Christian Horner prévoit une domination réduite de Red Bull
Formula 1 is looking to avoid another team's long-lasting domination. Even though Red Bull is currently easily dominating F1, Christian Horner doesn't believe that his team will have a longer reign than Mercedes.
Formula 1 wants to avoid another very long domination. Since Mercedes’ dominance from 2014 to 2020, Red Bull has become the dominant team in F1. The Austrian team has not lost a single race this season. The current leader of the world championship, Max Verstappen, has a 99-point lead over his closest rival, his teammate Sergio Pérez.
If the domination continues from 2022, Christian Horner does not think that Red Bull will experience the same dominance as Mercedes. « The stability of the regulations will bring all the teams much closer together. You can already see that it is starting to happen. It will not be seven years of dominance yet. One thing we know about this sport is that things will converge. And the most important thing to have convergence is to have stability, said the Red Bull team principal after the team’s 11th consecutive victory.
The next regulation where there will be a change in motor regulation could bring back team dominance. « The power units are all quite similar now and the chassis evolves much faster than the engines. We can already see from the beginning of the season until now that things are already converging », adds the director of the Austrian team.
The boss of Red Bull already notices that his team’s dominance is diminishing and that other teams are copying the Austrian team to get closer to their performance. This is the case with McLaren. « It’s a very similar concept; I was looking at the car on the grid. It’s the first time we really see it this year and we can see that the philosophy they have adopted is very similar. They have chosen a similar path. It’s flattering, isn’t it? », the team manager confides.
« It is inevitable that this happens. Why wouldn’t you do it? When you have a car as high-performing as ours, it is quite logical to seek to imitate it, which some teams have chosen to do. », explains Christian Horner. For now, it is difficult to believe that a driver can compete with Red Bull this season, especially with Max Verstappen on the inside.
