‘Red Bull reeling in McLaren’ theory emerges after Brown bibgate reaction

Up in arms about Red Bull’s bib trick, it has been suggested McLaren have taken their “eye off the ball” as they have been “reeled in” by the controversy.

Red Bull’s bib height adjustment mechanism dominated headlines in the build-up to the United States Grand Prix with the saga rumbling on throughout the weekend, partly driven by Zak Brown’s comments.

Have McLaren taken ‘their eye off the ball’ amidst Red Bull’s bibgate?

The Red Bull RB20 features a bib adjustment system that allows the team to change the height of the bib, which affects the airflow underneath the car. There is, however, no evidence that illegal changes were made to the bib height under parc ferme conditions.

Initially calling for the FIA to launch a “thorough investigation”, Brown was sceptical about Red Bull’s argument that the system could not be accessed “when the car is fully assembled”.

Pointing out that teams are “allowed to not have the car fully assembled in parc fermé when you’re working on driver comfort”, the McLaren CEO even went as far as to call for Red Bull’s management to sign affidavits stating they’d never used the bib trick under parc ferme conditions.

Red Bull team boss Christian Horner brushed the saga aside, calling it “paranoia” and “moaning from one of our rivals”. He added: “I feel that it’s sometimes to distract from perhaps what’s going on in your own house, sometimes you try and light a fire somewhere else.’

But instead of putting the focus on Red Bull, it has been suggested that ‘bibgate’ has played out in Red Bull’s favour as it has distracted McLaren as a whole.

More on Red Bull’s adjustable bib

?Front bib and T-tray explained: The F1 car part under suspicion in new tech row

?Explained: Why Red Bull’s adjustable bib isn’t being punished by the FIA

Speaking on the F1 Nation podcast, FIA press conference host Tom Clarkson said: “Someone put it to me coming into the weekend that Red Bull were reeling in McLaren metaphorically with the whole ride height story of them having a mechanism in the cockpit to change the ride height of the bib in that actually it wasn’t a performance advantage.

“All it was doing was making McLaren take their eye off the ball, and they were reeling them in.

“Zak Brown was the most outspoken about it, but you have to figure that there was some energy lost within McLaren worrying about that instead of focusing on themselves.”

His fellow commentator Alex Jacques reckons it’s a painful lesson McLaren are learning, but one he feels they won’t repeat.

“They’ve been in the doldrums for a really long time, and they’ve had chances to perform well, get podiums and to win races on occasion,” he replied.

“This is the first time in a decade where they’ve been able to put a challenge together, and lessons like you’ve just described are learned painfully, but they won’t need to learn it again.

“I don’t think there’ll be anywhere near that much chatter if there was something contentious again.

“Zak is the perfect person as the CEO of the team to have an oversized role. He’s not running the race team, Andrea is running the race team. So he’s a perfect spokesman in this regard.”

Red Bull outscored McLaren for the first time since Spain at the United States Grand Prix, closing the gap in the Constructors’ Championship to 40 points with 250 still in play.

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