'He'd know too well...' - Red Bull hit back at George Russell’s F1 2023 ‘sandbagging’ claims
After Red Bull continued their 100 percent winning start to F1 2023 at the 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Australian Grand Prix, Russell said he believed the team were “almost embarrassed” to unleash their full pace “because the faster they seem globally the more🌸 the sport is going to try to hold them back somehow.”
The Mercedes driver and teammate 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Lewis Hamilton both had brief spells leading Sunday’s race in Melbourne as they looked to challenge 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Max Verstappen for victory.
But Verstappen recovered from a poor start to claim another predictable win, having use🐽d Red Bull’s superior straightline speed to breeze past Hamilton once he got within DRS range.
Horner was quick to counter Russell’s suggestion af♓ter꧒ the race whilst taking a dig at Mercedes’ own spell of F1 domination between 2014 and 2020.
“That’s very generous of him,” Horner s🐻aid. “He’d know too well fꩵrom his team about those kinds of advantages.
“There’s always an element of management that goes on in any raceꦺ. Becauseཧ it was a one-stop race and a very early one-stop race, of course there was an element of tyre management going on.”
Vers🔯tappen also dismissed Russell’s claim, insisting Red Bull are not deliberately trying to hold b🍸ack.
"I think anyway, there’s nothing really they [the FIA and F1] can do," he told the BBC’s Chequ💜ered Flag podcast. "I mean, we just try to do the best we can with the development of the car, but it’s also about pace management.
"We didn’t really know, I think no-one really knew how long that hard tyre would last, so it’s about just bringing it home because we h✨ad a bit of pace I think over t💫he others.
“There’s no need to try and gain half a second a lap and destroy your tyres to the end because you never know, a safety car can𝐆 happen, red flags, like we had today. So yeah, it’s not necessary to risk all that."
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