In preparation for this weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix, Red Bull brought some new upgrades to Budapest but it appears Sergio Perez’s crash in the opening practice has provided their competitors a good view of their secrets.
Red Bull might suffer greatly as a result of Sergio Perez’s practice crash after cameras captured the underside of the damaged RB19 as it was being recovered.
The Hungarian Grand Prix weekend got off to the worst possible start for the Mexican driver as he slammed his RB19 into the barrier on the first push lap. He had to wait for his mechanics to fix the car in the garage for the remainder of the first practice session as a result of the damage.
Given that the team wanted to test their new aerodynamic upgrades, the crash didn’t happen to be the best situation to reveal their secrets.
This comes as Red Bull’s cars now include updated sidepods, radiator ducts and cooling systems and it’s also possible that they have also modified the floors to go along with those changes.
Red Bull would have sought to keep their new floor plans a secret if they had but with Perez’s crash, it appears that competitors will be able to have a closer look at the revised design.
Martin Brundle who featured on Sky Sports throughout the channel’s coverage of FP2 on Friday, was out on the track to collect an entirely new view of the action.
He was met by a group of photographers who insisted they had captured the floor of the crashed Red Bull being recovered.
“They were telling me a little bit earlier on that a very good number of them were able to photograph the underneath of the Red Bull when Sergio Perez crashed earlier on,” Brundle told viewers.
“I’m sure that will be most useful to other teams and a lot of pain for Red Bull, with their updated car, to have that all photographed again.”
Brundle had been perplexed by the crash of the Mexican earlier in the course of the show. Considering Daniel Ricciardo has returned to the grid with sister team AlphaTauri and is publicly seeking for a future Red Bull comeback, Perez is already under significant pressure due to a poor run of form.
This pressure has only increased after the crash and Brundle was astounded by Perez’s crash given how consistent he has been throughout his F1 career.
“I can’t get my head around that. It is a rookie error,” Brundle said of the Red Bull driver’s mistake. “I think back to his brilliant victories earlier this year in Saudi and in Azerbaijan.
“And his utterly brilliant victory last year in Singapore on a drying track, one of the most challenging races I’ve seen in a long time, where he was perfect.
“And then, he does that. I can only assume it’s the pressure… He didn’t just clip the edge of the grass or the white line, he was on the grass by a metre or so.
“I can’t get my head around it at all,” Brundle claimed. “Sergio has been so rock solid all through his career.
“He’s not been that dynamic and goes on the missing list sometimes, but my goodness is he fast, consistent and keeps the tyres intact.
“All of these errors are so inconsistent with how his Formula 1 career has been.”
