Red Bull’s adviser Helmut Marko thinks rivals Mercedes and Red Bull will fight it out in 2022 for title despite rule changes.
The Austrian has never doubted the effectiveness of his team in dividing tasks between the technicians which have been focusing on the developments for the 2021 campaign and those who instead were working on the “stimulating” (Newey’s word) project for the 2022 Formula One season, which will bring to the track “attractive” cars from an aesthetic point of view, as confirmed by Helmut Marko.
Regarding the consequences of the efforts made in 2021 to fight to the end, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner stated that it will be necessary to wait for Bahrain in March to draw the first conclusions. “If Ferrari wipes out the competition then yes, it will mean that we have sacrificed 2022 to win in 2021” – Christian Horner said a few weeks ago.
However, Helmut Marko believes that despite a revolutionary regulation in 2022 the fight will always be between Mercedes and Red Bull: “The new rules represent an unknown factor, especially regarding the diffuser. I think it will still be a battle between us and Mercedes” – said the head of the Red Bull youth program interviewed by Italian daily newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport.
In 2022 there will no longer be the ‘Honda’ on Red Bull, which will make its debut ‘Red Bull Power Trains’ linked to the new engine division under construction in Milton Keynes, an infrastructure where ‘Honda’ power units will continue to be developed based on intellectual property and the know-how underlying the agreement between Red Bull and the Japanese giant signed in 2021.
Helmut Marko is not worried about a drop in engine performance: “Nothing will change, Honda will continue to build engines for us, the difference is that we will have to pay them. In this sense, it was essential to freeze the regulation as regards the developments of the power units, which will stop in 2022” – he concluded.
