Red Bull has plenty to do to catch their rivals but Daniel Ricciardo’s 75-second deficit in Spain wasn’t representative of the overall picture, according to team boss Christian Horner.
The Australian earned his first podium of the season in Barcelona, but it more out of luck than pace as Ricciardo close to being lapped by the leading Mercedes and Ferrari.
“Daniel obviously had a pretty lonely race, benefitting from Bottas’ retirement,” Horner admitted, following the first corner collision that also eliminated Verstappen and Kimi Raikkonen.
However, he would then reveal the 27-year-old’s pace had been limited for a large portion of the 66 laps.
“Pretty much halfway through the race, we turned the engine down to try and save engine life,” he claimed.
“Obviously it’s got to do quite a few events, and the pace to the front running cars was pretty significant.
“We’ve still got plenty to do, we made some progress here this weekend, it’s given us a very clear development direction,” Horner continued. “Hopefully, we’ll be looking to capitalise on that on coming races.
“I think the delta was a lot bigger in the race [as well]. Daniel didn’t look as happy with his car this weekend as Max but I’m not suggesting Max would have been 20 seconds up the road, there’s still issues in that when you have a gap like that.”
Asked where he felt the team was struggling the most, the Briton added: “The way you’re working the tyres is a key element, particularly on this track, it gives an interesting workout on the tyres.
“We can see it’s an area where we’re giving away performance [as] we look relatively more competitive in the second half of the race than the first.”
As for Ricciardo himself, though pleased by the result he achieved, the Honey Badger was also disappointed by the overall performance.
“Firstly, it’s nice to be back up here, absolutely and it’s nice to see at the front there’s some battles and that they’re enjoying it,” he said.
“We [Red Bull] want to have these battles and fights. I’m envious not to be part of that but we’re still going to try and work on it.
“Today we just have to be grateful for the first podium of the year.”