Given the reduced possibility of spending hours in the wind tunnel and the penalty they incurred for breaking the budget cap, Tom Coronel believes that Ferrari and Mercedes have missed a significant opportunity to close the gap on Red Bull. The 10% reduction in wind tunnel hours and the already limited hours available due to last year’s championship order, in fact, haven’t been enough for their rivals to narrow the distance to the Austrians, which has even increased in 2023.
Coronel accuses Ferrari and Mercedes of not taking advantage of Red Bull’s penalty
“The regulations have never been such that the top team has fewer opportunities on paper,” Coronel stated to Motorsport.com. “These regulations should offer opportunities, and the wind tunnel penalty has added to this.”
“With the current rules, to me it’s very clear that Ferrari and Mercedes have missed an opportunity. Additionally, let’s think about Alpine, what are they all doing in recent years?”
On paper, the 2023 championship should have been a much more balanced season, as Red Bull should have suffered the penalty imposed by the FIA for violating the spending cap in the 2021 championship.
Although the penalty was quite lenient, no one would have expected such dominance on the eve of the championship, even more significant than in 2022. After only twelve races, Red Bull has already broken through the 500-point barrier, more than twice that of the second-placed team, Mercedes. Aston Martin and Ferrari are even further behind, trailing by over 300 points.
“At the beginning of the season, everyone wondered ‘how many races will Verstappen win this year?’, but you should have been asking ‘how many won’t he win?'” Coronel added about the absolute dominance of the Dutch superstar. “It’s no longer fun. Sure, it is for us, but not for the others.”
Source: f1ingenerale
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