Red Bull Furious: Mercedes Engine Upgrade Again? 😨

Alright guys, welcome back to Formula 1 News. The FIA have officially revealed the engine figures from the second and duo period of the season, and the results are exactly what Red Bull did not want to see. Once again, they are considered to have the best ICE on the grid, despite Toto Wolff a couple of weeks ago saying that the best power unit most certainly belongs to Mercedes. Is this rigged? Is this some crazy corruption? What is going on behind the scenes to allow this to be possible? But Ferrari, still despite some recent engine upgrades, still find themselves in the position that more is yet to come. Very much looking forward to your thoughts in the comments. Hit the like button if you enjoy, subscribe if you're new as always. Apologies for not doing this video last night, it was a long travel day, but I thought I'd get it out this morning because there's plenty to talk about here. Real Madrid are the official sponsor for the Spanish Grand Prix, it's at the Madring. We do have a couple of images to share of the circuit, so this is the bit at the end of the lap. It's basically Sochi, isn't it, right? As far as I can tell, it's basically Sochi. This is some overhead footage of the Formula 3 cars that have been doing some testing there over the last couple of days. This corner to me is ripe for a crash. We're going to see somebody in this barrier here. You guys can't quite see it because of the screen, but this right-hander, especially because of the curve there that you could potentially bump over, there's going to be somebody in that wall on the outside. There's going to be a lot of people in a lot of walls, I think, on this circuit. I've given my opinion on it. I'm going to lay off the criticism, at least until we see the race for now, and just say, you know what, let's just see what it brings when we actually get there. What I can say is that this is what the drivers said. So apparently the drivers that were doing the F3 tests said that they need to be really careful because they've got a race next week. Very dirty track, very little grip, fast sectors, several blind spots, and we did see, as a result of this, over the couple of days of testing that they've now done, 19 red flags, which is a lot. Now, yes, there are caveats here. New circuit, dusty conditions, dirty track, all these other factors, right, and, you know, junior drivers, right? So there's lots of reasons to expect red flags. The circuit's also brand new, so there'll be red flags for other reasons as well, and you've got younger drivers who are going to crash. But still, right, two days of testing, 19 red flags, it's kind of a lot, and you can see the list of these red flags here, at least some of them. Contact with the barriers, found the barriers, found the barriers, found the barriers, another red flag, contact of the wall at turn 10, contact with the wall at turn 5, contact with the wall at turn 11, lost his front wing at turn 7, hit turn 14, hit turn 7, hit the barriers at turn 3. You know, this is only within a few hours of the test, right? So, you know, usually you wouldn't expect to see quite this many, but 10 drivers hit the barriers, so not ideal, and 19 red flags overall. The other drama, actually, was due to this. So the local residents are frustrated about the noise. Now, unfortunately for them, at least, they didn't exactly vote for this, it is what it is, like the council decided, the local government decided this is what we're going to do, so that's how it is, right? So I guess they have to put up with it for the time that there's going to be racing there. I will say, Formula 3 cars are actually really loud, like the downshifting especially, but they, well, anyway, they measured some of the decibel levels locally to the circuit, it's 108 up to decibels, so now, of course, the decibel scale is a logarithmic scale, so in terms of the permitted noise limit, that's not, you know, it's not like 50 percent over the noise limit, it's 27 times the permitted noise limit, which is, of course, so, you know, the local residents are going to complain to the government, the government are going to say, well, unlucky because we chose to do this, so we are not going to punish ourselves. Regardless, the drama around that circuit and the Grand Prix does continue to some extent. We go there in a couple of weeks to see how it goes for real. Start of next season, unclear. It's becoming increasingly probable that this season is going to end in Imola, with no Qatar and no Abu Dhabi, and if that does happen, then, of course, it also allows the possibility that next season, is it going to start, you know, can it start in the Middle East? What does that look like? Some rumors that actually China could end up as the season opener, and it would then go, because currently it's like plan A is Bahrain, Jeddah, Australia, Japan, China, so going back to a Bahrain season start, but next year's calendar, we're in August, it's not been confirmed yet, we don't know what's happening, but the other option apparently is then to say, okay, no Bahrain, no Jeddah, but swap around the start of the season to not start in Australia, but start in China instead, and then go China, Japan, Australia. So, like, I don't know what's going to happen, but that would be kind of interesting if the season starts there. Couple of updates, Aston Martin, apparently their Hungary package reduced the weight of their car by 14 kilograms. There's still more potential to extract, there's still more weight to take out of that car. We'll get back to their engine though in