Red Bull commits to radical ‘upgrade’ for Verstappen and Perez

The Azerbaijan Grand Prix is an important one this season as it is destined to either confirm or subvert the trends seen across the field in the two races following the summer break. 

It is a race in which Red Bull has multiple chances of managing the points advantage accumulated by Max Verstappen in the first part of the season as the field closes in on the RB20. 

As is known, in Miami, the car first encountered significant balance problems, becoming unstable and unpredictable with a tendency to understeer. 

The engineers found a substantial lack of correlation between the simulator data and what was being collected on track, leading to a decision to only analyse the latter to determine car set-up more effectively. 

RacingNews365 understands that for the Baku weekend, the floors of both RB20s for Verstappen and Sergio Perez will take on something akin to a ‘patchwork’.

The floor will be composed of a mix of three different evolutions, with the radical step considered by the engineers to be the most logical solution to avoid wasting the effort and resources spent on producing each evolution. 

Although the team does recognise that the sum of the individual elements does not equate to the overall competitiveness, the radical step was the only plausible choice the team had, considering the short amount of time available. 

Red Bull must show signs of reversing its alarming slump in form in Baku, even if it is in glimpses, but this could be a problem given Baku is not as smooth as the newly-resurfaced Monza which can exaggerate balance issues.

In Azerbaijan and especially in Singapore – the only race it failed to win in 2023 – the team is in damage limitation mode, with the aerodynamics department led by Enrico Balbo already working on a sizeable upgrade which is set to be delivered for the United States Grand Prix in Austin in October.