Steiner expects Red Bull to be caught

Haas team boss Guenther Steiner thinks Red Bull will not enjoy its current advantage throughout the 2023 Formula 1 season.

Red Bull has been the dominant force in the three races so far to sit comfortably clear atop the constructors’ championship.

Behind them, a trio of teams are jockeying for the mantle of best of the rest.

Aston Martin currently holds bragging rights in that squabble ahead of Mercedes and Ferrari.

However, Steiner suggests the margin to Red Bull ahead will narrow as the year wears on.

“Obviously in the moment Red Bull has an advantage, but I wouldn’t say they keep that advantage now for the next 20 races,” he said.

“I’m not sure about that because everybody will catch up and hopefully we find out how Red Bull came to this advantage and we can copy it, or do something similar.

“Everybody will be working hard, and then you never have to forget Red Bull has got the penalty they got last year, they can do less development in the winter this year.

“So they cannot move a lot ahead anymore, in theory.

“You have to see, but they did a fantastic job and therefore you cannot blame the regulations for that, because if somebody does a better job than anybody else, they should get the advantage.”

Steiner’s comments come as some raise questions over whether the new-for-2022 regulations have had the desired effect.

Changes to the sport’s technical side were made to spice up the on-track action and close up the field.

While that has ended Mercedes’ run of domination of F1, it has simply been replaced by Red Bull.

The argument runs that the changes have done nothing but shuffle the deck.

Analysis of the opening three races however suggests a field spread of less than two percent on single lap pace, with nine teams split but little more than 1.5 percent.

However, Red Bull does enjoy a 0.4 percent advantage, which equates to 0.360s over a 90-second lap.

Formula 1 heads next to the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, where a number of teams are set to introduce upgrade packages.

That will likely see the pecking order change slightly, though whether it erodes the RB19s performance delta remains to be seen.