By Carlo Platella
These days the thoughts of fans and professionals turn to the world champions, on whose work many of the chances of attending a more or less contested 2024 championship will depend. The starting project of the RB20 is already largely completed, the car set up with a dual objective: eliminate the weaknesses of the RB19 and enhance its advantages. Work is currently underway in Milton Keynes on the first aerodynamic updates that will arrive during the 2024 season, but studies on the 2025 project have already begun.
The objectives of the RB20
Ben Waterhouse, head of Red Bull's performance engineering division, gave a long interview to Racecar Engineeringillustrating the design objectives for the 2024 car: “We are aware that the RB19 had considerable limitations. If we think back to Singapore, weaknesses have certainly emerged. There are areas we want to improve, be it performance at high or low speeds. At the same time, [la macchina] it had clear strong points, which we want to enhance while at the same time trying to address its critical issues”.
The RB19 was a car designed to be competitive across the widest spectrum of circuits and conditions. Among its strengths, it stood out high aerodynamic efficiency, i.e. the ability to release high levels of load at the cost of limited resistance to progress. It is therefore not surprising that the 2023 Red Bull dominated especially on high-efficiency circuits, characterized by a mix of fast corners and straights, such as Silverstone and Suzuka. Precisely because of its versatility, however, the RB19 was not specialized for tracks at the extreme ends of the calendar spectrum, such as low-load tracks (Monza and Las Vegas) or bumpy, twisty city streets (Monaco and Singapore). Despite still managing to impose itself in almost all the Grands Prix, on these tracks the 2023 Red Bull was more susceptible to attack by the competition.
The less competitive areas cited by Ben Waterhouse were predominantly performance in full load configuration, traction out of slow corners and tendency to understeer at low speeds. Furthermore, the car lost more competitiveness compared to its rivals when the unevenness of the road surface made it necessary to raise the height from the ground, a condition that occurred especially on street circuits. “For this reason, we defined clear objectives quite far back in time, during the development process of the RB19 for the RB20,” explains Waterhouse. “In general, we managed to hit most of them. However, I wouldn't say that everyone is satisfied, since there is still some work to do to try to improve compared to the RB19″.
Looking to 2025
Strengthened by its performance and ranking advantage, Red Bull stopped development of the RB19 early in 2023, diverting all resources to the 2024 car. Waterhouse explains: “The RB20 is a machine that is at least six months old and we are already starting to move it our attention on the RB21even if the season hasn't started yet.” However, the schedule in Milton Keynes does not differ much from that of their opponents. Alpine, for example, laid the foundations of the 2023 project in late 2021, while after the tests in Bahrain last year Ferrari diverted all resources to the 2024 car on which work had already begun. However, having concentrated all resources on the RB20 in advance represents an advantage for Red Bull, which will be able to dedicate itself more calmly to the RB21. From this point of view, prohibiting aerodynamic analyzes on the 2026 cars before next January was an important decision by the FIA, preventing Red Bull's current advantage from automatically extending to the new regulatory cycle.
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