Red Bull: after FIA fine, Christian Horner warns rivals

An explanation after the fine became official.

Red Bull has been fined $7 million, payable to the FIA for breaking the Budget Cap threshold set for the 2021 season. In addition, the world champion team will not be allowed to use the wind tunnel at 70 percent ahead of the next championship, but only at 60 percent. A situation that team principal Christian Horner wanted to analyze at a press conference held in Mexico City.

“Of that money we didn’t spend a single penny to improve our performance. It was about catering costs, and we thought they were excluded from the count. The FIA, however, thought differently,” Horner explained. “The document that we as Red Bull submitted showed that our expenses were 3.7 million below the limits, and this penalty is colossal from both an economic and a sporting point of view.

Horner added that he experienced with surprise that only Red Bull had stumbled into such an error: “It leaves me astonished, but good for the other teams. We learned a lesson, but we reiterate that we did not make any gains on the track. Now we will have to deal with this development tile, it could cost us something like half a second in performance. But it won’t be enough for the others to catch up with us.”