Advantage Ferrari as This ‘Self-Inflicted’ Problem Could Come Back to Haunt Red Bull at Azerbaijan GP

The Azerbaijan Grand Prix always serves up something different whenever F1 races there. It is a high-speed street circuit with a very long start-finish straight which will favor cars with good straight-line speeds and top speed. But championship leaders Red Bull are careful, heading into Baku this weekend.

Red Bull Chief Engineer Paul Monaghan mentioned the DRS issue they faced is resolved going into the race. The Austrian team faced an issue with their DRS flap throughout the whole Spanish GP weekend, which caused a lot of frustration for Max Verstappen.

Will the DRS flap be an issue for Red Bull F1 in Baku?

Since Baku is a high-speed track, teams often go for a low-downforce setup despite it being a street circuit. So DRS plays a huge role around the track and having an issue with the flap will cost teams a lot of time. But Monaghan hopes that the fixed DRS flap will work in Baku.

“Our DRS problem was self-inflicted, I think if we are honest, so now we’ve learned our rather painful lessons,” said the engineer.

“Baku presents slightly different problems. Your opening speed is 160km/h [in Monaco], in Baku it is 300km/h. So, it’s not really about weight on the flap, it is lifting it up against its own aero load.”

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“I think it would be foolish to rest on our laurels. We know what we did wrong. It was in our remit to fix it, so thus far, we’re okay,” said the Red Bull engineer.

Red Bull does have a straight-line advantage over their rival Ferrari this season. This could prove pivotal at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix this weekend and it also makes them the favorites to take the race win.

Can the Austrian team get back-to-back wins in Baku in 2022?

Red Bull were able to win the 2021 courtesy of Sergio Perez taking the lead in the dying moments of the race. But this season they already head into the weekend as favorites looking at their current form and the 2022 car.

They could very well end up dominating the weekend and extending their championship lead over Ferrari even more. If they did win in Baku this weekend, it would be their 5th consecutive race win this season.

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But it would be interesting to see which of the Red Bull drivers will get a favorable strategy from the team during the race. Hopefully, they could get another 1-2 this season without any rigid team orders.