Red Bull Team Principal Christian Horner has described Ferrari’s pace as “enormously impressive” in the wake of the squad’s Bahrain Grand Prix display.
Ferrari finished 1-2 in each of the three practice sessions, locked out the front-row of the grid and held the fastest package in race trim.
A spin for Sebastian Vettel and a cylinder failure on Charles Leclerc’s car prevented Ferrari from climbing atop the podium, but Horner was nonetheless left impressed.
“Ferrari were very strong at the weekend,” said Horner.
“Mercedes have got lucky with a one-two. Ferrari were the dominant team [in Bahrain]
“It looked like they selected another gear. It was enormously impressive, their straight-line performance.”
Horner nonetheless believes Red Bull, which struggled for performance in Bahrain, has substantial gains to unearth with its RB15.
“I think we need to find more performance,” he said.
“So trying to understand where we are, the strengths and weaknesses to Ferrari is quite important.
“You can see; once you get in the window, particularly with these tyres, they looked like a different team to two different weeks ago and vice versa with Mercedes so it’s just understanding what the magic is.
“We’ve got more to sort out on the chassis side, the engine is continuing to make good progress so our focus is on understanding the tyre issues and get the car into a good operating window.”
Max Verstappen took fourth in Bahrain while Pierre Gasly classified eighth.
Red Bull holds third spot in the Constructors’ Championship.
