Horner pinpoints problem after Belgium GP: 'This has become more difficult'

George Russell surprised friend and foe by successfully opting for a one-stop strategy at the Belgium GP. That strategy was not on the radar of any other Formula 1 team, including Red Bull. "I don't think anybody had a crystal ball that the one-stop was going to be the strategy that worked out," Horner began in conversation with GPblog and others. "I don't think George set off in that race expecting to do a one-stop"

"was a strange race because all the data from Friday pointed towards graining, high deg, the new surface here, and it was actually, whether it's due to the temperature or whatever, it was actually the complete inverse where a one-stop won the race," continued the 50-year-old Briton. " I don't think anybody could have envisaged that, but I thought Max did a good job today going from 11th to 5th, finishing ahead of his nearest championship rival who started 4th and only 7 seconds from the leader."

Horner pinpoints problem after Belgium GP

Horner also notes that overtaking has become a lot more difficult at Spa-Francorchamps. "I think so, and I think shortening that DRS, actually on the last lap I think we were quite grateful for it, but it made overtaking much harder. I think those 75 metres on the run up to Turn 5 was definitely, you could see there wasn't a lot of overtaking going on today."

As Max Verstappen noted, Horner also saw that Mercedes performed significantly better than expected during the F1 race. "Mercedes looked out of it on Friday, and then their race pace looked very good today. So I think the big unknown is the tyres, different conditions, the different track surface, and new asphalt. I don't think anybody's race plot would have predicted that today, or simulations," Horner continued.

Although no Red Bull driver managed to reach the podium, Horner is not dissatisfied given Verstappen's catch-up race, who still finished fourth thanks to Russell's disqualification. "But to start 11th, finish fifth, seven seconds from the leader, and we never really got to run in clean air, we were always in dirty air. If we'd have started on the pole, potentially we could have won it. But we've got that engine penalty in the bag now, which puts us in a better place for after the break.," the team boss concluded.

This article was written in collaboration with Olly Darcy