F1: Cost Cap breach hurting Red Bull, but Horner likes Cost Cap

Red Bull’s Christian Horner says 2023 car development is already hurting at his team due to its cost cap punishment handed out by the FIA over the 2021 season overspend.

“We’re probably 25% almost of the way through that penalty and, of course, it has an effect,” Horner told RACER’s Chris Medland.

“It’s limiting, significantly, the number of runs that we can do in our wind tunnel over each quarter. And I think that the team is having to adapt to that. It just means you have to be a bit more focused, and more disciplined in what we put through the testing process within the tunnel or within our simulation tools.

“So it’s another challenge. And it’s a handicap for sure, coming into this year, but we’ve got very capable people that are looking to obviously extract the best that we possibly can and apply ourselves in the most efficient and effective way.”

However, Horner remains a big fan of the new cost cap era.

“I think the principle of it is great, and it’s driven efficiency.”

“If I look at the business now, compared to where it was four or five years ago, we’d have ended up with a lot of stock of spare parts that were brand new that had never been used, and then they’re just scrapped. And so now you just can’t afford to have that. You’ve got to be so effective and efficient.

“So I think from that point of view, it has driven great efficiency into the business. It’s got rid of that wastage that was there that nobody saw previously.”