Red Bull’s chief engineer Paul Monaghan is extremely proud of the team’s major update package for the Hungarian Grand Prix, describing it as “an incredible piece of work” that has been delivered ahead of schedule.
The package introduced at the Hungaroring has a noticeable change to the top of the engine cover, which drops more steeply behind the cockpit than the previous configuration. While this isn’t the biggest performance differentiator of the new part being developed, Monahan says it’s a significant step forward in delivering it ahead of schedule.
“We’ll have to see what happens here, as it has to do with temperature and track characteristics,” Monahan said. “If the lap times are relatively bad, you have to take that into account. But I believe we’ll keep going. Everyone at the factory has done an incredible job, arriving earlier than expected. Hopefully we can make good use of that.
“Based on the data we’ve gathered going into this race, it’s going to be valuable to us. I think we judge it by what everyone else has done, right? We’ve taken the biggest step we can. Will that be enough? We’ll find out on Sunday afternoon. That’s really the assessment of it.”
The endless data hunt continues with Perez’s car in Budapest. Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
Monahan admitted the need to upgrade has become increasingly urgent given the approach taken by rivals, and revealed he plans to continue developing the car throughout the season to maintain Red Bull’s lead in the standings.
“We looked at how quickly we could get this done and this is the fastest opportunity,” he said. “Everyone is close to us so we have to be at the top of our game and this is another small step. The upgrades are for both cars, except for one part, so this is a big statement and I would like to thank everyone who has gotten to this point.
“It doesn’t really matter what changes we make to the car. What matters is whether we can consistently build lap times from it and produce decent qualifying and race performances. So if our changes take us a little bit further away from them, that’s giving us what we all want.
“Is it important to take a step forward? It doesn’t really matter if we can do it quickly enough to defend the championship by the end of the season. Whether it’s this weekend, Spa, Zandvoort, Monza, Baku, Singapore, they’re all important for us. We’ll see big changes there. [this weekend] But I think they all have this character.”
