F1 | Ricciardo: “Too weak in the fast corners, we need load”

The last five events have shown both the strengths and weaknesses of a Racing Bulls that, after Barcelona, ​​has once again gone in search of itself. The innovations introduced in Spain should have increased the load and, above all, improved the efficiency of the VCARB01, but the team has pursued the wrong path with the development, so much so that it has had to take a step back.

The good performance in Hungary, although partially “dirtied” by some strategic choices that didn’t work with Daniel Ricciardo taking him out of the points zone, once again highlighted how competitive the Faenza single-seater is in the slower areas, like its progenitor, the AT04. However, the interesting aspect of the Hungarian Grand Prix was more related to the step backwards on the technical level, because the Australian’s car was equipped with the package used in Miami, in fact without the updates introduced in the subsequent events.

“The slow corners help us. Daniel’s car, for example, is completely back to the Miami spec. It really suited him there. In Hungary everything went well. The high temperature, the soft tyres and the Miami spec car, and also our strength in the slow corners, which was felt in Budapest,” said team CEO Peter Bayer.

If the characteristics of the Hungarian track somehow played in their favor, in Spa, even though a point was still achieved after George Russell’s disqualification, deeper reflections emerged on how much work still needs to be done to improve the car in certain specific areas to resolve those problems that Racing Bulls has been carrying around for some time now.

In Belgium Racing Bulls showed up with a new wing configuration more suited to the needs of the track, but this was not enough to cure some aspects of the VCARB01, such as the lack of top speed at the end of the straights. Already in Spain the team from Faenza had tried to intervene on this issue by working on the wings to have a more efficient profile, in that case with a more medium-high load wing, while in Spa they tried to propose the same concept with a more unloaded wing.

Ricciardo was the only one to start on the soft, a decision that, despite initial fears, actually turned out to be positive, especially because in the first part of the race the drivers on the medium had pushed to keep the pace as slow as possible in view of the next two stints. While it is true that in the end a precious tenth place arrived that gives morale, in reality there were some elements that played in his favor, such as the excessive degradation of Albon’s Williams on the medium, Sauber’s choice to suffer the undercut by Ricciardo to push towards a one-stop strategy that, then, they did not confirm, but also the engine temperature problems suffered by Gasly.

Esteban Ocon, Alpine A524

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images

Daniel Ricciardo, AlphaTauri VCARB01

Photo by: Erik Junius

As such, Daniel Ricciardo admitted that RB still has work to do to address the car’s weaknesses, despite adding updates over the Belgian Grand Prix weekend. “I still feel like our strengths are a bit more in the low-speed sections and our weaknesses are a bit more in the really high-speed corners,” he explained.

“So even in Turn 10 during the race, Pouhon, especially when the team says ‘well, we’re going towards the end and the tyres look OK’, so at that point, you’re pretty much flat out all the way to the end, even then I had the feeling that Ocon with less downforce was quick. “They were quite quick on the straight, I assume they were less downforce but Ocon was still quite quick in Turn 10.”

I think the high speeds are still a bit to work on, but for all the tighter, twistier corners it looks like we’re OK. So yeah, probably the characteristics are the same, just now the downforce is our friend, so maybe I’ll put on a bit of weight during the break and that will help me!”, Ricciardo joked.

Ocon vs Ricciardo comparison in clean air at the Belgian GP

Photo by: Gianluca D’Alessandro

While it is true that in the final part of the race Ocon was able to count on much fresher tyres, in fact the Australian’s sensations reflect reality, as had already been seen in qualifying, after all, with that exploit by Alpine. Compared to the Frenchman, who had focused on a very light set-up, Ricciardo paid about 10 km/h, while compared to Gasly, who instead had a more loaded setup, that gap was reduced by more than half km/h, but widened much more evidently precisely in turn 10.

More developments will come after the summer break and Racing Bulls believes it has learned a lot from what went wrong with the package introduced in Spain. “I think we understand a lot now and I think it’s fair to say that it set our development back then, but now it’s also put us forward a lot. We understand a lot more about the car now. So yes, it was painful. But now we can ramp up and I’m confident that future developments will work very well,” explained Racing Bulls sporting director Alan Permane.

Formula 1 is often a world of compromises, but the Faenza-based team doesn’t want to give up too much of its strengths in the slow sections to cure its weaknesses in the fast ones: “Honestly, I don’t think you want to give up low-speed performance, ever. Low-speed sections are where the car spends most of its time by definition. You don’t want to give up low-speed performance. Obviously you want better performance everywhere, but I don’t think you have to make too many compromises. We have a couple of nice tracks ahead of us. Obviously we’re looking forward to Baku and Singapore. But we expect this car to be good everywhere.”