Red Bull boss Christian Horner has outlined that McLaren’s main strength over Red Bull across recent Formula 1 races is having a car that boasts a “broader window”.
McLaren has emerged as Red Bull’s most consistent contender since introducing an update package in Miami that inspired Lando Norris to claim his maiden F1 win.
But while it rued several near misses since that breakthrough triumph, the Woking-based squad’s MCL38 dominated in Budapest to seize a first 1-2 result since 2021.
Meanwhile, Max Verstappen was complaining about the balance on his RB20 car throughout an eventful event at the Hungaroring which saw him come home in fifth.
Horner has acknowledged that McLaren being competitive across multiple circuit configurations demonstrates that it retains a more versatile machine than Red Bull.
“I think their car is in a better window than ours at the moment, it’s perhaps easier or a broader window,” Horner assessed.
“Our window seems to be very peaky, and that’s what’s making it difficult for the engineers difficult for the drivers.
“I think we have to take the balance of the car and make that window broader as it’s so critical on temperature and all the relevant factors.
“And I think that’s something that the team are very aware of and working very hard on.”
McLaren capitalising on a front row lockout to land a 43-point haul ensured that it capitalised on Red Bull’s woes to reduce the gap in the championship to 51 points.
“McLaren obviously have a lot of pace at the moment, they had a big score today, and we need to start scoring big points from next weekend onwards,” Horner added.
Red Bull’s third consecutive race without winning was more damaging as it held hopes that accelerated developments would cement its return to the benchmark side.
But although Horner has insisted that Red Bull still has further potential to extract from the RB20, he cited it could be dependent on widening the car’s operating range.
“I think we’ve got more performance to bring, so as I say I think we need to expand that operating window for the car,” he expanded.
“So when the car is in the right window, it qualifies on pole by four-tenths in Austria, and then here we missed the pole by less than a tenth.
“But you can see when you listen to the driver, particularly Max, he’s got limitations in the car that he knows is where the performance.
“The trick is how you translate those issues into solutions, engineering-wise and aerodynamically.”
Horner’s spat with Verstappen’s father, Jos, looks to have subsided as the pair were seen in talks, with the former having clarified the entire team is fixated on the title.
“I think everything is focused on going racing, we have a tight championship battle, you can see that,” Horner explained.
“I think everybody in the team is focused on making sure all the energy is going into optimising our performance as a team, developing the car, getting the most out of race weekends.”
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