F1 | Red Bull RB20: The only reliability fear is the heat

The Red Bull RB20 presented itself in the 2024 F1 season as a worthy heir to the world champion car that last year won 22 of the 23 GPs contested. Adrian Newey's new creation immediately imposed itself on Max Verstappen in the Bahrain GP with a superiority that seemed disconcerting compared to the most aggressive opponents.

Is this the scenario we should expect again this weekend in the Saudi Arabian GP? Everyone in the paddock is wondering this, since the new Red Bull has made a clear break with the RB19, a car which had now reached the limit of development and still had little margin for growth, taking into account that these F1 cars will be destined to last two years.

In 2025, in fact, the teams will allocate the bulk of the budget to the study and construction of the car for the 2026 regulation, so everyone's tendency will be to leave only a residual amount for the development of the cars that were presented in 2024.

The RB20 caused a sensation not only for its very extreme aerodynamic shapes, but also and, above all, for the unprecedented concept of the cooling system which we can define as multi-stage. In fact, on Red Bull there are four distinct systems which have each been designed to be independent from all the others. Each element is powered by its own air intake and a specific heat outlet, in a modular way, so as to be able to modify the cooling capacity according to the characteristics of the track and the ambient temperatures.

Red Bull RB20 detail: the four elements of the cooling system visible

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

In the drawing of Giorgio Piola we can observe the openings that appeared between the bazooka and the bonnet in the area of ​​the bodywork that is most hollowed out. This is an area that is not easily visible due to the walls of the bazooka which are decidedly higher than the competition, but according to our information they were vents that had already been opened during the pre-season tests, when the temperature was decidedly higher than that recorded in the race.

From the first meters Newey's car had been seen as the new bogeyman of the Circus, but some data had led observers astray: Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez had never done a Grand Prix simulation like the other teams, preferring to interrupt every race stint with a stop of at least a quarter of an hour.

It was hastily said that the stop was dictated by the desire to refill the fuel tank (which was also confirmed), to restart each fraction of the GP with the same quantity of petrol on board and do a bit of pre-tactics to hide the actual potential.

In reality, in addition to the desire to “play” and hide, there was an actual need, linked to reliability: some temperatures of the RB20 were not yet fully under control, so the stop was useful to bring the values ​​back into the range expected, without running the risk of breaking down with an unquestionably fast, but perhaps still immature car.

When Pierre Waché's staff had to deal with a Bahrain GP that would be held in unusual weather conditions for Sakhir, with about ten degrees lower than expected, the few fears that the engineers had for the debut race they melted into very eloquent smiles.

Red Bull RB20: on the sides of the bazooka the air vents of the side radiators

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

Nonetheless, the RB20 tackled the race with the same hot air vents used in testing, preferring to give up some aerodynamic efficiency so as not to take any risks on reliability. In other words: Red Bull is a bomb, but there may still be some flaws in the revolutionary cooling system.

Jeddah, therefore, becomes an interesting testing ground: in Saudi Arabia the forecasts indicate a much hotter weekend than in Bahrain, so it will be possible to verify whether Red Bull will have to open other loopholes to respect the reliability indices or whether, instead, Adrian Newey and his companions will have already taken measurements of the cooling needs and will have already made arrangements.

It is fair to remember that the engineers of Milton Keynes can benefit from the use of the Honda RBPT H002 power unit: in addition to being very powerful, it requires significantly smaller radiant masses than the competition, offering the chassis builder the opportunity to decide on a more efficient machine from aerodynamic point of view.

Will heat alone be the RB20's true greatest enemy? We will find out in this second GP of the season…