a second, because a big bomb arrives that apparently Toto, Wolf and Laurence Stroll have been at least having conversations about what they can do about a Mercedes engine. So Toto was apparently spotted in the Aston Martin motorhome in Zandvoort, and he was also spotted there in Barcelona, so it's a conversation that's being had. Of course, Aston Martin are going to put some pressure on Honda to deliver a better engine. If they can't, will Mercedes supply another one, because, I mean, look, Mercedes have a lot of customers. They let Aston Martin go, but they brought on Alpine, so they still have McLaren, Williams and Alpine. Could they bring in another? I guess they could, I don't think there's anything necessarily to stop them, but would they want to do that? Aston Martin, it's an interesting spot though, especially in Zandvoort, because the start of the season there were many conversations, oh wow, McLaren are not able to extract the same out of this Mercedes power unit that Mercedes are. Maybe this generation is more complicated, maybe the team's just going to have a real disadvantage as a customer team in this set of regulations compared to the previous, given that the turbo hybrid era was 11 years deep really when McLaren started to win. But actually, the last couple of races, McLaren have started to win, and the reason why they were far behind, we think, is because they just put so much into the end of last season that they were inevitably going to be roughly three months behind in their development curve. They've now made serious progress with their chassis, their engine is, well, it's the same as the Mercedes engine, but they're able to basically have the same performance as Mercedes. They've definitely closed that knowledge gap as the season has gone on. You know, Mercedes weren't very helpful telling them how to use their engine, but they figured it out and now they're pretty much where they need to be. So I think Aston Martin have probably seen that and thought, well, you know, is it impossible that we win a championship with a Mercedes engine? Of course, we'd love to do so as a works team, probably with Honda, but if Honda can't deliver, then what are you going to do? Because, look, the chassis of the Aston Martin is pretty good, right? Like, this is going to go down as one of, if not, Newey's worst ever cars. A lot of that, again, is on the engine, because if you watch the Zandvoort Grand Prix from, like, Alonso's onboard, the chassis is getting there. The chassis is definitely getting there. It's probably at worst a midfield chassis, probably on par with Racing Bulls and, you know, teams like that. But it's just not got the engine, right? So, you know, that's where they are right now. There's also talk about the V8s, what happens next, because, again, Aston Martin, they might think, well, do we even need Honda? We've only got a couple of years left of these regulations. So, and then maybe when the V8s come around, they could even make their own. You know, they're going to be more simple in terms of architecture. I wouldn't say that's impossible. So, anyway, Bencillian wants a V8 engine that sounds good and a smaller battery. He says, as a purist, I like it. I can't stand the cars accelerating for 10 seconds before the start. The other thing to say is Hadjar's injury. Apparently, he is confident that his wrist is better. He's optimistic about his return to Monza. He's going to have some medical examinations this week. To be honest, I would like to see Lawson get another go just to get a bigger sample size and get to see him actually over a race distance against Max to see how that would go. They don't want to rush his return, however, and they're not really needing to. It's not like the championship is determinant on it. It's not like they need Hadjar because they need the points. They are where they are in the championship. They're going to be behind the top dogs. They're going to be ahead of the rest. They're going to be fourth. It's very unlikely that anything else happens there. Verstappen isn't in the title fight, so it's not like you need to bang a teammate to back him up or something. So, you know, it doesn't really matter. I think as far as Red Bull are concerned, I wouldn't mind saying, look, just take another week out. We'll give Lawson another go. It might be in Red Bull's best interest to do that, but it might not be in Hadjar's best interest, of course, as well. The other thing to say, because it's been complete chaos, is on Monaco. I can't believe we're still talking about Monaco. It's been two and a half months since Monaco, and yet we're still yapping about the pit lane speeding like absolute fast. Let's just call it that. So we have a decision expected kind of soon. McLaren, to their credit, especially given that people still talk about this, and I think understandably, that Mercedes after the events of 2021 did not try especially hard to protest, although they may have had a more compelling case, especially with some of the events in hindsight that they decided to explore. Regardless, what I will give credit to McLaren for is that at least they've given it a go. They're saying that it's unfair that Gasly's two five-second penalties were removed, and that screwed up the order. Piastri lost points. Of course, Hadjar was the man who stood on that podium. Gasly then received the podium in hindsight, but Piastri also lost out, as, of course, did George Russell big time. But, you know, that's something that you can't really resolve because he took a pit stop and they messed it up, and the penalty and the drive-through