F1 | Red Bull did not copy Mercedes, but opens a new path

The external appearance of the Red Bull RB20 on the day of the presentation raised the doubt that Adrian Newey had wanted to teach Mercedes a “lesson”, adopting some of the solutions that had not worked on the black arrows, demonstrating, instead, that they could be successful .

After discovering the characteristics of the car from Milton Keynes, it is more correct to limit the judgment to a simple external analysis, because the RB20 expresses technical concepts that are different from those introduced by the Star.

For the first time we have seen a cooling system that has been separated into four separate systems that give a very sense of being modular, adaptable to the characteristics of the different circuits. If you try to drop 10 cents in the spaces between one component and another on the sides of the Red Bull it is difficult to imagine that they will reach the bottom, as the spaces have been designed for packaging so complex that it leaves you speechless.

It is clear that whoever spoke of the possible evolution of the RB20 towards a “zero pods” version, just to stick to the Mercedes theme, could not have known what was actually inside the belly of the car from Milton Keynes.

Red Bull RB20: here are the air intakes for cooling the water and the intercooler

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

Red Bull was only able to decide on an extreme aerodynamic shape thanks to the overcoming of the concepts of the RB19 that dominated last year with 22 victories out of 23 GPs. The world champion car had now reached its development limits and it was necessary to introduce a new idea of ​​a ground effect car if we wanted to make a leap in quality, in the knowledge that the opponents would be very close.

To say, therefore, that Red Bull copied Mercedes is wrong, despite some similarities that suggested this similarity. The technical director Pierre Waché takes care of settling the issue, explaining how they arrived at certain choices in Milton Keynes, having had the possibility of having more time to develop the 2024 car having stopped the development of the RB19 before the others and being able to count on an unbridgeable technical advantage.

Red Bull RB20: the new last flap adjustment system in comparison with the RB19 solution

Photo by: Giorgio Piola

When asked by Motorsport.com if there was a bit of irony in having gone with ideas seen on Mercedes, the Frenchman explained: “No, I don't see it that way, it went another way. First of all, because it is better to develop your own ideas. Then we decided to take a step back: we analyzed what the stopwatch and our systems were saying, to decide what was best for the future.”

And with a clear mind, new development criteria emerged which made Waché say that a path has been taken “… which is definitely much better than before”. Red Bull, therefore, did not look at Mercedes, but based its choices on simulations and numbers: “We knew that the others would arrive, and with the concept of the RB19 we did not have large margins for growth so we decided to bet and to risk a little. Now we have more freedom to change.”

Pierre Waché, technical director of Red Bull Racing

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Waché's message is clear: the Red Bull, as soon as it was put on the track, immediately went very strong, at least in the hands of Max Verstappen. The RB20 is not an easy single-seater, as the Ferrari SF-24 may seem, at least judging by Sergio Perez's adaptation difficulties, but in Milton Keynes they are only at the beginning of a growth path (already defined and planned) that will be implemented according to the competitiveness of the opponents.

This Red Bull opens a new technical cycle that aspires to total domination of this regulatory cycle which will be completed in 2025. Only internal political wars, which erupted after the Horner case, can explode a system that seems unassailable from the outside…