Red Bull believes that some “low risk” changes it has brought to Max Verstappen’s car for the Miami Grand Prix can help it unlock stability improvements that could be key to its Formula 1 title hopes.
While many of its rivals have steered clear of bringing developments this weekend because it is a sprint event, Red Bull has bucked the trend by introducing some floor changes on Verstappen’s RB21.
The developments include repositioned fences to energise the underfloor differently, plus new floor edges featuring a more cambered mini-wing for an increase in local load.
One of the key issues Red Bull is trying to cure at the moment is a lack of through-corner balance.
Asked by The Race if the changes were about pure downforce or in improving the stability issues, Red Bull chief engineer Paul Monaghan said: “Both! It’s a bit of both. That’s why we’ve brought it. It’s reasonably stable.
“We can bring it at relatively low risk as it’s a sprint race. It’s an opportunity to do it and we were able to do it. People worked really hard in the factory to put it on the car and enjoy the benefits.”
While other teams do not like bringing upgrades to sprint races because there is limited practice time to iron out any problems before qualifying, Monaghan said the ‘low risk’ belief was because of a lack of concerns about a negative impact on the car balance.
Monaghan added: “In our judgement of flow stability, the flow stability is unchanged so we’re not fearing it to be aerodynamically unstable or anything of that nature. It can go on and it’ll give us a few kilos of load and we shall enjoy the benefits.”
While the changes on the Red Bull are quite small and may not automatically bring a big step in car performance, Monaghan is convinced that even a small gain the team can make in ironing out its through-corner balance problems could unlock a big leap forward.
But he was clear that getting on top of the issue was going to take a bit of time and may take a few upgrades to resolve.
“If you think about Jeddah and the complaints we had out of Bahrain, we’ve addressed some [weaknesses],” he said. “Have we done it wholly? Probably not. Will we continue? Yes.
“It won’t be a sort of turn-key solution to unlock. It’s going to be incremental improvements on the car.
“We understand what’s happened but actually effecting a cure is not that straightforward.
“It [the problem] may never disappear from the car. Can we reduce the magnitude and improve the laptime? Yes.
"There’s a lot of clever people in Milton Keynes who are working hard to improve it, and it will come.”
Upgrades round-up
Red Bull was not alone in bringing some car changes to the Miami sprint weekend.
Some teams restricted their new parts to changes on wing profiles so they were better suited to the demands of the Miami track.
Mercedes
Mercedes introduced a camber change to its rear wing flap to give a better match with the track characteristics.
Aston Martin
Aston Martin has given the front and rear wings a trim and reduced the lower beam wing to a single chord to suit the low-drag demands of the circuit.
Williams
Williams introduced a shorter chord version of the existing beam wing that it has available here.
Sauber
Sauber has reprofiled its front suspension sheaths to better align the airflow downstream.
Alpine
As part of its pre-event documents Alpine submitted a host of updates but ultimately decided, because of the demands of a sprint weekend, not to run with them.
The parts, which will now likely appear at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in a fortnight, include new front brake ducts claimed to give better aero optimisation downstream and an increase in cooling efficiency.
The front suspension sheaths have been reprofiled to optimise flow to the new ducts.
