Ferrari and McLaren have ruled out wanting the FIA to intervene with rule changes to stem Red Bull’s current dominance in Formula 1.
Having won 10 of the last 11 races last year, Red Bull has extended its competitive margin over the competition to storm to victory in all 14 rounds to be held to this point in 2023.
The Austrian outfit has already surpassed the previous record for the most consecutive wins in F1 history, prompting Charles Leclerc to express doubts about the team being caught during this regulation cycle.
Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton declared last week that the FIA introduced several changes during Mercedes’ title-winning years with the sole intention of slowing it down.
However, Red Bull Team Principal Christian Horner is not concerned about the sport’s governing body stepping in to reduce the reigning champion’s advantage anytime soon, adding that he still expects the entire grid to converge under the current rules set.
“Well, look, regulations are pretty stable,” Horner began. “We have three sets of regulations now: Technical, Sporting and Financial. The Technical and Sporting playing fields seem to be reasonably content. The Financial one, there seems to be a little bit of manoeuvring now and again on.
“But I think that regulations are stable for the next couple of years.
“And we fully expect our competitors… I mean, look at the jump that McLaren made recently. We fully expect there to be convergence, you know, even this year, before we head into 2024.
“I’m not aware of any draconian, significant regulation changes in the pipeline. We have that already for 2026, which will be a complete reset.”
The Red Bull chief has also rebuffed complaints about the racing product, citing the Dutch Grand Prix setting a new benchmark for the most ever overtakes in a single race as evidence that races have been entertaining despite one team dominating.
“Despite the fact that we’ve done a lot of winning this year, a lot of the races, including the last race, [have been] pretty entertaining. Or certainly, from where we were sitting, [Zandvoort] was,” he added.
“So yeah, I don’t think that the sport is lacking entertainment at this point in time.”
Whilst the Red Bull RB19 is yet to be defeated over a race distance, the order behind the Milton-Keynes-based squad has continuously changed throughout the year.
Both Ferrari and McLaren, courtesy of a mid-season resurgence, have taken turns to finish second on a Sunday in 2023 to Max Verstappen, who secured a record-breaking 10th consecutive victory last Sunday.
But both side’s respective team bosses claim they are against any rule changes being introduced with the entire aim of disrupting Red Bull’s relentless record run.
Asked if he would support a tweak to the regulations targeted specifically at hindering Red Bull’s competitiveness, Ferrari Team Principal Frederic Vasseur responded: “I’m not a big fan of the balance of performance or any kind of artifice like this, it’s not the DNA at all of Formula 1.
“And on the top, we have already the wind tunnel allocation, with a kind of balance, not balance of performance but balance of allocation and it’s enough.”
McLaren’s Andrea Stella added: “Yeah, I agree. We don’t want to have any help. We want to close the gap by our own means. And we like this challenge. And that’s what we want for the next couple of years.”
