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.

 

[The Pits]

My understanding, second hand from someone who knows a bit about it:

The rake is important, as it increases the effectiveness of the diffuser, and can effectively lower the front ride height, as height is measured above the reference plane, which is also raked.

The difficulty is that if the gap between the diffuser and the ground is too large, it will stall, and the downforce will all but disappear. the trick which Red Bull do better than most is using the exhaust wash to "Seal" the gap between the edge of the diffuser and the ground/rear wheels thus maximising the downforce available.

There is a lot more to it than that in real terms, however, that is the key as I understand it.

 

[Blog Zbod]

The new thermal cameras noted hot spots on Webber's tea tray at Korea, which had some speculating that Newey was scattering about their CURSE's supercaps and had some imbedded in the tea tray. Scarbs reports on it and says it was just the titanium skid blocks in the legality plank being rubbed along the tarmac when the car was at high speeds.

Of course this says nothing about what might be happening behind it but it is exactly what you'd expect to be seeing if the car were running an extreme rake, which would leave the tea tray's leading edge precariously close to the track surface.

 

[Blog Zbod]

James Allen speculates Red Bull losing two top members of their aerodynamics staff might indicate they had some insider information regarding Newey's future at Red Bull. His contract, IIRC, expires at end of 2014, and he has made no secret that he is not fond of the sport's present über-restrictive constructor's rules, which only is progressively getting worse. It makes sense that such clever chaps would be aware their market value is increased for as long as they remain associated with Newey (and his successes), and McLaren at this moment are in a spending mood, particularly eager to poach Red Bull talent.

 

[FB]

No 2013 WDC T-Shirts on the Red Bull Racing website yet...

 

[RasputinLives]

The haters love to moan about Red Bull but they are a class act.

To think that team grew out of the shambols that was Jaguar.

 

[Il_leone]

no-FIAt-please the 2012 Mclaren there was concern that it did not go with the platypus nose that all the other teams did to meet the regulation and it was going to cost them 1 tenth of a second

 

[Il_leone]

How do you use the quote function?

 

[Il_leone]

RasputinLives The haters love to moan about Red Bull but they Newey and Vettel are a class act... and Horner is a smug and whingeing knob

 

[Titch]

I only hope that in 2014 a team will rise from the ashes of 2013 and challenge Red Bull. But it will still have the Newey/Vettel combination, and it's going to be hard for anyone to do that.

 

[Il_leone]

If Mercedes sort themselves out who is in charge then I think they have the best shot

 

[Titch]

Yes you're probably right il_ leone

 

[Il_leone]

FB

have they prepared a special drum kit for Christian Horner to lead the marching band on their victory parade

 

[FB]

Hey, this could mean only Red Bull Home Run in MK. Fire up the Prius!

 

[Il_leone]

FB

That is what I see Christian's Horner's role at Red Bull - the one that leads the marching band with his drum and trumpet and making noises about how great Red Bull are
Don't forget the hat as well and microphone with it

Not sure using a Prius would go down if your team signed to promote Infiniti - Nissan (Renault)

 

[FB]

I think Horner gets a very bad press. His job is to run the red Bull Racing team and under his tenure they have won multiple Championships. He also has to defend the drivers, the team and the brand because that is what he's paid to do. I pretty sure his position within RBR is a little more complex than being a "cheer leader" Il_leone.

 

[Il_leone]

FB He does not handle the press well and maybe his demeanour in these situations is not like Ross Brawn who lets people know he is in charge and lets it get out of hand

Sometimes he does not help himself when he's heard over the radio bragging a bit like " Who needs ride height! ! in the wake of accusations the cars maybe illegal

----

I'll give credit for Horner for managing to convince Dietrich and Helmut they need experienced drivers to get to the front first not rookies who are going to do a lot of damage to chassis when they became a team in 2005

--------

 

[Bill Boddy]

We will have to see what happens next season. ERS may well change the game, especially if Newey gets the packaging wrong, it wouldn't be the first time.

 

[Blog Zbod]

The Beeb's Gary Anderson speculates that the secret to the RB9's speed is a self-adjusting mechanism that flexes their cars' tea trays to maintain optimum rake without exceeding skid block wear limits by responding to temperature changes to the forward lip of the tea tray when it scrapes along the tarmac.

 

[Il_leone]

the turbos may be an issue with reliability especially with fuel consumption and going full power all the time

 

[Mephistopheles]

The Beeb's Gary Anderson speculates that the secret to the RB9's speed is a self-adjusting mechanism that flexes their cars' tea trays to maintain optimum rake without exceeding skid block wear limits by responding to temperature changes to the forward lip of the tea tray when it scrapes along the tarmac.

Such as a rather large bimetallic strip.