Red Bull advisor Dr Helmut Marko has had a cheeky dig at Mercedes following the Monaco Grand Prix, with both teams having seen their car lifted high into the air.
Lewis Hamilton crashed Mercedes’ new concept at the end of Free Practice 3, whilst Sergio Perez crashed in the opening minutes of Q1 at the Circuit de Monaco.
Both of the crashed cars had to be lifted to safety, allowing photographers to capture the floor of the RB19 and the W14.
Sky Sports F1 reporter was the first to joke about Mercedes’ design, with him having admitted that compared to Red Bull’s “thing of wonder and beauty”, the Silver Arrows’ was “prehistoric”.
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“I tell you when you look at these pictures and compare them to the Mercedes and Ferrari you think ‘okay, no wonder this Red Bull RB19 is so good’,” Kravitz added.
Given that Red Bull have been so dominant since the start of 2022, there was considerably more attention on the flying RB19, than on Hamilton’s W14.
This is despite Hamilton’s car having been aloft for longer, with Marko joking that “nobody” was more interested in seeing Mercedes’ flying car compared to Red Bull’s.
“The Mercedes car was in the air for much longer than ours,” Marko told Motorsport.com. “Only nobody was as interested in that as they were in our car.”
When asked if he was one of those not interested in the W14’s floor, Marko joked: “No!”
Unlike Hamilton’s, Perez’c crash was actually very costly for the Mexican.
Checo started the Monaco GP from last following his crash, with him having only salvaged P16 during the race.
Despite the mild humour, Red Bull ultimately weren’t happy to see their pride and joy lifted into the air, giving their rivals a prime opportunity to investigate how they’re so quick.
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“Of course we don’t like that our floor was on display,” said Marko.
“Okay, the floor is very important, but if you don’t have all the other parts of the car and the concepts behind it, it’s not that easy to copy things.
“It’s not just the floor,” he explained. “That floor has to work well with the front wing and the rear of the car, for example. It’s about all those things together and that makes it much more complex than just the floor.”