and, you know, complete shambles, right? That affected George pretty badly. So not something easy to resolve, but I think the FIA, I wouldn't say they made a mistake. What I'm trying to say is that they admitted fault. They admitted that they had measured the pit lane distance wrong, and therefore it was throwing up erroneous errors, and they also admitted that they were aware of this, but the stewards were not properly informed. So, like, the FIA literally said we cocked up badly, and I think that's what's given McLaren the feeling that they can make a case here to say, well, this was just gross negligence at the highest order, something has to be done. And they wouldn't be wrong, and I think the effort, you know, they should pursue this, right, just to see where it goes. But we're not expecting a verdict for at least a couple of weeks on that. Now, Nikola Solov, potential Red Bull future driver, certainly Racing Bull's future driver, is currently doing a great job in Formula 2. He's testing at Imola today in the old, I think it's going to be the old Racing Bulls anyway. In fact, we see him on the track here, so we can see if it can't be this year's Racing Bulls. So, yeah, here you go, last year's car. So, anyway, doing some testing around Imola. This is Solov today doing some laps. We might end up talking about his lap times or something later on today or tomorrow, depending on what happens next. There's a lot of talk about Rafa Camara, so there's a lot of testing going on right now before Monza. We've seen the one in Imola. There's a Pirelli tyre test that the McLaren boys were doing. There's also Camara at Mugello with a test with Haas. So, Rafa Camara, it's Camara, Fornaroli, among others, that want to get off on seats, basically. So, that's what's happening over there. This, by the way, is a concept livery for what we think could be a potential Ferrari special livery for the Monza Grand Prix based on the, I think, the 96 Ferrari is what they're talking about when Schumacher joined the team. Let's, though, talk about some of the drama with Ferrari, but also with Mercedes. So, engine drama is rife, especially we go to Monza. We then go to Baku. Antonelli's taken a grid penalty in Monza. I think that George Russell's going to take a grid penalty in Baku, right? So, engines, they had some failures earlier on in the season. Now that's coming back to bite Mercedes. They're going to do so on circuits where overtaking is absolutely possible, of course, and very much engine-dominated circuits. If there's any time of the year for now is the time, and the FIA published the results of the first two Aduo periods. So, you guys might remember after Monaco, but I think it was after really like around the Canada time anyway, there was discussion about the Aduo, the additional development and upgrade opportunities. They measure this on occasions, like three occasions per year. It was meant to be after like six races, after 12, and then after 18 races. So, those three periods in the season, they measure the performance of the engines. And based on that, they then say, okay, if you are X percent, well, if you're 2% behind, you get one upgrade this year, one upgrade next year, and a bit of money to spend. If you're 4% behind, you get two upgrades this year, two upgrades next year, and even more money to spend. And if you're worse than 4%, it's still two and two, but the money goes up, the testing goes up. So, Honda, we think are nearly eight, 9% behind. So, they get an awful lot more. Now it's worth noting, of course, this is based purely on the ICE, on the internal combustion engine, and this is the political battlegrounds that Red Bull have lost. So, the FIA confirm Mercedes will be allowed one additional PU homologation in 2026 and another one next year. Audi, Ferrari, and Honda will be allowed two additional homologations as a result of the first two periods analysis. So, worth suggesting here that this can change over time. If you catch up to the leader, then this reduces, this gets eliminated, and then, obviously, you get the advantage, but, you know, this will not be a thing anymore. So, you don't just keep getting it forever. That's why they do the periods. The third AGUO review period will cover races 12 to 18 from the Netherlands to Mexico City. So, after Mexico, they will do this again, and they will tell us where we are then, and then we will see how that shapes up. Now, I think the clever thing, arguably, that Mercedes have done with this, because it's now official. So, Red Bull aren't very happy about this, and, oh my god, if Christian Horner was still in charge, oh wow, I couldn't imagine the interviews. Every day he'd be talking to the press about how outrageous this is. Lauren McKeese and Red Bull now, I don't know, they're obviously not the same team they used to be. Red Bull used to be just win at all costs. Do we need more catering? Sure, win at all costs. Break the cost cap. Who cares? We'll deal with it after the season. That's the way that Red Bull were, and I think that's the way that some of Red Bull still are. Certainly, that's how Max Verstappen is, and some of Red Bull, I think I would also argue that is true. But, you know, they've lost this war. Now, okay, first of all, is it impressive that they've made the best ICE? Yes, congratulations, but that's not the whole picture. This also includes the battery, but also it includes how the engine and the ICE relates to the battery. If you guys have not heard me yap about this before, I'll just make it clear again. Our understanding as to why Mercedes-Benz have a weaker ICE but a