Adrian Newey concerned ‘limited’ Red Bull made mistake with 2024 F1 car

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Adrian Newey is concerned that Red Bull made a mistake and were ‘too conservative’ with the development of their 2024 car having been ‘limited’ by Formula 1’s cost cap.

Their new challenger is the first car to feel the full effects of Red Bull breaking the cost cap in 2021. The FIA fined Red Bull $7m (£6m) in October 2022 and also reduced the team’s total aerodynamic testing allocation for 2023 by 10%. But it carried little impact on their 2023 car.

Red Bull were already far down the road to developing the nearly all-conquering RB19 which won 21 of the 22 Grand Prix in 2023. Max Verstappen claimed 19 of those wins en route to a third drivers’ championship. He also scored 575 points through a record-breaking F1 season.

Red Bull breached the FIA’s cost cap for the 2021 F1 season by £1.8m

The FIA ruled in October 2022 that Red Bull had inaccurately excluded and/or adjusted costs of £5.6m in their 2021 accounts. Those amounts took the Milton Keynes natives £1.8m over the £118m limit in 2021. All 10 of the F1 teams met the £108m cost cap in the 2022 season.

With the penalty not affecting Red Bull’s 2023 car, Verstappen swept the drivers’ title with a 290-point advantage over runner-up and teammate, Sergio Perez. It was the first time in the team’s history that they posted a one-two year. Perez won two of the 22 Grand Prix in 2023.

Adrian Newey fears evolution over revolution may not pay off in 2024

Now, though, Red Bull’s global chief technical officer, Newey, is concerned that the team will be caught in 2024. He fears the Milton Keynes natives were too cautious with their upgrades having developed, rather than revolutionised, a car they first designed for the 2022 season.

“Last year’s car was an evolution of the ‘22 car,” he said, via Sport.de. “The key points were, of course, the normal winter development – in terms of aerodynamics, some understanding of what we needed to do on the suspension to improve the car and the weight reduction.

“This year’s car will then be the third evolution of the original RB18 from 2022. What we don’t know, of course: ‘Is the third evolution too conservative, while other [teams] have done something different?’”

Newey believes Red Bull were ‘limited’ in developing the RB20 for 2024 due to the cost cap and their penalty for breaching it in 2021. So, he hopes their decision to only polish the few imperfections with the RB19 pays off, having not built a fully new car for the new campaign.

“We can’t do everything and not consider all possibilities,” Newey continued. “We took the approach of developing what we had. Hopefully, this is the prudent and right decision.”