Red Bull team principal Christian Horner pointed to their outdated windtunnel as a limitation regarding recent performance issues.

However, that is merely a “PR spin” and “deflection” from Horner, claims ex-F1 racer turned Sky F1 pundit Karun Chandhok, who says he put this theory to Red Bull‘s sister team VCARB, who also uses this windtunnel, and they apparently quashed it.

Red Bull windtunnel: A limitation or scapegoat?

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Red Bull’s dominance faded after the team lost their way with 2024’s challenger, the RB20, and the RB21 has balance flaws still to iron out with Red Bull having claimed just the one victory so far in F1 2025.

Horner has highlighted Red Bull’s windtunnel as a key issue on that front, the team due to move out of their ageing facility near Bedford down the line with a new windtunnel under construction.

“Primarily the wind tunnel has driven us in a direction that isn’t replicating what we’re on track and so, then you end up with a mishmash between what your tools are telling you and what the track data is and so obviously now as we’re accumulating track data, it’s the track data that’s driving the solutions,” the team principal told the media, including PlanetF1.com.

“I think it’s clear we understand what the problem is, it’s implementing the solution. It’s the entry phase into the mid-corner that needs addressing and giving him [Verstappen] the ability and grip and confidence that takes carry speed into entry of corners, now that’s fundamentally an aero issue that we need to be able to give him that grip.

“The problem that we have is that we’re at the end of a set of regulations where the gains are very, very marginal and I think we’re seeing some of the shortcomings in our current tunnel.”

Horner doubled down on this stance on the Red Bull windtunnel when he spoke to Sky F1 at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

“I think particularly when you get to the finer elements of a set of regulations like this, you know, the windtunnel that we have, it’s a relic of the Cold War, so it has its limitations, which is why we’ve invested in a new tunnel, which is in the process of being constructed,” said Horner.

“But with a set of regulations like this, you have a scatter of, you know, three points a run, pretty much. And when you’re looking for a point, a point and a half, you know, that’s in the scatter of the read that you get from the tunnel.

“So, yeah, it doesn’t help, but we’ve got some very bright engineers and aerodynamicists and mechanical designers. I’m sure we’ll figure it out.”

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But, considering that Red Bull’s second F1 team VCARB also use this facility, Horner was met with a follow-up of ‘and they haven’t experienced the same issues?’

VCARB began the F1 2025 campaign as a major threat within the top 10, particularly over one lap.

“Well, I think they have, because they’re not on pole position, are they?” Horner struck back with.

But, Chandhok said he has been in contact with VCARB personnel, who have confirmed to him that they are not seeing any correlation issues between the windtunnel and track.

That, therefore, led to a blunt verdict from Chandhok on Horner’s comments.

Speaking on Sky F1’s The F1 Show podcast, Chandhok said: “Every time I listen to Christian Horner’s ‘our wind tunnel’s a relic of the Cold War’ thing, it’s just PR spin, isn’t it?

“He’s such a master politician. He’s the master of deflection.

“I don’t see Racing Bulls complaining about correlation. They use the same wind tunnel. I actually asked a couple of the people at Racing Bulls whether they’d struggled with the correlation. They said ‘nope’.

“It comes back to a Red Bull Racing issue.”

Red Bull sit P3 in the current F1 2025 Constructors’ Championship standings, 99 points behind leaders McLaren, while Max Verstappen is P3 in the Drivers’ Championship, 12 points off Oscar Piastri and top spot.

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