After another strong start to a season in 2024, Red Bull finished third in the constructors’ standings the previous year. The team just wrapped up three days of pre-season testing in Bahrain, but it’s still anyone’s guess where they really stand.
And according to Christian Horner, climbing back to the top won’t be easy with teams so closely matched.
"I think we’ve just got to improve across some of the characteristics of last year’s car. The team worked very hard on that over the off-season," the Red Bull Racing team principal explained in Bahrain.
While critics took aim at the RB20 toward the end of last season, Horner was quick to defend their previous car.
"Let’s not forget we still won nine races and four sprint races with that car last year. So we had a reasonable basis from which to develop."
It wasn’t exactly a disaster.
Much of that success came down to Max Verstappen, who managed to secure his drivers’ title at the Las Vegas GP despite the car’s supposed shortcomings.
The competition looks incredibly tight this year, with Horner not expecting any single team to run away with it like they did in 2023.
"The competition is very tight and, of course, in the last year of this set of regulations you can see the convergence," he noted.
"The cars all look incredibly similar today. I think it’s going to be be very competitive throughout the season from the first race all the way through."
With teams having had several years to optimize their designs under current regulations, the performance gaps have naturally shrunk.
This could make for one of the most exciting seasons in recent memory.
