Formula 1 team bosses are hoping for FIA clarification over the strengthening alliance between Red Bull and its sister team RB.
A poor start to the 2023 season for AlphaTauri saw Red Bull confirm that the Faenza squad would benefit from a closer technical relationship with the parent team.
A late development push saw AlphaTauri climb from 10th in the Constructors’ championship to an eighth-place finish following the implementation of Red Bull components in preparation for 2024.
Over the winter break, McLaren CEO Zak Brown has been particularly vocal with his concerns regarding the alliance between the two Red Bull squads.
However, Brown insists that the issue lies more with Formula 1 regulations as opposed to fears of cheating and foul play.
“I think, first of all, Red Bull’s been awesome for Formula One. I think Formula One’s been awesome for Red Bull, so there’s absolutely no issues there,” Brown said during Thursday’s press conference in Bahrain.
“They hold Grands Prix for us. They have two fantastic teams. But I think the sport has moved on in this budget cap era. I don’t think we can go ‘Well, this happened 15 years ago’ and therefore there should be a different playing field because of the rules.
“My issue is the rules,” Brown continued. “When you have sharing of facilities, you watch on Netflix that the Red Bull team principal is making a decision on the driver that’s going in the AlphaTauri.
“When you hear Helmut [Marko] saying we’re going to do everything we can within the rules to bring the two together. When you hear their CEO say we need to use their suspension because that’s the second most important part of the racing car.
“That doesn’t strike me as being independent at all. I’m much more interested in the independence of the 10 teams than the actual co-ownership itself, even though you do get into things around governance and voting.
Hinting at Red Bull’s attempt to fast-track the RB junior team up the competitive order, Brown, who joined a struggling McLaren ahead of the 2017 season added: “We’ve come from ninth in the championship when we started and losing a tremendous amount of money to nine podiums last year and being a profitable business for our shareholders.
“It hasn’t been simple, but we’ve done it through hard work.
“I think in sports and in any other sport, if you’re in football and there’s the best team and one that’s struggling, the game doesn’t start one-nil, it starts nil-nil. And then you gotta work a little bit harder.”
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff weighed in on the discussion, adding that while Red Bull has cultivated a legacy in the sport’s modern era, he still questions whether current regulations are stringent enough to protect the entire grid from certain loopholes that Red Bull may benefit from.
“I think there is a legacy situation with Red Bull that we the sport owe them a lot to have two teams to finance them. They have a great junior program, attract and add lots of brand value. And so they’re not like any other smaller team,” said Wolff.
“But on the other side, we are a constructors’ sport. And I believe, since shareholding, same location, share of facilities, it’s clear that some ambiguity is always going to be left with competitors.
“Are the regulations robust enough? Are they policed well enough for us to be to feel in a safe place? Are we seeing some potential loopholes and what is it we need for 2026? And I think that is the main question.”
The Mercedes boss rejected comparisons drawn between the RB and Red Bull alliance and that of Haas and Ferrari.
“There is more boxes that are being ticked, because with Haas we have an organisation that couldn’t be standing on its own feet when it’s with its own staff,” Wolff continued.
“It’s clear that they are a client of the Ferrari infrastructure. But I don’t think that Ferrari would ever, you know, see great benefit, and sorry for Haas, in utilizing or in extrapolating any information.
“If you are in the same place with the same management with the same structures, that there are reasons why people are being sceptical and I think that’s what needs to be safeguarded.
“It’s if one guy takes all the decisions or a small group of people for two teams, what does it mean for our good governance in the sport?” Wolff questioned.
“You have to vote in a 10 in a 10 group F1 commission. No, you already have 20% of the votes. And none of us has that. I know there’s the argument always, ‘Yeah, well, Williams is gonna vote like you’, but look at the stats. That’s not the case.
“Certainly not the case for everything that is chassis related. I haven’t seen any different voting on chassis-related topic or any other voting between AlphaTauri and Red Bull. Because it’s one person that probably decides what the vote is.”
Addressing the technical relationship between Red Bull and RB, Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur posited: “You could imagine having a collaboration even if you are not owned by the same ultimate company.
“At the end, this is possible. There is a clear cut into the regulation, and it’s up to the FIA to decide if it’s white or black.
“I think we also have to avoid being arrogant and to remind ourselves that at some stage a couple of years ago, some teams were not able to produce parts on the vote side and the governance side.
“It’s true that it’s a bit unbalanced to have someone with two votes compared to the other teams that when you know that you need to have the supermajority on some decision and you need to have eight votes it means that you are almost there to block the decision.”
