Red Bull boss Christian Horner teasingly thanked Mercedes counterpart Toto Wolff after his team’s dominant win at the Belgian Grand Prix.
The Milton Keynes-based outfit was in a class of their own at Spa Francorchamps, particularly Max Verstappen as he eased to a commanding victory by 18 seconds despite starting 14th on the grid.
When asked the reason for Red Bull’s sudden dominance at Spa, Horner initially alluded to the floor changes introduced at the event following much vocal outcry by Mercedes.
“On the face of it I’d probably have to thank Toto for the TD!” he joked.
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Mercedes had hoped the FIA stiffening of the rules to do with floor flex and plank wear under the car would bring them back into play at Spa.
But Horner insisted the team had been unaffected by the changes.
“A lot was made and a lot of expectation was put on that TD, so perhaps it’s hurt others more than it’s hurt ourselves,” he added. “But we haven’t really changed the way we operate the car.
“Obviously, grounding here has always been an issue because of Eau Rouge, but that’s not unique to us that’s the same for every team.”
Referring to the initial question though, the Red Bull chief suggested their performance was simply a case of a perfect car, driver and circuit combination.
“In all seriousness, I think this circuit has played to our strengths. We have a very efficient car, we’ve found a very good setup and Max has just been in phenomenal form the very first lap in first practice,” Horner said.
“Obviously, strategically we chose to take the penalty here and 14th became 13th technically as the starting point with everybody else.
“But of course, Max still had to navigate his way through the pack and he did that very efficiently over the first couple of laps, so he hit the front far quicker than we could have ever expected and the soft tyre seemed to work for him as well in that stint.
“Thereafter the pace we had with Max and Checo was enough that he got past Carlos and bring home one of the most dominant performances that we’ve had as a team since either 2010 or 2013.”