stronger overall power unit is that they designed their engine with this in mind. They designed their ICE such that it would be strong in the rev ranges that are maximally important to recharging the battery, which Red Bull, Red Bull and Ford were like, okay, well, we're going to have a tough time. Let's build the most powerful engine we can. And they're basing their analysis, the FIA, and look, the teams all knew this. So while it might be ridiculous, it was clear in the regulations and some teams, and I think Ferrari as well, knew what they were doing here so they could get the potential upgrade benefit. Anyway, the point is that Mercedes, their engine in terms of peak power output is probably 2% off Red Bull's. Red Bull has the best peak output, but that's not really the relevant number. The relevant number is the efficiency of the ICE and also where it delivers that power. So Red Bull have complained and they've been like, this is ridiculous, this can't be true. But the FIA is saying, look, we told you how we were going to measure it and based on these measurement characteristics, you know, they've got you, right? Mercedes and I think Ferrari as well, they made engine architecture decisions, right? They made this decision to go for the steel cylinder heads and to run their engine at a much hotter temperature, which limits their power outputs. But it means they require less cooling. It means that their chassis can be better designed. And it's like Ferrari, I think, have also played a similar political masterclass here, really, where like, yes, their engine is weaker and they need upgrades. And we'll see that in due course. And they did mess up with their engine. We know that Wolf Zimmerman was in charge of making this engine project, which kept blowing up on the test bench and therefore they had to divert and go down a different idea. So I don't think Ferrari have like played some 4D chess strategy, but I think they were kind of forced into this corner. And once they realised they were, they realised they had an opportunity here to make what was still going to be a great car and then open the door to getting the Agio, which is what they've got. I think for Ferrari, what's the surprise is that Mercedes have still got something and Red Bull are technically the best, but we know that they aren't really. Now, I think what's interesting about this is that Mercedes had the opportunity to bring an upgrade as did Ferrari, right? So Ferrari brought an upgrade, an engine upgrade to Austria. That was their Agio 1 homologation, but yet they are still in the 4% category. So that's like the things I've just mentioned, I've said before, this is the new piece that this is based on period two as well. And Ferrari are still over 4% behind. So that means their benefit and their money basically will continue to roll on. So they've brought their first upgrades, it's improved things, but not enough to take them over the 4% limit as we understand. When they bring their second upgrade, which we think is G for Monza, then I expect that by the time we get to Mexico, Ferrari probably will not be in the 4% club anymore. That's going to change. And I think also this might be the reason why Mercedes have not brought their upgrade. They could have done, they have the ability to, they could have done what Ferrari did and bring a new engine, but it doesn't look like they're going to do that. They maybe find more value in just living in the 2% club and saying, okay, we get a bit more money. We get the opportunity to do this when we want and we'll do it when we like. And we'll stay in the 2% club while we're still winning. Cause why would Mercedes need to bring a new engine here? They can, but they can buy their time. They can, they can sit in that 2% range and just enjoy the benefits. Like they have the car to deploy when they want to, right? But they're not necessarily using that Joker just yet. So it is very interesting. Honda apparently are just a way behind. I know it does say 4% plus here, but um, you know, the reality is it's way more than that. Apparently they're 70 horsepower behind the best engine on the grid. It delivered 17 additional horsepower of the 30 that were promised, but apparently that handling was worse. So yeah, not exactly great. Apparently Ferrari say that Honda are not going to be anywhere close to anyone else in 2027. It's going to take at least two years to recover. So maybe that adds more fuel to the fire of those conversations we talked about slightly earlier on, but I'm like the FAA say that we checked it. Red Bull were complaining. Like we know that Red Bull said, Hey, this can't be right. Can you check the numbers again? But the FAA say, look, we've got a high level of confidence in our findings, what we tested and what happens is true based on the way that we said we were going to test it. So look, it's, it's still outrageous, right? Don't get me wrong. It's still outrageous. The fact that Mercedes had the best power unit by their own admission, Toto Wolf literally said it a couple of weeks ago, we have the best power unit and yet they still have an upgrade opportunity is outrageous. But unfortunately that is the rule set that we are living in right now. And Red Bull are not very happy about it. And I can understand why, but does it mean there's some, you know, the numbers are rigged as some sort of corruption. I think there's a more innocent explanation than that, but very much into your thoughts on all this stuff in a comment section below, hit the like button. If you enjoyed subscribe, if you're new, take care and I'll see you next time.