Current Red Bull Racing

Red Bull Racing

FIA Entry: Red Bull Racing Renault
Car 1: Sebastien Vettel
Car 2: Mark Webber
Engine: Renault V8
Team Owner: Dietrich Mateschitz
Team Principal: Christian Horner
Chief Technical: Office Adrian Newey
Chief Designer: Rob Marshall
Race Engineer Car 1: Guillaume “Rocky” Rocquelin
Race Engineer Car 2: Ciaron Pilbeam

Stats as of end 2010

First Entered 2005
Races Entered 107
Race Wins 15
Pole Positions 20
Fastest Laps 12
Driver World Championships 1
Constructor World Championships 1

Team History

Before Red Bull

In 1997 Paul Stewart, aided by his father Jackie and the Ford Motor Company, made the leap from F3000 to F1 as an entrant. Jonny Herbert won 1 race for the Stewart team before it was sold off to Ford who re-branded the cars as Jaguar.

Ford stuck with it through thick and thin (mainly thin) through to the end of 2004 before selling the team to Dietrich Mateschitz, who owns the Red Bull drinks brand, for $1 on the understanding he invested $400 million over 3 years

Red Bull Racing

With Christian Horner installed as team principal, McLaren refugee David Coulthard and Christian Klien as the drivers Red Bull went racing. Their first season was certainly more successful than Jaguar had managed, even with the same Cosworth power plant, with Coulthard managing a 4th place at the European Grand Prix and the team finishing 7th in the Constructors Championship.

Adrian Newey joined from McLaren as chief designer for 2006 and Red Bull swapped to Ferrari engines. Coulthard managed a podium at his "home" race in Monaco prompting Christian Horner to jump naked, other than wearing a red cape, into a swimming pool.

Christian Klien, who shared the car with Vitantonio Liuzzi in 2005 and Robert Doornbos in 2006, departed the team for 2007 and was replaced by Mark Webber. The RB3 was the first full "Newey" car and was coupled with a Renault motor. The car was very unreliable, suffering from a variety of different problems but Webber managed a podium at the European Grand Prix and the team finished 5th in the WCC.

Retaining the same engine and drivers for 2008 Red Bull slipped back to 7th in the WCC and again only managed a single podium, for Coulthard in Canada, but the reliability issues which plagued the car the previous season were mainly resolved.

2009 was Red Bull's break through year. With Coulthard having retired Webber was joined by Red Bull junior driver Sebastien Vettel. The new rules allowed Newey to design a car which challenged for both the Drivers and Constructors Championship. Webber won 2 races, Vettel 4 and the team climbed to 2nd in WCC taking 3 pole positions en-route.

In 2010 Red Bull justified Mateschitz's investment winning the Constructors title and Vettel the Drivers Championship. They won 9 races through the season, 5 for Vettel and 4 for Webber and took 10 poles. Webber led the title race for much of the season but it was the 23 year old Vettel who stole the title in the last race of the season and became the youngest Champion as a result.

2011 sees the team retain the same driver line up as 2010 and continue with Renault engine power in the new RB7 car.

 

[mnmracer]

Considering Red Bull wasn't the top team at the start of last season, the end of last season, or more than half of the races of 2012, let's first see if they can have a better start of the season than last year.

 

[Brogan]

Interesting comments from Horner after he initially refused to give an unequivocal answer directly after the race (no surprise there).

Although Vettel apologised to the team and Webber for what happened - claiming his actions in defying orders were 'not deliberate' – Horner says he is not convinced.

When asked why the team did not ask Vettel to relinquish the position to Webber in the closing stages to make up for his defiance, Horner said: "Do you honestly think that if we had told him slow down and give the place back, he would have given it back?

"There was no point. He had made it quite clear what his intention was by making the move. He knew what the communication was. He had had the communication. He chose to ignore it.

"He put his interest beyond what the team's position was. He was focused on those eight points difference between second and first place – which was wrong. He has accepted it was wrong."

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/106356

 

[Fenderman]

Did anyone else think the cut and paste job the Beeb did with Seb's and Mark's interviews was somewhat shabby or what? It seems to me the situation is plenty inflamed as it is without that flipping nonsense.

 

[Il_leone]

Fenderman

The BBC had only limited time to cover this uproar . Everyone knows the history has been there but Vettel has taken this to a new level

This could break / wreck Red Bull's season.

Webber knows he's always got a gun pointing to his head from Helmut Marko pretty much and is quite fed up with it because he did what he was told to do by the people who employed

Vettel - we've seen a Schumacher esque side to him..was that really necessary - squeezing down the pitwall? What if both cars touched down the straights and crashed..who would look silly then?

In my opinion Vettel has potentially set off a dynamite at Red Bull and created poison of his own doing just like Alonso did at Mclaren in 2007.

This is one of two things

1) the catalyst for Vettel to leave Red Bull - Ferrari/ Mercedes are you watching?
2) the end of Webber's career - this might have been coming but this has been hastened and I think Mark may stick two fingers to Seb and future team orders will be flouted

 

[Fenderman]

Crikey I didn't know any of that!!! I really should have read all the preceding posts spread about the team, driver, race threads, etc. Oh, wait ... I did

 

[Kewee]

Il_leone.... Considering the importance Ferrari place on their drivers putting the team before themselves, Vettel may have just done himself immeasurable harm in Ferraris eyes. At the very least, Ferrari would need to see a very different attitude before they even thought of employing him and I don't believe a leopard changes its spots. The arrogance and selfishness is part of who Vettel is.

 

[FB]

Thanks Kewee , that's one of the funniest things I've read on here in years. Do you do stand up? Schumacher **cough cough**, Alonso **cough cough**, Prost **cough cough**

 

[RickD]

I actually think Vettel may have done us fans a favour by doing this to Webber.. Do you seriously think that the rest of the year, Mark will listen to team orders?

 

[Il_leone]

Kewee

What Vettel has done has potentially put him on the shop window for MErcedes and Ferrari

Luca is not afraid to make these decisions he wanted Raikkonen in the same team as Schumacher as some sort of succession planning but Michael quit before having the ignominy to do so

RickD
up to now Horner was saying Webber could stay longer but if it does not matter what Webber does then I think he will race on his own

He's done Seb and the team enough favours only to be squashed constantly like a bug

 

[Kewee]

FB... The culture at Ferrari along with almost all the senior personal, has changed dramatically since Schumacher's days. Alonso may well be their number one driver but he understands the team comes first.

 

[FB]

You do do stand up, don't you?

 

[RickD]

FB - To be fair, I can see where Kewee is coming from. Alonso is the Team leader, so he comes first. As long as he is in front of Massa, then the Team is fine, otherwise the Team has issues.

 

[Fenderman]

drum roll, boom-boom.

 

[Kewee]

A lot of opinions seem to be based on the belief all things and all people remain the same. Anyone who's the same now as they were in their early 20's has my sympathy, it means they've learnt nothing during their important informative years.

 

[Fenderman]

How bizarre. To whom does one refer?

 

[Kewee]

not me!!!!!

 

[Fenderman]

nor me, I trust

 

[Brogan]

Red Bull appear to be at least making some effort to show a passing interest in yesterday's nonsense.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/106372

 

[RasputinLives]

I reckon Red Bull are going to have two new drivers going into 2014.

I'm plumping for Kimi and Hulkenberg at the min. Although I'm sure that would course problems too.

 

[ExtremeNinja]

A change in lineup at Red Bull would be a much welcome breath of fresh air!