Sebastian Vettel believes it is wrong to rule out Red Bull challenging for the championship this season.
The Milton Keynes outfit is notorious for making steady starts each year and 2019 hasn’t been much different with the RB15 the third fastest car on the grid.
However, Ferrari’s poor execution in the races means Max Verstappen sits third in the Drivers’ Championship and Vettel knows all too well the threat from his former team will only grow.
“I don’t know who these people are [that doubt Red Bull],” Vettel was quoted by GPFans on Thursday.
“Going into the season after the test I think we looked in very good shape, we lost a bit of that but also Mercedes looked very strong and so did Red Bull.
“We expected it to be a three-way fight, which maybe it hasn’t been so far at all the races, but I certainly think that Red Bull will be one of the contenders as we go on.
“They are usually very strong developing their car and improving their pace and performance throughout the season. They had a decent start and they will only get stronger.”
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The big question mark before the season was Red Bull’s new partnership with Honda and whether the Japanese engine would be a match for Ferrari and Mercedes.
Generally, top speeds have been in the ballpark but Verstappen believes in this area, Ferrari now sits a class above.
“Compared to Mercedes, yes, but compared to Ferrari it’s big, really big, but it’s big for everyone,” the Dutchman said on whether the power gap had been closed.
“It just seems they did a really good job with something, so you just have to work harder to try to close that gap.
“For our side at the moment is that we are able to maximise the result all the time, which has been a third and twice fourth, without retiring,” Max added.
“So that is sometimes more important than maybe gaining a tenth but then breaking down all the time.”
It is clear, however, that Mercedes have the best all-round package in 2019 and in Baku, both Red Bull and Ferrari will bring updates to try and close up.
“If you improve the car in general, it helps you here and it helps you everywhere else,” Vettel commented.
“We’ve been targeting to have some new bits and they are all targeted to make the car faster, no matter where we go, and hopefully we can find the same results on track that we found in the wind tunnel etc..
“Hopefully the numbers and everything stacks up and we see how much of a jump we can do.”