Written by Vyas Ponnuri
"For some reason, on this configuration of circuit, the all-dominant Red Bulls are looking over their shoulders!" exclaimed F1 TV commentator Alex Jacques, as Max Verstappen made his way into the final sector in his ever-conquering Red Bull RB19. He'd given away half a second in two sectors to George Russell's Mercedes, the Briton topping the time sheets in Q2.
Verstappen pieced together a decent final sector to go tenth, and momentarily put himself into the top ten shootout for pole position.
However, four tenths off the pace on a revised track comprising three Drag Reduction System (DRS) zones and straights in the first and third sector seemed inexplicable. More so, this was a car touted to have one of the most efficient DRS systems on the grid.
The Austrian energy drink outfit's struggles were prevalent on the streets of Singapore. As Verstappen charged into the first chicane, he went slightly deeper into turn 2. The Dutchman experienced a bout of oversteer as he tried to take the hairpin of turn 3.
When it came to sector times, Verstappen had fallen over three tenths of a second behind at the end of this first sector. On a day of fine margins, this proved telling for the dominant Dutchman's fortunes.
While Verstappen navigated the struggles and was able to carry on, teammate Sergio Perez experienced a spin at turn three, the same corner which saw Verstappen experience oversteer a few moments ago. He was out in Q2, sitting eleventh at the moment with 30 seconds to go for the chequered flag to drop.
As Verstappen eventually drove through the pain to go tenth, he would face the nervous wait until the end of the session. Three drivers stood a chance at causing the biggest upset of the Formula One in 2023. While Alpine's Pierre Gasly and AlphaTauri's (now VCARB) Yuki Tsunoda fell by the wayside, the biggest surprise came from stand-in racer Liam Lawson.
In only his third race weekend, and his first qualifying session at Singapore, the Kiwi set a lap good enough to make it into the final part of qualifying, by the slender margin of 0.007 seconds to the then-double world champion.
It was "A seismic shock" in the words of Jacques, who, like many tuning into Saturday's qualifying session, couldn't believe what they had just seen. The team had won each of the 14 races up until then, but the dramatic turn of events had meant they were restricted to 11th and 13th on the grid for Sunday's race.
Flashback to two weeks earlier. Verstappen started on the front row of the grid, alongside Ferrari's Carlos Sainz for the Italian Grand Prix. The Dutchman had made it nine victories in a row at his home event in Zandvoort, only a week earlier.
He'd matched Sebastian Vettel's run of nine Grand Prix wins in a row, and for the first time in a decade, the German's record looked under siege.
Having hung behind the Ferrari ahead in the opening laps, Verstappen pounced on lap 15. A lock-up for Sainz ahead presented him the opportunity he so rightly thirsted for. The duo were side-by-side into Curva Grande, before Verstappen streaked ahead on the inside, setting himself up for an unparalleled tenth consecutive race win.
There was no stopping Verstappen, who never looked back after elevating himself into the race lead. The Dutchman drove a peerless race, typical of his season until then, to take the outright record for most consecutive race wins in a row.
All the talk in 2023 had been about Verstappen and Red Bull's newest creation, the RB19. The Austrian team's latest challenger was an evolution of the previous year's RB18 that was on the top step of the podium 17 times in 22 races.
The RB19 featured a unique 'Triple DRS' system, aided by the combination of a highly-effective DRS mechanism and efficiently designed aerodynamic parts on the rear of the car. Coupled with a powerful powertrain, the speed advantage Red Bull possessed was staggering.
This straight line speed was a decisive factor in Red Bull's bull run in 2023, as Verstappen and Perez could fight back from poor qualifying positions with relative ease, using the extremely superior straight line speed to soar past.
Their performance advantage was even more evident on low downforce circuits, as the Red Bull RB20 dominated on circuits such as Jeddah, Spa-Francorchamps, Monza, Baku, and Austria, where straight line speed was critical to the success on such tracks.
While the RB19 had excelled on a wide range of tracks, the car had one major chink in its armour. With the RB19 running lower to the ground compared to the rest of the grid, Red Bull were able to harness the full potential of the ground effect Formula One cars on permanent road courses.
However, around street circuits, this strategy wouldn't reap such benefits. The bumpy surface of the street circuits meant the champions had to run their car at a higher ride height. This would mean the team wouldn't be able to derive a significant chunk of their performance gains.
With other teams running at higher ride heights, this issue wouldn't recur for them, as it did for Red Bull around street circuits. While Verstappen had to dig deep to secure pole at Monaco, Singapore would be a different beast to tackle.
The bumps on the Singapore street circuit forced Red Bull to raise the ride height of their all-conquering RB19. This scuppered the handling characteristics of the car, and upset the aerodynamic balance of a truly efficient machine. With the reduced level of airflow underneath the car, due to the raised ride height, the team couldn't generate as much downforce
A major consequence meant Verstappen and Perez struggled to warm up the tyres, costing them precious lap time, and the car sliding around in the corners.
As a result, even on a newly-profiled low downforce Singapore layout, featuring as many as three DRS zones and a speedy section between turns 14 and 16, the dominant Red Bull simply didn't have the performance advantage from two weeks prior at Monza, another low downforce circuit.
Their impending struggles of sliding and poor tyre warm up spilled over into qualifying, eventually. With the car sliding around more in the corners, the tyres lost grip and overheated across the duration of a lap, costing the drivers chunks of lap time.
And for the first time in 2023, Red Bull had found themselves truly on the backfoot. Starting from 11th and 13th, they would only be able to finish fifth and eighth, having displayed better race pace compared to those battling in the mid-field. Yet, the damage had already been done in qualifying itself, the previous day.
Every great team does indeed have an Achilles' heel, and for Red Bull, the streets of Singapore came to be their undoing. A 10-race win streak for Verstappen, and 16 in a row for Red Bull as a team, had finally come to an end. The biggest winners — Carlos Sainz, who will hold his head high as being the only non Red Bull winner in an utterly dominant season for the team in dark blue.
Just like McLaren in 1988, Red Bull's 2023 season will feature that one splash of red in an otherwise perfect season.
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