Days before the opening of the Formula 1 season in Melbourne, Red Bull boss Laurent Mekies stated that Mercedes, Ferrari and McLaren are “a good deal faster” than the RB22. During pre-season testing, the Frenchman stated that expectations for the performance of the car driven by Max Verstappen and Isack Hadjar should be moderate.
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“We see Mercedes as the fastest team at the moment,” he told the press. “As Alan [Permane, Racing Bulls boss] said, it’s a bit of a guessing game. I was questioning my colleagues’ guessing game; I’m not going to get into that game. But we [Red Bull] think that Mercedes, Ferrari [and] McLaren, the three of them, are probably a good deal faster than us right now.”
The RB22 had a more discreet second test in Bahrain, but Mekies highlighted that part of the difference could be due to the power reduction of the new Red Bull-Ford unit. “To say by how much or in what order is probably very difficult, but that would be my guess right now. But the guess will change when we all evolve our cars. We will all start to optimize what we have, and things will change again. I would say we think those three [Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren] are a good deal ahead of everyone else.”
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The 2026 Formula 1 season begins between March 5 and 8, in Australia. Even with the current conflict in the Middle East, which disrupted the travel schedule of several teams, organizers guarantee that the round should not suffer major consequences.
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