McLaren’s Stella zeroes in on ‘very interesting’ Red Bull upgrade

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The Miami Grand Prix paddock was awash with upgrades, whispers and lingering glances toward rival garages last weekend – but amid the flood of new parts bolted onto Formula 1’s latest machines, one Red Bull innovation quietly captured the attention of McLaren team boss Andrea Stella.

And it wasn’t the RB22’s headline-grabbing rear wing.

While much of the discussion centred around Red Bull’s striking interpretation of Ferrari’s so-called “Macarena” rear wing concept, Stella revealed another feature of the upgraded machine that had sparked intrigue up and down pit lane: the car’s radically different sidepod design.

A new aero battle emerges

Red Bull arrived in Miami armed with one of the most elaborate upgrade packages of the field, as Formula 1’s leading teams intensified an aerodynamic arms race that is beginning to split the grid into sharply contrasting philosophies.

According to Stella, the sport is entering a fascinating technical phase where no clear blueprint has yet emerged – and Red Bull may have just shifted the conversation again.

“For those who are technically interested, we are in a very, very interesting phase,” Stella told media.

“It is very interesting because if you see the sidepod concept that Red Bull introduced, it is quite different to the sidepod concept that, for instance, Mercedes and Ferrari have adopted, and the McLaren style is further different.

“There will be a stabilisation at some stage, a convergence, but we look like we are quite far from this convergence.”

That lack of convergence is precisely what has heightened the intrigue inside the paddock. Instead of the gradual copycat evolution that often defines mature regulation cycles, Formula 1’s current generation of cars still appears to be encouraging wildly different aerodynamic interpretations.

And Stella made clear that Red Bull’s latest concept will not go unnoticed.

“So I think there will be a process of looking at each other, testing things and certainly each team will be testing, taking a look at the Red Bull concept to see the advantages,” the Italian added.

Red Bull’s “smart and innovative” move

What particularly caught Stella’s attention was the manner in which Red Bull engineered the update within the regulations.

While teams constantly search for loopholes and grey areas to unlock extra performance, Stella hinted that Red Bull may have found an especially clever route with its revised geometry.

“They have been quite smart and innovative in the way they have used some legality concessions to introduce such geometry,” he said.

The comments are likely to fuel even more curiosity among rival engineers.

For now, Stella believes Formula 1 remains far from reaching a settled aerodynamic template – a striking contrast to the final years of the previous regulations, when the grid slowly evolved toward near-identical concepts.

“I think the overall designs of the cars are far from converging,” explained the McLaren chief.

“This doesn't mean that some things have already started to look like: 'Oh, that is the direction everyone has taken', but with the 2025 cars, after a few years of the regulations, they started to look very similar to each other.

“I think we are still far from these conditions.”

And that uncertainty may be exactly what makes this chapter of Formula 1’s technical war so compelling. In Miami, Red Bull may not only have unveiled an upgrade package – it may have revealed the next battleground.

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Michael Delaney