Currently, Red Bull has one of the heaviest cars on the grid and, despite this, they have managed to perform at a very good level in these first two races of the season, with Max Verstappen taking his first victory of the course. in Saudi Arabia last weekend.
This result has been a great source of motivation for the team after both RB18s were forced to retire in the opening race in Bahrain, handing Ferrari the victory and the double.
On this problem, Dr. Helmut Marko , Red Bull ‘s main adviser, has good news: “In Imola we will lose some weight. That should give us an important time advantage,” he confirmed before the microphones of Servus TV .
“Currently [the car] is too heavy. To get an idea: if you are 10kg over the minimum weight, lose about three or four tenths per lap on a track like Saudi Arabia.”
“Reducing weight also means using more expensive materials that are lighter, and therefore that affects the production of more parts, because you also have to work with the cost cap.”
“There are a number of reasons why our car is so much heavier than others. We are now at a point where when we work on updates to the car, we also need to be very mindful of the weight savings that will come with it.”
“We cannot produce the same part twice because of the financial limit issue. On the other hand, reliability plays a key role. This car has to face different challenges and that makes it more difficult. Before we had a single CFO and now the finance department consists of ten people, that shows how important this topic is”.
“We have to find the right financial commitments and balance it with the technical ones. That is continuously monitored. There are also rumors that some teams are even further above the minimum weight, but the point of all this is that the middle-class teams like Sauber (Alfa Romeo), which has the lightest car of all, have skyrocketed in performance,” concluded Helmut Marko .
