Formula One: Red Bull’s Crack Widens
The rivalry and drift among the Red Bull drivers catches more fire and heat. Both the Red Bull drivers portrayed severe rivalry and envy at the Turkish Grand Prix as well but now it has become more evident at the British Grand Prix. Moreover, this time it is the entire team that has played a role to ignite the fire and show favouritism.
Last Sunday, at the Silverstone Circuit one of the most anticipated races took place amidst all the cheers and roars of the crowd. The toughest competitor’s perceived for the day were the four top slot drivers of the season so far, the two McLaren drivers and the other two from the Red Bull. However, as the day unfolded the Red Bull driver, Mark Webber could be clearly seen smouldering and smoking for how the team treated him.
Webber, suffered from a dramatic crash last month at the Silverstone Circuit as the Lotus driver, Heikki Kovalainen crashed with him, making his RB6 perform a complete somersault in the air before he hit the boundary tyre wall. Following the crash he had to retire from the race whereas the car was rebuilt for him for the Silverstone race. It was lucky of both the drivers that they came out of the crash unhurt and especially Webber who had been able o run the next race just after fourteen days of the bad collision.
However, last week during the practice sessions the other Red Bull driver Sebastian Vettel damaged his car’s wing were replaced by the new ones from Webber’s car. This was not only shocking for everyone around but also for Webber who is one of the leading drivers of the season.
It might not have been a very big issue if that was some other team in which one of the drivers was leading and the other one was only a mediocre but here the case is different. Webber had already been able to bag two victories of the season, equal to his teammate, had been able to lead the drivers’ charts earlier this season and also he is one of the strongest contenders of the 2010 title.
The teams’ decision clearly undermined him, placing him as a “number two” driver of the team and evidently showing their choice of considering Vettel as the lead driver of Red Bull. The same team had been banging the band of considering both the drivers equal throughout the season and the decision came really disheartening for Webber.
Previously the rivalry of the two drivers came to the forefront at the Turkish Grand Prix as the two bumped into each other while they were going one-two near the final laps of the race. The crash of the teammates deprived both the drivers from the first and second positions while Vettel had to retire from the race following the crash. The team than tried to smooth things between the two but this time rift had been widened by the team itself.
Webber, as he finished his race in full aggression and belligerence at the first position commented at the British Grand Prix commented, "Not bad for a number two driver", later it was read on his website that the win had tasted "even sweeter" after all what happened on the race day.
Well, for the Formula One world such rivalry is not new nor is the outcome of such rivalry. The team suffered immensely and lost its lead due to their crash in Turkey but still was not able to learn some lesson that it should have. Only a little more time to go and we will see what would be the outcome of this incident now and how would be the team able to move forward after all these cracks.
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