Christian Horner, the Red Bull principal, has insisted that his team will fall several million dollars below the budget cap for the 2022 season.
The auditing process for last year’s F1 season has begun, and Red Bull has fallen foul of claims that it exceeded the FIA’s regulations.
The team has been on the wrong side of the FIA previously, regarding financial rules.
Red Bull was fined $7m for a breach of the budget cap in 2021, when the current regulations were first introduced.
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They also received a 10% reduction in aerodynamic testing limits (ATR) time.
This penalty was criticised as being lenient by Red Bull’s rivals, with Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton among the most vocal.
He said that the $7m was nothing to Red Bull and may prompt other teams to follow their lead and breach the limits in return for increased car performance.
Horner was quick to deny that there would be a repeat of the 2021 fiasco once the 2022 audit has wrapped up.
He pointed out that Red Bull neglected maintenance of their cars last season so they would stay within budget limitations.
Horner remarked: “Last year, Max [Verstappen] damaged one front wing and Checo [Perez] had a crash in Montreal.
“Again we had a very limited amount of development on the car.
“So we were several million below the cap last year because accident damage and development – they’re huge costs.”
Horner went on to speak on Red Bull’s financial prudence in the 2023 season.
He stated: “Obviously this year, the biggest handicap we have is that lack of wind tunnel time.
“It’s significantly less runs in a week than any of our competitors, so we have to be very disciplined on where we focus our development.”
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The FIA appears to be on Horner’s side when it comes to these accusations.
It has dismissed ‘false rumours’ which stated that at least two F1 teams broke the 2022 season’s cost cap.
The FIA called these rumours “factually wrong.”