RBR team principal Christian Horner blames tyres for slow performances during races – Formula 1 news
Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner has said that the main reason behind their slow pace during the races compared to the qualifying sessions is the new Pirelli tyres which degrade quickly.
“It is all about the tyre. I think that we managed to extract a lap out of the tyre in qualifying that led to a hugely impressive margin here, but I don't think you can abuse the tyre like that in the race,” said Horner.
The reigning world champion Sebastian Vettel scored his fastest time of the qualifying session of the Spanish Grand Prix around a second faster than Lewis Hamilton of McLaren. As a result, his performance during the race was quite surprising.
Lewis Hamilton stayed under a second behind Vettel’s RB7 for almost the last 16 laps of the race which was quite surprising as it seemed that both of the cars were equally competitive in terms of pace which is not the case during the qualifying sessions.
Due to the difference, Hamilton believes that he could have passed the Red Bull driver for a lead if he found a way.
“I think our raw speed was… we were faster. If I was able to get past I think I would have been able to pull away,” said Hamilton.
Other than that, Jenson Button added that McLaren are improving as they have applied some major upgrades to their MP4-26 but it was still disappointing to see Red Bull almost a second faster than them during the qualifying.
“We obviously have upgrades on the car which have helped our performance compared to the cars behind but to see such a big difference in qualifying, a second to the Red Bull and then see our pace in the race, I was a little bit surprised,” said the 2009
Formula 1 world champion.
As a result of this debate, it is believed that the race strategy is very important this season and that is something Red Bull have been strong with so far according to Christian Horner.
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