Red Bull team principal Christian Horner was surprised when Mercedes announced the W14 F1 car for 2023, which was a ‘carried forward’ version of the unsuccessful W13 car design. He also expected Ferrari to be in better shape this year, given the pace the car set last year.
Mercedes experienced issues with its car throughout the ground effect era, which began in 2022. In 2023, the crew continued to work on a comparable car, but abandoned the ‘Zeropod’ concept after testing offered no discernible results.
The same could be said for Ferrari, which abandoned its concept this year to go the Red Bull approach with its car, which produced great results as upgrades arrived. However, Horner was astonished that both competing teams did not abandon their conceptions during the winter of 2022.
When asked if his team was relieved that Mercedes team manager Toto Wolff confirmed the abandoning of its car’s idea at the start of the 2023 season, Horner responded:
“What astonished us was that Ferrari had a very good car last year.” And as a result of that, we expected it to be a close contender this year.
“We were startled to see Mercedes continue with concepts that had plainly failed the previous year.
“If you looked around the vehicles in pre-season, the Aston Martin and McLaren were the most similar in idea to us.”
Horner underlined that Red Bull was unaware that they had created a championship-winning car capable of dominating the season from the start, while effectively establishing a significant weight lead over their 2022 competitor. He added:
“Certainly, going out of Bahrain, we felt like, ‘We’ve got a really excellent deal here. But we weren’t sure if it was circuit-specific – temperature, circumstances, asphalt.
“So, it’s only after you’ve had a sample of two or three and have gone to a couple of circuits that have been more challenging, certainly for us the previous year, like Melbourne, that you suddenly realize, ‘oh, no, this is really together.'”
“So, yes, it requires a sample of a few races to obtain a clear picture. Nobody was leaving Bahrain getting too carried away.”
