Red Bull will alter their pitstop procedure in Monaco to ensure Ferrari cannot copy their strategy, like they did with Fernando Alonso in Spain.
The recent revelations that Ferrari are spying or hacking into the Milton Keynes based outfit’s radio line, according to Helmut Marko, have led to the team revising their pitstop preparation in an attempt to confuse others.
During the Spanish GP, Alonso was called in to the pits at exactly the same time as Mark Webber, though at a later stop, Red Bull’s pitwall played a dummy by calling the Australian in, but secretly informing him to stay on track.
Ferrari fell for the dummy and called the Spaniard in, according to team principal Christian Horner.
“Pitstops are all part of the game and Ferrari’s only way to beat Mark was to cover him in the pitstops,” he is quoted as saying by Autosport on Wednesday.
“They saw something we were doing that was giving away when we were going to stop, and would call Fernando in – because it couldn’t be coincidence that he just happened to stop every time that we called Mark in. That is within the regulations.
“In the end, we made a dummy call. Fernando came in and Mark stayed out, but unfortunately by that time, he had lost so much time to Jenson [Button] and Lewis [Hamilton] that the podium was not possible.”
In a bid to stop such an occurrence in future, Red Bull will make changes to ensure other teams cannot preempt their stops.
“It is all part of the game and all part of being a team sport – it is only like a dummy pass in a rugby match or any other sporting activity.
“That is why we have changed our procedures this weekend,” he added. “I don’t know if mechanics were putting their hands in their pockets at the wrong time, or it was someone picking a tyre up.
“But anyway, we have changed our procedures this weekend to be less transparent.”
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