant advantage here. Honda and Mercedes are evenly matched speed wise around the track, here they both hit 314 and hold for a bit before turn in (Honda 2-3kph up on Mercedes on the DRS straight), Renault holding at 308 for a fair amount of time before 130R, looks to be lacking that last push.

https://ibb.co/6WZ5zKx

Just a note, if that mclaren is Sainz's, he said that his battery was old and it was cutting out.

[_cerber1]

CS "It wasn’t all smooth, though, as we had a problem with the batteries. The older they are, the less energy they are able to recover from the MGU-K, so the data showed it had cost me a bit of time, around a couple of tenths."