Peter Windsor says mystery F1 team is ‘struggling’ with car issue they can’t change due to design

Follow us on Google Discover

Formula 1 teams upgrade their cars nearly every weekend in a bid to extract performance, but sometimes they do not go as planned.

Mercedes and Red Bull have been prime examples of teams that have fluctuated in their performances on track this year, with the latter suffering a dramatic drop-off compared to McLaren earlier in the season.

Red Bull is now in a development race with McLaren in the final six races of the season and spent the last two Grands Prix understanding where their upgrades went wrong, in anticipation of a big upgrade for Austin.

Christian Horner cautioned that it might not add all the performance needed to beat Lando Norris, although Helmut Marko expects the Red Bull to be easier to drive for Max Verstappen in Austin.

Several other teams will be also bringing their last upgrades at the tail end of the season, but Peter Windsor revealed a mystery F1 team on the grid is ‘struggling’ with an inherent car problem they can’t change when speaking on the Cameron Cc podcast.

Mystery F1 team ‘struggling’ with inherent car problem

Many of the teams will be focusing on their 2026 cars from January next year, which means the current cars are set to reach their peaks in the next few months.

Next year’s cars will likely be evolutions of this year with incremental upgrades, with McLaren currently holding back a floor upgrade on their car through fears it could upset their current performance.

Windsor revealed he was speaking to a senior member of a team over the Singapore GP weekend, and they told him about the problems they face at the rear of their car.

“There is a team out there that is struggling out there with traction and I was talking to one of their engineers and I said ‘You’ve had this issue for months now, why not just do something at the rear?’,” said Windsor.

“And he said ‘We can’t make any adjustments because if we did, we’d have to build a completely new gearbox’.”

Red Bull could slip further behind in the Constructors’ Championship

The battle in the Constructors’ Championship is set to ramp up in the latter stages of the season as McLaren tries to extend its lead over Red Bull.

The Milton Keynes squad faces another challenge from Ferrari after both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz outscored Verstappen and Sergio Perez in the last few races.

If Red Bull is unable to produce an upgrade that helps them in Austin, Nico Rosberg has suggested they might have to backtrack on any work they’ve currently done on next year’s car to improve the RB20.

READ MORE: McLaren ‘poor management’ has cost Lando Norris ‘ridiculous’ points loss

Further back on the grid, Sauber has yet to score any points in what has been a dismal season for them after picking up problems with their pit stops earlier in the season.

Visa CashApp RB faces competition from Haas with them separated by three points after Nico Hulkenberg closed the gap in Singapore, which is potentially why they might swap Daniel Ricciardo with Liam Lawson for the remainder of the season.

Williams also looks like it could score a healthy amount of points with Franco Colapinto, which could put them further ahead of Alpine who have yet to score points since the Dutch GP.