F1 technical expert admits he’s been ‘properly thrown’ by one aspect of Red Bull’s 2024 car

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Formula 1 technical expert Gary Anderson has admitted there’s one aspect of Red Bull Racing’s 2024 car which has really confused him.

Gary Anderson – who worked for the likes of Tyrrell, McLaren and Jordan as a lead designer – has been assessing each team’s new cars ahead of the upcoming Formula 1 season.

Speaking on The Race Podcast, Anderson suggested he was confused by something Red Bull have done with the RB20.

Anderson surprised by one thing he’s seen on Red Bull’s 2024 car

While Formula 1’s launch season may have now ended, there are still plenty of unanswered questions about the cars that will be taking to the track in Bahrain on Wednesday.

Teams were very clever with the images they released, the access journalists and more importantly cameras were allowed and will want to protect their latest innovations until the very last second.

Williams didn’t even show their newest car at their launch, simply showing their new livery.

All eyes will be on Red Bull heading to Bahrain given their dominance of the 2023 season.

It would have been easy for Adrian Newey and co. to stick with what was successful last year, but they also know that their rivals aren’t going to sit still.

So, they’ve gone in a new direction with a few parts and Gary Anderson has spotted one part on Red Bull’s 2024 car that has raised some questions.

It’s not the floor of the car which almost certainly wasn’t the real thing.

Instead, it was a part of the car that left even Damon Hill surprised when he saw their plans.

Red Bull twist when sticking in 2023 would have been easy

Analysing Red Bull’s latest offering, Anderson said: “We go back a little bit further into the different sidepod inlet which is one part that has properly thrown me a little bit.

“Two of three reasons for it I believe. It’s one of these sorts of deals where all last year they were lifting the top, the underneath of the radiator inlet upwards and trying to open up the sidepod undercut.

“And they probably got to a point where they couldn’t lift it any higher because the sidepod top shelf, the top surface itself is level with the top of the chassis and you obviously need an inlet of some sort there.

“They’d gone up as far as they could do, but it meant that the lower edge of the radiator inlet relative to the top of the chassis was probably 50 millimetres down.

“And in doing what they’ve done now, they’re able to lift that right up and use just the top surface, so their sidepod undercut is much, much bigger. Deeper I suppose you might call it.

“So, it’s given them more mass flow through that undercut area.”

Red Bull’s sidepods could end up being a big talking point through 2024 if they find a solution that Mercedes couldn’t with a similar idea and experts like Anderson will be studying any minor changes they see over the next few weeks.

Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez won’t be shy to share their thoughts if they feel the team have gone in the wrong direction after several years of superiority over the rest of the grid.

However, they could easily roll back these changes and go back to their 2023 car and almost certainly still be one of the fastest cars on track.