Red Bull needs to know its fate as soon as possible but Marko conceded that this could be a delaying tactic by its rivals.
View PhotosHonda decided to leave F1 in September 2020
Red Bull’s Helmut Marko has revealed his displeasure over another delay for a meeting which would have tabled the idea of an engine development freeze at the end of the 2021 season. This meeting has been delayed to now February 11, 2021. ”The agreement we had on Friday suddenly disappeared on Monday. There are now more talks and negotiations”, Marko told Motorsport-magazin.com expressing his anguish over the situation.
Many believe if Red Bull gets a good power unit, it will be able to take on Mercedes
The engine freeze is critical to Red Bull’s plans and its potential future in F1. After the exit of Honda as an engine supplier – Red Bull and its sister team AlphaTauri are without a works engine partner.
Red Bull has been lobbying hard to get control over the IP that Honda has created. Honda is scheduled to be launching an all-new engine for the 2021 season which could potentially close the deficit with Mercedes which has the class-leading engine in F1.
Red Bull also has a deal with Honda in principle for the same, however, it doesn’t have the resources to further develop the power unit like manufacturers like Ferrari, Mercedes and Renault.
Red Bull also wants to secure a good deal because that will make sure Verstappen never leaves the team
Red Bull has been lobbying the idea of an engine development freeze but Ferrari is open to the idea only if there is a catch-up mechanism for a manufacturer in the case it falls massively behind like the way it did in 2020 and have the proposed next-generation engine moved ahead. Renault is against the idea of the engine freeze, while Mercedes is open to the idea.
Red Bull needs to know its fate as soon as possible but Marko conceded that this could be a delaying tactic by its rivals would benefit from a delay while Red Bull would be stuck.
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“That thought is not wrong”,” said the Austrian who is a close confidant of the Red Bull founder.
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