Red Bull team principal Christian Horner says his team is in a “shitty” position after the Chinese Grand Prix, but vows to regroup with power unit supplier Renault in an effort to come back stronger.
The Milton Keynes-based outfit experienced another tough weekend in Shanghai as poor reliability hampered its progress.
Daniel Ricciardo was forced to switch to its third ICE out of the allocated four after Saturday’s qualifying, while team-mate Daniil Kvyat succumbed to an engine problem during the race.
To make matters worse, the Australian’s anti-stall system kicked in at the start, which dropped his RB11 down to 17th place on the opening lap. From there, Ricciardo was able to scrap his way back to ninth and salvage a couple of points.
Although early struggles in Australia led to rapid deterioration in the Red Bull-Renault relations with both partners threatening to eventually quit F1, they appear willing to come together after China in a bid to exit their current morass .
“The solution is we get our heads down,” said Horner. “We work hard. From Red Bull's point of view, we'll offer as much support in the relevant areas as we can
“It's a shitty position to be but we've just got to engineer our way out of it.
“Viry has got a long history of success in Formula 1 and they've still got some very capable people there.
“As Ferrari has demonstrated, things can be turned around pretty quickly when you've got a clear direction and a clear focus. Whatever we can do from our side, because we are reliant on each other, in order to assist Renault understand their current issues, there's no bigger priority.”
Renault’s reliability woes weren't limited to Red Bull in Shanghai with Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen also suffering an ICE failure four laps from the end of the Chinese Grand Prix.
Renault Sport F1 managing director Cyril Abiteboul is equally determined to come out of the doldrums through increased cooperation with the supplied teams.
“We've just got to analyse what happened a little bit,” he said. “It looks like the two issues are similar. We need to have a clear understanding.
“(Red Bull) is a team that wants to be extremely successful, they are relentless in their quest for success so we understand that and we understand their frustration.
“We are a supplier, but it doesn’t change the fact we are racers and racing people, so we are extremely frustrated. I think it is about understanding each other’s philosophy and issues and supporting each other, rather than dragging down each other.
“We will not surrender. We are in this together and we will hopefully fight back.”
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