Red Bull boss Christian Horner has praised McLaren’s “truly impressive” pace at the Austrian Grand Prix, describing it as something that no other team will be able to match this year.
McLaren drivers, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, dominated the race in Austria, staging an exciting battle for the victory. Norris led for the first 20 laps, with Piastri hot on his heels.
What is truly impressive, and for me I don’t see any other team capable of doing it, is when you observe how close Oscar can run behind Lando with a car full of fuel at the beginning of the race.
Christian Horner
Horner highlighted McLaren’s ability to protect their tires and maintain a good balance, something that, according to him, gives them a significant advantage. “I don’t see any other car that can follow so closely without damaging the front or rear tires. I really don’t understand it,” he added.Although Red Bull is far behind in the constructors’ championship, Max Verstappen seemed like a contender in the race.
The home race was difficult for Red Bull. Verstappen was taken out by Kimi Antonelli of Mercedes on the first lap, while Yuki Tsunoda struggled, finishing in sixteenth position.
“Well, it was a home race to forget,” Horner commented. “We were unlucky with the yellow flag in qualifying, which put us in a tricky position, and Kimi simply lost control spectacularly at Turn 3. Max had already passed the corner and was regaining power, and he was taken out. It was an unfortunate mistake by Kimi, he apologized to Max, but for us it ruined the afternoon.”
Charles Leclerc of Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton took third and fourth place, with Mercedes’ George Russell in a distant fifth place, but Horner believes Verstappen would have been in the fight for the last podium spot if he had stayed in the race.
“I think we would have had the pace to compete hard with the Ferraris today. George had no pace at all. When you’re out at Turn Three, there’s not much you can do about it. We just need to see what damage there is, hopefully it’s not too bad in terms of the amount of parts and so on for Silverstone.”
“McLaren, you can see how they are competing with each other, they have an advantage over the rest of the field. For us, we only focus on one race at a time. So we don’t even think about the championships.”
